φύσις κρύπτεσθαι φιλεῖ
Here we are on the other side of the fall, in the world, in history and forced to deal with our vulnerability, frailty, mortality and weaknesses — in short, the human condition. There are seven recognized master-motifs, recurring thematic threads that permeate the entire plot, to the biblical library. These have been outlined quite nicely…
The art of our necessities is strange, That can make vile things precious. William Shakespeare, King Lear (1606) In our last post we discussed the temptation and the fall from paradise. Today I want to look at the sins of Adam and Eve from a slightly different angle. Whether if it is the totalitarian kallipolis which…
I heard your voice in the garden, and I was afraid because I was naked; and I hid myself Genesis 3:10 I Here we are, the temptation and the fall from paradise. In many ways the story of the temptation and the fall from Eden was the corner piece of the jigsaw puzzle for me….
In Genesis 2:20 we get the statement of lack which then spurs on the divine creative energy. It says here that “for Adam there was not found a helper comparable to him.” With this, God creates Eve and with her interpersonal ethics and the pattern by which people will relate to one another, to the…
In the beginning there was relation, and in the act of turning toward the other, humanity was born. Martin Buber, I and Thou (1923) Today we bring the second chapter of Genesis to a close with the introduction of Eve. Today’s post will deal with Adam’s need for a helper, the differentiation of humanity into male…
I named them, as they passed, and understood Their Nature, with such knowledge God endued My sudden apprehension: but in these I wound not what methought I wanted still John Milton, Paradise Lost 1667 (Book VIII, lines 338-354) In our last posts we discussed Adam’s role in tending and keeping the garden and the prohibition…
Then God said, “Let us make mankind in our image, in our likeness, so that they may rule over the fish in the sea and the birds in the sky, over the livestock and all the wild animals, and over all the creatures that move along the ground.” So God created mankind in his own…
The Lord God planted a garden eastward in Eden, and there he put the man whom he had formed. And out of the ground the lord God made every tree grow that is pleasant to the sight and good for food. The tree of life was also in the midst of the garden, and the…
The book of Genesis contains within it a series of stories that each represent a new and growingly sophisticated beginning. The first, lowest resolution, is Genesis 1:1 and God’s creation of habitable order out of chaos. Our last post dealt with the second beginning, the creation of man in Genesis 2:7. With the introduction of…
And the LORD God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul. (Gen. 2:7) And just like that, here in Genesis 2:7, God creates man. Like with so many of the biblical stories, the brevity of the sentence belies the…