and i'm only a few more chapters into genesis. right now we're getting to abraham. i just got through reading the 80,000 names of people that were born in between noah and abraham, and have always been a little curious as to why some people's names made the list and not others?
also, some thoughts on the tower of babel. it's funny reading this story as an adult, because it's only about 3 graphs long. in effect it just seems to be another example of god punishing man for working for his own purpose versus god's purpose. but really, what would we ever end up accomplishing that was great enough to compare to god's creation of the universe? *shrugs* but maybe i'm missing the point. the corrective action wasn't to prevent competition, it was to redirect the ambitions of man.
but there are some weird things about that story. for instance it talks about how god redistrubuted people. so did he just pick them up and move them? or did he start creating famines, etc. to send people in search of new lands. also, how did the division of languages work? did it go by bloodline? or at some point you just didn't speak the same language as your brother?
fast forward to abraham. our first introduction to him is interesting. god asks him to move. and when he gets to where god tells him to move there's a famine. wah, wah. so he goes to egypt and then tells his wife to lie and say she's his sister so they won't kill him to get to her. when he gets to egypt, pharoah is hot for sara and gives abraham a bunch of goats. but then *cue shakespeare* a plague falls on pharoah's house.
a few things. so, in less than twenty chapters, we've seen man's fall from grace, the earth destroyed by flood, and then the tower of babel. then all of a sudden, egypt just appears! with this all-powerful leader, the pharoah. and there's no explanation! it's just very weird. i mean, theoretically, noah and his folks repopulated the earth, right? so why wasn't there any mention of the fact that his descendants went on to form a ruling dynasty in egypt?
i suppose that stuff isn't pertinent because the pharaoh isn't an example of one of god's servants, and the bible is primarily made up of people who served the lord or who directly defied him. but still. there are a ton of questions there. these are the types of things that chip away at faith. it's the details. maybe they shouldn't. but sometimes i wish there was more detail or explanation. i suppose that's the conflict.
anyway, pharoah is punished (with the plague) for abraham's lie, which i also find upsetting. granted, not sure where god comes down on the whole harem thing, so maybe there's some logic from that point of view. were people allowed to have multiple wives back then? seems like they were. (marriage ‡ man + man or woman + woman, but could = man + woman + woman + woman? though the women would not be married to one another. which is weird.) but then again (we haven't gotten there yet) abraham takes a second wife later and things don't end very well...
to be continued....
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I don't know how the language change was administered, but once people were speaking differenct languages, it makes sense that they would band together (based on who could understand each other) and move on. I've read somewhere that some have suggested that "separated the lands" is more about phyisical lands--continents--than about people groups. I don't have one of those Hebrew-English side by side translations to see if that's even a possible meaning.
ReplyDeleteIf you look at Noah to Pharoah, many generations passed; they were still long generations (though not as long as before the flood).
The whole thing about Abraham lying. He was never condemned outright for that anywhere, but that was never held up as a good thing, either. He does it more than once. I think it just shows his fearfulness.
As to the plural marriage thing, just because the account is listed in the Book, it doesn't mean it reflects God's intention for marriage (some LDS-offshoot groups, and the LDS church itself before Utah applied for Statehood, used Abraham and others as a basis for plural marriage). Once you get to the Gospels, you'll see that the Christ, when confronted with the question of divorce, revisits the Genesis account and holds it up as what God intended for marriage--not polygamy, but monogamy.
BTW--I've never understood Abraham to have Hagar as a second wife. Hagar was Sarah's slave (which was not like slavery in US history in most aspects), and the old lady (literally) thought Abraham's only chance of having a child would come through the younger woman. I guess one could argue "de facto" wife, but "mistress" or "concubine" seem more appropriate. [I hope I didn't spoil things by getting ahead of you.]
Oh, and yes, I'm a runner (of sorts). I started the Couch-to-5k program (from coolrunning.com) at the end of August (8/31) and will be running my first 5k this weekend. I started over 300 lbs. (hence the name), have lost 20, and have many more to go.
ReplyDeletei'm so late getting back to your comments, it's embarassing.
ReplyDeletedon't worry about ruining the ending for me. ;) i have a working knowledge of the bible seeing as both my parents are biblical scholars. but i'm embarassed to admit that i've never read the whole thing! thus the project. however, i'm sad i didn't start this two years ago, i think it would have made my trip to israel MUCH more fun. (though it was a blast anyway).
congrats on the C25K!!! i know a ton of people who have used that ( i think beth, the other contributor, recently used that to do a turkey trot!!). running is very exciting and very spiritual. i just ran a marathon in april and it was a soul-altering experience. best of luck on the weight loss, 20 lbs is an incredible start.
good point on the concubine v. wife thing. i guess i'm just confused where the big idealogical shift comes, though. i'm hoping to see it emerge somewhere in there before jesus just says that it's so. :D