Poetic Lives in a Material World: Why Genesis 1 & 2s' Creation Story Should Not Be Taken Literally

NOTE: This is a post from a couple of years ago that I had up on Facebook.  A friend recently asked me a question about Genesis and creation, so I thought it might be helpful and interesting to have this post available on my blog as well.  This bit came about March 10, 2010, when I posted a link on Facebook to my friend, Matt Rundio's blog that had three video clips on why the creation stories in Genesis do not have to be taken as "literal" history in the modern sense of the word ( http://mattrundio.wordpress.com/2010/03/08/genesis-1-videos-worth-watching/). In particular, I suggested people watch the video on Matt's page of N.T. Wright on Adam and Eve. After doing this, another friend of mine responded concerned that N.T. Wright was making some logical errors in this video and that the notion of symbols in a story did not mean that the story could not also be true in a literal sense. I started to address his concern, but my response got so long that I thought it would make a better note on Facebook (and not blog entry) then it would a long comment on a chat thread.  Keep in mind that when you start reading it, it will feel like jumping into the middle of the conversation.  It should not be too difficult to follow, though.  So, here it is. It is not polished so please forgive any typos. Cheers!

Adam and Eve by Lucas Cranach (1472-1553)

My response:

I completely agree with you that recognizing or finding symbolism in a narrative does not disqualify it from also being historical. I cannot even think of a true story that could be told that could not have symbolism attached to it. In the case of Wright and Genesis 1 & 2, his beliefs and arguments on the matter are certainly more complex and nuanced than what a short video clip could allow for. He would definitely not make the equation that the telling of a story fraught with symbolism equals not historical (In fact, he wrote a 738 page book against liberal theologians/biblical scholars, arguing that the bodily resurrection of Jesus was an historical event and not just some type of spiritual metaphor).

I think a big part of what is going on in this discussion is that people like Wright are making the point that there is more than one faithful way to read for a faithful Christian to read Genesis 1 & 2 and that there are some pretty compelling reasons to not read Genesis 1 & 2 as scientifically-oriented descriptions of how the universe and the first human beings were made. Of course, how one ends up reading and interpreting the Bible depends in great part upon what one assumes going into the reading upfront. One assumption I would argue against is the one that fundamentalist Christians and some conservative Evangelicals hold, which is that the entire Bible should be read as if it all should be taken as conveying all historical facts (i.e. If one had videotaped the events referenced in the Bible, those events would correspond directly and almost exactly with the Bible's descriptive stories). When people say, "Either it is all literally true or it is all literally not true," is really problematic because it does not seem to take seriously the fact that the Bible is full of different types of literary genres and that different literary genres have their own rules for being read. The Bible has narrative, poetry (and within its poetry different types of poems), prophecy, history, gospels, epistles, apocalyptic (i.e. Daniel and the Book of Revelation), parables, etc. (Of course, history in a modern sense of the word may or may not be present in each of these genre types). And certainly you do not read apocalyptic literature the same way you read narrative history.

When you, in essence, asked how Wright could say on one hand Genesis 1 is not an historical description of how creation happened, but then say that he believes Genesis 1 is true, perhaps the best answer to that would be the analogy of Revelation as apocalyptic literature (In biblical studies, "apocalyptic" is the name of a particular genre of Jewish writing during the intertestamental period). Most orthodox Christians would read Revelation and say that it is completely true and yet are not expecting to see wicked-huge wasps and dragons flying around killing people in the last days. The reason for this is they recognize that the nature of the writing style and genre is not meant to be taken as literally conveying what will happen even though all of the symbols are referencing expected aspects or events at the end of this age. The same type of thing can be said of Genesis 1 & 2. Genesis 1 & 2 say that God created all things that exist and that God created the first human beings and that they broke faith with God and that changed their fate, relationship with God, each other, and the world. I do not think N.T. Wright, you, fundamentalist Christians, Evangelicals, or I would disagree with that being the truth that Genesis is telling. That is absolutely true. The difference is folks like Wright and I do not think that the way these creation narratives in Genesis 1 & 2 have to be read like literal descriptions of what materially happened in the creation process or of how the first humans, Adam and Eve screwed up (Keep in mind that one thing English Bibles do not show well is that in Hebrew the word "Adam" gets interchangably used as a proper name and as a way of saying human. We just always seem to read it as a proper name, but that is not how it works consistently in Hebrew. And, also, Eve's name "Chava" in Hebrew also means "mother of life," which is a great name for the first human woman, whoever she was, whether the proper named woman, Eve, that conservatives believe in, or symbolically as the character in the story that references the first human woman.) .

