OK...taking it a bit out of context, but geepers! If you were looking for any morality in the book of Genesis you would still be looking...and still...yep still looking...
Perhaps I'm being a bit cynical. I began reading the Old Testament, not only so I would become more knowledgeable when confronted by someone spewing gospel and verse from their mouths, but also (hopefully) to become closer and more centered on my faith. Instead, I find myself asking, "What is it that I believe?"
I still don't know the answer to that. OK, I can take the whole people living to be 8-gajillion years old...seriously...I can take that. Who can really do the best job with time references that far back anyway? So seriously, this didn't bother me at all. The morality, or lack thereof, did. Adam and Eve. OK. Eve was tempted by the snake/devil and ate the apple and then brought it to her husband to eat. God discovers them and like any good parent, asks them if they ate from the tree. Yes...but she made me do it! Yeah, buddy, she just shoved that thing in your maw and said CHEW!
But I look at some of the die hard lunatics out there and finally realized where they got some of the justification for their behavior. Multiple wives. Women who can't get pregnant offering their slaves to their husbands feeling that if the slave gave birth at their knee that they would be considered to have had a child through them. Really? Wow. Then there's the whole, "your brother died, so take his wife so he may have descendants" nonsense makes this genealogist's jaw drop.
I got it...I know...it was a different time. As a genealogist I do understand that you must look at things through historic perspective, but I'm having trouble with this.
I guess I can say that it's a good story. Who needs Percy Jackson and the Olympians when you've got the Book of Genesis. Granted it's the seedier version. I mean they even mention "heroes" in the Old Testament. No seriously. Right after the generations of Adam to Noah and before the warning of the flood there is this random "thing" just hanging out there. Genesis, Chapter 6, verse 1-4, "When men began to multiply on earth and daughters were born to them, the sons of heaven saw how beautiful the daughters of man were, and so they took for their wives as many of them as they chose. The the LORD said: "My spirit shall not remain in man forever, since he is but flesh. His days shall comprise one hundred and twenty years." At that time the Nephilim appeared on earth (as well as later), after the sons of heaven had intercourse with the daughters of man, who bore them sons. They were the heroes of old, the men of renown."
You want me to take that with any amount of seriousness? Mythology in the Old Testament. It seems instead of bringing me closer to my faith it is making me a cynic. I don't really like that.
Sadly, I realized that I was already familiar with the stories of Genesis, but I suppose when it's only read piecemeal in mass you miss out on the lack of morals. What does Genesis try to teach us? Apparently one of the lessons is that you should try to be as deceptive as possible in order to get what you want. Just look at Esau and Jacob. Esau comes in hungry and asks his brother for some food and gets in return, "First give me your birthright in exchange for it." Hungry, idiot Esau does just that. So much for the great hunter, Esau. Was he such a miserable hunter that he couldn't kill something to eat? Really? So now Jacob (the 2nd born son) has his brother's birthright because he took advantage of him in an hour of need (Chapter 26, v22-34). But he doesn't stop there. Oh no. He takes advantage (with his mother's help) to deceive his father into believing that he is Esau and to pass on his blessing to him, thus cheating Esau of pretty much all that was his right (Chapter 27).
I guess there was a touch of morality in that Joseph was sold into slavery in Egypt and his master's wife tried to get Joseph to sleep with her, he said no, she cried attempted rape, and he gets thrown in jail. Sweet! (Chapter 39, v6-20).
There are morals, if not morality, in the chapters of Genesis. For instance, Joseph suffered at the hands of his brothers and to an extent by his captors. He remained faithful to God and was protected. Despite his enslavement and misfortunes they were a part of a larger plan. Joseph did not lose faith despite all that he encountered and in the end, he became trusted and powerful within Egypt. He saved the people of Egypt from famine and in doing so his own family.
Hmmm...so I guess as I type this blog post I realize that maybe there were some redeeming characteristics in my reading (and to be fair, more than just Joseph), but they are steeped in what we would consider today to be improper behavior.
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