Reflections

The presentation that stuck with me the most was Cameron's.  It stuck with me because my experience with the class was the opposite of his.  I distrust the church, and I was eager to come to class and learn about the Bible in a non-ideological way.  But I did not come to class with an open mind.  I came hoping to find tangible proof through my own reading of the Bible that all religion was bullshit.  Indeed, I came believing that the Bible was nothing more than a bunch of bullshit.  I came thinking I would find something to gloat about to all those blind sheep who think they know the Bible without having read it; and I came just as blind and bound up in ideology as those whom I condescended.  If Cameron has enough sand to stand in front of the class room and say what he did, that he realized he was being close minded, then I ought to have enough sand to at least admit to myself that I have been close minded as well.  The Bible is not what I thought it was, and I have no other way to say what I just said because I still don't know what the Bible is.  So that is what I know now that I didn't know before, and I really don't know how to articulate why it's important.  It is like the Book of Kells.  Though I did not know the the book in the movie was specifically the Four Gospels, I knew it had to be the New Testament.  What I got out of the movie is exactly what Dr. Sexson got out of it:  "It does not matter so much what the book says, only that the book is beautiful. Yes?"(Dr. Sexson's words from class)  I feel that the writing which I have produced in this class is sub par to work I have done in the past, but the writing is not what was most important to me for this class.  For me, the most important aspect of this class was comprehension of the material, and I don't mean for the purposes of doing well on tests.  I mean actually understanding what is being read, which is subtly different from understanding what has been written. 

Term Paper

The last sentence of the prefatory note leading into the second half of Words with Power reads:  "Out of this I hope that some indication of how coherent lifestyles, connected with primary concerns and the kerygmatic mode, will emerge from the infinite possibilities of myth (Frye 143).  The second variation, the garden, is most closely associated with the primary human concern of sex--both the sex act and the distinguishing of the masculine and feminine in a symbolic sense.  For the purposes of this paper, I will be focusing on the symbolic aspects of masculine and feminine imagery in the Bible with specific attention to how this imagery connects the Old Testament with the New.

It is a commonly held belief by some who claim to have read the Bible that God gave men the supreme right to rule over the earth, the animals, and women.  The support, they claim, lies right there, in black and white, in the words of the Biblical creation myth; however, this is an unfortunate misreading of Biblical text that has spawned an apathetic cultural attitude toward exploitation.  God planted a beautiful garden and put the man in it it to tend it.  Then God decided the man should not be alone, so He created animals for the man to name.  Last of all God put the man to sleep and took a rib and made it into a woman, a "help meet" in the words of the J writer.  The term "help meet" implies a partner of equal stature, though the rest of that particular passage clearly defines two different symbolic representations of human kind.  One is man, the masculine representation, and the other is his wife, woman, the feminine representation.  Here begins the arduous task of differentiating between the literal and symbolic roles assigned to the notions of masculinity and femininity in the Bible, and how these notions coalesce to form a coherent pattern of myth to live by.  Frye believes that the original adam is most likely androgynous and is the first masculine symbol, though not yet an actual man; and the garden, in all its beauty and fertility, is the feminine symbol.  Frye describes the creation of Eve as an afterthought, "a rectifying of an original deficiency"(190).  Though deficiency has a negative connotation, Frye does not mean it in a misogynistic context.  It simply implies that the God of the J creation account is a great experimenter, and realizing His original creation needs a little tweaking, He divides the masculine and feminine traits into two distinct human entities.

This is where we first see the theme of rejuvenation as it pertains specifically to feminine symbolism.  The garden, the feminine symbol, is now objectified through Eve, who has become not only woman, but the man's wife.  The original feminine symbolism contained within the garden is implicitly maternal, but is transformed to become a bride figure in Eve.  The purpose of rejuvenation, according to Frye, is to eradicate any previously existing undesirable qualities; presumably, this is how God rectifies the deficiency contained within His original creation.  Eve is not given to be subservient to Adam; she is given as a companion, where one does not preclude the other.

This balance is disrupted when Adam and Eve eat of the forbidden tree of knowledge of good and evil; this is also probably the most erroneously interpreted event in all of Biblical myth.  Patriarchy is not given out as a reward to man for what seems to be perceived as his innocuous involvement in the Fall; rather, patriarchy is given to woman as castigation for her initiation in the events which culminate in the Fall.  Man, along with the serpent, is given his own set of punishments for his involvement in the unfortunate event.  Misogynists have long held to this weak interpretation as justification to denigrate women, and feminists have long proclaimed it evidence that the Bible is biased against women.  The efferent expansion of feminine Biblical symbolism has also served to reinforce this weak misinterpretation of the garden myth.  It has spawned a tradition of weak, ideological misreading which has resulted in the validation of exploitation of all that is symbolically female.  The earth, nature in general, women, children, and slaves of all ages and both genders are all viewed as chattel; they are goods to be bought and sold as seen fit by a specially appointed few who represent a symbolic patriarchal minority.

