The Bible: Commentary and Controversy

To be scrupulously exact, the second law of thermodynamics deals with an entire system, which is what we were considering in Part I. However, the law does not prohibit subsystems from progressing toward order without a systemic positive energy source; there can be specific directional forces within the system that facilitate or dictate orderly growth. For example: snowflakes with their six-sided crystalline symmetry are formed spontaneously from randomly moving water vapor molecules. Salts with precise planes of crystalline symmetry form spontaneously when water evaporates from a solution. Seeds sprout into flowering plants and eggs develop into chicks. This subset of the law would, of course, be embraced by proponents of evolution. It could also account for isolated people, places, civilizations, and other things progressing toward order within our system (the earth) since the beginning of time.

But because this is my study, I don’t have to stay on subject. So… Here’s the deal. Bill Maher and a few million other people don’t believe in God, or as far as I can tell, any god except money, sadism, irresponsibility, and hypocrisy. And some of them are pretty aggressive about it. My point is if you don’t believe in some higher power you can never exceed your own limits. Everyone develops expectations of themselves over time. Kay, my wife, believes she’s not good with numbers — had a terrible time with algebra in school. She can’t exceed that limitation. At least she can’t exceed that limitation without the belief that she can. And as far as I can tell she can’t develop that belief without first believing in something else. Maybe something as un-ephemeral as a math tutor.

So if Bill Maher, for instance, only believes in himself, then he can never be more than that — can never exceed his own expectations of himself. That seems to be quite adequate for Mr. Maher, but some of us would like to grow beyond our own self-set limits.

Come to think of it, that hypothesis has been proven countless times, at countless levels. When, for example, a charismatic leader pops up in a group, or state, or country, and his/her followers/constituents begin to believe they can accomplish things they had never thought possible. Probably this also ties into some/most people’s desire to be a part of something greater than themselves. If I am on a quest, say to rid congress of liars, cheats, thieves, rascals, lechers, wastrels, and narcissicists, can that quest make me greater than I am? Can it help me to exceed my own expectations of myself? Well, yeah. Because then that quest becomes our god, right? And sometimes someone believes in him/herself so strongly he/she thinks she has superpowers. And so believing, he/she outgrows his/her self.

Whether you believe the Bible is apocryphal or the immutable word of God, the message is still there. David and Goliath. Samson. Joshua. And all the others. Could they have generated their extra-human powers on their own? Maybe. Did they? Maybe. but God spoke to them — a God they believed in as naturally and fully as you or I might believe in our next-door neighbor. Except that He was God, of course. There was NO doubt. Of course that was true with religions throughout history — the Egyptians, the Romans, the Greeks, most of the tribal cultures. Did everyone believe in their God(s) like Joshua, and Moses, and David believed in theirs? Probably not. But I digress.

The Bible tells us there will be a second coming of Christ, at a time when we (the inhabitants of earth) have degenerated into complete and utter chaos. Well, yeah. That would be the right time to bring in another external positive source. After everything’s gone irretrievably to hell, so to speak. Do I believe that will happen? That’s irrelevant. The fact is, it did happen a little over 2,000 years ago, when things were in a pretty sorry state. The world was a lot smaller then, the Roman Empire was the capitol of the world, and the Romans are the ones who crucified him. So his life, persecution, and death brought a new sense of order into pretty much the entire world as it existed then. Or maybe you’re one of those people who don’t believe Christ was a real person. Or a myth built around a real person, like John Henry or Johnny Appleseed. The effect he obviously had on the world keeps me from believing that. Do I believe he was the son of God, sent by God to save us? I don’t think I want to get into that right now.

As far as I can tell, the facts are: 1) he existed, and 2) he changed the world by bringing a new, positive force into it. Now, by my computation, we’re rapidly degenerating into irretrievable chaos again. For the same reason Adam and Eve lost paradise and their immortality: by choosing not to believe in His divinity, by becoming, in effect, pragmatists, thereby turning off their external source of positive power. Can the world be saved again? Only if such a powerful presence appears that it can’t be ignored. Like the second coming. Or aliens landing. And to be honest, right now I believe one is as likely as the other.

Thermodynamics says that without the input of energy, a closed system will become more and more disordered. So the world of Adam and Eve was perfect and orderly, and would have stayed that way except for their exclusion of God as an “energy” source. When they moved into their “God’s not such a big deal” phase, as evidenced by their willingness to disobey Him, they shut off their energy source, and disorder inevitably followed, including sickness and eventually death.

