I have to apologize, I realized (after SarahK spit in my dinner) that I was a bit harsh with my post yesterday. Christianity is important to me, and I got overtaken in my passion and became too dismissive of beliefs I don’t happen to share. The word “asinine” was particularly inappropriate. I have my own views that I have formed through my own thinking, but I shouldn’t be so arrogant as to act like my own opinions are scripture or I risk wandering off the reservation. I should read with an open mind – for I have much to learn – balanced by my skepticism. Thus, I will follow the example of Jesus – who apologized every time he was wrong – and say I’m sorry for my tone yesterday.
That said, today’s secret word is “begot.” Remember to scream real loud whenever you see it.
Moses really could have used an editor. There is a whole chapter devoted to “this guy had these sons, and those sons had these sons.” Sorry, but my eyes just glaze over at those parts. Only thing notable is some of the names. Gomer, Tubal, Cush, Put, Lud, Uz, and Hul. Why don’t we see these names in more baby books?
“Dude, where’d you get a cool gangsta nickname like Tubal?”
“Actually, it’s my given Christian name; it’s biblical, you know. Anyway, let’s get back to busting caps in people’s asses.”
Then, of course, there is Nimrod, son, of Cush, son of Ham who done saw his dad neckid. Gen. 10:9 –
He was a mighty hunter before the LORD; therefore it is said, “Like Nimrod the mighty hunter before the LORD.”
Funny, don’t they say today, “Like Nimrod, the idiot.” Maybe I’m missing something.
About this chapter I notice an item of concern: No woman has been mentioned by name since Eve, and she was only worth mentioning because she screwed up paradise. The next woman to be named is Sarai at the end of Chapter 11, noted for being barren. That’s pretty phaleocentric… or something.
Just thought I’d put that out there.
Anyway, onto the tower of Babel and confusion… and I mean my confusion. Now, as a kid, I thought the story was that God punished man’s hubris of trying to build a tower to reach Heaven by making them all speak funny, but the language in this Bible translation doesn’t make that so clear.
So, everyone speaks one language at this point, and they’re like, “Let’s get together and build a tower.” Sounds logical so far. So then read this (Gen. 11:6-7):
And the LORD said, “Indeed the people are one and they all have one language, and this is what they begin to do; now nothing that they propose to do will be withheld from them. Come, let Us go down and there confuse their language, that they may not understand one another’s speech.”
Couple of questions here. Since many Bibles put Jesus’s words in red, why doesn’t God speaking get any special treatment? Shouldn’t He be in like giant font in bold?
And what is God’s reasoning here? Is He saying that these people have too much ability and He’s decided to mess things up, like someone who got bored with an ant farm and decides to shake it like an Etch-a-Sketch?
And who is this “Us”? Is that a divine Us, or he is like speaking to his mafia-like angels?
“We’re going to go down there and smack these people around ’till they don’t even know their own language no more.”
So everyone gets their languages messed up and God scatters them good. That leaves a few more questions, such as what was the one original language? Esperanto?
And what were the heinous crimes of those made to speak French? Did they see both their father and mother neckid?
Well, the Babel story is followed by more begattery which I’m just getting plain tired of. We learn that people are now living only like two hundred to four hundred years instead of nine hundred – which I guess is of interest. Anyway, we finally get from Shem to Abram and his wife, the aforementioned Sarai, and their wacky adventures.
So God tells Abram to get a moving since He’ll lead him to a land in which he’ll form a great nation. Thus, people understanding its a good idea to do what God tells you in this time, Abram heads off with Sarai and his nephew Lot. Soon, they get to Egypt and Abram says to Sarai, “Damn, woman, you fine! But let’s just say I’m your brother so no one kills me to steal you away.”
Wuss.
And what’s he so worried about? They’re only a few generations down from Noah; shouldn’t all these people still be meeting together at family reunions?
Anyhoo, in a plot right out of a sitcom, the Pharaoh tries to put the moves on Sarai and then gets plagued by God. Then the Pharaoh finds out the reason he is getting plagued is because Sarai is actually Abram’s wife and it ends with them all having a laugh over the wacky misunderstanding… or something.
