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GENESIS THESIS BY GODWIN GUNEWE

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• Published: 18 March 2010

Thirteen Essays on Evolution and Creationism in Modern Debates

Stephen C. Barton and David Wilkinson (eds): Reading Genesis after Darwin. New York: Oxford University Press, 2009. pp. xiv + 254. S/b $24.95

• Kim Paffenroth 1  

Evolution: Education and Outreach volume  3 ,  pages 297–299 ( 2010 ) Cite this article

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This anthology consists of 13 essays written by professors trained in biblical studies or theology, writing on the interpretation of Genesis (by which they almost exclusively mean the first chapter of Genesis) since Darwin’s Origin of Species (1859). After a brief Introduction by the editors, the book is then divided into three parts: “Engaging again with the Scriptures,” “Understanding the History,” and “Exploring the Contemporary Relevance.” It includes an index of modern authors and a subject index. References of works cited are included in the notes for each chapter, though a bibliography at the end would’ve been a welcome addition.

Section 1, “Engaging again with the Scriptures,” includes four essays. In “How Should One Read the Early Chapters of Genesis?” Walter Moberly discusses the implications of taking Genesis as “a literary phenomenon.” His conclusion is probably unremarkable to anyone trained in modern, liberal biblical criticism, and it will recur in similar terms in several of the other essays: Moberly challenges us to see in Genesis biblical ideas such as “wonder and delight of the world, creaturely contingency, creaturely responsibility, the gift of relationship between creature and Creator, and the difficulty that humans have in genuinely trusting God as a wise Creator and living accordingly”. I think he is quite correct that this view maintains the text’s meaning and relevance, without insisting on a literal reading of it.

Francis Watson takes the history of controversy much further back, in his essay, “Genesis before Darwin: Why Scripture Needed Liberating from Science.” He traces what he calls the “annexation” of the Bible by astronomy and geology in the sixteenth to nineteenth centuries: harmonization of the biblical account with scientific findings (e.g. the “days as eons” solution) was done to the detriment or obfuscation of both. Darwin put forth his theory with no reference to Genesis, and according to Watson, this shows a more fruitful and beneficial relationship between Genesis and science—separation or liberation from one another.

In “The Six Days of Creation according to the Greek Fathers,” Andrew Louth discusses the interpretation of Genesis by Theophilos of Antioch and Basil. Louth’s conclusions echo Moberly’s, in that he counsels some of the same attitudes toward creation, showing how ancient theologians regarded the created world with “wonder” and “humility” and were convinced of its “interconnectedness”.

In “The Hermeneutics of Reading Genesis after Darwin,” Richard S. Briggs examines the comparison of Genesis with other ancient Near Eastern texts (a method of biblical study that was coming into vogue contemporaneously with Darwin), concluding that the process and implications of such “triangulating” are similar, whether one is comparing Genesis to the Enuma Elish or to Darwin.

Section 2, “Understanding the History,” includes three essays. It starts with John Rogerson’s “What Difference Did Darwin Make?: The Interpretation of Genesis in the Nineteenth Century,” which examines some biblical commentaries published shortly before and shortly after Darwin’s work, to see what effect (if any) it had on their interpretation of the Genesis text. The examination does a good job of showing there was no unanimity among interpreters as to the meaning of Genesis, and a range of interpretations were advocated, both before and after Darwin. Perhaps even more interestingly, even within the group that rejected his theory, interpretations of Genesis often differed.

John Headley Brooke, in “Genesis and the Scientists: Dissonance among the Harmonizers,” returns to some of the scientific controversies already examined in Watson’s essay, concluding similarly that Darwin’s theory may be more amenable to Christianity than attempts at harmonizing Genesis with current scientific theories, since Darwin “purged it [Christianity] of a semi-deistic position”. This is an important distinction for those who would “defend” the Bible, who too often seem to be defending a deistic position that God created the universe and let it go on its own subsequently, rather than defending the idea of a God who wishes to be in communion with humans (the more narrowly biblical concept of God, in either Jewish or Christian interpretation). He also speaks in terms similar to Moberly and Louth, counseling a “nonliteral reading of the text”, and focusing on the text’s primary relevance to “our human existential condition”. David Brown concludes the section with a discussion of some paintings in his essay, “Science and Religion in Nineteenth- and Twentieth-Century Landscape Art.” The most familiar of these to readers is probably Dali’s “The Sacrament of the Last Supper.”