One reason for not feeling the need to read Genesis 1 & 2 as literal "video camera" descriptions of what happened is that it would not make sense for these stories to be trying to answer scientific questions about the material creation process, since no Hebrew or Israelite back when these stories were told and written down would have even thought to ask such questions. The scientific method as we know it with all of its questions and concerns for how the materially world materially functions (physics, biology, geology and all of that good stuff) is a product of the Western world well after Christ. So, to expect that God would even be trying to answer questions for the Hebrews/Israelites in these stories--questions that they did not even have, know to have, or even would have cared about--about how scientifically long it took the universe and the planet to be made, the order things were done, and how people were made seems a little stretching it. In fact, most biblical scholars recognize that Genesis 1 & 2 are actually two different creation narratives arguably told and written in different periods that were later put together (This can be seen in that God is consistently referred to by name differently in chapter one versus chapter two, that the stories seem some what redundant in what they cover and yet are different, they use vocabulary that seems to come from different periods of the development of Hebrew language, and Genesis 1 reads more like a sub-genre type called Priestly literature that is akin to the type of writing in Leviticus in that it cares about demonstrating order and ordering, whereas Genesis 2 reads more like a standard narrative.) So, one can see arguably that even early on in Israelite history that there was not one version of the creation story that Israelites had and that they must have thought them both true--even though taken literally they would have some contradictions in them--because they honored both stories as the Word of God and sowed them together in the form that we now have them today. I think it would be egocentric of people today to assume that God would have really be leading the authors of Genesis to be answering our modern questions about the astrophysics of creation even though the early Hebrews would have known nothing of such things. Why should our perspectives and concerns be more important than theirs, especially since there concerns would arguably still be a part of ours today.

While this is pretty much a cliche now, perhaps a good way to look at science's description of creation with a big bang and the Bible's creation story is analogous to how a poet and an engineer could witness the same car accident and yet would describe them completely differently. A poet would use big flowering language and metaphors, whereas an engineer might describe things "literally" in terms of velocity, impact, the way in which the metal crunches together, etc. If one were to look at their two descriptions and ask which one is true, the answer depend upon what you were actually wanting to know in asking the question. If you want to know an answer laden with physics than you will want to read the engineers description and you will say that is true. But if you want the aesthetic sense of what happened, than you want the poets answer. In this way, both are true.

Now, I am sure this non-literal way of reading Genesis 1 & 2 may sound like some creative new liberal way to gut the Bible in the name of science. I would say this is not new at all. In fact, many of the early Church Fathers who knew nothing of contemporary theories of evolution or the Big Bang, did not read Genesis 1 & 2 in the same literalistic sense that fundamentalist Christians seem to think is the time-tested faithful way to read. (Here is a link to an article that lists several quotes from Church Fathers on this. Look particularly at St. Augustine's. http://www.catholic.com/library/Creation_and_Genesis.asp). Also, C.S. Lewis, himself, a figure beloved by Evangelicals and considered a faithful and noble Christian did not read Genesis 1 & 2 literally (He talks about this rather extensively in his book "Reflections on the Psalms," in chapter 11; this chapter is well worth reading). Of course, quoting popular respected Christian figures does not prove in and of itself that Genesis 1 & 2 should not be taken literally, but it does show that among people that the Church universal has accepted as faithful orthodox believers, that there are different possible ways to faithful read the creation stories and that non-literalistic approaches are older than many conservative Christians may think.

So, I do not take Genesis 1 & 2 as literal scientific-esque descriptions of creation and I do not see the necessity for doing so. I think such readings are well-intentioned mistakes that create a level, amount, and quality of tension and animosity between Christians and the scientific community that I think is for the most part unnecessary in this particular matter. There are plenty of issues I might argue with scientists about, but I am not so much interested in this one. The point to me is that "In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth." I believe that with all of my heart.