And who’s the Pharaoh? I spent five hours reading about 80 billion different sons, so why not tell me who the Pharaoh is and who he’s related to? Or did I miss that when my eyes glazed over?
Moving on, Abram is pretty rich in livestock and what not, and so is Lot. They’re running our of grazing room, so Abram tries to settle things by saying Lot pick one way and he’ll go the other way. Lot, being a ripe bastard, picks the well-watered areas towards Sodom and Gomorrah (which the Book tells us are going to be destroyed – totally ruining the surprise).
So Abram head into Cannan, and the Lord promises all the land to him, and Abram builds an altar (as he seems to like doing that). The wording was interesting (Gen. 13:14-17):
And the LORD said to Abram, after Lot had separated from him: “Lift your eyes now and look from the place where you are northward, southward, eastward, and westward; for all the land which you see I give to you and your descendants forever. And I will make your descendants as the dust of the earth; so that if a man could number the dust of the earth, then your descendants also could be numbered. Arise, walk in the land through its length and its width, for I give it to you.”
I’m making a jump here, but, going by this text, if we could number the dust on the earth, could we then figure how many people had to live before Armageddon occurs?
Then again, it’ll be just like the hanging chad thing as we get into argument about what technically is dust or not.
So what’s the moral of these four chapters?
No frick’n clue. Maybe it’s don’t build large towers. Actually, the whole Babel idea seemed pretty bad as they were just using bricks and didn’t have any steel supports. Come to think of it, if God hadn’t scattered those people, it would have fallen and hurt someone and there would be lawsuits until the Israelis reached the Promised Land.
Well, we’ll continue our adventure through the Old Testament later. Hopefully I’m past all the begetting, and the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah are coming up which should be fun. See you then, thumpers.
She spit in your dinner? Not sweet sarahk!
Well Frank, as we saw recently in the Memo-quiddick scandal, Giant Bold Font wasn’t invented until MS Word 95 and the Bible was originally written in WordPerfect 2.0.
Hence, no special treatment for God’s words.
Jen,
It still was a very good dinner.
Like you live in a Southern state and don’t know the importance of “Who’s your people and the hour long search to find aquantinces who know the descendents of your 3rd cousins twice removed” conversation? You need that introductory course “Survey of the Old Testament”. So you can learn about the half dozen theories about what’s going on in Genesis, and why did Phil…whoops wrong one.
In fact, the dinner was good enough for….oh nevermind, too easy.
Frank,
You asked, “So what’s the moral of these four chapters?”
I think this will help you out:
http://www.bible.org/passage.asp?passage_id=1
Well I suppose for some people, spit enhances the flavor…? Curse those crazy good cooks!
One more comment, Frank. Since we seem to have been having a “discussion” re. a literal account of Genesis and Genesis-as-allegory, here’s an interesting article on the “gap theory” that I think you’ll like.
Sorry, this is my last one.
I promise.
At least SarahK only spit in your dinner, she could have kicked you in the whozits.
The original world language was English, so proven by that being the dominant bibles are printed in.
The people forced to speak French are descendants of those who survived Sodom and Gomorrah; which explains their fondness of playing butt darts TV Shows like my two dads.
Well, I enjoyed immensely your little logical poking-fun-at-the-bible thing. Cracked me up. I would not have spit in your dinner. Although, I probably would never have made your dinner to begin with…
I didn’t read yesterday’s post until after today’s apology so it kinda took the bite out of reading yesterday’s post. Which is a good thing I guess.
In any case, if you do get concerned about the literalness of the OT, Frank, remember this-its a text written a long time after the fact by someone from a very different time and culture. Where we get all worried about the science-it didn’t exist then, so what the one writing it down cared about was more along the lines of the “begats”. Someone said once that scholars of Europe from the Dark Ages struggle with the economics because no one writing back then understood economics, nor thought it was important. Doesn’t mean the authors of the texts were lying, just didn’t care about the same information we do now.
So, I don’t have any trouble believing each story from the OT is true while having no desire to figure out the science. (I don’t have any desire to figure out how and why my car works either-it runs so that’s good enough for me.) It seems to me figuring out the science with such a lack of information is doomed to failure anyway. Figuring out the moral if any of the story is much more important.