Section 3, “Exploring the Contemporary Relevance,” includes six essays. David Wilkinson’s “Reading Genesis 1-3 in the Light of Modern Science” gives perhaps the fullest summary of the interpretive issues, compared to the other essays in this collection. He puts Darwin in the context of other, sometimes more fundamental and intractable controversies with the Bible; he briefly describes the creationist alternative (pp. 132-135); he traces the various attempts at harmonization, with their pros and cons; and he lays out possible points where Genesis may still speak to the human condition and understanding. Echoing previous essays in the volume, his conclusion is that a primarily literary approach is needed to understand or appreciate the text, and this will yield an interpretation that does not address cosmogonic or biological data, but rather our “unique conscious intimacy with God”.

In “All God’s Creatures: Reading Genesis on Human and Nonhuman Animals,” David Clough argues that in light of evolution (and other observations of animal consciousness and rationality), Christians should abandon anthropocentric readings of Genesis (what he calls “human-separatist” readings throughout). Jeff Astley argues in “Evolution and Evil: The Difference Darwinism Makes in Theology and Spirituality” that evolution exacerbates the problems of theodicy by making suffering (and large amounts of it) intrinsic to creation.

In “’Male and Female He Created Them’ (Genesis 1:27): Interpreting Gender after Darwin,” Stephen C. Barton examines constructions of gender in the classical world, in the Bible, and in subsequent biblical interpretation, contrasting these with modern and postmodern analyses. Ellen F. Davis looks at how organisms fit into their environment in her essay, “Propriety and Trespass: The Drama of Eating,” drawing some conclusions for our current environmental situation and its (un)sustainability. Finally, Mathew Guest’s essay, “The Plausibility of Creationism: A Sociological Comment,” examines the current popularity of creationism in the USA (and to a much lesser degree in the UK), suggesting some sociological forces that may contribute to its acceptance, despite its logical or factual shortcomings.

Although I was excited when I first began reading this volume, this wore off in the course of study. I would single out three essays for praise. Moberly’s is a very helpful look at how believers could still maintain the importance and sacredness of the biblical text, without interpreting it literally. Rogerson’s is a wonderful and suggestive illustration of how Christian belief and interpretation are never monolithic, and never a matter of “good guys” versus “bad guys.” Wilkinson’s is a thorough and accessible discussion of the issues at stake. But overall, I was struck by how little the book deals with Darwin: it could be entitled “Reading Genesis in the Modern World” with little loss of focus. Several of the essays make only the barest nod toward Darwin before moving on to some topic only tangential to his work. The suggestions for the future interpretation of Genesis (literary criticism, a reading that encourages a sense of wonder and humility, the acknowledgment of human incompleteness and contingency, etc.), while sober and encouraging, are repeated by several contributors without much expansion or specificity (Moberly, Louth, Brooke, Wilkinson); such heuristic suggestions are also commonplace in biblical studies, so I found little new here that couldn’t be found in many introductory classes or texts on Genesis.

