Genesis

Creation

I suppose there's no better place to start than at the beginning, right?  And in that beginning, God created the heavens and the earth, and God said "Let there be light and stuff!"  Alright, all fine and dandy.  I mean, even though it makes no sense at all that light came to be because God says so, who am I to question God's awesome power, right?  But let's look at the third paragraph in (1:6) where God says,

"Let there be an expanse between the waters to separate water from water."  So God made the expanse and separated the water under the expanse from the water above it.  ...God called the expanse "sky."

Okay, for those who don't have much of a mental visualization to understand what the fuck is happening here, let me break this down for you.  There's a bunch of water on this empty planet, and that's it.  Then God decides to separate this water, putting a bunch of it in a dome that hovers over the earth called the "sky".  So, according to the Bible, the sky is a dome of water.  Hrm... Gee, already we can see the demonstrable accuracy of the Bible at work here.

Let's move on.

Blah blah blah, God creates everything else and he sees that it is good and he is happy with it and blah blah blah.  But what's this?  No mention of Hell?  No creation of the Devil?  Important note to remember here.

(1:26)  Then God said, "Let us make man in our image, in our likeness..."

 Let "us"?  In "our" image?  Who exactly is God talking to?  Is there more than one god in charge here?  Or perhaps he's talking to his angels.  But, if we are created in God and his angel's image, then is God simply just another angel?  By saying "our" in this sense, it is implying that he's at least on par with whomever else he's speaking with.  Most arguments I hear is that God is talking to Jesus, because Jesus was there in spirit since the beginning.  "In the beginning there was the Word, and the Word was with God."  Dats in Genesis and it's about Jesus! they say.  When, in fact, it most certainly is not in Genesis.  It's way ahead in (John 1:1), and most interpretations of this meaning is either the awesome Word that God speaks things into existence, or God's Law - aka Word of God, which was received and recorded by a prophet as commanded by the literal words of God - (which we will get into over the next few books).  Yes, there are those somewhat unofficial interpretations that specify that the "Word" is actually Jesus preaching about stuff.  But if this is so, it just doesn't make sense to me.  For one thing, you can't help but admit it's a little dishonest to take something that's written in a completely different library of books (Old vs. New Testament) - one predated the other by a good few thousand years at least - and try to attribute an earlier statement to a later meaning that doesn't even relate to the connection that one tries to fabricate.  [1]

Two, okay fine, the Bible is right even when it's wrong.  So let's play out this scenario; God is Jesus, so God is essentially talking to himself about his plans of creating mankind out of dirt.  Right, got it.

ONWARD!

Anyway, so God created Adam and Eve and placed them in the Garden of Eden and it's so awesome because they can do whatever they want EXCEPT eat from a specific tree.  Somewhere in the middle of (2:9) it says,

...in the middle of the garden were the tree of life and the tree of knowledge of good and evil.

Two things to note here: one, there's a second tree that most people don't acknowledge - the tree of life; two, the tree of knowledge of good and evil.  I just want to note that God has also created evil.  Basic principle of "it takes one to know one".

So, you know how people say that the Devil was manifested as a serpent to persuade Eve to take a bite of the apple of the tree of knowledge?  Well, look for yourself.  There is no devil.  Only a serpent, who is simply the most crafty of any of God's animals that he created.  (Chapter 3, in case you wanted to look.)  And you know the rest, I'm sure.  The serpent pointed out that God lied to them when he told Adam and Eve that they'd die if they ate the apple, and assured them that they'd become intelligent if they did, so they ate the apple and got smart and God was pissed.  The serpent was punished by having his legs taken away from him, thus we have snakes, Adam was punished by having to work for his food, and Eve was punished by having painful labor during childbirth.  (I'd just like to note that God was mad at the serpent for telling the truth and having his lie exposed.) And we are all paying - I guess - for Adam and Eve's original sin by suffering these punishments.

