Noah's Wife

Genesis 7 begins one of the harder biblical texts. The task of trying to understand God's ways when they don't make sense to us is rife in these verses, in this flood, in this destruction. Often, the application taught lands on another task: being righteous like Noah.

Finally, the day came when the LORD said to Noah, "Go into the boat with all your family, for among all the people of the earth, I consider you alone to be righteous. (Genesis 7:1)

Way too much pressure, I think - both to be considered the only righteous one and to have to try to live up to such a standard. As I take on the "task" of trying to understand God I want to opt toward love, relationship, and grace...on God's part and mine. This story makes that difficult. But not impossible.

A few years ago I came across a children's book by Sandy Eisenberg Sasso entitled Noah's Wife: The Story of Naamah. Here is how she describes the story she tells:

Suppose you are reading the biblical story about Noah and the ark. You wonder who was Noah's wife. What was her name, her story? Suppose you give Noah's wife a name, Naamah, and tell that she gathered two of every seed, every living plant, and created a garden on the ark. When the flood receded she replanted the earth's garden. In imagining this explanation, you would be creating a type of story that in Hebrew is called midrash. Many such stories were told by our ancestors to enrich the Bible. In time, some of these were written down, and then they were read again and again until they began to feel very old, as if they were always part of the tradition.

This story of Noah's wife is a modern midrash. You may use it to talk about the wisdom and courage of a woman and her role in saving the world from destruction. You may want to focus on the dandelions and the importance of caring for all living things, even those we might wish to ignore. The story may be the starting point of a conversation about our responsibility for caring for the earth. Most of all, the story of Naamah helps us to pause and take delight in the beauty of the natural world that surrounds us.

"...the wisdom and courage of a woman and her role in saving the world from destruction." That sounds like love, relationship, and grace to me.

Buy the book. Read the book. And imagine explanations that enrich another book: the Bible.

Kept Safe

Given all the strong, provocative, and affirming references to women in only these first six chapters of the Bible, it's amazing to me that the predominant theology and praxis for thousands of years has been far more inclined toward our weakness (of body and character), seduction, and shame. I certainly don't blame Scripture for this. And on some level, I don't even blame men. Context matters. History matters. It's not all that surprising (though no less disappointing) that the articulated thoughts of the learned and esteemed "experts" seeped into the consciousness of everyone around them and are now inculcated in not only our thoughts - conscious and unconscious - but the very fiber of our culture. But just because it is, doesn't make it OK. Rather, it invites me to re-imagining context and re-writing history - and then living in that reality; one that I think is far more consistent with Scripture's heart and intent.

The remaining verses of Genesis 6 (after the "beautiful women") read like this:

This is the history of Noah and his family. Noah was a righteous man, the only blameless man living on earth at the time. He consistently followed God's will and enjoyed a close relationship with him. Noah had three sons: Shem, Ham, and Japheth. Now the earth had become corrupt in God's sight, and it was filled with violence. God observed all this corruption in the world, and he saw violence and depravity everywhere. So God said to Noah, "I have decided to destroy all living creatures, for the earth is filled with violence because of them. Yes, I will wipe them all from the face of the earth! "Make a boat from resinous wood and seal it with tar, inside and out. Then construct decks and stalls throughout its interior. Make it 450 feet long, 75 feet wide, and 45 feet high. Construct an opening all the way around the boat, 18 inches below the roof. Then put three decks inside the boat-bottom, middle, and upper-and put a door in the side. "Look! I am about to cover the earth with a flood that will destroy every living thing. Everything on earth will die! But I solemnly swear to keep you safe in the boat, with your wife and your sons and their wives. Bring a pair of every kind of animal-a male and a female-into the boat with you to keep them alive during the flood. Pairs of each kind of bird and each kind of animal, large and small alike, will come to you to be kept alive. And remember, take enough food for your family and for all the animals." So Noah did everything exactly as God had commanded him.

God protects not only Noah, but women: Noah's wife and their sons' wives. On first glance I suppose this isn't all that profound. In order for the earth to be repopulated after its destruction women are going to be kind of important. I get it. But it's more than that. Listen to and look again at the words: But I solemnly swear to keep you safe in the boat, with your wife and yours sons and their wives. This is about more than procreation. This is about a God who is gracious and kind, beautiful and compassionate.

Despite history and theology's attempts - again and again - to shame women because of Eve's "fall," God's heart (and Scripture) says otherwise - again and again. We are kept safe. We are protected. We are chosen. We are honored. We matter.

For my own sake, and hopefully yours as well, let me say those words again - slightly re-phrased:

God keeps women safe. God protects women. God chooses women. God honors women. We matter.