Several essays were much more deficient, in my estimation. Briggs’s idea that comparing Genesis to other, contemporaneous myths, and comparing it to a scientific treatise written 2,500 years later, are somehow similar comparisons, and the two interpretive acts can shed light on one another, struck me as odd, if not misleading. It overlooks the more fundamental difference in genre: comparing Genesis to other myths (contemporary with it or not) is probably more helpful to understanding it, than comparing it to scientific writings (from whatever time period, though especially a work that eschews teleological questions, and therefore has a completely different outlook than Genesis). Brown’s essay has little to do with the topic of this collection and barely mentions Darwin or Genesis: its observations would make a fine beginning to a chat about “art and spirituality,” but it has no place here. Clough’s essay doesn’t deal with “stewardship,” which many interpreters today would see as the crucial way to understand the biblical teaching on how humans differ from, and yet are immersed in, the created order. Neither Clough’s nor Barton’s essay deals with the differences between Genesis 1 and 2, again a crucial interpretive issue for understanding the text’s ambiguities (and discrepancies) on anthropocentrism and gender.

I say all this from the perspective of a biblical scholar of a decidedly liberal Protestant bent, for whom these issues are well-worn. Perhaps if I try to step outside of this context (and many of the essays in this collection properly remind us of how much context determines meaning), I might better see where some of these essays could fit into a useful discussion. I’d say that for someone who thinks (as many of my atheist and agnostic friends do) that all Christians are creationists, that all Christians immediately opposed Darwin’s ideas and continue to do so today, or that there is only one way to interpret Genesis—for a reader with such impressions, the better written, more thorough of these essays would prove enlightening, and might promote a dialogue that goes beyond secularists versus Biblicists, those who would discard the text versus those who cling to a literal interpretation of it. Such a dialogue might even become a mutual search for truth, conducted with real exchange, understanding, and respect.

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Paffenroth, K. Thirteen Essays on Evolution and Creationism in Modern Debates. Evo Edu Outreach 3 , 297–299 (2010). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12052-010-0215-3

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Summary of the Book of Genesis

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Genesis Essay

The Creation Of Genesis : Genesis And Genesis

Genesis Genesis is also known as the first book of the Pentateuch written by Moses and it signifies the beginning of when God had first created the Heavens and Earth. The book is divided into two parts; the first describes the events of mankind including the time of the Dispersion, and the second gives a history about Israel and the death of Joseph. “The Fall” “The Fall” is a term used by Christians to explain the process in which the first man and woman moved from a state of innocent obedience

Comparing Genesis And The Genesis Of The Gilgamesh And Genesis

Comparing The Gilgamesh and Genesis There is a collection of evidence to prove and explain how the Israelite people might have known or heard some Babylonian myths. This evidence is shown through similarities in the Genesis creation myths and many Babylonian myths. As an example, there are many similarities shown throughout the Gilgamesh story that relates to the Noah story in Genesis. Some similarities include the heroes character, the order to build a boat, the number of animals, the means

Comparing Genesis And The Flood Story Of Genesis Vs. Gilgamesh

existence, different cultures share stories that may have many meanings; from explaining why mankind exists to how a hero defeats a forest monster. Two well known stories are Genesis and Gilgamesh. Both stories contain a part where there is a flood that wipes out mankind. Although two different stories, the flood story from Genesis and the flood story from Gilgamesh share a plethora of similarities that connect the two stories. Some key similarities include the cause of the flood, the animals on the

The book of Genesis is within the Narrative History and Genealogies genre. Genesis was written by Moses in 1445 B.C. (Hindson & Towns). Genesis is the first book in the entire bible, it tells about the beginning of life. The word Genesis literally means “in the beginning”. The book of Genesis opens with the story of creation. God, a spirit from above an empty void, creates the world by calling for there to be light, sky, land, vegetation, and living creatures over a period of six days, and there

Genesis 1 Vs. Genesis

and Genesis from the Hebrew Bible. Genesis contains two different stories of creation. These are commonly known as Genesis 1 and Genesis 2 which contain very similar details but in different orders. Genesis 1 begins with the creation of heaven and earth while Genesis 2 begins with the creation of man, Adam. Both these stories have immense importance. However, what would be different if there was only version of events? If there was only one version of creation that could be published, Genesis 1 would