But (back to the note from earlier) then God says,

 The man has now become like one of us, knowing good and evil.  He must not be allowed to reach out his hand and take also from the tree of life and eat, and live forever.  (3:22) 

Again, who is God talking to?  God admits to having knowledge of evil as well as good, thus he is not all benevolent as people like to say.  And, he doesn't want humans to become "one of us".  Spelling it out for you, a GOD.  So he gives 'em the boot, not to punish them, but to eliminate his godly competition.

And you know about Cain and Able, or at least the basics.  God decided that he didn't like Cain's offerings to him, so he just kind of ignored Cain and gave all his favor to Able.  Cain got pissed and killed his brother.  God got mad and cursed Cain to be a "restless wanderer on the earth" whose crops will not yield to him.  Then Cain goes to Nod and marries his wife.

Wait... what? 

Okay, let me see.  So, first you get Adam and Eve, who got busy and made some babies named Cain and Able.  As far as we're concerned, those are the only people in the world, right?  So... who's this random chick from Nod?  This remains to be unanswered.

The Nephilim, The Revolt, and Fall of the Angels

Now, here's one of my favorite parts of the Bible, the beginning of chapter 6 in Genesis.  For one thing, this story lacks a lot of specifics that other texts like the Torah and the Apocrypha elaborate more on.  Putting the pieces together makes for a very lovely story.  For another, there is a very important detail that the Bible refers back to numerous times that I'm going to point out shortly.

To start things out, I'm going to give you the full version of this story so you understand better what's happening here.  Keep in mind that the Old Testament and the Torah are really the same thing.  (The Apocrypha is kind of like a collection of things to fill in the blanks.)  Some people just decided that certain details are better kept out of the Bible.

So, before God created Eve (and Lilith, but let's not get pedantic) he was so proud with his creation of Adam that he commanded all of his angels to come to earth and bow to Adam.  So they all did, except Lucifer wouldn't bow.  When God asked what his problem was, Lucifer was like "But... why do we need to bow to this insignificant little man?  You created us first, and made us so much more powerful and able to serve you.  I want to worship you, not this Adam man.  How is this not idol worship?  I thought I was your most beloved, that man should worship us.  Please, God.  I am your friend."  But God was like "Pfft, whatever.  Quit whining and go away."  Heartbroken, Lucifer was then cast out of Heaven for disobeying God.  Over the generations, Lucifer's sadness turned into jealousy, which led to anger, then hate, and eventually wrath.  During these transitions, Lucifer had been talking with the rest of the angels, and about a third of them (I believe - I don't have these scripts at my disposal) agreed with Lucifer that this whole thing was ridiculous and demeaning.  Then, one day, out of jealousy and rage, Lucifer and his followers devised a plan to desecrate God's "perfect creation" as a means of vengeance and reclaiming their place as most beloved in God's eyes.  (Here's where you get back to specific Bible scripture.)  These angels came to earth and raped women, impregnating them and giving birth to the Nephilim.  The Nephilim, a hybrid of angels and humans, were super strong and super powerful; they were giants measuring between 9 and 11 feet tall (depending on what version of the Bible you read).  And the Bible also explains Greek mythology by claiming that the Nephilim were "the heroes of old, the men of renown".  (6:4)  And they were an abomination, because they were the result of the desecration of God's perfect creation.  Back to the Torah/Book of Enoch- the angels that revolted taught the women and their Nephilim children how to sin properly, and so these teachings spread.  This is where God became furious with Lucifer and his followers, so he created Hell for them to fall to and forever live in agonizing eternity without their God.  Back to the Bible - when the Nephilim began to multiply, God basically became disgusted and decided to wipe the earth clean of all this nonsense via flood. [2]

So here's where you get Noah and his righteous family and a couple of pairs of all the animals in the world fitting on a little arc that is actually smaller in measurement than the Titanic to be saved from the purging of the world by the great flood, then God feels bad and promises never to destroy the world by flood (loophole) again, and then - of course - you'll need to proceed while totally disregarding the question of how Noah's little family reproduced if everybody in the world is wiped out.  Unless you look at it this way... in (6:4) it says,

The Nephilim were on the earth in those days - and also afterward...

Does this imply that they, at least, survived the flood?  Of course it does!  But you'll find that out later in the book of Numbers.

