Inception
Examining the First
“Christian” Myth
The [Church] Fathers may
sometimes say that we are punished for Adam’s sin: but they much more often say
that we sinned ‘in Adam’. It may be impossible to find out what they meant by
this, or we may decide that what they meant was erroneous.
–C.S. Lewis
In the beginning, having
created the heavens and the Earth, and on the sixth day God created all living
things and among them he created man and woman, from which he fashioned out of
the red clay of the Earth herself. God breathed life into his creation and he
placed them in a paradise garden, wherein grew a very special tree. This
amazing tree had magic fruit containing all the knowledge in the world. And
then God made the serpent—and he made sure the serpent was more cunning than
all the other beasts.
This Hebrew myth, or more specifically
fable (since it involves a talking animal and a moral injunction, as we shall
soon see), is familiar to many because it is one of the best known and most
revered of all the Bible stories. It is one of the most familiar stories in
Western culture. Indeed, many of us were taught it in Sunday school, but
outside of church not very many people ever stop to re-examine the story and
pause to consider what it’s really about. In other words, they take it for
granted, and they simply believe what they are told about it because someone of
authority tells them what the conventional Christian thought on the matter is.
But there is much more to the story of Adam and Even in a magical garden with a
magical talking snake than first meets the eye.
The
goal of this section is to correct several misconceptions regarding the first
three chapters of Genesis—specifically that of the story of Adam and Eve. What
I want to do in this final chapter is show the difference in interpretations of
a well known myth and how certain contextual readings are demonstrably better
than others.
As such, I will juxtapose the pious view
of Genesis which adheres to a strict devotional belief in Christian theology
with the secular view which attempts to objectively look at the facts as they
are without any preconceived biases. Admittedly, however, there will always be
a certain level of prejudice when interpreting a text, as we must always allow
for the variation of our unique personal experiences, but what I propose is
that we must, at the least, make an effort to start off as objectively as
possible before reaching any set conclusions. Only after considering all the
relevant information can we come to any sort of conclusion.
Although
it may seem out of place from the rest of this book, I want to ask that you
induldge me (perhaps consider this a bonus chapter of sorts), as I analyse the
story of Adam and Eve in Genesis 1-3. First, I’m going to focus on why the Adam
and Eve story in Genesis cannot be considered history and why it is just a
myth. Next, I will discuss what the underlying meaning of the story is, pinpoint
the core morals of the fable (minus any additional theological dressing), and
explain why Christians are misreading it and have been misreading the Garden of
Eden story since its inception into Christian faith.
By examining the genesis of the story, to
turn a phrase, we can better detect where Christian reasoning frequently goes
wrong thereby correctiing any misconceptions which may arise because of it. If
true, and the Christian interpretation is colored by a preconceived biase of
either theological or the religious kind, then it would suggest that much of
Christian scriptural interpretation might also be tainted by similar biases.
Something we would need to be mindful of when talking about the historicity or
cultural significance of any religious text.
Adam
and Eve: What's the Meaning of the Myth? Six Interpretations
Alice C. Linsley, a Christian scholar, has
written about the various views of the Adam and Eve story. Is it fable? Myth
perhaps? Linsley outlines six possible ways to read the Garden of Eden story. We
can interpret the story of Adam and Eve
as 1) literal interpretation,
2) allegory, 3) federal headship, 4) typology, 5) myth, and finally 6) archetype.[i]
Personally, however, I would submit that
myth contains both allegory and archetype, since that's usually what a myth is.
But Linsley seems to separate them for
the reason that, as with the example of allegory, like most Christians she
presumes the concept of sin is a real phenomenon. As the Christian view holds
it, the story may be alluding to the supernatural phenomenon of sin. Sin is something humans aren't fully capable of grasping, but because of the
simple allegory found within the story we can see that sin is quite real—even
while admitting the story is, perhaps, not meant to be taken
literally. This is not Linsley’s view personally, just one of the Christian
views, which is probably why she separates it into other distinct
theological classifications.
However, I see no reason for the distinction, since it is merely attempting to
allow for the variation of Christian hermeneutics. As we are not talking about
what this story means to Christians, but talking about the meaning of the
stories content and its possible origins, our exegesis need not apply the
additional classifications which Linsley supplies.
Linsley
seems to subscribe to the Archetype position that Adam and Eve are Archetypal
ancestors of Christ, as Pauline theology teaches. The Biblical scholar Randel Helms details, “For Paul, the story
of Adam was not merely the history of past things; Adam was a “type [typos] of
him who was to come”—Christ (Rom. 5:14).[ii]
Such
a Pauline consideration is made
explicit in Linsley’s comment
that “Genesis is first and
foremost about Christ and the Edenic Promise (Gen. 3:15). The rulers listed in
the Genesis genealogies are Jesus Christ’s historical ancestors, the people to whom God gave the promise that the
Woman's Seed would crush the head of the serpent and restore paradise.”
Perhaps Linsley would be better off just
combining typology and archetype since it appears as if she is merely using
archetypal ancestry to buttress Paul’s theory of typos. If so, we are only
dealing with two practical categories, Myth proper and Christian hermeneutics.
It is within Christian hermeneutics that various theological considerations,
interpretations, or readings can flourish—but all of them are distinctly
variant Christian formulations of the same myth.
On
her website, Linsley was asked the question: “What is the point of the Adam and Eve story if it is ‘only a myth’?” Linsley's replied, “The point is that God made us in the Divine
Image to enjoy His fellowship and He is restoring that Image through the Divine
Person Jesus Christ.”
While this may sum up Christian orthodox
conviction regarding the meaning behind the allegory that Christians find contained within the myth, it is strong misreading of the text.
Linsley's answer, however,
reveals a common mistake Christians make in their reasoning regarding ancient
Hebrew texts. To put it
plainly, such an interpretation relies on both the literal belief that
the story contains reliable elements of history, that there is implied typology
relating Adam (the archetypal man) to Jesus Christ (the perfected man), that
the allegory all points toward and defines Jesus ultimate destiny—the Edenic
Promise—and the imputation of Christ’s righteousness and the salvation belief
in him brings, as well as his atonement freeing us from the curse of the
serpent. All this is what the Christian reading entails when we read the myt
literally. However, I feel this literal interpretation is invalid.
Not only does the Christian reading seem
rather contrived, because it is, but forcing to myth to mean all this requires
lots of theological tap dancing in order for the Christian to pull the meanings
they want out of thin air. In actuality,
these Christian claims about what the myth means reak of theological
fabrication.
Myths are typically rudimentary—they are stories with morals—but
they do not contain advanced theology or even Christology of the type alluded to in Linsley’s answer. The thing I
have always found disturbing about similar interpretations of the
Adam and Eve fable is how easily contemporary Christians make an ancient Hebrew fable into a story about the Christian savior. Jesus would not have
read the Adam and Eve myth the way Paul did, and so it seems strange to assume
he did. Forcing the Hebrew meaning of the story into the
straight-jacket of Christian faith does not help to elucidate the
unadulterated meaning of the potent myth.