Genesis 2 Vs Genesis

There are indeed two stories in Genesis on how we and the world came about. The first story starts at Genesis 1:1 and go through Genesis 2:3; the second story picks up at Genesis 2:4 and goes through the chapter ending at Genesis 2:25. In the first story, The Creation takes six days and man and woman are created last after all the plants and animals are created. In the second story, The Creation focuses on one day the sixth day, the man is created first, then all the plants and animals are created

Creation In Genesis And Genesis

Enuma Elish, which is the Babylonian creation epic, and the book of Genesis in the Bible, what Israelites believe, shows little similar sense but totally different idea of creation. From the first part of each writing, book of Genesis and Enuma Elish, the similarity and difference can be found. In the beginning, the world in both Genesis and Enuma Elish does not have shape. There is nothing but just emptiness before creation in Genesis: “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. Now the

Genesis : Themes In The Book Of Genesis

existence, how everything is the way it is, who God is? Adam and Eve? All these questions are answered in the book of Genesis. Genesis means “in the beginning”, this gives a good introduction to the Bible because Genesis is the first book of the Bible. It begins with the story of God’s creation of the universe. God also reveals himself in the book of Genesis, God is revealed in genesis as the one in who life exists. One also gets to see how God reveals himself through creation, Adam and Eve’s fall and

Genesis : Creation And The Beginning Of Genesis

Genesis is the beginning of the beginning, the basis for the rest of the Bible, and the start of it all. Genesis shows us creation, man’s sinful downfall, man’s rebellion, a chance for redemption, and God’s mercy. Genesis starts off with creation. God spoke into nothing and said, “ Let there be light” and there was light. God then created the sky, land, nature, animals, and humans. It was good until sin entered the world and corrupted it. Adam and Eve sinned against God and here was the start

Genesis : The Beliefs Of Abraham And Genesis

In Genesis chapter twenty two, verses one through nineteen, God told Abraham to sacrifice Isaac. As Abraham obeyed, the Lord sent an angel who provided a ram instead and blessed Abraham by reiterating the promises. In Genesis chapter eighteen, verses sixteen through thirty three, Abraham pleaded to God not to kill the people of Sodom. Then Abraham bargained with God about how many good people could save the city, saying there could be at least ten good people. Abraham responds to God in two different

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Essay on genesis.

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The Bible is a fascinating text that approaches the issue of creation in very different lights. Genesis maintains different explanations for how the world came into existence; one is a literal creation story, the second is based on the conception of free will present in mankind. This sample religious studies paper explores the origin story of the Bible.

The two sides of Genesis' creation story

The first chapter in the Bible is the book of Genesis where we learn of the creation of the earth including all its plants, animals, the creation of man and woman, and of original sin. This creation is described in two ways in Genesis.

• The literal creation of the earth occurring over six days, with the seventh day reserved for rest
• Free will has always been a choice for man

Chapter one discusses the logistical development of the earth, while chapter two introduces Adam and Eve. Chapter three outlines the fall of man from paradise and introduces the idea of original sin. In this essay, we will explore the various points of the creation stories concluding that in the first story God created the earth and it is good.

Adam and Eve's fall from grace was caused by committing the original sin. Original sin was committed by exercising free will in disobedience of God. Throughout these stories, ideas of morality and proportional punishment are discussed as well as man’s threat against God when he acquires knowledge.

Genesis chapter 1: A creation designed by God

Genesis 1 chronicles the seven days it took for God to create the earth. At the end of Genesis 1 the earth, sky, land, water, plants, and animals are all created. The most important point to get from Genesis chapter one is that God created the whole world and that it is good. The light the dark the mornings and the evenings are all good and all part of God’s creation. This is emphasized because it is presumed that all things God does are good, and it started with the literal creation of the earth.

Genesis chapter 2: God's original plan for mankind

In Genesis chapter 2 God creates man by forming him from the dust of the earth and then breathing life into him through his nostrils (Genesis 2:7). Thus, Adam was created. God took Adam and placed him in the garden of Eden to tend to the garden (Genesis 2:15). Then God decided that man needed a helper to tend to the garden. Each animal that God had created was presented to Adam to be named. After naming all the animals a suitable helper was not found (Genesis 2:20). God placed Adam in a deep sleep.