Even with the NT we have to struggle some because Jesus used the farmer-folk as the basis of many parables and most of us have to have explanation as to what sheep are again? to understand.
In the meantime, I’m enjoying your “reading” of the Bible. Who knew Genesis was fun?
Love it. Can’t wait for you to get to the story of Joseph with Potiphar’s wife.
What was for dinner last night?
Selina,
Mexican salad! I love that.
SarahK is a great cook, BTW.
I think spit is actually one of the ingredients in all Mexican dishes. At least, that was the way it appeared when I peeked into the kitchen at the Taco Bell.
Darn, I wanted to hear about Lot’s wife getting turned into salt.
In fact, there is a pillar of salt in that area over there today, and everyone in the neighborhood calls it “Lot’s Wife”, and claim it’s been called that for thousands of years, or a long time whichever is more accurate to the date of Lot’s wife departure from being an organic life form.
Elsewise, spitting in the dinner is traditional when members of the opposite sex get together in a habitat. It speeds up (and sometimes enhances) the process of sharing body fluids. Since you didn’t know this SaraK is no doubt wondering about your depth of intellect and is right now plotting how to use your misunderstanding against you at a time when you least suspect. Kind of how your cat plots against you.
But in either case, the plotting is being done with the fondest of intentions, so don’t get all worked up about it.
She spit in your dinner? don’t you already have her cooties? So where’s the threat?
Did Noah have two cooties on the ark?
The universal language? Why, Dance, of course. That’s why white guys, as the most spiritual of all guys, can’t dance.
begetting? Ha! you haven’t even started!
Just wait till you reach the book of Numbers.
I think Nimrod is an insult now because there was another Nimrod king of Babylon (or Ur) who was worshipped as the Sun God. But then after awhile as the mid-east became more monothiestic, they made fun of the backwards sun worshippers, saying “you Nimrod” kind of like silly April Fools who had the wrong day for the beginning of the year.
That is my theory, I just made it up this morning (except the guy Nimrod the sun god-king who existed, if I remember correctly).
The “Us” refers to the Trinity. Go check out the sixth day of Creation. “Us” and “our” is used by the Almighty there too.
I’ve just read your Genesis analysis over the past week, and I love it! I’m a theology major at the University of Dallas and I spent last semester studying the Pentateuch. You’ve pointed out many of the things we discussed (albeit in a more serious manner) in class. And, as a Catholic, it’s easy to see why the Church distinuishes bewteen truth and Truth in the Old Testament: some stuff just plain doesn’t matter outside of the ancient Hebrew atmosphere.
Keep these analyses coming!
Oh, I forgot to say:
The “Us” in Genisis is actually, believe it or not, in reference to other gods (other heavenly beings). Now, before I get pegged with preaching about the existence of other gods, let me clarify: in the ancient Hebrew world, they did believe in many gods besides Yahweh, but they did NOT worship them. The concept of monotheism had not yet been developed. An ancient Israelite acknowledged the existence of other gods, but did not pay them tribute or any sort of honor that Yahweh demanded was exclusive to Him. Weird as it may sound, the gods of the ancient Israelite world were not unlike the gods of ancient Greece, with Yahweh being the Zeuss-like “boss” of the gods. The difference is that these other gods opposed Yahweh, and only those who exclusively worshipped Yahweh found favor with Him. They were present with Him before the universe was created, but they didn’t really do anything until people started worshipping them. The belief in other, less-powerful gods gave the Israelites comfort in that while other people and their gods may have power, Yahweh is infinitely more powerful than all. This also humbled the Israelites, for if they fell out of covenant with Yahweh, other gods could take the opportunity to either smite Yahweh’s people or take them from Him. Fear of other gods helped keep peoples’ loyalty to THE God.
The concept of a Trinity didn’t even take place until after the Gospels were written. The Messiah was never thought to have been God, simply a really powerful and influential warrior/teacher/priest. That’s why the followers of Christ were so worried in the early Church: some people thought of them as polytheists.