Jesus came into that vastly disordered system bringing a new energy source, thereby increasing order.  Moral standards and laws were largely non-existent or disregarded. Jesus gave the world a new moral standard, i.e., a new source of moral energy. He cured the sick, even brought the dead back to life. He let us know we could do the same, if we reattached ourselves to the source and let the energy back in.

Then he disappeared. His remarkable presence, plus a renewed belief in God, was enough to bring order back into the world, at least for those who believed in him, but not enough to keep the world from falling back into disorder as his memory became less and less distinct.

Which brings us up to today. We have a new source, but one of negative energy, which is accelerating the natural process of disorder. Most of those who see it happening believe the problem is that we have nothing to replace the moral standards we are working so hard to remove, resulting in moral chaos. Which is true as far as it goes, but does not take into consideration that the moral standard evolves from a positive energy source.

It’s not possible to simply install a moral standard that does not spring from a positive energy source. If Moses had brought the ten commandments down from the mountain and said “Here are the rules to live by; I just made them up,” he would have been ignored by the general population. But when he said the commandments came from God, the population – who largely believed in the existence of God – accepted them. Didn’t like them, necessarily, but still accepted them. It was undoubtedly Moses’ presence as a respected leader and their belief that he was in touch with a higher source that turned the trick.

Same as with Jesus. Those who didn’t believe He was in touch with a higher source persecuted Him and eventually crucified Him. Those who believed in God and Jesus’ apparent relation to Him also believed Jesus and so availed themselves of the re-emergent energy source. The believers accepted the moral code he presented – “Love thy neighbor as thyself” – His second great commandment, with which we are all familiar. However, most of us do not understand the importance of the first commandment he presented:

And one of them, a doctor of the Law, putting him to the test, asked him, “Master, which is the great commandment in the Law?” Jesus said to him, “‘Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind.’ This is the greatest and the first commandment. And the second is like it, ‘Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself.’ On these two commandments depend the whole Law and the Prophets.” (Matthew 22:35-40)

Because in order for us to use the positive energy source Jesus reminds us of – God – we must believe we have access to it: must believe that we are more than just sentient beings – that we are truly God’s creations, related to Him in a very special way. And being children of God, as Jesus was, we could do the things He had done – work miracles, cure the sick, bring back the dead, etc.

This is Jesus’ way of accomplishing His mission. But is God per se really a necessary part of the equation? Would belief in power that comes from an unknown source have the same effect? And finally, could power that came from our own minds have the same effect? Because the power is inherent in us, even though we may not be aware of it or know how to use it, I believe the answer to both those questions could be “yes.” The point is we must believe so completely that there is no room for doubt. And it is so much easier to believe the power comes from an outside source rather than from ourselves.

But I digress. Our powers as children of god (or not) isn’t the issue here. The point is, since we have lost sight of our power source – extinguished it, to all intents and purposes – we have also dramatically accelerated disorder, and we are now on the cusp of chaos.

Giants in the earth? And how did Noah get all those animals into the ark?

Yeah, I know. Greater minds than mine have puzzled over these niggling problems. Like Adam and Eve had two sons: Cain and Abel. Cain killed Abel, then went to dwell in the land of Nod, which lay East of Eden. There he “knoweth his wife.” What? Where did she come from?

The “scholars” suggest that his wife was one of Adam’s children. Cain’s sister. After all, Adam had 33 sons and 23 daughters. And I guess you could argue, since Adam lived to be more than 900 years old, that places like Nod could be populated by Adam and Eve’s children, or that Cain married his wife even before he left for the land of Nod. But that makes my head hurt.

It’s just dystopian twaddle to me. Adam living to be more than 900 years old. Populating town after town with progeny. Allowing Cain, who killed one of his sons, to marry one of his daughters. Please.

I’m sorry, but who cares? I can’t see that it has anything to do with the message of the bible; that’s probably why it’s not explained. It’s just a seque to more pertinent stories, establishing the cast of characters.

A more interesting question is in Genesis 6:2, which says “sons of God see the daughters of men that they are fair, and they take to themselves women of all whom they have chosen.“ Whoa. Wait a minute. What? There is a difference between the “sons of God” and “men?”

But seriously. Youngs, my favorite, explicitly says “sons of God.” And: “The fallen ones were in the earth in those days, and even afterwards when sons of God come in unto daughters of men, and they have borne to them—they are the heroes, who, from of old, are the men of name.” The meaning seems to be that the “fallen ones” are the “sons of god,” and are obvioiusly different from just “men.” They see the daughters of those “men” and mate with them, which produces “the men of name.”