While sleeping, God removed a rib from Adam and from that rib created a woman for Adam’s help and company (Genesis 2:21-22). God presented woman to man and Adam names her Eve. According to Biblical history , Adam and Eve were then set to live forever in paradise in ignorance of good and evil. God filled the garden with abundance and two very important trees, the tree of life, and the tree of knowledge of good and evil. God commanded Adam before Eve came along not to eat of the fruit of the tree of knowledge. It is assumed Eve was aware of this restriction when she was tempted by the serpent.;

Genesis chapter 3: The original sin

In Genesis chapter 3 we see the fall of man from paradise and the introduction of original sin. The consequences for eating from the tree of knowledge of good and evil were quite severe. Toward the end of Chapter 3, God is harsh on Adam and Eve for disobeying him. The ultimate question is why was God so harsh on Adam and Eve? Was it more of the act of defiance, or the effect of the fruit?

The punishment received by Adam and Eve seems disproportionate from just disobeying God, the effect of the fruit, the new knowledge was more of the issue for God in leveling his punishment. Platonic Christian thought looks at God's wrath in a different light. They see it as the basis for realizing divine love and the catalyst for salvation.

The serpent had warned that if Eve ate of the apple that, “But the serpent said to the woman, ‘You will not die; for God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil” (Genesis 3:4-5).

The serpent was correct, once Adam and Eve partook of the forbidden fruit, they immediately acknowledged their nakedness and had instant knowledge of good and evil. This was apparent when God confronted both Adam and Eve on what they had done.

Adam and Eve learn to pass the buck

God had to know something was up when he arrived in Eden to find Adam and Eve now clothed in loincloths. When confronted, Adam blamed Eve, who blamed the serpent. This certainly represents a knowledge of good and evil, the act of blaming and the guilt of knowing you have done something that you knew was wrong. This also represents a proper evaluation of the idea of ignorance which was the state of Adam and Eve before eating the fruit.

They hadn’t felt guilt before because they had not sinned before and the sin was not eating the apple, the sin was disobeying God. Now the mother and father of all humankind were endowed with knowledge of good and evil and would spread that to each of their children, the entire human race. This presents a contradiction where it appears that wisdom is also a sin.

God's punishment for the original sin

Punishments leveled against Adam and Eve by God was severe. There must be more to the problem than just disobeying God.

God says in Genesis 2:22, “Then the Lord God said, ‘See, the man has become like one of us, knowing good and evil; and now, he might reach out his hand and take also from the tree of life, and eat, and live for ever’ (Genesis 2:22).

Through this statement, God implies that there are others who are immortal and have knowledge of good and evil. The fear of God is that they will eat of the tree of life as well and live forever. This suggests that to become like one of us is to be immortal with wisdom. This appears to be rather threatening to God and He immediately banishes Adam and Eve from Eden to toil the ground, work the earth for sustenance, and suffer in childbirth.

He also places desire into Eve and makes her subservient to her husband, “Yet your desire shall be for your husband, and he shall rule over you.” (Genesis 2:16).

The wording here is curious, God says that woman will endure pain for childbirth but will still desire her husband. The punishment exacted by God seems harsh. This introduces the challenges of being a human with free will and the constant challenges of making moral decisions.

Themes of temptation, condemnation, and sin in Genesis

God’s punishment addresses each of the problems eating of the fruit presented. Serpent tempts woman, woman listens, convinces man, and all suffer a consequence. For the serpent, it's condemnation to scurry the earth. For the woman, creating a system of gender roles that make her subservience to her husband, desire for him, and experience pain in childbirth. For man, having to live in hard labor. Additionally no more existence in paradise, and no immortality.