Also, Moses did not, contrary to popular (and poorly researched) belief, write Genisis. Genisis, and the rest of the Pentateuch, were oral traditions passed down through the generations until they were finally written down by high priests in the First Temple Period. Moses is given credit for the sake of simplification, but careful analysis of the Pentateuch (Genisis and Exodus especially) reveal several different writers (4 is the general consensus) authoring the story from different ppints of view. Long story short, you could divide up Genisis and get 4 similar yet very distinct narratives. The creation story is a perfect example of this: there are two of them. God is portrayed as a completely different character, form, and even has two levels of divinity.
I’d get into it some more, but I’d start writing another essay.
Hmmm…is that pronounced “Sarah I” like we say “sarahk”? I wonder what her last name was…
I read somethin once that whole tower of babel was to worship the stars and that is like worshiping false idols or something and God didnt like that because there werent going throughout the earth like he told them to and also they were worshiping stars which is just stupid.
Frank
I wanted to let you know that as an Independent Baptist I believe that your going to hell for a long time.
HERETIC
ps- that ‘shaking an ant farm like an Etch-a-Sketch’ was the funniest thing I’ve ever read on the Internet. Good job
Nimrod the hunter became nimrod the idiot thanks to Bugs Bunny and Elmer Fudd.
No, seriously.
I have often wondered that about Genesis. I would always swear that the person writing it changed back and forth as I read.
I’ve been damned by a Baptist Minister once. I’m glad I’m not Baptist, otherwise that might have ruined my day.
And no, I wasn’t doing anything stupid. He mocked my beliefs and I asked him to leave. I may have stood up in a threatening manner. I don’t remember exactly, it was a long time ago. But it proved for a great journal entry.
The confusion at the Tower of Babel was due to some people using the metric system instead of English measurement. Neither side knew how to convert their measurements to the other system. They stopped working, and one side started playing soccer & the other side marked off 100 yards & started playing football. I’m tellin’ ya’ Frank–it’s TRUE!!
-gs
Joey,
No offense, but if I were you I’d seriously be demanding a refund for your theology classes. The last time I read anything that kooky was on one of those wingnut “End Times Prophecies – Satan Lived On Mars?” websites. >_>
I’m confused. Is this the Peter Gabriel Genesis, or the Phil Collins Genesis?
If SarahK is making you less funny, you need to cook and eat her. NOW! Before its too late!
Jesus apologized every time he was wrong? Frank, are you being sneaky?
Any satirical piece that starts off with an apology has already failed. Time to move on.
Ah, don’t bother, I’ll just move my IMAO link to the “don’t visit unless you’re really bored” folder.
actually, what joey said rang a bell with me. My mother once told me long ago that the commandment “Thall shalt worship no god before me” was written that way because they did believe that there were other gods, just not as important.
SeanF,
I completely forgot about that; thanks.
Cracks knuckles First year theo 101…online.
The endless lists of begots are in there to grant a sort of continuity. The bible is essentially unique among holy books in that it doesn’t say “Long long ago”
It says ‘When Bob was around, but before Chuck, in such a such a specific place’ Its a generation thing, it also helps to show descendancy (a biggie in the middle eastern world).
As to why the Tower of Babel was so bad? Well, its bad because they were again having aspirations of unearned godhood. The midrash, if memory serves, makes strong implication that they wanted to build a tower so they could climb up and -kill- God. As I doubt He wanted to fling another bunch of his creations into Hell, he obscured their language. Christ touches on this with his ‘A time to gather, and a time to cast away’ stuff from later in the Bible (It was stolen almost verbatum and had ‘turn turn turn’ added to make it a song).
The moral of most of Genesis, and indeed the old testament, is to drum into people’s heads the importance of the original sin of mankind: Pride. The Devil sort of gave us the sin that caused him to start sucking on brimstone in Hell. Evil isn’t very original.
Pride ultimately is the source by which all other sins come in.
Wrath: Cain’s “I know better then God about killing.”
Lust: “Who’s God to judge what goats I have sex with!?” IE: Sodom and Gamorrah.
Envy: Cain again. “Sniff! Why does are my brother’s offerings accepted and not mine! God should know better!”
And so on, and so on.
As to earlier statements as to the plurality, there’s the one side saying ‘Well, monotheism didn’t develop’ and my catholic side saying ‘God’s telling us about his trinity’. I lean towards my Catholic side. History doesn’t stop being history just because God and the supernatural gets involved.