The themes of exploitation and rejuvenation as they pertain to feminine symbolism are clearly demonstrated in the story of Ruth.  Ruth, being a Moabite woman, is cleansed of her undesirable heritage when she lies down on the field with Boaz in what is presumably a ritual of fertility.  In so doing she becomes a rejuvenated version of her mother-in-law, Naomi, and becomes a true daughter of Israel.  Indeed, when she bears Boaz a son the event is hailed as a son born unto Naomi.  This transformation allows her to take her place as a direct ancestor of Jesus.  Also prominent in the rejuvenation theme is the cycle of what Frye describes as "affliction, exile, redemption."  On page 215 he writes that the image of woman "expands into a kind of proletariat, enduring, continuous, exploited humanity, awaiting emancipation in a hostile world...."  He ascribes this metaphor specifically to the Israelites' bondage in Egypt, but this can also be seen on a grander Biblical scale as humanity's redemption through Jesus.  On pages 140-141, Frye states:  "Myth, concentrating as it does on the primary concerns that human beings share with animals and even plants, is more closely linked to man's genuine kinship with nature.  The Bible speaks continually of the alienation of man from God and of man's eventual redemption or reconciliation with God.  This latter movement, if we are right about primary concern, cannot be achieved without a corresponding redemption and reconciliation of nature, something that moves in the direction of restoring the original paradisal environment."  Frye contends that the mythical pattern dictates that humanity must be redeemed through woman.  Jesus, the masculine symbol of the New Testament is begotten through the body of a woman, and rather than being a father/bridegroom figure like Adam, he is representative of a Son/bridegroom figure.  That is, he is the Son of God and the bridegroom to humanity as a whole, where Jesus symbolizes the masculine and the Church symbolizes the feminine.  Even though Jesus may be the patriarch of all patriarchs, being the literal Son of God, he is still begotten through the body of a female.  Mary can be considered a rejuvenated Eve, and Jesus a second Adam.  This is a reversal of the garden myth, where Eve, a rejuvenated version of the original matronly feminine symbol (the garden), is taken from the adam's body to become a daughter/bride, and inevitably initiates the Fall of humanity.  On page 216, Frye states that patriarchy will eventually be reversed; not into a matriarchy, but into the equality that existed before the Fall.  This happens through the power of love, which seems to be the main tenant of Jesus' teachings.  He bucks all the norms of typical patriarchal behavior.  He loves little children, he does not denigrate slaves, lepers, or other "undesirables," nor does he subordinate women or shun Gentiles.  Both humanity and nature are symbolically feminine, and redemption is attained by creating a loving union with Jesus, the masculine symbol.  Thus, this union represents the simultaneous reconciliation of nature and humanity with God.

Flawed, ideological interpretations of the functions of masculine and feminine symbolism in the Bible have falsely rendered it a misogynistic text, and given rise to the secondary human concerns of mastery and possession.  The purpose of Biblical mythology is not to subordinate one individual to another, nor is it to ordain one specific group supreme over all others; its emphasis is on the importance of the equality of love and mutual respect between men and women, parents and children, the individual and his or her community, and humanity and the world in which it is sustained.  The objective, therefore, of Biblical myth is to demonstrate how life can be most abundantly lived.

Garden 1: Sex in the Garden State

In "Northrop Frye's Bible," Steven Marx identifies sex as the primary human concern associated with the Garden of Eden creation myth in Genesis (4).  He writes:  "The sexual union of male and female is an analogy for the human union with God" (4).  The garden is centered about two trees, the tree of life and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.  "And out of the ground made the Lord God to grow every tree that is pleasant to the sight, and good for food; the tree of life also in the midst of the garden and the tree of knowledge of good and evil" (Genesis 2:9).  God, as we all know, forbids Adam and Eve from eating the fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil.  As noted by Frazer on page 16 of Folklore in the Old Testament, the fruit of the tree of life is not forbidden until after the man and woman eat of the tree of knowledge.  Frazer states that God does not want the humans to attain god-like qualities through immortality and possession of the special knowledge.  This notion is backed up by Frye who writes on page 194 of Words With Power, "...God seems to be addressing other gods in a spirit of something very much like panic (GC 109), we seem to be back to this fear, associated this time with the mysterious 'knowledge of good and evil,' and, still more, with the fact that humanity may now reach for the tree of life.  As the tree of life was not forbidden to Adam and Eve before, it seems to be only the possession of the new knowledge that makes it dangerous."  Frye describes the fear of which he speaks as a common theme found in pre-Biblical Near Eastern Religions, in which the gods feel "threatened by man's rapid advance, with a particular fear of his becoming immortal" (194).  Frye then proceeds to examine the "nature of the knowledge acquired."  He describes it as "a repressive morality founded on a sexual neurosis."  He goes on to say:  "The moral knowledge was disastrous when attached to a sense of shame and concealment about sex, and was forbidden because in that situation it ceases to be a genuine knowledge of anything, even of good and evil."  This is what caused the loss of sexual innocence which is essentially what constitutes the Fall.

Previously in the chapter, Frye says that the original adam may have been androgynous, so it stands to reason that the monotheistic God of Genesis is also androgynous.  That is, He contains both masculine and feminine traits.  God is creative as well as androgynous and monotheistic and wants to infuse these traits in His adam; but the adam is not God and is unable to express creativity in the same way.  To rectify this, God, leaving the masculine traits in the adam, draws out the feminine traits and imparts them onto His new creation, the isshah.  The act of sex is for enjoyment (Marx), expression of love, and creation.  The fruit of the tree of life was not forbidden because it functions as the axis mundi in the Garden of Eden myth.  It represents a bod between God and Adam and Eve which is withdrawn when they betray God's trust and strive for that which is forbidden them.  On page 155 Frye writes:  "This tree is not said to reach heaven, but it obviously is linked to a connection between earth and heaven broken at the Fall." 