The consequences for this choice were severe. Regarding this situation, it's not fair to blame the serpent because it did not lie to Eve. Adam and Eve had no ability to make a moral choice regarding the sin because they didn’t know that there were consequences except that God had told them they would die if they ate the fruit.

He was truthful in the sense that they would die sometime, he told Adam that, “You may freely eat of every tree of the garden; but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall die” (Genesis 2:16-17).

God's sovereignty threatened by Adam and Eve's action

Before the serpent tempted Eve, there was no question but to obey God’s command, don’t eat of that tree, it was not questioned it just is. It wasn’t until the serpent suggested doubt in God’s word that Eve began to make a moral judgment. The serpent responds that Eve will not die if she eats of the fruit. This contradicts what God told Adam and Adam told Eve. The serpent was correct, Adam and Eve did not die when they ate the fruit. They made a choice without thought of the consequences.

They didn’t know that if they ate of the fruit they would be kicked out of Eden, what they did know was that God told them they would die, however that wasn’t enough for Adam and Eve and they decided to trust the serpent. Adam and Eve had the choice whether they knew it or not to eat of the forbidden fruit, this is free will. The punishment for rejecting God’s command was severe for Adam and Eve. The choice is to follow God without question or to suffer whatever punishment may come along.

Genesis' translation of God's role in the original sin

God was not fully truthful with Adam and Eve by saying they would die if they ate from the tree of knowledge and the serpent knew that too. Yes, they would die, but when was the question. It could mean that they would lose the opportunity to be immortal in paradise. Christian ethics seems to confirm this hypothesis and teaches followers not to disobey God's commandments, or they will suffer eternal damnation.

They serpent was correct in everything he said as well, “But the serpent said to the woman, ‘You will not die; for God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil" (Genesis 2:4-5).

He said that if they ate of the forbidden fruit they would become more like God. The concern was that if Adam and Eve were to remain in Eden they would continue to disobey God and become immortal, and, “Like one of us” (Genesis 2:22). It is assumed that to be like one of us would include being immortal with knowledge of good and evil. This was not what God intended for Adam and Eve, or maybe it was all part of His divine plan. 

Creation stories and theology in Genesis

There is much packed into the creation stories in the Bible. First, the literal creation of the physical earth. The most important points to take away from that story is that God created the earth and it is good. Also, that man was created from the dirt of the earth, and woman from the flesh of the man, therefore, humankind's connection to the earth is absolute.

In the second story, we see the fall of man from paradise after acquiring knowledge of good and evil against God’s command. This is original sin, lack of faith in God. The consequences were a life of work and pain on earth which is not paradise. The interesting facets of the creation story are the notions that always man had free will. They always had a choice to obey or not to obey God and that choice remains today.

Works Cited

Anderson, Bernhard W.. Understanding the Old Testament. Abridged 5th ed. Upper Saddle River, N.J.: Pearson Prentice Hall, 2007. Print.

Bennett, Stephen J. "Old Testament Theology, vol. 1, Israel’s Gospel (review)." Toronto Journal of Theology 28.2 (2012): 319-321. http://muse.jhu.edu. Web. 9 Dec. 2012.

The Holy Bible: containing the Old and New Testaments with the Apocryphal/Deuterocanonical books : New Revised Standard Version.. New York: Oxford University Press, 1989. Print.

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• Religious Studies

Sample Essay on The Book of Genesis

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Various chapters in Genesis tend to propose that human beings are either good by nature or evil by nature. Starting from Genesis 3 where Eve was deceived by the serpent, to when Joseph was sold by his brothers to Midianite traders, human beings managed to portray their evil nature. However, human beings also demonstrated themselves as good by nature, starting from Abel, who offered God the right offering to Joseph, who opted to forgive his brothers who sold him to Egypt.