I’m half waiting for when Frank realizes that almost every OT prophet tries to weasel out of his duty. 😉
Again, my apologies if I seem obnoxious.
Great stuff over all, Frank!
Oh I cannot WAIT until you get to First and Second Samuel.
You all think YOU had problems with your in-laws!
Frank:
I rather prefer the first book of the New Testament to the First Book of the Old Testament. Can we shift the discussion to:
Matthew 25:
34 Then shall the King say unto them on his right hand, Come, ye blessed of my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world:
35 for I was ahungered, and ye gave me meat: I was thirsty, and ye gave me drink: I was a stranger, and ye took me in:
36 naked, and ye clothed me: I was sick, and ye visited me: I was in prison, and ye came unto me.
37 Then shall the righteous answer him, saying, Lord, when saw we thee ahungered, and fed thee? or thirsty, and gave thee drink?
38 When saw we thee a stranger, and took thee in? or naked, and clothed thee?
39 Or when saw we thee sick, or in prison, and came unto thee?
40 And the King shall answer and say unto them, Verily I say unto you, Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me.
— The above verses were translated into contempary American English by Emma Lazarus in 1885. —–
“The New Colussus” by Emma Lazarus (excerpt):
“Keep ancient lands, your storied pomp!” cries she With silent lips.
“Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!”
Read the second in the light of the first and you can see why I believe Our Creator is not indifferent to America’s place in the world.
John Bouler
Babel was a pride thing
Pride comes before a fall
Your comment at the end is thus quite appropriate. If God let the pride thing continue, look at how big a fall some people would have had.
BTW The bible says the Satan is the god of this system of things.
So, there are other gods but only one is to be worshipped as The God. (the other example I used shouldn’t be worshipped at all – his desire for worship is what led to the mess we’re in now.)
I always learned “us” was just the high form of “me”, like even in olde english the kings would say “we” instead of “I” in formal speech.
As for other gods,… well way back in Abraham’s time, but I don’t think by Moses’s time. When God said to Abram “you know me as el-shaddia,” and the god that Melchizadek worshipped, who the Bible says was the real God but doesn’t say anything about the name Melchizadek used or how the Lord even revealed himself to Melchizadek.
If you look at canaanite gods they are all “el-” something.
Sorry I cannot spell all those names.
SarahK, the bible doesn’t say anything about spitting in people’s food to make them see the error of their ways. You are suppose to heap mounds of hot coals on his head to get him to be a good Christian. Or was it, be nice to him, which is like heaping mounds of hot coals on his head? I forget, but I guess either one will work and is the biblical way of dealing with a Christian brother that you have a disagreement with…
i didn’t spit in his food. i just misted over it a little.
O.k. Frank,
I am debating whether or not to respond to your critique of the scriptures. So far it should be noted that God really doesn’t need your seal of approval. That aside it does help if you remember that things do build on what was previous. In Gen 6-8 we had the flood as a result of man’s unabated wickedness.
This followed the “fall of mankind” when man sinned in the garden. The serpent convinced Eve to partake of the fruit as “you will not die, your eyes will be opened and YOU WILL BE LIKE GOD, knowing good from evil”. So man started with the original sin, now knowing good from evil (instead of obeying God and trusting His instruction), moves forward into history and chooses evil so often that God is sorry he made us and destroys all in the flood.
The only ones spared are Noah and his family as he was “blameless” in God’s sight. Please note how God talks and cares for Noah and blesses Him. HE makes a covenant with Noah. God takes the initiative to establish relationships always. Remember, He is God and we ain’t. We have no right to get all up in His face.
So we get to Babel now. Please note a couple of minor but HUGE details. What did they set out to do? Make bricks and build a tower. But note that the bricks were baked thoroughly and they used pitch (tar) for the mortar. It is crucial to note that these items are designed to be water resistant, in case God wanted to try any of His flood you out stuff again and destroy what they were creating. Did’t God just promise Noah a little earlier not to do that? I guess these guys didn’t trust God much perhaps because they did not know Him.