God keeps me safe. God protects me. God chooses me. God honors me. I matter.

This may seem an over-simplified reading of this text or, at best, like trying to pull something out of nearly-nothing. Not to me. And here's why: in my own life the internal and external messages have been far different. They have sounded far more like this:

I am not safe. I am not protected. I am not chosen. I am not honored. I don't matter.

And the world around me continues to hammer these "truths" into my psyche. Domestic violence. Sexual trafficking. Pornography. Gender bias. Pay gaps. The list goes on and on.

For me, it's not oversimplified or nearly-nothing. It's everything. When Scripture offers me and all of us actual text, actual language, actual wording that heals those messages, I'm going to soak it up. With the onset of a flood (whether real or metaphorical), I am kept safe. When all seems lost, I am kept safe. When I feel like I'm drowning in a world that harms more than heals, I am kept safe. When I doubt my own value and worth, I am kept safe.

I am safe. I am protected. I am chosen. I am honored. I matter.
I am safe. I am protected. I am chosen. I am honored. I matter.
I am safe. I am protected. I am chosen. I am honored. I matter.

Language matters. The Text matters. Genesis 6:18 matters. Thanks be to God.

Beautiful Women

Here's the beginning of Genesis 6:

When the human population began to grow rapidly on the earth, the sons of God saw the beautiful women of the human race and took any they wanted as their wives. Then the Lord said, "My Spirit will not put up with humans for such a long time, for they are only mortal flesh. In the future, they will live no more than 120 years." In those days, and even afterward, giants lived on the earth, for whenever the sons of God had intercourse with human women, they gave birth to children who became the heroes mentioned in legends of old.

Much exegesis has surrounded these verses and, understandably, much confusion. I will not attempt to add any more into the mix - exegesis or confusion. Rather, I want to focus again on what the text uncovers for us...but is often left covered.

Beautiful women...

Again, just two chapters out of Eden, this feels significant. Women are not shamed or shame-full creatures still bearing the weight of the first sin - at least not by the Text itself. As in chapter four and five, women are integral, involved, important - and in relationship with God. In addition, they are beautiful.

For me, a woman who has struggled with self-image for most of her life, I have not been anchored in or invited to biblical texts that speak of my beauty. There's what is shame-full. How different would I feel about myself had I been told, again and again, that the narratives of scripture speak of women as beautiful (vs. sinful)? Even as I type the words I begin to feel different. And I begin to desire SO much more of the same for my daughters, now only 10 and 12.

Again and again I am struck by this Text; not one that harms women but that is our advocate, champion, and redeemer in the face of thousands of history that has harmed, has not advocated, championed, or redeemed through the Text.

Genesis 6 says "beautiful women." Indeed.

Generations of Daughters

It is not often I spend a lot of time in genealogy, nor will I today, but there are two things that capture my attention in Genesis 5.

First, verses 1 and 2:

This is the history of the descendants of Adam. When God created people, [they were] made …in the likeness of God. [God] created them male and female, and… blessed them and called them "human."

I find it poignant and beautiful that here, outside the garden, we are reminded of the larger story – a narrative without shame. It is full of hope, promise, blessing. No matter what, we are image bearers of God – men and women. There is no holding on to the past, no grudge or dark stain that accompanies Eve or Adam. The story begins again as it should: grounded in God’s image, God’s creation, God’s blessing. If this were the only thing we took from Scripture we’d be on a path toward far more redemption than most of us have known or been taught.

No matter what story has ensued I reflect God’s image.
I am a creation of God – as a woman.
I am blessed by God.

And if that weren’t enough, secondly, we have verses 3-32: a genealogy from Adam to Noah. Read closer. Nine times this phrase occurs: ...and he had other sons and daughters.

Though genealogy reading hasn't been one of my favorite pastimes, I do know that not many of them mention women. The consistent exception is Matthew 1 where five women are mentioned: Tamar, Rahab, Ruth, and Bathsheba, and Mary. Here, though unnamed, every generation of this listing includes daughters. That’s significant.

As the Biblical story continues, now moving quickly from the epic tale of the garden to the epic tale of the flood, we need to see women as integral, included, valued. Too often we see these early chapters, including the flood, as just more tragedy – all begun by Eve. And though I’ve already attempted to establish (at least for myself) that such is not true, having so many women included in chapters 4 and 5 helps me see these texts anew. Even more, it helps me see myself anew – not as one bearing a curse or carrying the weight of the sin of the world (which I'm pretty sure Jesus came to do) – but as one who matters, who is blessed, who reflects the very image of God.

These nine generations of daughters are unnamed but they matter. Thousands of generations of daughters have since lived and died, holding story, bringing forth life, creating, celebrating, loving, suffering, and creating a world that would one day birth me.