Some of the chapters in Genesis depict a contradiction of information. For instance, Genesis 1:1 to Genesis 2:3 contradict the information in Genesis 2:4-22 concerning the order of creation. While Genesis 1 represents creation chronologically, Genesis 2 indicates a thematic development of creation, with much stress on humanity. Another contradiction is found in genesis 10:5 were descendants of Japheth had their own language while Genesis11:1 indicated that the entire world was using one language.

The book of Genesis demonstrated humanity and its weaknesses. The challenges that humans went through illustrated that humans are bound to err. Despite being warned not to eat fruits from the tree of knowledge, Adam and Eve went ahead and ate the fruit. Cain killed his brother because of hatred while Abraham went ahead and bore a child with a slave, despite being promised a son who was to be conceived by Sarah.

At the beginning of Genesis 2, God opted to rest on the seventh day (Sabbath) to signify that He had finished his work. The verse does not indicate that God needed rest. Instead, it implied that God had just finished the work of creation, and was just appreciating what He had created. I believe that God is all-powerful : He does not need rest. Besides, there was no indication that He continued the work of creation the following day.

One of the similarities of creation from chapter 1 and 2 are that they do not diverge with regard to the order of creation, as both admit that creation took six days to complete. However, the differences in creation stories are that the first chapter illustrated the sixth day as the zenith of creation, but chapter two offered vivid details concerning the creation of man. While chapter one indicated that plants were created on the third day, chapter two indicated that before the creation of man, there was no vegetation on the earth.

After reading Genesis 2:25 and Genesis 3:10, one can identify some similarities as well as differences. The two verses depicted that Adam and Eve were created naked, and they were not ashamed of their nakedness. However, the two verses differ from each other concerning what was considered normal. While it appeared normal for Adam and Eve to be naked in Genesis 2, Genesis 3 implied that Adam and Eve were ashamed of being naked, and had to hide from God.

According to the book of Genesis, nobody was closer to God than Abraham. In chapter 12, God ordered Abram to move to an unknown land, although Abram feared of his safety and age. Abram agreed to move because he was faithful to God. In chapter 15, God promised Abraham that his descendants would be as many as the stars, yet Abraham did not have a son. In chapter 17, God continued to insist on His promise to Abraham, where Abraham was promised a son named Isaac . The promise began by circumcising all males, including slaves and their male children.

In chapter 12, God commanded Abram to move out of his original homeland for an unknown land. Abram took his belongings, together with his wife Sarai, and Lot, his brother, and trekked towards the promised land. Abram feared that he might be killed by Egyptians due to the attractiveness of his wife and pretended that Sarai was his sister. Sarai is snatched from Abram and taken to Pharaoh’s house to become the king’s wife, an act that brought plagues to Pharaoh’s house. Pharaoh discovered that Sarai was Abram’s wife and ordered them to leave the country. The moral lesson of the story is that people should believe in God’s promise without doubt, as whoever God wishes to bless cannot fall into any harm.This story depicts that the moral truth is not affected by the historical truth.

“The Book Of Genesis.” Vatican , n.d, https://www.vatican.va/archive/bible/genesis/documents/bible_genesis_en.htmlAccesssed 27 March 2017.

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Reading Genesis by Marilynne Robinson: one long sermon

This dense read feels a bit like sitting on a hard wood pew in itchy sunday best.

Pulitzer Prize-winning author Marilynne Robinson: her nonfiction is denser and more dogmatic than her fiction. Photograph: Getty

Hailing from northern Idaho – the American frontier – Marilynne Robinson is among our most revered living novelists. Her debut, Housekeeping (1980), received critical acclaim, but it was the Pulitzer Prize-winning Gilead (2004) that put her on the literary map. The three novels that followed – Home (2008), Lila (2014) and Jack (2020) – returned to the same story but from different points of view; the quartet has been compared to the Gospels .

In the 24-year gap between her first two novels, in addition to writing nonfiction and teaching at the Iowa Writers’ Workshop, Robinson immersed herself in theological study. Having grown up in a “ pious and Presbyterian ” family, she now adheres to Congregationalism, a subsect of Calvinism that she discovered in Hermann Melville’s Moby Dick. Her faith infuses her fiction: Housekeeping is full of Biblical allusions; Gilead is voiced by John Ames, a Congregationalist pastor wrestling with reconciling his faith with real life.