"The real issue involved here," Frye writes on page 198, "is not one of simple prudery, but of the difference between a poetic and metaphorical structure, founded among other things on the primary concern of sex, and the transformation of this structure into a form of ideological authority."  In other words, a weak reading of the Garden myth not only literally assigns men a more esteemed status to lord over women, but also renders the Bible a misogynistic text.  Woman, or that which symbolizes the feminine attributes of monotheism, initiated the Fall and patriarchy was meted out as one of her punishments.  Man, or that which symbolizes the masculine, received his own set of punishments, as he was not blameless in the fiasco.  "The sexual bias, however frequent, is certainly reversible, even if the history of literary imagery is not" (Frye 201).  The point is not that woman caused expulsion from Eden; the myth very well could have been written with man taking the lead in the events which culminated in the Fall.  The point is that Adam and Eve disrupted the balance of God's creation, their paradise, when they partook of the forbidden fruit and fell from God's grace.  The result is not only (supposedly) our life on earth outside of the Garden, but also the "perversion of sex at the Fall."  That perversion includes both the sexual act, condemned as impure, but also the way in which  the male and female sexes relate to one another.

On Epiphanies Gained while Arguing about the Bible

I unintentionally had this argument with an old friend just before we were given the assignment to start one.  He is a friend from my past with whom I had fallen out of contact.  We bumped into each other on campus last year and wound up in technical writing together this semester.  I said that I believed there were parallels between Biblical mythology and the mythologies of other religions.  Christianity, I said, shared many similarities with other religions.
"Not really," he responded.
"But how can you say that," I countered, "when Islam, Judaism, and Christianity all derive from the Old Testament?  And did you know the story of the 'Great Flood' is a common theme in many cultural mythologies?  It's not peculiar to the Bible.  In fact, there are Native American stories describing how Creator had become angry with humanity for living wickedly, and destroyed them with a flood; all but one pious man and his family, who weathered many days in a vessel which Creator explained how to make.  And these stories existed in their cultures before whites came and forced Christianity on them."
"I don't want to talk about it!" he snapped.
"Oh, I'm sorry," I said.  "I'm not religious, so--"
"Well I am."  As if only those who are religious have any right to voice opinions on the Bible.
"Well I'm not.  I don't think we should base our lives on a text written thousands of years ago by one small culture.  However, I think the Bible is important because it basically invented literature as we know it."
"That's fine," he says, trying to be authoritative, "as long as you respect it."
"Well, I do respect it, but not for the reasons you think I should.  It's a Semitic cultural accounting.  It's the story of ancient people who are not my ancestors.  It bears very little meaning for me."
"I'm sorry," I said without knowing why I was apologizing.  "I can't force myself to believe something I don't."

And that was it.  That's where I had my epiphany.  The stories contained in the Bible are not the accounts of my people.  I don't have lineage dating back to the Mayflower, or concrete accounts of noble ancestors contained in dusty, old archives in the Old Country; but I know where many of my ancestors lived before coming to America:  Wales, England, and Sweden.  Now, it can certainly be argued that my ancestors living in the British Isles were most definitely Christians.  Indeed they were, and some still are today.  It can also be argued that without the Old Testament, there would not be a New Testament; which is where Christianity derives most of its dogma.  Though Christians may cleave more adamantly to the teachings of the New Testament, they still claim the Old Testament's mythology as their own.  I have always balked at blindly accepting the Christian faith as the only way to believe without fully realizing why; but then, in that epiphytic moment, I did realize why:  It is not the story of my people; therefore it has no legitimate claim to my spirit.
I did not grow up religious, but I did attend a few church services with various friends and joined a youth group for a short period of time in middle school.  Never, not once, have I ever felt any sense of comfort in church.  I left the youth group because I came to realize what a crock it was.  A flimsy sham attempting to brainwash impressionable young people while out of their parents' presence.  I didn't like the way they countered what my parents had taught me (for I did pose questions of faith to the pastors) with how they thought  things ought to be.  I remember being told on one occasion that my parents were straight up wrong, and being a good person is not enough to redeem oneself from the horrors of Hell.  A statement I took to be a deliberate, meditated act of undermining parental authority.  As Dr. Sexson has pointed out, most of the beliefs associated with the Bible are not contained therein; they are interpretations formulated in the minds of individuals whose capacity to understand is no greater than mine.  What hegemonic rule makes one ancient culture's mythological history more legitimate than that of  another?  I want to learn more about the stories that were being told by the people who would become my ancestors, for they also walked the face of the earth during "Biblical Times."  That is where I will find myself; not in the pages of the Old Testament.  Nor do I believe it to be contained within the pages of the New Testament.  For me, it is unfathomable that there is not something beyond this life on Earth, but it is equally unfathomable that that something can be summed up on one small library of books called the Bible.  Last winter, a girl I had know since she was a child passed away.  She was only seventeen, but she was about to give birth to her first child.  A little girl.  She and the baby's father lived out in Three Forks and on their way to the hospital to give birth, she died in a car accident.  They were not able to save the baby.  It was an accident; one coalescent moment in time that resulted in a horrible tragedy.  She died, her baby died, but the baby's father and the other driver lived.  And why?  Why did it happen that way on that day?  I don't accept the answer that God's ways are mysterious, yet I do not begrudge God.  I do not angrily rebuke the sky, demanding to know why, if He's so just and great, God would permit such a horrible thing to happen.  I do not do these things because I feel that any answers given, whether by laymen or priests, would be hollow.  There is no answer; it just happened.  What if it had not been icy and foggy that day?  What if they had left the house just five minutes earlier or later?  What if they had taken the interstate into Bozeman instead of the frontage road?  What if the other driver had taken the interstate instead?  Who suffered the bigger injustice?  The young girl and her baby, or the young man who survived his family?  I find more comfort in accepting that life is unfair at times.  It's terrifying to realize the truth that bad things can and do befall anybody at any given moment in time; but these things are not resultant of cosmic vendettas, and we cannot stop their happenings.  That is the common thread which connects humanity.  We're all in this crazy world together, and we can feel empathy for the plights of others--even if they're not God's chosen people.  And that, I think, is the true beauty of the human spirit.  It is our want to ease the pain of others because we know, that at any unpredictable time, it could be us.

