This blog is a chronological project. This is day two of 365 days of material.
If this is your first time reading please click here to start at the beginning
Unlike the video from day 1, I wasn't really sure what to expect from this video just from its title. But just like the video from day 1, I really enjoyed it. I feel like I learned a little something about ancient cultures and civilizations that gives me more context to view scripture through. Also, like the first one, this video leaves me with a peaceful sense of God's goodness and love for *all* people. I also appreciated the subtle, but humorous uses of cats and a Furby.
Something I had never really thought about before watching this video is that no one should make images of God because God has already made images of himself. This video gave me a deep sense of just how vast and complex God really is. Collectively, all humans make up the image of God. To me, this means that not only can he not be reduced to one single thing in creation as they said in the video, but it actually takes all 7 billion-ish people alive right now, plus all the people who lived before, plus everyone who hasn't even been born yet, to even approximate his image. When you consider just how complex a single person is, that is mind blowing. I also really appreciated that the video clearly conveyed that all people are seen equally in God's eyes. There is no group of people that is elevated above others. Regardless of any personal characteristics, and even if someone ends up making bad choices, all people are made in the image of God. Therefore, we all have the same baseline value and worth.
Because of my own life experiences, I am very leery of heavy-handed guilt, fear, or shame tactics. At the same time, I do not want to swing the pendulum so far in the other direction that I lose sight of biblical truth. That is a another reason why I loved this video. I think it does a great job of demonstrating how and why humanity falls short without making me fall back into the world view of God being an angry dictator. Contrary to what some people might think, not everything about humanity is bad, and I shouldn't feel badly for thinking that way. Humans are capable of good, and even amazing things when we get it right, but the proclivity towards caring about ourselves above others means we do get a lot of things wrong, and sometimes make choices that cause harm to others.
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Day two scripture (Genesis 4-7) covers the story of Cain and Abel, and begins the story of Noah and the flood.
Chapter 4 starts with the story of Cain and Abel. Right out of the gate, verse one gave me pause. What exactly did Eve mean by her declaration when she gave birth to Cain in verse 1? My initial reading of this verse was from the English Standard Version (ESV), and it did not sit well with me at all. "Now Adam knew Eve his wife, and she conceived and bore Cain, saying, "I have gotten a man with the help of the Lord." I wasn't sure why, but I was left with the sense that she was saying she got exactly what she wanted, specifically, a boy and not a girl; and that God was complicit in her valuing a boy over a girl.
As I am writing this, I just keep being overcome with the feeling that this is a question I would have a hard time discussing with people in real life. I just keep picturing how some people might respond to what I just wrote with internally, or even externally, rolling their eyes at me, and labeling me as a liberal feminazi who is offended by everything and over analyses everything with the intent to make men look bad. That would make me very flustered and uncomfortable, and I would not do a good job engaging with that person. The end result would be me feeling discouraged and very angry for lots of reasons. Even though that scenario is entirely made up in my head, I think it speaks to the kind of culture we live in right now that I would even imagine such a scenario. This makes me glad for this semi-private piece of the internet where I can work through my thoughts without judgement. Or at least have time to craft a response perchance some one leaves a harsh comment.
To get back to the point, while working my way through the bible I really want to do my best to not be blind to any bias I might have. Given that I graduated from a Women's college, and I am a woman living in the United States in 2018 where gender equality is a hot button issue, I recognized that it was possible I was misinterpreting or maybe over-interpreting something. I read the verse in four additional translations to see if there was any difference in them like there was with verb tenses in the creation story from Genesis chapter 2. As I read each translation and mulled it over, I was more able to make sense of why this verse was off-putting to me.
I read the King James version next, and it puts the verse like this: "And Adam knew Eve his wife; and she conceived, and bare Cain, and said, 'I have gotten a man from the Lord.'" Reading this translation didn't bother me quite as much. Saying "...from the Lord" seemed more like a matter-of-fact statement that God gave her a child that happened to be male, where as "...with the help of the Lord" comes across as God helped her achieve her goal of specifically having boy and not a girl.
The third translation I read was The Message which puts the verse as "Adam slept with Eve his wife. She conceived and had Cain. She said, 'I’ve gotten a man, with God’s help!'” While this translation is very similar to the ESV it didn't register quite as offensively to me either. This translation seems more like she is acknowledging God's role in the child's existence rather than expressing gratitude for the child being male. I am not sure if that distinction would make sense to anyone else, but it feels like a nuance to me. Honestly, it could be that I read this translation differently than the ESV because I read it after the KJV, which put me in a place to read this in a more open-minded way. It could also be that using that comma just really makes a difference in how I perceive the statement.
Reading the fourth translation (The Amplified Bible) is where I felt I made some traction in understanding my thoughts. "Now the man Adam knew Eve as his wife, and she conceived and gave birth to Cain, and she said, 'I have obtained a man (baby boy, son) with the help of the Lord.'" My reaction to reading this was interesting to me. This translation was written exactly the same as the ESV except it says "obtained" instead of "gotten" and it just doesn't bother me as much. This made me consider that perhaps the word "gotten" caused some of the trouble for me. For some reason, to me, "gotten" gives off the impression of winning a prize or something, it is as though it bestows a sense of value to the thing that was "got". "Obtained" seems more matter-of-fact, and it doesn't seem to impart value, I guess? Reading this translation also helped me see that calling Cain, who was just born, a man also contributed to my reaction. I didn't think about this consciously until I read this translation put baby boy or son in parentheses, but saying "I have gotten a man..." feels like she bypassed the joy of simply having a child and went straight to the value of this child growing up into a man rather than into a woman. I think that is the root of my initial interpretation and my misgivings.
