Eve and Adam, Adam and Eve

On and off I have had impressions, faint suggestions that nudge me towards a clearer understanding of familiar passages. Presently I am referring to Genesis 3:14-19, the saga of Adam and Eve when they, having transgressed a law of God (at the instigation of the serpent), now faced their Father and Judge to learn of the consequences.

The oft repeated "summary", one I was first exposed to at the Baptist Church on Folsom Street (San Francisco), but perennially reinforced even as a Latter-day Saint, is that the serpent, Eve and Adam were all cursed for their actions, but since Eve first strayed, she was made subservient to Adam. The LDS soften the blow, somewhat, in part through additional narratives (The Book of Moses) in which Eve demonstrates great wisdom regarding the purposes of God, and in part by teaching that Adam was duty bound to follow God, thus Eve was in essence following God via her husband.

The entire concatenation has always left me disquieted, and I have learned that this unease is often a subconscious perception that some aspect has been overlooked, a perspective that once grasped, will kaleidoscopically rearrange the entire picture, without adding or removing a single reflective piece.

Question Number 1: Ever notice that the only being to be cursed is the serpent?

Genesis 3:14-15 "[14] And the LORD God said unto the serpent, Because thou hast done this, thou art cursed above all cattle, and above every beast of the field; upon thy belly shalt thou go, and dust shalt thou eat all the days of the life: [15] And I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between thy seed and her seed; it shall bruise thy head, and thou shalt bruise his heel."

Genesis 3:16 "Unto the woman he said, I will greatly multiply thou sorrow and thy conception; in sorrow thou shalt bring forth children; and thy desire shall be to thy husband, and he shall rule over thee."

Genesis 3:17-19 "[17] And unto Adam he said, Because thou hast hearkened unto the voice of thy wife, and hast eaten or the tree, of which I commanded thee, saying, Thou shalt not eat of it: cursed is the ground for thy sake; in sorrow shalt thou eat of it all the days of thy life; [18] Thorns also and thistles shall it bring forth to thee; and thou shalt eat the herb of the field; [19] In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread, till thou return unto the ground; for out of it was thou taken: for dust thou art, and unto dust shalt thou return."

At first glance it appears that Deity exacted a high price for disobedience. However, only the serpent was actually cursed on his person "thou art cursed". Eve was told that she would bear children, abundantly, with pain (as such is inherent to the process), but subsequent elucidations in scripture teach that mortality brings with it pain, pain that enables the sufferer to appreciate joy. Adam was told he would toil in the earth, but the earth would often bring up weeds of sorts, despite his efforts. Adam, like Eve, was not cursed personally, rather "cursed is the ground" he was told. Certainly mortality awaits the human family "unto dust shalt thou return", and we later see Adam and Eve sent out of the garden, but we also subsequently see God prepare a way for their return.

Question 2: Ever notice that when the serpent is cursed, part of his condemnation is a prophecy that the woman's seed shall crush his head?

It is a simple enough detail to gloss over, but in scriptures the terminology referring to reproduction was analogous to our current wording: men have "seed", "And in thy [Abraham's] seed shall all the nations of the earth be blessed...(Genesis 22:18), whereas woman have "fruit", "Lo, children are an heritage unto the LORD, and the fruit of the womb is his reward" (Psalm 127:3). Yet here the woman shall have "seed", only this seed shall crush the "head" of the serpent. This is the point of departure, the moment at which, in my opinion, the narrative clearly accomplishes more than the admittedly monumental task of laying out the foundation for human life: the family. The point where God prophecies that the woman shall have seed, and that this seed shall crush the serpent's head, this is the juncture at which "plan" comes to the foreground, specifically, that a virgin (that woman who shall have "seed", hence, independent of a man) shall conceive a child, which child shall lay waste to an alternative plan for humanity.

Question 3: Ever notice that only Eve is told she is going to bear children, that Adam is not told that he will beget offspring?

This is a spectacular omission. I concede that the Adam and Eve saga in its entirety is useful for organizing teachings on family structure, hierarchy, and collective diligence. The model of the first earthly parents can serve as a point of dedicated emulation. However, if the sole purpose of the narrative is to teach family obligations, then the omission of Adam's role as pater familias is stunning. It is here that the reader, I aspire, will begin realizing that the narrative of Adam and Eve, intentionally, was meant clearly to teach something germane to a subject greater even than parental roles within the home.