The men of name. What many interpretations call the “Nephilim.” These “fallen ones” and their progeny are filled with such wickedness that God repents having created mankind and decides to wipe them from the face of the earth. All, of course, except Noah and his family, because Noah “found grace in the eyes of Jehovah.” Perfectly understandable. They were so big and strong and “filled with wickedness” that no one could stand up to them. So it’s up to God to do it.

He instructs Noah to build an ark and fill it with two of every sort of living thing, and in a long conversation with him gives Noah a fairly detailed description of how he should build it. A description and task that is patently impossible (you can find a great, highly detailed description of that impossibility here: https://ncse.com/cej/4/1/impossible-voyage-noahs-ark).

What the naysayers don’t take into consideration, of course, is Noah’s long conversation with the God that made the heavens and the earth, mankind, and everything else. All he would have to do is snap his divine digits and the ark would appear. What they also don’t take into consideration is the possibility that this is simply an allegory, as I believe most stories in the bible are. The moral is one that runs throughout the book: make God mad, he will hurt you.

And that’s the primary difference between the old (non-Jesus) testament and the new one. But we’re getting way ahead of ourselves.

Let me admit again I am by no definition a biblical scholar, or any other kind of expert on religion.  The bible may or may not be the word of God, as far as this study is  concerned. However, it contains a story of creation, in some respects much like other stories of creation. What we should remember as we read it is the context within which the telling of it was conceived. There are two choices: it is the word of God, or it is not. If it is not the word of God, we again have two choices. Either someone was present at the creation, or someone made the story up. If it  is the word of God, verbatim, then the story is of course true as written. If the story was made up (I tend to believe no one else was present at the creation) then it could have been written as a parable, and may also contain anecdotal facts.

Whatever you choose to believe, the fact is the creation sequence in Genesis has been an important part of the Judeo-Christian religion for thousands of years. Which in itself is remarkable, since in many ways it’s just another “god made the world and made man and woman” story. What has made it so important, of course, is the “forbidden tree” section, which has spawned countless interpretations, including the concept of “original sin.” It has also spawned this study.

God told Adam not to eat from the tree of knowledge of good and evil on pain of death. Let’s talk about that, too, for a minute. God made man, then God made woman. At one point in time, I wondered if the tree of knowledge and of good and evil was an allegory representing the carnal knowledge of man and woman, pregnancy, and birth. Thinking He had made a couple of humans in His (our) likeness and that was plenty unless he decided to make some more. But that was pretty well quashed when He said “be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth.”

So how would they do that without sexual intercourse and pregnancy and birth? Well, they wouldn’t. But after they eat “the apple” He says to Eve “I will greatly multiply thy sorrow and thy conception; in sorrow thou shalt bring forth children.” So evidently intercourse, pregnancy, and birth was the plan all along; He’s just going to make it an unhappy event as punishment.

No, I don’t understand all that, either.

Anyway, God made man and woman, and the snake came along, and the rest is history. Voila! Original sin. But what actually was the sin? Disobedience? Nope. Hubris? Nope. It would be a petty god indeed who doomed mankind forever for such venialities. In fact, it was not a sin at all. It was an act that had almost nothing to do with God, or the serpent, or any petty (or even egregious) wrong.

God wanted Adam to continue in His image. That requires purity of thought, purity of emotion, purity of soul. It also requires the absence of knowledge, the suspension of conventional reality. “Mar 10:15  Verily I say unto you, Whosoever shall not receive the kingdom of God as a little child, he shall in no wise enter therein.”

By “eating” the fruit of the forbidden tree, Adam and Eve brought mortality into their souls. Not just the fact of death, but a completely new perspective – that reality was only what you could touch and feel: the “reality” that keeps us from believing in God and that we are God’s creations, and therefore godlike ourselves. The only “sin” they committed (except for the obvious disobedience and lack of gratitude) was that they were henceforth barred from full exercise of their spiritual powers.

Gen 3:16 (and forward)  “Unto the woman He said, ‘I will greatly multiply thy pain and thy conception; in pain thou shalt bring forth children; and thy desire shall be to thy husband, and he shall rule over thee.’  And unto Adam he said, ‘Because thou hast hearkened unto the voice of thy wife, and hast eaten of the tree, of which I commanded thee, saying, Thou shalt not eat of it: cursed is the ground for thy sake; in toil shalt thou eat of it all the days of thy life; thorns also and thistles shall it bring forth to thee; and thou shalt eat the herb of the field; in the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread, till thou return unto the ground; for out of it wast thou taken: for dust thou art, and unto dust shalt thou return.’”

