The Second Creation Story
Adam and Eve
It won’t come as a surprise to anyone who has read the Bible that it contains two creation stories. The two creation stories make up two theological views of God, which is evident from a close-reading of the text. We have the cosmological celestial sky God of the first creation story who speaks the world into existence and is aloof from it, while in the second creation story of Genesis 2 we have the earthly God who interacts with the world by walking around upon it and giving it shape and characteristics by actively shaping it like a potter molds clay with his hands. In other words, the two stories don’t contradict each other so much as thematically compliment each other to encompass the larger view of the ancient Israelite author(s) who wrote them.The order of creation in the Second Creation story is different. Human beings come first in this narrative because, as already suggested, this is is the down-to-earth version of creation (literally). In continuation of this earthly theme we have the introduction of Adam who technically has no name. Adam comes from the “adamah,” which in Hebrew mean earth, thus his creation from dust must be seen as wordplay. We have this mysterious Garden of Eden, the prototypical paradise. The Garden of Eden makes the most sense in a desert culture and is the ultimate wish-fulfillment fantasy of a farmer struggling to produce a meager crop in a hot desert environment. Myths, especially Creation Myths, are always a reflection of the concerns and values of the cultures that wrote them.
In this story, God creates woman from man’s rib in order to give the man a helper. In English this may sound inferior, but the same exact Hebrew word is used to describe God in numerous passages throughout the Bible, and it’s a safe bet that the Israelite authors weren’t suggesting that God is inferior to humans. The creation of woman seems like a good excuse for more wordplay. After the woman’s creation the man says: “This one shall be called Woman, for from man was she taken." – Genesis 2:23. This is not only wordplay in English, but also in Hebrew as the word for woman is “Ishshah,” and another word for man besides Adam is “Ish.” The man seems to view the woman as his equal, we might even say, a mirror image of himself for he says, “This one at last is bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh.”
The story continues with God leaving the man and the woman to themselves and like little children they end up doing no good. The serpent dares the woman to eat the fruit by challenging her: “Did God really say not to eat the fruit from that tree?” This can’t help but remind me of third-graders interacting, “Did your dad really say you can’t eat this twinkie because it’s bad for you?” or “Are you too chicken to ride up the dirt hill on your bike?” The sentiments here are exactly the same. Then the snake convinces the woman that God’s threat that she will die if she eats the fruit is nonsense, and the snake proves to be telling the truth. After the woman eats, the book describes that the tree “was desirable as a source of wisdom.” Their newfound knowledge helps them realize they’re naked, which never seemed to bother them before, and they seek to cover themselves. Now that they have reached a certain level of maturity (no longer children after eating the fruit), nudity matters to them because with adulthood and the onset of puberty sex matters.
The man and the woman don’t only learn about good and evil, but everything in between. In the larger scope of the story in which the male and female grow into adulthood, the tree has an allegoric purpose. The utopian world of a divine garden can’t last forever; the utopia of innocence and childhood. Knowledge comes with growing up and the protective and wonderful world of living with your parents (in this case God) comes to an end when we reach adulthood. This is basically what the story is about.
People often claim God curses the man, the woman, and the serpent. However, a close reading of the text shows that the only one of the three he actually curses is the serpent. Snakes are a creature that crawl on their bellies, but live on land (for the most part), while many of the other animals the ancient Israelites would have seen on land such as cattle, pigs, and even other reptiles species had legs. So the authors wrote this story in part to try to answer the questions: why do these aggressive snakes attack us and why are they such abnormal creatures in appearance compared to all the other land-dwelling animals that we can observe? The authors of the text answer this question with the help of a mythological story; this is why snakes are different from other land animals and why they hate us because God has cursed them.
Returning back to the punishments, the snake isn’t the only one who faces God’s wrath. While God’s tone is clearly angry,maybe we shouldn't read his words as actual punishments he’s inflicting upon the human beings, at least not in an uncomplicated way, but rather he is describing the consequences that their own actions will bring upon them because he’s going to kick them out of the Garden. The only punishment God inflicts upon them is kicking them out of the Garden, everything else that is supposedly inflicted upon them is a natural consequence of being kicked out of Utopia. Also should notice that their punishments are a consequence of adulthood. By eating the fruit they brought adulthood upon themselves. Basically their punishment is puberty.
Most importantly of all to understanding the text in relation to the rest of the Bible, Genesis 3 sets the conflict for the rest of Genesis: testing the relationship between God and humans and its boundaries. If human beings disobey God, how will God respond? If they try other methods to be like God how will He respond? If God promises to protect them, how will He respond when his devotee faces danger?