(I just want to add a little food for thought here that the creation story and the great flood story are IN NO WAY original to the Bible.  Just do, like, a Google search for ancient mythologies that have similar, if not the same, creation and flood myth.) [3]

Tower of Babel, Circumcision, Etc.

Let's move on to the Tower of Babel in chapter 11.  Everybody's at least heard of Babel, and it seems to me that most people believe that God came to earth to confuse everybody and make them speak a babbling language because they sinned somehow and needed to be punished.  Wrong.  Turns out, even though we humans are finite and mortal - thanks to God making sure of that - God was still a bit intimidated by us and our level of intelligence.  He saw that all these people were becoming a great society and learning how to use the resources of the earth to create things of their own.  And God said,

If as one people speaking the same language they have begun to do this, then nothing they plan to do will be impossible for them.  Come, let us go down and confuse their language so they will not understand each other. (11:6)

And WAHBOOM you have different languages.

Okay, blah blah blah...  As I look at my Bible now to skim over the less important details, I notice some of my own notes that I scribbled in the pages.  One note simply says "STDs?"  Let me reiterate the story that led me to this possible conclusion.  So Abram and his wife Sarai left their little land because there was a severe famine and headed for Egypt.  Abram told his wife to lie to the Egyptians and say that she is his sister, because he was worried the Pharaoh would kill him and take Sarai for his own wife.  Well, Abram's life was spared because of the lie, but that didn't stop the Pharaoh from taking Sarai for his wife anyway.  Then it says that God inflicted serious diseases on Pharaoh because of Sarai.  So naturally I came to the STD conclusion.  (12:10-20)

Then you get to the introduction of circumcision in chapter 17.  God kind of has a habit of changing people's names.  He tells Abram (which means "exalted father") to change his name to Abraham (which means "father of many") and Sarai to change her name to Sarah... which I'm assuming means "mother of nations".  Then he declares that every male of eight days old must be circumcised as a sign of the covenant between God and Abraham, that his "...covenant in your flesh is to be an everlasting covenant..." and anybody who is uncircumcised is to be cut off from their people.  (17:13-14) 

First of all, gross.  Second of all, GROSS.  I'm sorry, who in their right mind would go, "Yeah!  Let's hack up our baby's penis and devote the foreskin to God!  That sounds like a totally rational thing to do."??  Just sayin'.

Lot in Sodom and Gomorrah

Chapter 18: The Three Visitors.  Basically, God appears to Abraham in the form of three men and says that Sarah will bear him a child by the same time next year.  Mind you, Sarah is 90 years old.  And yeah, that's about it.  Just a weird part of the chapter.  Well, Abraham hears that God is planning on destroying Sodom and Gomorrah because they're wicked or something, and he gets all upset.  So God says that if he can find so much as 10 righteous people in Sodom, then he'll spare the whole city for their sake.  Isn't that nice?

In Sodom (chapter 19) there's this dude named Lot who sees a couple of angels kind of scouting out the place for those 10 righteous people, and Lot's like "Hey dudes!  Come stay with me and wash your feet and stuff!  Me casa su casa!"  So they did, and while everybody's hanging out at Lot's house, all the men from Sodom, both young and old, surrounded the house and said to Lot "Bring those two purdy boys out here so'z we can do the dirty with them.  Mhmm!"  (Sodom = sodomy)  Lot's all like "No, don't do that.  Here, have my two extremely young less-than-mature virgin daughters instead and do whatever you want to them."  But all the guys in town weren't interested in his daughters and they started making a fuss.  Well, the angels that were in Lot's house (although in verse 12 they're referred to as men) got all angsty over this drama.  They yanked Lot back inside and told him to GTFO along with his family because they were about to level the place.

Sorry, anybody notice that it was totally cool of Lot to offer his little virgin daughters to be gang raped by e-v-e-r-y man in town?

