Seoul Hero

This post follows on the preceding post, in which I commented on Genesis 1. Genesis 2, of course, doesn’t actually begin in chapter two verse 1, and it’s unfortunate that the chapter divisions (which were made long after the text of the book was written and edited together), begin so badly so quickly.

2:4 These are the generations of the heavens and the earth in the day that they were created, in the day that the LORD God made the heavens and the earth. 5. And every plant of the field before it was in the earth, and every herb of the field before it grew: for the LORD God had not caused it to rain upon the earth, and there was not a man to till the ground.

The very first part of verse 4 is a structural formula that is used throughout the book of Genesis, and may have been added later. “The day that the LORD God made…” functions as a title. While it’s true that “yom” can sometimes mean “time,” it usually means “day,” and the forced efforts to harmonize Genesis 1 with Genesis 2 by biblical literalists cannot succeed, for they are two different documents. Notice the order of creation events is totally different, as is the writing style, and the method of creation.

The verse and punctuation division after “earth.” is most unfortunate, because verse 5 continues providing the object of the verb “made.”

“LORD” of course, denotes the Hebrew name of God, “Yahweh.” When the ancient Jewish scribes added vowel points to their language, which was written only with consonants, originally, they chose to point the divine name with the vowels of the word for “lord”: ‘adonai. When the German Protestant revolution happened, the “y” was transliterated as a “j” (which, of course, has the same sound in German), giving us a divine name that never existed in ancient times: Jehovah. This name was adopted, with English pronunciation of the j, later. The use of this name of God throughout the passage is one reason why scholars name this document “J.” Both “J,” and “P,” together with other documents that include “E” (for “Elohist”) and “D” (for “Deutoronomist”) have been woven together by a series of what scholars call “redactors” (sometimes postulating R1, R2 etc.), or editors, into what we now call the “Pentateuch,” the first five books of the Bible.

But there went up a mist from the earth, and watered the whole face of the ground. And the LORD God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul. And the LORD God planted a garden eastward in Eden; and there he put the man whom he had formed. 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.
In Genesis 1, God created plants first, then animals, and then humans. In Gen. 2, he creates man first, then plants the garden, and then creates the animals last of all (verse 19). Unfortunately, the most popular translation of the Bible used by evangelical Christians, the New International Version, deliberately mistranslates the tense of “had been formed.” This was done on the basis of a linguistic argument that has not won over any non-religious scholars, and this attempt at harmonizing the two passages still fails.

The next verses (2:10b ff) relate what I call “primitive geography,” and are likely a later addition of (still) early material. They do not relate to the passage in any meaningful way.

And the LORD God took the man, and put him into the garden of Eden to dress it and to keep it.
The verbs in this passage are the very opposite of the problematic verbs from Genesis 1. Here, the verbs mean “serve” and “take care of.” The role of Man is that of a cultivator of the ground or land.

Hebrew has different words for “man.” In Gen. 2, the words ‘ish and ‘adam are both used. Man, ‘adam, is made by Yahweh God from the ground–this time not ” ‘eretz,” but ” ‘adamah.” Similarly, when Yahweh God literally, in Hebrew, “builds the woman,” he makes a being that “Adam” will call ” ‘ishah,” since she has been taken out of ‘ish. Genesis is full of such verbal plays, even if the etymologies are not always precise.

In Gen. 2, then, God “forms” (the Hebrew word suggests a potter at work) the man, “builds” the woman, “plants” the garden. He’s a very hands-on God, not at all the aloof being who creates by speaking commands. Yahweh God also does not know everything:

18. And the LORD God said, It is not good that the man should be alone; I will make him an help meet for him. 19. And out of the ground the LORD God formed every beast of the field, and every fowl of the air; and brought them unto Adam to see what he would call them: and whatsoever Adam called every living creature, that was the name thereof. 20. And Adam gave names to all cattle, and to the fowl of the air, and to every beast of the field; but for Adam there was not found an help meet for him.
The phrase “to see what he would call them” means the same thing in Hebrew that it does in English: that God doesn’t know what the man will call the animals. This God seems much more playful than the one in Genesis 1, insofar as he gets his hands dirty and even allows his best creature to name the others.

There are two things happening in verses 18-19. Why are these verses juxtaposed? This is an example of the incredible narrative tightness so characteristic of the ancient world. Unlike the insertion of the primitive geography above, these two elements are juxtaposed for very good literary reasons. The Jewish interpretive tradition has not been neglectful of the reasons for juxtaposition, and one text even imagines Adam saying “Zebra–but not a helper suitable for me. Horse–but not a helper suitable for me.”

It is at this point that Yahweh God realizes that he has forgotten something, and so he improvises by “building” the woman. Adam names her “Eve” (the English sounds nothing like her name in Hebrew, which recalls the word for “living”).

The passage closes with another aetiology. “Daddy, why did Jonah move out of our house and in with a woman?” “Because he got married, my son.” “And why did he do that?” “Because Adam and Eve were together in Eden, and when you are older, you will “stick to” a woman, too!” “Yuck!”