This was not punishment; it was simple fact. God obviously knew that by diminution or complete absence of their godly powers, Adam and Eve and all their descendants were going to have a tough time in the world.

So what was Adam and Eve’s sin? Let’s see how their actions fit the traditional “seven deadly sins.”

Wrath? Obviously not. They weren’t “mad” at anyone. Wrath is described as inordinate and uncontrolled feelings of hatred and anger. In its purest form, it involves self-destructiveness, violence, and hate. I read none of these feelings in the story of Adam and Eve except, perhaps, where the serpent is involved.

Greed? This would probably be the closest description of their “sin.”  The Catholic church defines greed as  “a very excessive or rapacious desire and pursuit of wealth, status, and power.” The serpent tempted them with the promise that they would “be as gods,” so the greed definition seems to fit. The problem is, they were already “as gods.” They were immortal, and had been given “dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth.” What more could they want? The serpent explained “God doth know that in the day ye eat thereof, then your eyes shall be opened, and ye shall be as God, knowing good and evil.” (Some translations use the noun “angels” instead of “God.”

This is enormously interesting. God created two sentient beings, at least one of whom was intelligent enough to name all the plants and animals of the newly created world, and who was given dominion over all of them. Which is secularly defined as “control or the exercise of control; sovereignty.”

Biblical scholar and essayist Theodore Hiebert says this: “The inescapable fact about the biblical term “dominion,” from the Hebrew verb radah, is that it grants humans the right and responsibility to rule, to govern the rest of creation. It establishes a hierarchy of power and authority in which the human race is positioned above the rest of the natural world. Such a conclusion is clear from the use of radah elsewhere in the Old Testament, where it is employed for the rule of the head of the house over household servants (Lev. 25:43) and of Solomon’s officers over his conscripted labor force (1 Kings 5:16 [Hebrew, 1 Kings 5:30]). On the international scene, radah is used for the rule of Israel’s king over Israel’s enemies (1 Kings 4:24 [Hebrew, 1 Kings 5:4]), or for the rule of Israel’s enemies over Israel itself (Lev. 26:17). In all cases, radah signifies the power, control, and authority of one individual or group over another.”

It is inconceivable to imagine someone receiving “dominion” over all things without some kind of concept of good and evil, or what’s right from what’s wrong. Perhaps a better definition of the nouns used by the serpent would be “happiness” and “sadness,” or “pleasure” and “misery.” Note the serpent doesn’t say “you will know good from evil;” he said “you will know good and evil.”

Being newly formed, it’s quite possible Adam and Eve’s elevators didn’t go all the way up to the top floor, but you’d think any simpleton would turn down an offer like that, because all they currently know is good. Why bring evil, or misery, or sadness into the picture? I’m certainly not the sharpest knife in the drawer, but I’m pretty sure I would have said “thanks, Mr. Serpent, but no thanks. I’ve got it pretty good here, and I don’t need any pain, misery, death, or sadness in my life.” So greed doesn’t really seem to work. Unless he said “you will be God,” he’s offering an empty promise.

Sloth? Doesn’t appear to be true. After all, Adam named all the beasts, and fowl – not a small job in itself – and evidently took care of the “garden,” since that was his job: to “dress it and keep it” – another pretty big job. Since we have no evidence that he did not do it properly, we must assume he was not slothful.

Pride? Many have used pride and envy as the basis for Adam and Eve’s actions, but it simply doesn’t hold up, for much the same reasons that greed doesn’t hold up. And gluttony isn’t even in the picture. Oh, I suppose you could make a case for Eve wanting to be on the same level as God, envious of His powers, etc. But that’s actually irrelevant to the fundamental truth in the story. In fact, it is a parable, but as far as I know, no one has discerned the true meaning of it. Many do believe, however, that this was the sin – the original sin – that Jesus came to absolve us from. Which never really made sense to me.

I could never believe in a god who made two creatures in His likeness, and gave them dominion over the entire world in which they lived, with only one rule – which he knew they were going to break – so he could damn them for an eternity to mortality, sickness, and chaos. Then he spends the next few thousand years intermittently torturing them, saving them, killing them, rescuing them, then has a sudden change of heart and sends his only son among them to absolve them from whatever the sin was the two progenitors committed, knowing he will be tortured and killed. From fairly neutral god (in genesis) to vengeful god, to loving god. I simply never understood it.

So here’s the truth of it. Whatever “sin” made Eve eat the apple was only, as Alfred Hitchcock used to say, the McGuffin – the thing that captures and keeps our attention while important things are going on in other areas.