Anyway, so the angels (or men) grabbed Lot and his wife's hands and led them and his daughters out of the city and told them not to look back.  But his wife did as brimstone and fire was being rained down on Sodom and Gomorrah, and she "turned into a pillar of salt". (19:26)

Many would arguably say that this "metamorphosis" is to be taken literally, because turning into a pillar of salt couldn't possibly be a metaphor for something else.  Regardless of the meaning, when you really start looking at the minutia of this particular situation, you just start falling farther and farther down the rabbit hole (which is why I'm not even going to bother leaving a citation for different interpretations of this verse).  If you yearn to know more, go on a Google rampage.  I wish you the best of luck in those endeavors.

Some time later, Lot's daughters decided it would be a great idea to get him drunk to the point of passing out and rape him so they could have his babies.  And they did.  And nobody cared.  And yeah, that's literally the end of that story.  Seriously... WTF?

Abraham and Isaac, Jews vs. Muslims, Miscellaneous

Well, back to Abraham, did anybody know that he married his sister?  Yup.  Sarah is actually Abraham's sister.  (20:12).  Remember a while ago when Abraham aka Abram told his wife to lie to the Egyptians and say that she's his sister rather than his wife?  Well, turns out she's both.  She just lied about the wife part.  What's kind of funny is that Abraham rationalized with incest, for one, by stating that she's only his half sister, and two, for saying that it's because the town that they're staying in has no fear of God that they'll kill him for incest. 

Let's just make a little mental note of this here.  For now, God's A-okay with incest.  The rest of the heathen world is not.  Right.  Must've had my morality compass on backwards.

Then you get to chapter 22 where God tells Abraham to take his son Issac up to some mountain to kill him and sacrifice him as a burnt offering.  Abraham's like, "Sure thing, God."  No question's asked.  Then right as he was about to kill Isaac, God was like "Wait!  Just kidding.  I just wanted to make sure you still loved me."  Douche. 

Try getting away with this nowadays.  Just a funny thing to think about, that Abraham is idolized for the willingness to slaughter his only son for God.  You do that now because you think God told you to, and you're crazy.  I wonder what the difference is?

Okay, blah blah, boring boring boring... Just want to point out that in (24:67) it specifies the requirements for marriage.  Sex.  That's about it.  Isaac takes Rebekah into his tent and makes her his wife.  Happy ending.

*chuckles*  Oh yeah!  So, funny story!  Okay, okay.  So, in chapter 25 there are these twin brothers, who are the sons of Isaac and Rebekah (Abraham's grandchildren).  One of them is an awesome good-looking quiet little chef, and the other is like this furry ginger wookie-looking fellow (I'm not joking) who runs around and hunts all day.  One day, the wookie hunter brother comes home and is really hungry and smells the soup his quiet chef-brother is cooking.  He's like "Oh man!  I'm so hungry!  Please let me have some soup!"  But the quiet chef is like "Not until you give me your birth right."  The wookie hunter's like "Not cool, man.  I'm literally starving.  Come on, give me some soup!"  But the chef's like "Not until you give me your birth right."  The wookie's like "Look, I'm seriously about to die here.  Give me some fucking soup!"  But the chef's like "Not until you give me your birth right."  And thus the split between Jews and Muslims.  Makes sense, right?  (25:24-34)  Jacob and Esau [4]

Another mention of marriage: (29:18) Jacob labors for seven years to marry the two daughters of some guy.  Marriage is like a business proposition.  AND POLYGAMY IS TOTALLY COOL!

At some point God changes Jacob's name to Israel and Esau's name to Judah.  They go their separate ways and marry and multiply and do stuff and establish cities and so on.  And that's about it.

In Conclusion

Well, I've flipped through the rest of Genesis and there doesn't really seem to be much left worth mentioning.  Basically, to sum up the rest of this book, there's a bunch of genealogy and some relatively unimportant stories left.  As I look over my summary before I get ready to submit my post, I can't help but give a little snort and snicker.  Really, this is just laughable.  Words turning mud into people, people turning into pillars of salt...  Case in point, this is Genesis in a nutshell.  Are you inspired by the Word of God yet?

[1] http://www.participatorystudyseries.com/what_is_word.shtml

[2] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lucifer
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Book_of_Enoch
http://www.subboard.com/generation/articles/100455758625222.asp

[3] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tree_of_life
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flood_myth

[4] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jacob#Jewish_tradition