Believing that, in spite of the murmurings of the callous and the self-righteous, lends me more strength and integrity than can be found in the pages of any book.

Stevens: A Mythological Modern Poet

When speaking in terms of "modernism" and the "modernist movement," it is important to recognize that these phrases are not synonymous with the English word "modern', which defines something contemporary in nature.  The modernist movement was not solely literary, for it embodied all aspects of creative art.  Its coming into existence was partially due to mass cultural uprising against Victorian rigidity, but was more profoundly fueled by Western society's extreme disillusionment resulting from the horrific experiences witnessed during the Great War.  Many modernist thinkers came to view the world as fragmented; there existed not just one, cohesive reality in which all of society was enveloped, but multiple realities all operating within their own dogmatic parameters.  This fragmentation was further compounded by the increasing feeling of isolation many people developed in response to the rapid technological advancements of their time.



Picasso's 1903 The Old Guitarist.  Many academics believe
this painting inspired Stevens to write "The Man
with the Blue Guitar."

 Perhaps these feeling of alienation and fragmentation are best represented by the visual arts, and among these representations the painter Pablo Picasso is probably the most recognizable.  Picasso once said:  "The world today doesn't make sense, so why should I paint pictures that do?"  Many modernist writers echoed this sentiment by experimenting with a variety of new writing techniques such as stream of consciousness, or by focusing on unconventional subject matter.  Others attempted to make sense of their chaotic world by incorporating the patterns of myth into their work to create new and unique literary styles.  These elements can be seen in the work of Modern American poet Wallace Stevens.  In his poem, "The Man with the Blue Guitar"(which many academics assert was inspired by Picasso's 1903 painting, The Old Guitarist), Stevens refers to the guitarist as "a shearsman of sorts."  According to my Oxford American Pocket Dictionary, shear can mean:  to distort or be distorted, or break, from a structural strain.    The man with the blue guitar "does not play things as they are," for "Things as they are/ Are changed upon the blue guitar."  But the people implore him to play "A tune beyond us, yet ourselves."  The amorphous term "they" characterized in the poem is a reference to society at large.  The poem's speaker and the man with the blue guitar may be consciously aware of the fragmented, alienated state of society, but the common masses are only subconsciously aware of it.  Thus they are unable to articulate that for which they yearn.  They are caught between cleaving to what  they had traditionally understood themselves to be, and striving to understand the state of their disillusionment. Later, in part XV of the poem, the speaker asks:  "Is this a picture of Picasso's, this 'hoard/ Of distractions,' a picture of ourselves,/ Now, an image of our society?"  In so doing, Stevens deftly depicts the complexities of human emotion by analogizing music and art. 


Picasso's 1937 Guernica.  Perhaps this is the "hoard of destructions" Stevens references in "The Man with the Blue Guitar."



Stevens further demonstrates his willingness to utilize mythology in "Peter Quince at the Clavier."  In this poem he again represents emotion through musical images.  Also present in the poem are alternate realities to what society has conventionally perceived.  Peter Quince, being an unsophisticated rube, would not normally be sitting at a clavier, plucking melodic chords and exploring the complicated emotions invoked by an unattainable mistress.  The poem is incredibly erotic.  In the Biblical story Susanna is renowned for her beauty and piety; in Stevens' poem, although demure, she is a sexually empowered woman.  In the privacy of her garden (a mythological symbol of eroticism), "She searched/ The torch of Springs,/ And found/ Concealed imaginings./ She sighed/ For so much melody./ / Upon the bank, she stood/ In the cool/ Of spent emotions./ She felt, among the leaves,/ the dew/ Of old devotions."  These lines are clearly depicting the act of masturbation.  "The torch of Springs" symbolizes her female genitalia, and concealed imaginings her sexual fantasies.  (It may be of interest to note here that modernist writers often attempted to break the societal barriers of prudery prevalent during the Victorian Era).  She stands on the bank "in the cool of spent emotions" and remembers "old devotions." Her sexual desires fulfilled, she pauses to remember her maidenhood; to remember the first stirrings of sexual awakening.  The elders have witnessed the entire event, and now their lust is kindled.  Susanna is ashamed of having been caught in such a private and vulnerable moment.  In the Biblical story the only explanation for her shame is having been seen naked by men to whom she is not married.  Stevens attempts to fill the lacunae of the Biblical version by presenting an alternate reality in which Susanna does more than just bathe in her garden, and in which the one imagining such a scene is a rough around the edges, blue collar guy fantasizing about catching a sophisticated, sexually unavailable woman in the act of pleasuring herself. 