There is more that may have escaped our attention (familiarity encourages inadvertence). Yes, Eve is told she will bear children, but oddly there is no mention made to the effect that she will "bear Adam children" or "bear sons and daughters unto Adam." It is worthwhile to examine how Moses described Rachel's accouchement (my ritual nod to la langue française).

Genesis 17:16 "And I [God] will bless her [Sarah], and give thee [Abraham] a son also of her: yea, I will bless her, and she shall be a mother of nations; kings of people shall be of her."

Genesis 21:2 "For Sarah conceived, and bare Abraham a son in his old age, at the set time of which God had spoken to him."

When Sarah was to bear a child, God said that Abraham would have a son also of her, and then Moses recorded that Sarah "bare Abraham" a son. Then in the case of Eve it is curiouser still (as the Brits say) that Eve should have her conception multiplied (meaning she would bare many), but no mention is made that she will bear them unto Adam.

As I stated earlier, there is no mention that Adam shall beget children in Genesis 3:17-19. This omission is particularly odd given the Biblical record-keeper's propensity for laying out detailed genealogies along patriarchal lines.

Genesis 5:2-6 "[2] Male and female created he [God] them; and blessed them, and called their name Adam, in the day when they were created. [3] And Adam lived an hundred and thirty years, and begat a son in his own likeness, after his image; and called his name Seth: [4] And the days of Adam after he had begotten Seth were eight hundred years: and he begat sons and daughters. [5] And all the days that Adam lived were nine hundred and thirty years: and he died. [6] And Seth lived an hundred and five years, and begat Enos."

The absence of any statement in Genesis 3:17-19 of Adam begetting children, in my estimation, is very telling of what the passage is actually communicating. I repeat, if the primary purpose of the declaration of God's judgment upon Adam was to delineate his role in mortality, then the absence of any statement on fatherhood is certainly an instance where less detail should catch more attention.

Question 4: Ever notice that ancient prophets routinely referred to assemblies of men and women collectively (all humanity in fact) as "a woman" or "a mother", and her "husband" is always the Lord?

Isaiah may have had the motifs of the story of Adam and Even in mind when he recorded what is now Isaiah chapter 54.

Isaiah 54:1,4-8 "[1] Sing, O barren, thou that didst not bear; break forth into singing, and cry aloud, thou that didst not travail with child: for more are the children of the desolate than the children of the married wife, saith the Lord. [4] Fear not; for thou shalt not be ashamed; for thou shalt not be put to shame: for thou shalt forget the shame of thy youth, and shalt not remember the reproach of they widowhood any more. [5] For thy Maker is thine husband; the LORD of hosts is his name; and thy Redeemer the Holy One of Israel; The God of the whole earth shall he be called. [6] For the LORD hath called thee as a woman forsaken and grieved in spirit, and a wife of youth, when thou wast refused, saith thy God. [7] For a small moment have I forsaken thee; but with great mercies will I gather thee. [8] In a little wrath I hid my face from thee or a moment; but with everlasting kindness will I have mercy on thee, saith the LORD thy Redeemer."

It is interesting to read here that an entire assembly or body, both of men, women and children, are collectively referred to as a sole "woman", yet this woman was barren, for she had been refused (presumably for her behavior), one would surmise early on in the relationship, hence her barrenness. Her "husband" is none other than her Maker, the Lord of Hosts, the Lord her Redeemer. He explains that for a brief moment he had hidden his face from her, but will soon embrace her with loving kindness, and she will bear more abundantly than all others.

Question 5: So what is the final analysis for Genesis 3:16-19?

Ultimately readers should consider and conclude for themselves. As for me, I see strong reason to believe that in the Genesis narrative, at the point when judgment is passed upon her just prior to her expulsion to the mortal world, Eve came to represent all of humanity, and this is the reason why her natality is so emphasized (her childbearing represents that of all of humanity, into the state of mortality). It was because Eve, at that beckoned moment may have represented the entire mortal experience of humanity that no mention there was made of her bearing children unto Adam, that is, because at this point in the narrative the objective was to teach the great plan of redemption.

