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As I start out at the beginning of the Old Testament I feel it’s worth noting that I’m approaching this book as the irrefutable and infallible Word of God, and nothing short of that. The claim has been made by many fundamentalists, including the IBS, Falwell, and more that this book is the real deal. There is no in between. For example, Falwell said:

The Bible is the inerrant…word of the living God. It is absolutely infallible, without error in all matters pertaining to faith and practice, as well as in areas such as geography, science, history, etc.

This theme is repeated again and again among the Christian faithful. So from this point on know that I am not reporting on this so much with the mindset of a person learning how a people completely alien to our culture used to believe, I’m reporting on this more as a true reference of history and of God’s Word to us. I’m told this book is dependable and I can trust it completely so that’s how I’m going to play it.

That said, let’s jump into it.

We start out with the creation of the sun, the earth, the stars, and the entire universe. If I were looking at this from the perspective of a person who lived three or four thousand years ago it might be believable. But I’m alive now in 2008 with far more knowledge than these people had and this story is total bullshit. This should in no way ever be used by anyone, anytime to represent the actual process in which the Earth, the solar system, or the universe itself actually formed. This text was obviously written by humans completely ignorant of how our world really works. I can come to no other conclusion.

If this truly was divinely inspired then why were we not provided with the real truth? Saying God wanted to us to figure it out on our own is a lame cop out, an excuse for having no real answer.

This story already stinks but I’m proceeding on regardless. I’ll be honest, I’m having some major issues accepting any of this as “the Truth”.

I beginning see where some of our entitlement issues come from. We humans often don’t see ourselves as part of an ecosystem; rather we see ourselves as some sort of planetary ruler. We have big brains so we are at the top of the food chain right now. Wait until a comet hits us and see where we are after that. Genesis 1:26, 1:28-30 gives the simpleton “divine dominance” of the world and its plants and animals. Biology tells us a different story.

The world was not created in six, 24 hour periods. This is bullshit. Don’t tell me that a thousand years is like a day and a day is like a thousand years. That’s not what it said. Besides, what good is a figurative reference here other than to be purposefully vague? Maybe I’m wrong; maybe it actually is figurative, but I know there was no “creation” lasting for six 24 hour days.

In verse 2:7 we learn about the creation of Man from dirt. I hope this is figurative as well because it’s every bit as unbelievable and incorrect as the preceeding verses.

In verse 2:9 we’re told that the creations are “pleasing to the eye”, suggesting a human-centric view of the world. The world was not created for us; we adapted to the world we evolved in.

In verse 2:18 we’re told that Eve was made as a “helper” for Adam. Apparently female subserviance starts early in this book.

In verse 2:20 we learn that Adam named every animal. C’mon, this is just silly.

In verse 3:1 we have a talking serpent. I hope that’s a figurative serpent and not an actual talking snake. We learn that the serpent tells Eve she should eat the forbidden fruit and she eventually agrees. She then coaxes Adam into it. God is later walking around the Garden of Eden (in human form?) and asks them where the hell they are (3:11). Shouldn’t he already know, being omniscient and all that?

Regardless, they come out dressed in fig leaves and God figures out what happened eventually. Adam throws Eve under a bus (3:12) and claims it’s her fault he chose to eat the fruit. We get more silliness about God causing painful childbirth and we’re told that man now rules over the woman (3:16). Adam has to till the ground and break a sweat now. Everybody has to leave the garden. Now all humans must die. Bummer.

In chapter 4 we see that Adam and Eve have a couple kids, Cain and Abel. Cain kills Abel and receives a slap on the wrist really. We get some polygamy in 4:19; this is confusing because I saw a fundamentalist bumper sticker one day that read “Marriage=1 man + 1 woman”. I thought polygamy was a no-no. God seemed to have no problem with these three shacking up, provided there’s no dude on dude action. Confusing.

In chapter five we get innundated with lineage and ages at time of death:

5:5 Adam, 930 years
5:8 Seth (Adam’s son), 912 years
5:11 Enosh, 905 years
5:14 Kenen, 910 years
5:17 Mahalalel, 895 years
5:20 Jared, 962 years
5:23 Enoch, 365 years
5:27 Methuselah, 969 years
5:28 Lamech (father of Noah at age 182), 777 years

I don’t see anything figurative about this. No human has ever lived this long; there’s absolutely no proof of this, whatsoever. As Christopher Hitchens says, that which can be asserted without evidence can be dismissed without evidence. This is seriously stupid. From a tall tale point of view this is no different than story like Paul Bunyon and Babe, his blue ox.

In 6:2 we see a heavily populated Earth and men marrying anyone they want. Looks like men have all the fun in this book. In 6:7 we learn that God is angry with men for having wickedness in their hearts so he plans to mass murder every living thing on the planet, all except Noah and his family. He says in verse 6:13 it’s punishment for man’s violence. In 6:15 we get ridiculously small measurements for a boat that’s supposed to hold two of every animal on the planet; an equally ridiculous premise.

In chapter 7 we’re told about the Great Flood. Noah was 600 (7:6) when the killer flood came, killing every single living creature on the planet, save the animals in the boat and Noah’s family. I’m still unsure at this point how the flood killed all the fish in the world.

In chapter 8 the flood is over. Noah sends out a bird who eventually returns with an olive leaf. This tells Noah that dry land is out there. How did the bird return with an olive leaf if all olive plants were destroyed in the flood? Floods for 40 days will kill dry land-bound trees and plants. Confusing again.

In 8:20-21 Noah builds an alter and roasts some offerings (presumably animal sacrifices). God smells these and likes what he smells so, apparently, while in a good mood, he decides that despite the violence in humans he’ll never destroy the world in a flood again. I guess he figured he might have overreacted. Oh well, hindsight is 20/20. Mass murder doesn’t weigh heavily on the conscience of God, apparently. How, though, does a god make creatures purposefully imperfect only to kill them for their imperfections?

We get some more human entitlement in 9:3, a confusing reference to not killing each other in 9:6, and a silly story about rainbows symbolizing God’s convant with Man to never destroy the world with a flood again.

In 9:19 we learn, of course, that all humans are descendents of Noah’s sons. The wives play a seemingly unimportant role in all of this. They don’t even have names.

In 9:18-27 we get a seemingly pointless story of Noah getting drunk and falling asleep in a tent. One of his sons tells everyone about his compromised state and the other two sons walk in backward to cover him up (never looking at his “nakedness”). Noah wakes up and is severely pissed off. He tells the son who snitched he is now the slave of his other two sons. I kinda thought he overreacted a bit but I also thought committing mass murder by covering the world in flood waters was a tad extreme.

So far I’m tremendously unimpressed with this text as any kind of guide for morality. I’d say that it’s anything but. It has enormous holes in its theories on how the universe was formed, and tells obvious fables about a worldwide deluge and boats containing two of every animal in the world. As fables these stories might work; as a reference for actual historical events or guides for morality they fail miserably.

I’ll continue with Genesis, chapter 10, in my next post. Let’s hope it gets a little better.