But a fantasy is just that. It is "momentary in the mind."  The sexually charged fantasy of the virginal maiden dies when the maiden is deflowered.  She is replaced by a sexually aware, unattainable woman.  The latter fantasy being no less momentary than the first.  Peter Quince well remembers the lesson learned through the elders' mistake.  How could they have foreseen Daniel's meddling in the matter?  Peter Quince is also well aware of his shortcomings, and knows that he, too, will probably be foiled if he dares to act upon his fantasy.  So he sits, isolated, dejectedly plucking at his clavier, refusing to give his Susanna the satisfaction of gloating over herself for all of eternity.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w32XfBVWFqw   

http://www.writing.upenn.edu/~afilreis/88v/blueguitar.html

I have finally made it through Numbers, and perhaps I should now retire my humor lense.

Neith

Today's key lecture question for me was:  "Who has seen the face of God?"  I had assumed that Moses had seen the face of God, because he speaks to Him in what I had interpreted as several face to face encounters.  I had attributed the discrepancy found in the short, lovely narrative in which Moses glimpses God's "back parts" to the patching of redactors, but perhaps I did not read the text closely enough.  This made me think of an inscription apparently found on a statue of Isis ( I have read these words before, but never took the time to really think about them until now):  I am all that is, that was, and that shall be, and no mortal has lifted my veil.  I did know these words were associated with Isis, and that Isis was an ancient Egyptian Goddess, so I wondered if there was any more intertextuality to be explored--especially since these two religions presumably existed around the same time, and in close proximity to one another.  While researching the phrase I discovered that Isis was not the first to utter it.  She had a predecessor named Neith.  Neith was a war goddess in Egyptian religion before the epochs of the pharaohs.  It was said that she made weapons, and that she kept a death watch over the bodies of slain warriors.  Apparently her name can also translate to "water" and "weaver."  She is the mother of Ra.  In later times, because of the interpretation of the word "weaver," she was believed to be the creator of all the universe; for she had woven everything into being on her loom.  She is also famous for arbitrating the bitter feud between Horus and Seth.  I am just as ignorant about Egyptian religion as the Bible, so I did a little research into this feud.

Apparently there were once two predominant gods in the land of Egypt; Horus ruled the northern part of the land, and Seth ruled the southern end.  At some point the two lands became one, and this is where the trouble starts.  Seth is brother to Osiris, Isis, and Nephtys.  Nephtys is Seth's wife and Isis is married to Osiris.  Horus is their son.  Seth is very well known for killing his brother, Osiris, and attempting to murder his nephew Horus.  Horus is awarded full reign over all of the now united land, and Seth is banished to wander the desert forever.  This myth sounds hauntingly familiar.  The same themes of fratricide and banishment and incestuous treachery ( Nephtys slept with her other brother and bore him a son, yet Seth never sired any offspring).  However, some interpretations say that Seth was not all bad.  According to Wikipedia, he came to be viewed as a protector who kept the dangers of the desert at bay.  He is quite often pictured alongside Horus bequeathing the power of divine rule upon the infamous pharaohs. 

Seth was also given the Semite goddesses Astarte and Asat in an attempt to soften any hard feelings incurred after the pantheon's ruling.  This stopped me in my tracks; then led me on another line of research.  I always thought the term "Semite" was a synonym for "Jew" or "Hebrew."  This is how Wikipedia defines the word:  "The term Semite means a member of any of various ancient and modern Semitic-speaking peoples originating in southwestern Asia, including Akkadians, Canaanites, Phoenicians, Hebrews, Arabs, and Ethiopian Semites."  It further states that "the word Semitic is an adjective derived from Shem, one of the three sons of Noah."  It should also be noted that the Semitic family of languages and peoples does not include the Egyptians.  I found a very interesting learning module at wsu.edu/~dee/HEBREWS/WANDER.HTM.  The author admits that virtually nothing is known about the Hebrew occupation in Egypt beyond what is recorded in the Old Testament, but asserts that several educated guesses can be made about the events leading up to migration out of Egypt.  The Hebrews weren't the only Semitic peoples living in ancient Egypt; in fact, for a time, the foreigners were so populous that they ruled over the Egyptians.  Once the Egyptians regained dominance, they either expelled or punished the Semitic peoples residing within their kingdom.  The Egyptians also made several militaristic changes within  their society.  The author believes that "garrisoned" cities cropped up during this time, and taxation in the form of labor was extolled from the Semitic peoples.  This could explain why an Egyptian was beating a Hebrew on that fateful day after Moses was grown, and why Moses, in turn, killed that Egyptian.  That day, generations of bad blood finally came to a boil, and for Moses there was no turning back.  The author even goes so far as to speculate that Moses learned of the religion of Yahweh from the Midianites, and that the Exodus consisted of a mixed band of Semitic people.  I find this very fascinating because this amalgam of beliefs appears to be the rudimentary beginning of Hebrew religion.  "I AM THAT I AM" is not so far removed from "I am all that is, that was, and that shall be...."  Perhaps the pages upon pages of the tedious hashing out of laws and punishments in the book of Leviticus is a testament to the blending of several diverse cultures into one new, complex society.

