In my previous post I said that the death of 24,000 Israelis was an example of how the Bible often describes unchecked female sexuality as something that brings disaster and death. Terry replied:
I would write "You've got to be kidding" except I know you're not kidding.
Terry also said:
And it was not the sexuality of the women which was an issue, it was the worship of false gods which was the problem.
I agree, but the Bible tells us over and over how women use their sexuality to tempt men to disobey God and also often to worship false gods. So their sexuality is the means that these women use to make the men sin and disobey God.
This pattern is firmly established already in Genesis, in the story about Adam and Eve. God creates Adam for no special reason, except for the obvious reason that God wants Adam to exist. We can say that Adam is created both for his own sake and for God's sake.
Now that God had created Adam, he planted a lovely garden in Eden and put Adam in that garden. There were two very special trees in that garden, too: the tree of life, which would have given Adam eternal life if he had eaten of its fruit, and the tree of knowledge of good and evil. God said to Adam:
"You are free to eat from any tree in the garden; 17 but you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for when you eat of it you will surely die."
We must conclude that God had indeed intended for Adam to eat of the tree of life and become immortal. So God planted the tree of life in the garden of Eden to give Adam eternal life. But God also planted the tree of knowledge of good and evil to test Adam's loyalty and obedience. If Adam ate of that tree, he would die.
But as soon as God has put Adam in the garden with the tree of life and the tree of knowledge of good and evil, he discovers that Adam is alone. After many failed attempts to give Adam the "helper" that he needs God finally creates woman. Please note that woman is created for Adam's sake, while Adam was created for his own sake or for God's sake. God creates woman not because he loves woman but because he loves Adam. Almost certainly God wants Adam to love him back. The tree of knowledge of good and evil exists in the garden as a test of Adam's loyalty to God.
Ah, but the naked woman that God has given to him is so lovely.
There is a serpent in the garden of Eden, and the serpent tempts woman to eat of the fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil:
God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.
The serpent says to woman that if she eats of the forbidden fruit she will be like God. The woman wants to be like God. So she picks some fruits and eats them. And then this happens:
She also gave some to her husband, who was with her, and he ate it.
She also gave some to her husband,
who was with her, and he ate it.
Adam was with her. He must have heard what the serpent said to his wife. He must have seen her pick the fruit and eat it. He must know what is going on. And when his wife offers him some fruit, Adam must make a choice:
Should he do what his wife wanted and eat the fruit?
Should he do what God wanted and refuse to eat the fruit?
Adam ate the fruit. He knew what he was doing. He chose to do what his wife wanted rather than what God wanted. He chose woman over God.
And why? Why did Adam choose woman over God? Well, we know why:
The man and his wife were both naked, and they felt no shame.
Adam chose woman over God because he preferred the sex she gave him over anything that God had given him.
The way I see it, Genesis can be said to describe God and woman as two rivals fighting for the love and loyalty of man. In Genesis, man - Adam - chooses woman over God. So what happens when he makes such a choice?
Death happens. That's what. But first Adam and woman are punished while they are still alive. God rules that woman will have to endure pain during childbirth:
"I will greatly increase your pains in childbearing;
with pain you will give birth to children.
Your desire will be for your husband,
and he will rule over you."
And interestingly, God also decides that from now on, man shall rule over woman.
As for Adam, God says to him:
"Because you listened to your wife and ate from the tree about which I commanded you, 'You must not eat of it,'
"Cursed is the ground because of you;
through painful toil you will eat of it
all the days of your life.
18 It will produce thorns and thistles for you,
and you will eat the plants of the field.
19 By the sweat of your brow
you will eat your food
until you return to the ground,
since from it you were taken;
for dust you are
and to dust you will return."
God punishes Adam by sentencing him to painful toil for the rest of his life to produce the food that he must eat.
I find it very interesting how God describes Adam's sin. God doesn't just say, "Because you ate from the tree about which I commanded you, 'You must not eat of it,' I will punish you." No, God says "
Because you listened to your wife and ate from the tree about which I commanded you, 'You must not eat of it,' I will punish you." Adam's sin began when he listened to his wife.
If woman and God are two rivals for the loyalty of Adam, then Adam's real crime was not so much that he ate the forbidden fruit, but rather that he obeyed God's rival instead of God. By commanding woman to submit to her husband, God forbids her to try to influence Adam any more, and he forbids Adam to listen to his wife. The foremost problem is not so much the details of Adam's transgressions as much as it is his willingness to do woman's bidding instead of God's.
So Adam, man, chose woman over God. This is
the major catastrophe in the Old Testament. Because what does this catastrophe lead to?
As I said, it leads to death. First of all, it leads to Adam's death. God says:
for dust you are
and to dust you will return.
God says this to Adam, not to woman. It is not as if woman won't die, too. Rather it is that her death is not important, because she was never created either for her own sake or for God's sake anyway. Creation was always about Adam, and woman was created for Adam's sake, in the same way that everything else was created for Adam's sake. The catastrophe is that Adam will die even though he was the purpose of creation, and after he is dead woman will serve no purpose. So woman will surely die, but the significance of her death is small compared with the significance of the death of Adam. It is Adam's life and death that matters, and when God drove Adam and his wife out of the Garden of Eden, it is really only Adam's expulsion that is of any significance:
And the LORD God said, "The man has now become like one of us, knowing good and evil. He must not be allowed to reach out his hand and take also from the tree of life and eat, and live forever." So the LORD God banished him from the Garden of Eden to work the ground from which he had been taken. 24 After he drove the man out, he placed on the east side [e] of the Garden of Eden cherubim and a flaming sword flashing back and forth to guard the way to the tree of life.
God drove both Adam and his wife out of the Garden of Eden, but woman's expulsion isn't even mentioned.
The fact that Adam was banished from the Garden of Eden meant that all his descendants for ever and ever were banished from the Garden of Eden, too. And because Adam was prevented from eating from the tree of life because he had chosen woman over God, every man (and every woman) who has ever lived has had to die as a result of Adam's disobedience of God because of woman.
As a fundamentalist Christian Norwegian man who used to beat his wife to discipline her out of love put it, "You women, you are the Fall."
To summarize, God creates Adam for his own sake and woman for Adam's sake, but Adam chooses woman over God, and every human being who has ever lived has to die as a result.
Ann