Eve's being beguiled by the serpent, but Adam's choice to partake in order not to let her enter the world alone may, in fact, not imply that women are impulsive but men rational (as is, let's face it, a common underlying teaching). The narrative may signify that all of humanity is easily beguiled, often by having our good intentions used, as it were, against us. Yet there was someone who was not beguiled who instead partook of our mortality in order not to abandon us.

Adam is the figure that represents the Husband, the Lord, the Redeemer, the one who sacrifices himself rather than let humanity, the woman, enter mortality alone (for God so loved the world...). She could be described as "barren" because humanity strayed from God from the very beginning separating itself, "herself", from the loving Husband. Yet the Father foretold that Eve's "desire shall be to [her] husband, and he shall rule over [her]", in my view, quite possibly with a signification greater even than family structure; Eve's desire and submission to her husband meant that humanity's only salvation would be to draw to the Redeemer, the Husband, and to accept to have him rule over them, the world, in his mercy and loving kindness.

If Adam indeed symbolizes the Christ, again, at that point in the narrative (Genesis 3:17-19), then his toil in his fields in order to eat the good herbs, fields that would constantly push up all manner of weeds all his efforts notwithstanding, may symbolize the rebellious nature of humankind despite the nurturing of the Good Husbandman. Adam's duty is to toil in the earth and achieve his good herbs and bread, "by the sweat of [his] brow". His mission is to work the cursed land to achieve the blessed harvest.

Certainly, my personal conclusion that the judgment of Adam and Eve carries with it an outline of the great plan of redemption seems to account for curious details in the verdict, namely, the woman having "seed", Eve bearing children though not explicitly unto Adam, Eve submitting to Adam, and the absence of child-rearing in the declaration of Adam's duties, all which have tended to leave many a good reader to conclude quite innocently that Adam's or male humanity's primary role in this life is to be breadwinners and heads of household with fatherhood only implicit, not explicit, unlike Eve whose maternity is spelled out. However, the very verses may in fact be the exposition on the plan of salvation and the central role of God's mercy and Jesus Christ as Savior in this plan.

As one final point, if Genesis 3:17-19 lays out the Messianic role, then it would then follow that Jesus' recurrent (New Testament era) parabolic teachings of a sower whose seeds either do not germinate or are under constant threat of weeds would seem to connect the mortal Messiah to the very beginning of the sacred records. The reader will be advised to reference Matthew 13:3-9, The Parable of the Sower, but in particular Matthew 13:24-30:

Matthew 13:24-25 "[24] Another parable put he forth unto them, saying, The kingdom of heaven is likened unto a man which sowed good seed in his field: [25] But while men slept, his enemy came and sowed tares among he wheat, and went his way."

I perceive greater depth in the Savior's parables when I can see their possible connection to what the sacred records had taught from the very beginning. It is tantalizing to consider that God had revealed the plan of redemption with his Son as the Redeemer from the very moment that Adam and Eve had transgressed his law. And if the Savior's role was so perspicaciously provided for, then one is tempted to contemplate how Adam and Eve, the actual earthly protagonists, may have opted into the greatest adventure ever known, mortal life, rather than having been duped into an agonizing period of challenges and ultimate physical demise. Viewed this way, the Genesis narrative is imbued with a form of influence far more nuanced and subtle, one that may prompt the reader to consider that we, like the early protagonists, knowingly opted in.

So is this romantic? To each his own. Given my personal proclivities I may not be the best candidate for writing Hallmark cards for Valentine's Day. But in my own little way, written from what is dear and known to me, I say to Womankind, blessed art thou! You represent all humanity, the best of our collective attributes and aspirations. Let us hold hands together, if only symbolically, and follow our merciful Husband. He will lead us onward, and as we emulate him, we will become good leaders to ourselves, our homes, and our communities, together and in gentleness.

I love how uplifting even the most familiar stories can be when we examine what is actually textual.

And finally, Brethren and Sisters, Happy Valentine's Day!

Unacrimonious Anachronisms: Take One

I have a fondness for apocryphal books. I hold the Old Testament apocrypha (those extra books held as genuine in the Roman Catholic Old Testament) dear, and my ardor expands to include a dozen or more books once regarded as inspired by Jewish and early medieval Christians groups.