What made Adam and Eve do what they did is not nearly as important as what they did, and what followed from that act, which also explains the appearance and importance of Jesus. Because their “sin” was separating themselves from their higher power. Embracing the belief that only the things we can prove are real. That our five senses are the limits of our world. That god was inaccessible, if not unreal. In other words, they chose materialism rather than spiritualism. The apple was merely an earthly symbol of their choice.

In other words, instead of moving up to his level by “becoming as gods,” as the serpent promised, they turned the phrase around, and brought god down to their level. Eve allowed the serpent to diminish the distinction between God and humanity so she could be tempted to eat the fruit.  She would never have disobeyed GOD. But disobeying “someone who was her equal” was not such a big deal. So instead of trying to make themselves gods, their “sin” turns out to be just the opposite – humanizing God, and thereby shutting the door on him and on their own unearthly powers.

God didn’t kick them out of the “garden;” they walked out. If I were god, this would make me unhappy – to see the creatures I made turn their backs on me. But of course I’m not god. It must have had some effect, however, because the next few thousand years appears to be the source of fire and brimstone, with those who disobey him (and sometimes those that don’t) receiving terrible punishment. He is, as Adam and Eve came to believe, a separate, authoritarian, fearsome god with more cruelty than love in him.

Occasionally, as we’ve said, someone would believe in god so intensely that he was able to work miracles. Maybe. Or maybe God worked them. Maybe those stories are anecdotal, too, intended to tell us that with a connection to our extrasensory powers we can do extraordinary things.

Then Jesus appears. And what is his message? That we are divine creatures, capable of performing miracles. And of course he gives us proof: turning water into wine, healing the sick, raising the dead, and the ultimate proof: his own immortality.

So Jesus is, in effect, our connection with our higher power. And sin, in Jesus’ mind, is separation from that power.

John the Baptist said “Behold, the Lamb of God, that taketh away the sin of the world!” Note John used the singular: sin. Not sins. Jesus came to revive our spirituality, to make us believe all things are possible, to re-instill in us the knowledge that we were made “in the image and likeness” of God. He came to re-birth us, because in order to be all that we can be, we must “be born again.”

God said to Adam and Eve, in effect: “Don’t stop believing in your godliness.”

Jesus said to us, in effect: “Start believing in your godliness.”

Why hasn’t anyone (to my knowledge) brought this to light until now? Probably because it’s too subtle, and we get too caught up in the religious inference – kingdom of god, heaven, hell, sin, etc. Or maybe I just haven’t read enough commentary.

But this is not about religion; it’s about enlightenment. You’re certainly free to believe in God or not, afterlife or not, sin or not, guilt or not. Those beliefs are irrelevant to the concept of self-actualization, as Goldenstein (and later Maslow) labeled it. Or as a past Army commercial encouraged you – to “be all that you can be.”

Religion and God are not a necessary part of the equation. They are, however, handholds many have used on their way to achieving this fully developed state, Jesus being the most outstanding example. Jesus told us “All these things that I do ye shall do also, and greater things.”

“Whatever you wish, ask it in my name, and you shall receive it,” he told us. He reminded us many times that we are “children of God,” capable of performing miracles. He showed us by his miracles what we might achieve through faith. He made a handhold of himself, and of His Father, that we might pull ourselves out of our assumed mortality and become as gods again.

Really? We can work miracles? Us ordinary people? Well, Jesus evidently said so, and strangely enough, so does quantum physics. We’ll look into that a little later.

By the way, here’s another, sartorial question.

In Genesis, the Bible says (Gen 3:8,9,10, and 11): “Late in the afternoon a breeze began to blow, and the man and woman heard the LORD God walking in the garden. They were frightened and hid behind some trees. The LORD called out to the man and asked, ‘Where are you?’ The man answered, ‘I was naked, and when I heard you walking through the garden, I was frightened and hid!’  ‘How did you know you were naked?’” God asked.

Okay, here’s my question.

So God was walking in the garden, came upon Adam and Eve, and discovered they were naked. My question is “What was God wearing?” Either He was covered or He wasn’t. If he was, then it would have been no problem for Adam and Eve to also be covered. So obviously God was naked, unless He had made it clear that it was appropriate for Him, being God, to be covered, but inappropriate for Adam and Eve, his creations. But the Bible doesn’t say that. It’s my guess the authors didn’t think of that niggling problem, or thought it would never come up, because no one reading the Bible would ever imagine that God was walking through the garden naked.