What was their motivation? “let us build a tower that reaches to the heavens (God’s place), so that we may make a name for ourselves and not be scattered over the face of the earth”. In short, we will be like God (original sin again) and we will have self determination (God won’t be the boss no more, we’ll show Him). Do we see a pattern here?
When He says “with one language they have begun to do this,then nothing will be impossible for them”, He is not concerned about their abilities to accomplish some feat as if we can be some threat to God. That is how we think. What God is concerned about is that what we put our efforts into is evil and the scale to which we can get involved with it. All the folks were working together as one group again to accomplish evil, as it was before the flood. So, to slow down the learning curve of evil he confused the languages and scattered them, for our own good. This is good as we aren’t clones of the French!
Later you will see that the very thing that they wanted “to make their name great” is one of the key parts of God’s covenant with Abraham. He also desires for us to be near to Him (in His place ) not as advisaries but in fellowship that He can bless.
It all fits together. Even if the begats get a little boring, they are there for a reason (lineage, timelines and dates that are important later on). So before you jump into a frenzy and have your food moisturized by Sarahk, ask God to open your heart, mind and spirit to understand His word. There is a lot there, more than I can grasp, and it is waiting to be mined as a treasure. It should be revered as such.
The good news is that as usual God initiates the relationship (as seen in Genesis on ) and He is still up to His old tricks.
Keep reading, Keep studying, the best is yet to come!
Todd
p.s. Not too many women mentioned yet, but they are very important (Proverbs 31 is a whole chapter describing how excellent they can be, and just wait till The Song of Solomon) 😉 The good news is there are no monkeys, so smile!
I wonder if SarahK did the gummy bear trick when she spit in Frank’s salad. Palmed a yellow or green one, chewed it up a bit, then spat it into the goodies?
God didn’t destroy the tower of Babel and scatter the people because they wanted to build a tall building. If you read carefully, it is clear that God destroyed their plans because of their pride. They were trying to gain worldwide renown for having built a huge tower, and this selfish pride pissed off God.
Nimrod was supposedly the father of Tammuz, but we won’t learn about him til Ezekiel.
But if Tammuz was the son of a mighty hunter before the LORD, why did he get killed by a wild boar?
Too stupid to live, I guess.
“el” is the Hebrew word for “a god”..rendered God in the OT.
“el Shaddai” means “God Almighty”, which is also how you see it rendered in the English translations,
I don’t know if anyone above said this, but this could be your great book of humor. I’d buy it, if I wasn’t getting it here for near-free.
Reese
Frank, you thought Noah being neckid was bad, wait until you get to the part with Lot and his daughters. God smites Lot’s wife for looking back, and then apparently condones incest.
Wow! You people realy do take that silly book seriously, don’t you? Look at all the words expended here today on one of Frank’s postings about it.
Get over it, all. It is no more real than the Greek and Roman mythologies, it just lasted longer and then got the added bonus of moveable type and expanding populations.
Put down your big ole book and get outside to smell the roses.
The Ninjamonkeys have already been sent to Corsair. Also – bad news, Corsair – looks like episode 3 is going to suck too.
I think “Nimrod” became an insult because Bugs Bunny called Elmer Fudd a “Nimrod” once. Bugs was being ironic and sarcastic, but people hearing the word for the first time figure he was being insulting.
…”And who is this “Us”? Is that a divine Us, or he is like speaking to his mafia-like angels?”…
Silly billy the trinity is Us. Jesus and God and the Holy Spirit…
The moral? This is where the bible is consistent…mostly this stuff is about the picture of human nature and the person of God. listening to and trusting God or NOT. Negative example and positive. Becoming an object of God’s wrath…or not.
The “Us” could also be a Trinity reference.
And Frank, its not as if you don’t take in enough of that particular brand of spit directly. Maybe she thinks you need help with your digestion.
Actually frank there is a lot of stuff in there, you just have to slow down and concentrate. Even the begats are full of little nuggets I missed the first time through. one quick easy one: If I am a nigerian, you know I am from nigeria. If I were an antisemite where would I go to find the object of my hate? The sons of shem, are the semites. So when a cajun asks you who’s yer mama, are you a catholic and can you make a roux, think before you speak.