In Reading Genesis, Robinson turns her attention to the source text, with the King James version of Genesis included in the volume. Just as Calvin upheld sola scripture, or the authority of scripture, Robinson has referred to the first book of the Bible as “ God’s self-introduction ”. She believes that the Bible most likely had multiple authors, collectively guided by the Holy Spirit, and that reading it as literature does not diminish its divinity.

The crux of Robinson’s thesis is that Genesis shows a benevolent God and the goodness of creation. “This world is suited to human enjoyment,” she writes. The reputation of the “Old Testament God” as punitive is unsupported by the text, she argues. The Flood, for example, resulted not from a vengeful God but from the evil brought on by “the thoughts of men’s hearts”. The misinterpretation is partly a translation problem: “vengeance” is a less accurate translation from the Hebrew than “judgment”. God shows “restraint” in Genesis, Robinson believes, with Cain and Joseph’s brothers, for example. If we “are to be granted individuality, agency, freedom, meaningful existence as human beings, then God must practice almost limitless restraint”.

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Righteousness, which has the power to save a city (Sodom) or Creation (Noah), “is a very important word in Scripture, too little considered by interpreters, perhaps”, she writes. Yet God’s expectation of righteousness does not preclude his unwavering forgiveness. The story of Cain, for example, shows that “we are disastrously erring and rebellious, and irreducibly sacred. And God is mindful of us.”

As to the age-old question of why a benevolent God would allow so much suffering, Calvin’s version of providence suggests widening the lens to take “a God’s-eye view” – it is only in the fullness of time that his purpose is revealed. Robinson is less heavy on predestined damnation than Calvin, pitching God’s forgiveness as gentler than judgment based on free will. Yet she still sees the Israelites’ 400-year enslavement in Egypt as providential. God “chose to let us be”, she writes, “to let time yield what it will – within the vast latitude granted by providence”.

Robinson holds a PhD in English; she wrote Housekeeping as a distraction from her dissertation on Shakespeare. Reading Genesis, as such, promises a literary close read in addition to the theological one. Robinson makes a convincing case for the Bible as a kind of ur-novel. In a departure from Babylonian and Assyrian mythology, which foregrounded gods, “the remarkable realism of the Bible, the voices it captures, the characterisation it achieves, are products of an interest in the human that has no parallel in ancient literature,” she writes. Furthermore, by creating us in God’s image, “the centrality of humankind in the creation myth of Genesis is from the beginning an immeasurable elevation of status”.

[  In praise of older books: Housekeeping by Marilynne Robinson (1980)  ]

[  Bleak and courageous: Lila, by Marilynne Robinson  ]

Her literary analysis of Biblical stories tends to get trumped by her theological objective, however, which is to demonstrate God’s grace. Robinson has taught Bible classes and given occasional sermons at her church. Her nonfiction works include a collection of lectures she gave at Yale and four essay collections on her principal preoccupations, which include civics, science, religion and consciousness. She once told Barack Obama in conversation that her essays “are actually lectures”, and Reading Genesis has a similar oratory quality. With no chapter headings or introduction to orient the reader, the book reads like a long sermon, in both senses of the word.

Reading Genesis is not without its pleasures. I enjoyed Robinson’s analysis of narrative techniques, etymology and how translation has affected interpretation. But a beach read, it is not. Her nonfiction is denser and more dogmatic than her fiction: I missed John Ames’s gentle self-questioning. Without the empathy and elegance of the novels, for this lay reader, it felt like sitting on a hard wood pew in itchy Sunday best. There were flashes of inspiration, but I found myself squirming in my seat.

Mia Levitin

Mia Levitin, a contributor to The Irish Times, is a cultural and literary critic

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