The Cursed, Cursed Book of Numbers

I am currently bogged down in the Book of Numbers.  My husband's slightly Bible thumping boss(he's a Bible freak, but not one who's over the top), upon learning that I was taking this course, issued a good natured warning about the Book of Numbers.  I pushed the thought to the back of my mind, knowing there would be moments of wading through  doldrums while reading the Bible.  I thought maybe he was referring to another one of those long lists of who begat whom, but with the even more boring task of numbering the masses of Israelites.  Well, I was somewhat correct--there are lists of "begattings" along with a head count, but my husband's boss was actually referring to the pages and pages of redundancy.  Paragraph after paragraph repeating almost the exact same words.  In fact all of the words are identical except for the names and numbers contained therein.  Unfortunately, I have not yet uncovered the "mysterious mental maneuver" that Dr. Sexson urges us to attain.  Surely, this mind trick varies from person to person.  I have tried a few different lenses to avoid auto-pilot reading, all to no avail.  During Genesis I was able to view it as just another creation myth, which made me want to turn the pages and absorb more info to file away for comparison during future readings.  The stories revealing the short-comings of the likes of Abraham and Jacob made me feel better about being human in general.  I always thought that the one thing religious people had over me was the superiority of their scruples, but these stories, which are important, even sacred to many people who keep faith with the three biggest religions, brought the fact that we are all just human, each as imperfect as another, into context for me.  Even God exhibits very human flaws.  He is quick-tempered, and even admittedly jealous.  He regretted drowning the world in the great flood, even though His children had angered Him through their wickedness, and He actually vowed never to do such a thing again.

I was able to use a lens of humor to get through the mind numbing pages of crazily nit-picky laws of Leviticus--case in point, the stoning of murderous oxen in my last blog.  Also, one the most unintentionally hilarious texts I've ever read in my life is located in Leviticus, Chapter 13, verses 40 through 44.  Laws pertaining specifically to bald lepers, need I say more?  But Numbers!  The cursed, cursed Book of Numbers.  This goes beyond boring.  It's not the same as reading receipts.  I actually get the receipt thing because I do pick up pieces of paper and read them, though I always attributed this to just plain nosiness.  Sometimes, when I'm going through my millions of plastic grocery store bags(terrible, I know, but I always forget to throw my reusable shopping bags in the care before I go to the store), I find a receipt still floating around in one.  I always, always fish it out and read the items purchased and look at the date, and try and remember that day.  The strange thing is, I can almost always remember that particular shopping trip.

So I guess the only thing to do is to keep going, and wait patiently for the more juicy parts of the story.  I suppose I could skip ahead to the more exciting parts when my mind is dulled, but I know that I will not return to those sections of text.  This is simply not an option; not only am I taking the endeavor of reading the entire Bible seriously, but my concrete random personality forces me to read texts in chronological order. There exists little to no organization to my life in general, but I must read books from front to back.  Period. 

How's that for redundancy?

I came into this with an open heart.  I really did.  You see, I was completely anti-religion when I was younger.  Though I find flaw in the great majority of Marxist thinking, I always believed he was spot on when he said that "Religion is the opiate of the people."  Now that I'm a bit older (right at thirty--I''m technically not over thirty, yet), and have had more world experience, and learned to have intelligent discussions with people without flying off the handle, I have mellowed out a bit.  People have a right to their beliefs and there is no reason for constant turmoil over minor disagreements.  As I have mentioned before, I have no true religious affiliation.  My family comes from a long line of Lutherans, though none in my memory are actually practicing.  Yet, up until my birth, they have all been baptized in that faith.  My folks figured that I could decide for myself what, if any, religion I wanted to practice.  Consequently, I never read the Bible.  I did think that maybe I would find some comfort and peace within those pages.  Of course I realized that the Bible was not all peaches and cream, but most of it so far I have found either ridiculous or appalling.

Such as the story of Jacob.  This person is really considered to be holy and deserving of a covenant with God?  He is not only sickeningly deceptive, but a coward as well.  After he and his mother trick both Esau and Isaac(one of the few people in Genesis who is actually half-way decent), he runs away because he knows that his brother is not only fully capable of whooping his ass, but also has every right to do so.  He finds himself a new father-in-law to screw over after fourteen years, though I do concede that his father-in-law tricked him into taking Leah over Rachel.  But this little bit of the story tells me two things about Jacob:  1) He can dish it, but he sure can't take it; and 2) He can really hold a grudge.  Of course he eventually returns to his homeland, after he gets one last good one in on his father-in-law, and all is well for slow-witted Esau has forgiven him.  At this point in the story there are still clear examples of his cowardice.  He divides the camps into two regiments so that one half can escape if Esau chose to attack the other half.  Genesis 32:24 says, "And Jacob was left alone: and there he wrestled a man with him until the breaking of the day."  So, after dividing the camps, and sending a lavish offering of apology to his brother, Jacob sat somewhere alone.  I interpret this to mean that he was not in either of his two camps, and therefore is not at risk of being slaughtered with his wives and children.  And what is the deal with this random guy with whom he allegedly wrestles all night?  Plotz explains that it is an angel, and upon a second reading I found that both men were evenly matched, and Jacob refused to let the guy go until he received a blessing.  The "angel" obliged.  I put angel in quotes because I'm not convinced Jacob has enough sand to keep even with an angel in a wrestling match--he couldn't even face Esau.  Jacob's quite the blessing whore, is he not?  I think this is perhaps symptomatic of a lack of confidence.  That would also explain why he sucks so much as a human being. So in conclusion, not a big fan of Jacob.