When I find a passage or idea in an apocryphal book that expresses a view that the (first) Mormon prophet, Joseph Smith, later came to believe, per divine inspiration he asserted, I view the apocryphal passage as a sort of confirmation that the belief or tenet at hand had indeed once belonged to the religion of the ancient covenant people. Joseph Smith, in my view, then seems ever more to be the "restorer" he claimed he was, that is, when the relevant apocryphal passage was rediscovered after Joseph Smith's doctrinal declaration. The question "How could Joseph Smith possibly have known that ancient Jews/Christians believed this?" lightly bemuses me.

On and off over the last few weeks I have asked myself a question: "Why do I not experience the same excitement when I find a Book of Mormon (BoM) passage that predates a Biblical passage?" Surely the same rule would apply, that is, that a supposedly earlier BoM passage that teaches what a subsequent Biblical passage does would also be a confirmation, in this case, that the Biblical writers indeed preserved a teaching that belonged to the faithful saints of days gone by. Should this putative earlier passage in the BoM, for example, not also rally in me a deeper appreciation for Joseph Smith's role as a restorer?

The truth is that I do not always get as enthused. Why? The answer is no riddle, but quite simple: If I share with anyone not of my faith or church a passage of scripture in the BoM that supposedly predates the Bible's version, their conclusion may very well be that "Smith simply plagiarized the Bible. In fact, he was so sloppy about his appropriation that he used a scripture known to date to a certain time and attributed it to a fictitious character who supposedly lived hundreds of years earlier." Yes, the double specters of plagiarism and historical anachronisms rear their hoary heads.

So it was that on this frigid but restful morn I opened the Book of Mormon to a randomly chosen passage in order to share a moment of inspiration with the family; I take pains to start and end our days this way. Maybe the audience does not appreciate this, but I find some of my greatest personal insights this way.

Anyhow, my eyes landed on Second Nephi, chapter 25, verse 13, written (we Latter-day Saints believe) between 559 and 545 B.C., by a Jew named Nephi who left Jerusalem with his family and resettled somewhere in America, possibly in Mesoamerica, soon thereafter joining forces with Native Americans who were amenable to his faith and world view:

"Behold, they will crucify him [Christ]; and after he is laid in a sepulchre for the space of three days he shall rise from the dead, with healing in his wings; and all those who shall believe on his name shall be saved in the kingdom of God..."

Though the reader who only now is exposed to this passage may be puzzled at the clear Christian reference before Christ's actual birth, what I found more interesting initially was the expression "he shall rise from the dead, with healing in his wings". The adverbial phrase "with healing in his wings", it turns out, is known to the world only through the final Old Testament book, Malachi, chapter 4, verse 2, dated perhaps to the second century B.C.:

"But unto you that fear my name shall the Sun of righteousness arise with healing in his wings..." (KJV)

So did Nephi's use of the expression "with healing in his wings" truly predate Malachi's usage by perhaps as much as 400 years? Well, rest assured that I cannot prove it, so I will not undertake a wild goose chase through faith texts in an attempt to do so. But a frank acknowledgement of the inability to prove an assertion does not mean I have nothing else to share.

For starters, Nephi, per the text, states that Christ shall be crucified and buried, and that after three days he will rise with healing in his wings. The rising of Christ is his resurrection, and the healing in his wings would presumably be his power of resurrection for all. Contrast Nephi's description to Malachi's assertion that the "Sun of righteousness" (the capital "S" was the King James translators' decision since Hebrew has no capital letters) shall arise with healing in his wings. Here the object at hand is the sun, only it is a solar body that represents "righteousness", presumably by emitting powerful light.

I found something interesting, and I want very much to share it. About 800 B.C., roughly 200 years before the BoM prophet Nephi would have lived (if the record is taken as genuine and not merely Joseph Smith's composition, and this decision is the reader's prerogative), the King of Israel was Hezekiah. King Hezekiah chose a royal seal, a couple royal seals in fact, and interestingly enough, he borrowed an Egyptian motif, the winged sun for one of them (and a scarab beetle for the other, also Egyptian). First fancy this image of the Egyptian winged sun that represents the sun god Re of the ancient Egyptian religion, a symbol that was also used to represent the one true God Aten (Aton or Adon) preached by the monotheistic Egyptian Pharaoh turned religious reformer, Akhenaten.

Now examine a fairly recent archeological find, Hezekiah's royal seal, one of several such found in Israel within the last 20 years.