The last translation I read was the New Living Translation: "Now Adam (Or the man) had sexual relations with his wife, Eve, and she became pregnant. When she gave birth to Cain, she said, 'With the Lord’s help, I have produced (Or I have acquired) a man!'" Out of 5 translations, this one reads the best to me. To me, this reads as though she is acknowledging that she was able to give birth because of God (as he is the giver of life) and the child she happened to produce was male. Thinking about this last translation also gave me the idea that perhaps the choice to translate this verse using the word man was a result of what the written Hebrew language was like at the time it was originally written?
The end result of all my thinking is that I believe my feelings about this verse are valid, but I should try to look past them. Even though that interpretation makes sense to me through a modern western lens, I really don't think that's what the author was trying to convey. More importantly, this verse is really not the point of this story anyway. This sort of tempts me to feel like what I just wrote was a waste of time. I just have to remind myself that the point of this blog is to give myself some space to really think through and flesh out anything that comes up as I read scripture. So with that in mind, the main purpose of this blog is being fulfilled and its not a waste of my time.
As a side note, I personally was so relieved to learn my child was male. Not because I think he has more value to me as a grown man than a daughter, but because I feel like raising a son is easier to do in our current culture. To me, it seems less daunting to teach my one son how to treat all people, but especially all women, with respect than to prepare my one daughter for how she should handle being disrespected by most men. And that is sad.
To pick things back up in Genesis chapter 4, the story of Cain and Abel is just sort of weird. Cain, a farmer, gives God a gift of fruits from his harvest. Abel, his younger brother and a shepherd, brings God a gift too - specifically the first born of his flock. The translations all describe God's reaction to their gifts with different words. God regarded/respected/accepted/liked Abel's gifts, and did not regard/respect/accept/like Cain's. When God does not accept his gift Cain gets angry, and after that Cain kills Abel. When God asks Cain where Abel is, Cain and gets sassy about it to avoid saying he killed him. As punishment Cain is cursed to never get good crops from the ground that took up Abel's blood and from then on, he must be a homeless wanderer. Cain is worried that he will be killed, but God puts a mark on him so that he will be protected. (4:2-16)
At first, before he kills Abel, I actually felt a little sorry for Cain. I was actually tempted to find fault with God at that point in the story. I could understand God liking Abel's gift better, but to not like the gift Cain brought at all? When I unpacked that thought I realized it was because I was taught to appreciate any gift I am given even if I don't really like it because it is the thought that counts. Then it clicked. Unlike Abel's gift that was given out of sacrifice, there was no thought behind Cain's gift. If I am totally honest, I also don't like it when people give me a generic gift out of some perceived obligation rather than because they want to give me a gift. With that in mind, I can't really blame God for not liking that kind of behavior either.
I also wasn't really sure what to make of God's response to Abel being mad that his gift wasn't well received. God responded to Cain's anger by saying "'Why are you so angry?'... 'Why do you look so dejected? You will be accepted if you do what is right. But if you refuse to do what is right, then watch out! Sin is crouching at the door, eager to control you. But you must subdue it and be its master.'” (4:7, NLT)
In particular, the statement "You will be accepted if you do what is right" gives me pause. I am just not sure what to make of this statement. It is the exact opposite of what the Gospel of Jesus teaches, namely, that we cannot earn salvation through our own good works. We can only have salvation by faith in the sacrifice Jesus made on our behalf. After thinking about it I figured, well, this happened before the life and death of Jesus so this isn't actually a contradiction. Then I realized I actually don't really know anything about the relationship between people and God at this point. I know eventually God is going to make a covenant with Abraham that he will use Abraham's family to reconcile all people back to God, and I know that eventually a set of laws will be given to the people of Israel that dictate how they need to live including sacrifices to atone for sins, and I know that Jesus (a direct descendant of Abraham) ultimately fulfills the covenant that God made with Abraham to reconcile all people back to God. But this story of Cain and Abel happens way before any of that happens. I am just going to accept that I just don't have enough information to read into this scripture with any certainty.
Something about this passage that is reassuring even in the midst of not fully understanding every single verse, is the fact that God didn't punish Cain until he killed Abel. All he did was not accept his gift. And whats more, he actually gave Cain advice to try to keep him from killing Abel. Even after Cain kills Abel, God shows Cain undeserved grace by marking him in a way that no one would murder Cain as he did Abel. This is reminiscent of the undeserved grace Adam and Eve got when they were sent out from the Garden.
The next few verses (4:17-24) include a partial genealogy of Cain's descendants that ends with Lamech who was mentioned in the video from day one. He is the first guy mentioned to have multiple wives, and he is not only very violent, but also extremely arrogant. But something that stood out to me was even though he was a "bad guy", his children contributed a lot of good things to society. One was the first to be a migratory shepherd, one invented the flute and harp, and the other was an expert at forging tools of bronze and iron.
The chapter wraps up with the birth of Seth (4:25-26), a mention of his direct descendant Enosh (4:27) and a very odd statement: "At that time people first began to worship the Lord by name." I don't really understand what that is supposed to mean. Did people not worship God before? Did they worship God but not know his name? I have no idea, but this doesn't particularly bother me so I don't feel the need to try to find an answer.
Seeing how much I had to say on just chapter 4, I have decided to stop here, and pick up the rest of the day two material in my next post.