Now on to the end of Exodus where the priestly writer describes in painstaking detail how God wants His people to set up the tabernacle.  In these passages, God's personality is akin to petulant A-list stars who want only green M&Ms in the candy bowls in their hotel rooms.  He's God for godssakes!  What possible use does he have for all that material stuff?  This seems more like a weak, human desire to have more stuff than anybody else, rather than a Godly decree.  And by the way, aren't the people supposed to not covet thy neighbors' stuff?  Now segue into all those crazy commandments.  Exodus 21: 28 states:  "If an ox gore a man or woman, that they die, then the ox shall be surely stoned, and his flesh will not be eaten."  Seriously?  What is the purpose here?  Are all the other oxen made to witness such stonings so as to discourage further bad behavior from them?  And why can't the flesh be eaten?  And is Exodus 22:29 actually commanding parents to sacrifice--as in kill--their firstborn infant sons?!  I truly would like an answer to this if anybody reading this blog would be so kind. Then of course there is the whole golden calf debacle.  Plotz already  expounds upon the shortcomings of Aaron, so I won't go there.  Obviously God's chosen people have thoroughly pissed Him off, but He forgives them once those in the house of Levi massacre 3,000 of their brethren.  That's nice, isn't it?  I must admit, though, that choosing to worship the golden calf was very poor judgement on behalf of the Israelites.  One would think they ought to know how God is by now.  Especially after witnessing what went down with the Egyptians. 

This whole, long rant does have a point.  Exodus 22:20 clearly forbids sacrificing unto any other god, and 22:28 says not to "revile the gods."  Gods, as in plural.  So there are other gods?  I think I'll take my chances with one of them.  What could they possibly do that's worse than the God of the Old Testament?  With friends like that God, who needs enemies?

The tale of Cain and Abel has long been one of the best known stories of the Bible; and one that I looked forward to the most when I first set out on this endeavor.  Does that make me weird and morbid?  Perhaps, but I am willing to wager that I am far from being in the minority of the population which find this story particularly intriguing.  It is, after all, presumably the first recorded murder in the history of man.  But what is the signifigance of that?  I suppose it all depends on if one reads the Bible for literature and/or history, or if one reads it for the purpose of moral sustainibility.  Obviously, I am prevented from discussing it in the latter sense for many reasons.  One being that that is not the purpose of this class, and another being that I am not particularly religious myself.

I will start out by saying that the reletively short length of the text, and the vague language thoroughly vexed me during my first reading.  Why was God more privy to Abel's offering than Cain's?  Based upon what I've read thus far, I am compelled to assume that these histories were recorded in a place and time that were dominantly patriarichal.  Some may decry me for stating the obvious, but I reiterate that I know nothing of the Bible or the world(s) in which it was created.  So, my first reaction was to assume that God looked upon Abel's offering more favorably because it was more "manly."  A blood sacrifice as opposed to a vegetarian one.  Or perhaps God perceived Abel's sacrifice as more generous, as if Abel were willing to give more of himself to God than his brother.  On closer reading this line jumped out at me:  "And the Lord had respect unto Abel and to his offering.  But onto Cain and to his offering he had not respect" (Genesis 4:4-4:5).  It states that the Lord had no respect unto Abel...  This indicates to me that there wasn't necassarily anything wrong with Abel's offereing, but that the fault lay in the way in which it was made.  Perhaps Abel was more lazy, perhaps he only wanted to attempt to appease God rather than actually accept and obey His laws.  Maybe he was just plain bad from birth.  This theory is supported by the lines that follow.  Immediately Cain became "very wroth, and his countenance fell" (Genesis 4:5).  God tries to correct his wayward son by warning him of the dangers of jealousy and excessive anger.  " 'If thou doest well, shalt thou not be accepted?  and if thou doest not well, sin lieth at the door.  And unto thee shall be his desire, and thou shalt rule over him' " (Genesis 4:7).  God advises Cain not to give into his impetous emotions, but to master them.  In doing this Cain would be able to master sin, rather than sin being his master; and he would therefore be acceptable to God.  But it is not to be.  Cain seems to let his resentment simmer, for he "talks" with his brother, presumably about the offering incident and God's subsequent advice.  Immediately following their conversation, Cain murders Abel without any apparent provocation.  This leads me to believe that under the guise of reconciliation, Cain lures his brother to the field where there would be no witnesses to his premeditated evil deed.