The text is in Hebrew, but not the Assyrian (Babylonian) letters now regarded as Hebrew, rather in the ancient Hebrew letters derived from Egyptian hieroglyphics. The text reads "To (the) King (of) Judah". The symbol is the sun with two long wings, and more interesting still, an "ankh" at the end of each wing. The "ankh" is the Egyptian symbol of life. Notice how the sun's wings are bent somewhat downwards implying movement upwards.

So essentially what we see in Hezekiah's seal (and this seal continued to be used for several hundred years) is the sun rising with life-force, "healing", it its wings. The idea that the solar sun represents Deity is common among world religions, and, surprisingly enough, common to religion of the ancient prophets, as we shall see shortly.

I mentioned Akhenaten, the great Pharoah who, he asserted, through personal inspiration and angelic visitation, converted from a belief in many gods, to the belief in the One True God, whom he called "Aten" (also pronounced "Aton" and possibly "Adon"). Nearly 1400 years B.C. Akhenaten wrote a hymn to Aten. Fancy this excerpt:

"Splendid thou risest in heaven's lightland, O living Aten, creator of life! When thou hast dawned in eastern highland, Thou fillest every land with thy beauty. Thou art beauteous, great, radiant, High over every land; Thy rays embrace the lands, To the limit of all that thou madest. Being Re, thou reachest their limits, Thou bendest them for the son whom thou lovest; Though thou art far, thy rays are on earth, Though one seeth thee, thy strides are unseen. When thou settest in western highland, Earth is in darkness as if in death; One sleepeth in chambers, heads covered, One eye doth not see another. Were they robbed of their goods, That are under their heads, People would not remark it. Every lion cometh from its den, All the serpents bite, Darkness hovers, earth is silent, As their maker resteth in lightland. Earth brighteneth when thou dawnest in lightland, When thou shinest as Aten of daytime; As thou dispelest the dark, As thou castest thy rays, The Two Lands are in festivity. Awake they stand on their feet, Thou hast roused them; Bodies cleansed, clothed, Their arms adore thine appearance."

If the reader's curiosity is piqued, read Psalm 104 and judge for yourself if Psalm 104 is not uncannily like the Hymn to Aten, down to the order of the noun descriptors and adverbial phrases used. But alas, Akhenaten's hymn and the psalmist is a topic for another day. Suffice the passage for the moment merely to demonstrate how the rising of the sun in Egyptian theology related to their beliefs of death and resurrection.

To touch upon a different Psalmist citation, if King David did indeed pen the Psalms, then they date to approximately one thousand years B.C. Consider this passage from Psalm 84:11:

"For the LORD God is a sun and shield: the LORD will give grace and glory: no good thing will he withhold from them that walk uprightly."

In my opinion, the most intriguing aspect of ancient Hebrews using the "solar sun" as a symbol of the Lord Jehovah is that, per the Hebrew scriptures, God (Elohim) made the solar sun to shine through the earth's atmosphere and give light and regulate time at the start of the fourth day (fourth creative period), just after the third day. Inasmuch as God would be seen as the Maker of the solar sun, God would be the creative Father of the solar sun.

The Book of Mormon's extended name (in the LDS Church) is "Another Testament of Jesus Christ", in part because the book recounts Jesus Himself visiting the Nephites, His Amerindian Hebrew-esque covenant people. At one point Jesus states that the Father wanted Him to deliver Jewish scriptures to the Nephites, scriptures that the Nephites lacked. Malachi was the book Jesus chose or was commanded by His Father to deliver. He cited Malachi 4:2 (3 Nephi 25:2) the following way:

"But unto you that fear my name, shall the Son of Righteousness arise with healing in his wings..."

In the Book of Mormon the "Sun of righteousness" mentioned by Malachi is unequivocally the "Son of Righteousness", the Son of God, and His rising with healing is His power of life over death, the universal resurrection.

Well, these passages are brought together by my personal sense of inquiry and searching. I leave it to the reader to decide if these citations belong together, and whether they are relevant to the passage of Nephi 25:13, be the Nephi passage a possible early witness to the Israelite symbol of the rising sun as the bringer of healing or life in its wings, or a clever nineteenth knock-off of Malachi. Whether you see the statement attributed to Nephi ("(Christ) shall rise with healing in his wings") as genuine, historically and archeologically plausible, coincidental or just plain out of left field, the passages cited are, at least, actually textual.