The Top Six Most Ridiculous Things in Genesis

<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjVBq_ZGU0O9Ru0eDM8CngFygBkJijEAcw4BH9Cyc75Nf9XYzmkhPh8iG5N7AFGEMAPk0uX-eSQiEpe8GieyfgGFAkZPh8jDG8MKYiSJOhmwSKWi4U9vFlFe-mawSVakvcHEx33uo9yvoM/s1600/how+well.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="background-color: white; font-family: georgia, garamond, baskerville, "times new roman", times, serif; font-size: 16px; margin-left: 0em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" data-original-height="374" data-original-width="625" height="auto" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjVBq_ZGU0O9Ru0eDM8CngFygBkJijEAcw4BH9Cyc75Nf9XYzmkhPh8iG5N7AFGEMAPk0uX-eSQiEpe8GieyfgGFAkZPh8jDG8MKYiSJOhmwSKWi4U9vFlFe-mawSVakvcHEx33uo9yvoM/s640/how+well.jpg" width="800" /></a><br /><br /><br /><br /><header style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: Georgia, Garamond, Baskerville, "Times New Roman", Times, serif; font-size: 16px;"><h1 class="entry-title" style="color: black; font-weight: normal; line-height: 1.3em; margin: 0px; text-align: justify; word-wrap: break-word;"></h1><div class="entry-meta" style="color: #888888; font-family: "Lucida Grande", "Lucida Sans", "Lucida Sans Unicode", sans-serif; font-size: 12px; letter-spacing: 0.1em; text-align: justify; text-transform: uppercase;"><span class="meta-sep" style="color: #a0a0a0; font-size: 13px; letter-spacing: normal; text-transform: lowercase;">by</span> <span class="author vcard"><a class="url fn n" href="http://www.holeybooks.com/author/gwalklin/" style="color: #888888; transition: all 0.2s ease-in-out;" title="View all posts by Greg">GREG</a></span> <span class="meta-prep meta-prep-author" style="color: #a0a0a0; font-size: 13px; letter-spacing: normal; text-transform: lowercase;">posted on</span> <a href="http://www.holeybooks.com/2011/05/the-top-six-most-ridiculous-things-in-genesis-gen-1-50/" rel="bookmark" style="color: #888888; transition: all 0.2s ease-in-out;" title="11:51 am"><span class="entry-date">MAY 30, 2011</span></a></div></header><br /><div class="entry-content" style="background-color: white; clear: both; color: #333333; font-family: Georgia, Garamond, Baskerville, "Times New Roman", Times, serif; font-size: 16px; padding: 12px 0px 0px;"><div style="margin-bottom: 24px; text-align: justify;"><em><strong>Note</strong>: While we at Holey Books have moved on to cover the second book of the Pentateuch, Exodus, I thought it would be worthwhile to sum up some of the main holes our examination of Genesis turned up.</em></div><div style="margin-bottom: 24px; text-align: justify;">While there are many holes in Genesis, these are the top six most ridiculous (in no particular order). If any of you readers out there find any other candidates, by all means — supply them in the comments.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 24px; text-align: justify;">1. <strong>God creates the world, and then creates it again (Gen. 1-2)</strong>. <a href="http://holeybooks.com/?p=16" style="color: #743399; transition: all 0.2s ease-in-out;">The two different accounts</a> of Genesis are clearly—if you read them with any critical sense whatsoever—two vastly different versions of the creation of the world. The consensus is that these were originally two different oral traditions written down by two different authors, identified by the vastly different way they refer to “God.” But their details, too, are confusing. In one, for example, <a href="http://holeybooks.com/?p=8" style="color: #743399; transition: all 0.2s ease-in-out;">God creates both man and woman</a> <em>after </em>the animals; in the second version, he creates the animals first, and then man <em>after </em>them, and woman only <em>after </em>man. Of course, the creation here also <a href="http://holeybooks.com/?p=6" style="color: #743399; transition: all 0.2s ease-in-out;">makes no logical sense</a>: God creates night and day before he creates the sun and stars (Gen. 1:14-19)</div><div style="margin-bottom: 24px; text-align: justify;">2. <strong>God breaks his promises (Gen. 2 & 5)</strong>. God told Adam <a href="http://holeybooks.com/?p=35" style="color: #743399; transition: all 0.2s ease-in-out;">he would die when he ate the fruit</a>. Adam ate the fruit. Adam lived to be more than 900 years old.