Cain's seemingly purposeful actions lead me to conclude that he knowingly gave a sub-par offering, and cooked up a vengeful scheme of murder to placate his petty ire.  Contrary to Plotz's interpretation of Cain "getting off scot-free," and being rewarded as "the father of all mankind," I see his banishment as the ultimate punishment.  This is especially true if we look at the reality of banishment in those days.  Life was harsh and brutal in those days, the act of banishment is the ultimate punishment, worse even than death.  Not only does Cain have to live his life outside of the Grace of God and the warmth of family, he has to live with what he has done.  Perhaps he is the true definition of a psychopath, and does not rue the murder of his own brother,  but only regrets the punishment.  It doesn't really matter, for the lesson is clear:  what has been done cannot be undone.  Cain chose not to master sin, and now he has to pay for that choice.  Perhaps we are all still paying since mankind is descended of him.  One bad apple really can spoil the whole bunch.

Intertextuality between Genesis and Native American creation stories

Oranda Davis

Like many others in class, I have never read the Bible.  I have also never kept a blog.  Though I did once read Genesis for high school AP English.  That was about a million years ago, but I remember thinking that the very first verses, the seven days that God spent creating the earth, were some of the most beautiful words I've ever read.  I was not disappointed the second time around.

In Genesis 1:21 God creates "great whales, and every living creature that moveth, which the waters brought forth abundantly, after their kind, and every winged fowl after his kind...."  This struck me as similar to many Native American religions which have one Creator, who was responsible for making animal Spirits.  These Spirits would in turn create their own children in their likeness to dwell on Earth.  I found this association intriguing, so I asked my friend, Charles, who is a Crow Indian and an anthropology major, about his people's creation story.  I was actually hoping to draw comparisons between Adam and Eve, and a story containing First Man and First Woman.  The Crow, however, do not spring from a first couple (though Charles assured me that most Native creation stories do in revolve around a first man and woman).  In the beginning there was one supreme being, the Creator, and Old Man Coyote.  The Earth was composed entirely of water, but Old Man Coyote asked several different birds to dive to the bottom and retrieve mud to make dry land.  The duck was the one who succeeded.  Charles noted that Noah also sent birds (a raven and a dove) out after the flood to find dry land.  Once the earth was brought up from beneath the water, Old Man Coyote made clay figures to represent all the different races of people.  To test their bravery (or perhaps faith?), Old Man Coyote set them atop a giant slide and told them to descend into to stakes planted at the bottom.  Each figure leaped off the slide at the last minute for fear of death.  All but the Crow figure, who died and was subsequently resurrected.  And that is how the Crow became Old Man Coyote's favorite people. 

I also found similarities in other tribes' myths.  The Blackfeet's Creator was called Old Man.  He made all the plants, roots, berries, trees, and animals.  When he made people he created a woman and her son, and he covered the clay figures for four days.  On the fourth and final day he bade them to get up and walk.  I found this significant because four is a sacred number to most Native American tribes.  It represents the number of seasons and the four sacred directions of East, West, North, and South.  The first people were also described as "poor and naked," and the myth clearly states that Old Man breathed life into the people and the bison he made to sustain them; just as God breathed life into the people he raised from the dust.  Old Man left his people and travelled west, but vowed always to take care of them.  He also promised to someday return.

I also found a story about a flood on Superstition Mountain in Arizona.  This story comes from the Pima tribe and it is strikingly similar to the story of Noah.  The creator in this story is actually the Great Butterfly, or Earth-Maker, who created man out of his own sweat.  Over time, the people grew to be ungrateful and contentious.  Earth-Maker, being fed up with how the people had become, decided to drown them.  Earth-Maker warned the people to change their wicked ways, but they merely laughed.  Four warnings were sent via the East, West, North, and South Winds, but the only one who listened was a righteous shaman named Suha.  The South Wind instructed Suha and his wife to build a giant ball of spruce gum to weather the impending flood.  After many months, the giant ball settled high atop a mountain.  The people eventually repopulated the earth, but were warned to maintain more pious lives lest Earth-Maker again decided to drown the wickedness from the world.  It was also clearly stated that "only good people would be able to eventually go to live with the Sun God."

The last myth I want to discuss is the Plains Indians' stories of Morning Star, the son of the Sun and Moon.  Morning Star fell in love with a human named Feather Woman.  She went to live with him in the Sky World, where her new father-in-law disapproved of her relationship with his son.  In the Sky World there was a giant turnip which was never to be disturbed.  Feather Woman's curiosity eventually got the best of her.  One day she decided that it wouldn't hurt to just take a peek beneath the root and attempted to dig it out, but her digging stick was too weak.  At that same moment two huge, white cranes came to her aid; unfortunately, the cranes were the "sworn enemies of the Star People."  Through the hole of the uprooted turnip, Feather Woman saw Earth and became homesick.  When she returned to her lodge that night the Sun immediately knew she had done something wrong.  She confessed and was sent back to Earth with her son.  This story bears striking similarities to that of the forbidden fruit of the sacred tree in Eden.  It is interesting that rather than being persuaded by malicious intentions of the cranes, as Eve is by the serpent, Feather Woman makes her own conscious decision.  She is subsequently punished by being cast out of the Sky World and never able to return.

Alas, I had to tear myself away from these stories with the reminder that I am enrolled in a Bible as literature class, and not a mythologies course.  I found these stories and several more at www.indigenouspeople.net/legend.htm.  Of particular interest are the stories of how Indians and white people came to exist (Salish/Flathead), and the great flood of the Yellowstone Valley.