It won’t come as a surprise to anyone who has read the Bible that it contains two creation stories. The two creation stories make up two theological views of God, which is evident from a close-reading of the text. We have the cosmological celestial sky God of the first creation story who speaks the world into existence and is aloof from it, while in the second creation story of Genesis 2 we have the earthly God who interacts with the world by walking around upon it and giving it shape and characteristics by actively shaping it like a potter molds clay with his hands. In other words, the two stories don’t contradict each other so much as thematically compliment each other to encompass the larger view of the ancient Israelite author(s) who wrote them.The order of creation in the Second Creation story is different. Human beings come first in this narrative because, as already suggested, this is is the down-to-earth version of creation (literally). In continuation of this earthly theme we have the introduction of Adam who technically has no name. Adam comes from the “adamah,” which in Hebrew mean earth, thus his creation from dust must be seen as wordplay. We have this mysterious Garden of Eden, the prototypical paradise. The Garden of Eden makes the most sense in a desert culture and is the ultimate wish-fulfillment fantasy of a farmer struggling to produce a meager crop in a hot desert environment. Myths, especially Creation Myths, are always a reflection of the concerns and values of the cultures that wrote them.
In this story, God creates woman from man’s rib in order to give the man a helper. In English this may sound inferior, but the same exact Hebrew word is used to describe God in numerous passages throughout the Bible, and it’s a safe bet that the Israelite authors weren’t suggesting that God is inferior to humans. The creation of woman seems like a good excuse for more wordplay. After the woman’s creation the man says: “This one shall be called Woman, for from man was she taken." – Genesis 2:23. This is not only wordplay in English, but also in Hebrew as the word for woman is “Ishshah,” and another word for man besides Adam is “Ish.” The man seems to view the woman as his equal, we might even say, a mirror image of himself for he says, “This one at last is bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh.”
The story continues with God leaving the man and the woman to themselves and like little children they end up doing no good. The serpent dares the woman to eat the fruit by challenging her: “Did God really say not to eat the fruit from that tree?” This can’t help but remind me of third-graders interacting, “Did your dad really say you can’t eat this twinkie because it’s bad for you?” or “Are you too chicken to ride up the dirt hill on your bike?” The sentiments here are exactly the same. Then the snake convinces the woman that God’s threat that she will die if she eats the fruit is nonsense, and the snake proves to be telling the truth. After the woman eats, the book describes that the tree “was desirable as a source of wisdom.” Their newfound knowledge helps them realize they’re naked, which never seemed to bother them before, and they seek to cover themselves. Now that they have reached a certain level of maturity (no longer children after eating the fruit), nudity matters to them because with adulthood and the onset of puberty sex matters.
The man and the woman don’t only learn about good and evil, but everything in between. In the larger scope of the story in which the male and female grow into adulthood, the tree has an allegoric purpose. The utopian world of a divine garden can’t last forever; the utopia of innocence and childhood. Knowledge comes with growing up and the protective and wonderful world of living with your parents (in this case God) comes to an end when we reach adulthood. This is basically what the story is about.
People often claim God curses the man, the woman, and the serpent. However, a close reading of the text shows that the only one of the three he actually curses is the serpent. Snakes are a creature that crawl on their bellies, but live on land (for the most part), while many of the other animals the ancient Israelites would have seen on land such as cattle, pigs, and even other reptiles species had legs. So the authors wrote this story in part to try to answer the questions: why do these aggressive snakes attack us and why are they such abnormal creatures in appearance compared to all the other land-dwelling animals that we can observe? The authors of the text answer this question with the help of a mythological story; this is why snakes are different from other land animals and why they hate us because God has cursed them.
Returning back to the punishments, the snake isn’t the only one who faces God’s wrath. While God’s tone is clearly angry,maybe we shouldn't read his words as actual punishments he’s inflicting upon the human beings, at least not in an uncomplicated way, but rather he is describing the consequences that their own actions will bring upon them because he’s going to kick them out of the Garden. The only punishment God inflicts upon them is kicking them out of the Garden, everything else that is supposedly inflicted upon them is a natural consequence of being kicked out of Utopia. Also should notice that their punishments are a consequence of adulthood. By eating the fruit they brought adulthood upon themselves. Basically their punishment is puberty.
Most importantly of all to understanding the text in relation to the rest of the Bible, Genesis 3 sets the conflict for the rest of Genesis: testing the relationship between God and humans and its boundaries. If human beings disobey God, how will God respond? If they try other methods to be like God how will He respond? If God promises to protect them, how will He respond when his devotee faces danger?