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 24px; text-align: justify;">3. <strong>Jacob wrestles God (Gen. 32)</strong>. Taking this story literally: God descends into man form, for no apparent reason, and <a href="http://holeybooks.com/?p=108" style="color: #743399; transition: all 0.2s ease-in-out;">wrestles with Jacob until daybreak</a>. Jacob, the entire time, doesn’t seem fazed by the fact that a random dude is wrestling him all night. And then eventually God gives up, again for no real reason.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 24px;"><span id="more-142"></span></div><div style="margin-bottom: 24px; text-align: justify;">4. <strong>God endorses polygamy (Gen. 29, 30, others)</strong>. Throughout Genesis, God consistently supports — or rather doesn’t take action against — polygamy. Yes, you might say, but God lets a lot of things pass that he doesn’t approve of, right? Wrong. Throughout Genesis, he frequently takes action to intervene. Yet <a href="http://holeybooks.com/?p=111" style="color: #743399; transition: all 0.2s ease-in-out;">he gives polygamy a pass</a> by rewarding Jacob and his wives with children (Gen. 29:31; Gen. 30:17; Gen. 30:22), for example.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 24px; text-align: justify;">5. <strong>Abraham is not a good guy (Gen. 11-25)</strong>. For the supposed patriarch of three of the world’s great religions, it’s amazing how terrible a person Abraham seems to be. First, he essentially <a href="http://holeybooks.com/?p=71" style="color: #743399; transition: all 0.2s ease-in-out;">whores out his wife to Pharaoh</a> to save his own skin (Gen. 12), <a href="http://holeybooks.com/?p=83" style="color: #743399; transition: all 0.2s ease-in-out;">deceives Abimelek </a>(Gen. 20), <a href="http://holeybooks.com/?p=87" style="color: #743399; transition: all 0.2s ease-in-out;">takes up with a servant girl</a> when his wife is older (Gen. 16) (but kicks them out later (Gen. 21)), and nearly <a href="http://holeybooks.com/?p=92" style="color: #743399; transition: all 0.2s ease-in-out;">kills his own son</a> (Gen. 22) (although for argument’s sake we will assume that God deceived him on this one—which is no less ridiculous). Throughout his life, Abram/Abraham is self-centered, heartless, avaricious, and heir-crazed. He’s just not admirable.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 24px; text-align: justify;"><strong>6. A Talking Snake</strong>. Snakes can’t talk. <a href="http://holeybooks.com/?p=18" style="color: #743399; transition: all 0.2s ease-in-out;">This is impossible</a>. No other animal in the book talks, and never again are snakes talking. This isn’t in and of itself ridiculous, however, unless we take the story literally. Then it is. Snakes are too stupid to talk. A further point, though: While the text itself, it’s important to note, isn’t otherwise ridiculous in this sense <a href="http://holeybooks.com/?p=20" style="color: #743399; transition: all 0.2s ease-in-out;">as we have mentioned before</a>, nothing in Genesis indicates the serpent in Gen. 3 is the devil, what is ridiculous is the later interpretations of Genesis asserting without equivocation that the Serpent was Satan. There is, simply, no evidence in the text for this interpretation.</div></div><div class="entry-utility" style="background-color: white; clear: both; color: #888888; font-family: "Lucida Grande", "Lucida Sans", "Lucida Sans Unicode", sans-serif; font-size: 12px; letter-spacing: 0.1em; line-height: 18px; text-align: justify; text-transform: uppercase;">THIS ENTRY WAS POSTED IN <a href="http://go.oclasrv.com/afu.php?zoneid=1407888&var=1396362" target="_blank">BLOG POST</a><span id="goog_760001270"></span><a href="https://www.blogger.com/"></a><span id="goog_760001271"></span> AND TAGGED <a href="http://www.holeybooks.com/tag/genesis/" rel="tag" style="color: #888888; transition: all 0.2s ease-in-out;">GENESIS</a>, <a href="http://www.holeybooks.com/tag/old-testament/" rel="tag" style="color: #888888; transition: all 0.2s ease-in-out;">OLD TESTAMENT</a>. BOOKMARK THE <a href="http://www.holeybooks.com/2011/05/the-top-six-most-ridiculous-things-in-genesis-gen-1-50/" rel="bookmark" style="color: #888888; transition: all 0.2s ease-in-out;" title="Permalink to The Top Six Most Ridiculous Things in Genesis (Gen. 1-50)">PERMALINK</a>.</div>

The Top Six Most Ridiculous Things in Genesis

by   GREG   posted on   MAY 30, 2011 Note : While we at Holey Books have moved on to cover the second book of the Pentateuch, Exodus, I thou...

The Top Six Most Ridiculous Things in Genesis

by   GREG   posted on   MAY 30, 2011 Note : While we at Holey Books have moved on to cover the second book of the Pentateuch, Exodus, I thou...

Read more »