I found myself so surprised by Genesis, chapter 4. Chapter 5 has offered me more of the same.

I reflect God’s image.
I am a creation of God – as a woman.
I am blessed by God.

And I come from a long line of women for whom the same realities were true. May I live richly in the gift of that reality, that legacy, that lineage, yes…that genealogy. And may I stay steeped in a post-garden world that seems to be far more beautiful and hopeful than I’ve been told.

The Women of Genesis 4

4:1 - Adam lay with his wife Eve, and she became pregnant and gave birth to Cain. She said, "With the help of the Lord I have brought forth a man."

4:2 - Later she gave birth to his brother Abel.

4:17 - Cain lay with his wife, and she became pregnant and gave birth to Enoch.

4:19 - Lamech married two women, one named Adah and the other Zillah.

4:22 - Zillah also had a son, Tubal-Cain, who forged all kinds of tools out of bronze and iron. Tubal-Cain's sister was Naamah.

4:23 - Lamech said to his wives, "Adah and Zillah, listen to me; wives of Lamech, hear my words. I have killed a man for wounding me, a young man for injuring me.

4:25 - Adam lay with his wife again, and she gave birth to a son and named him Seth, saying, "God has granted me another child in place of Abel, since Cain killed him.

Much occurs in this chapter: Cain's birth, his killing of his brother Abel, Cain's "curse" and becoming a wanderer, his living East of Eden in the land of Nod, building a city, more killing - Lamech (Cain's grandson) of another man, the birth of another son, Seth, to Eve and Adam. Much could be (and has been) considered, pondered, and exegeted from these 26 verses. But these are not the stories or themes I am intrigued by - at least today. I am intrigued by how many women appear in this chapter, how much "voice" they have, and how powerful their presence is - not just subtly scattered throughout.

As I discussed in my last post, this chapter begins with Eve's voice and notable movement from shame to co-creation with God. Indeed, the life that begins outside of Eden feels more redemptive and whole than what was experienced in Genesis 3 - and certainly our interpretation of such over the years. In many ways, Genesis 4:1 - a woman's presence and her relationship with God - sets the stage for what follows. By focusing on the women of Genesis 4 we can re-experience and re-interpret the subsequent text and (re)view narratives that have too-often followed the same trajectory as our predominant interpretation of Genesis 3 - bound up in sin (particularly the woman's) and our "falleness" as created beings.

So, what do we see in the women of Genesis 4?

Pregnancy
Birth
The awareness of God's partnering and relationship
Wives
A Sister
Listening
Naming

In every story that flows from this text, particularly the one we always focus on - Cain and Abel - women are present. They are nurturing and bringing forth life. Just as in Genesis 2, they are naming. They are in relationship with men, their children, one another, and their God. They are not just subtext and in the background. They are present and named (Eve, Adah, Zillah, Naamah).

Such remains true - no matter the stories being told around us or those that have been told in the past that continue to haunt, shape, and influence. Women continue to nurture and bring forth life - both literally and metaphorically. Women continue to name - the life around them, the truth they see and experience, themselves. Women continue in relationship with men, their children, one another, and God - often despite plot lines that would move them toward isolation, shame, and silence. Women are not subtext. They are named, present, and powerful.

What I'm most struck by - again - is how powerful it feels to find women in these narratives. The way these stories have been told have either been with negative references to women or no women at all. But that is not what's really there. And even more, it's not true! Women are present and in powerful partnership with God.

Will I acknowledge the same in my own narrative, my own story? Will I look at the whole text of my life and then show up? Will I recognize my partnership with God vs. too-often feeling a lack of agency or control? Will I step boldly into my power to bring forth life, to birth, to name, to act, to relate,to matter? Will I?

Genesis, chapter 4 invites me to do so - over and over again. How easy it is to fall back into the deeply-entrenched patterns of bearing the sin of the world, feeling to blame for all things dark and evil, staying in the shadows as the lesser of God's creation(s). Maybe easy, but so misguided and frankly, so un-scriptural.

The women of Genesis 4 matter. Let's come out of the subtext and step boldly into the story being told and created around us. In fact, let's be the tellers and writers of our own stories - and those created around us. Let's add our names to the list: Eve, Adah, Zillah, Naamah, Ronna, and...

East of Eden

I’m stepping out of Eden with a different perspective than the one I've most often held; one that is on-purpose and intentional. I now choose to see Eve and Adam's movement into the unknown as no less inhabited by God’s kindness, care, and presence; their relationship with one another not shaped by shame and blame alone, but also mutuality, an accurate “seeing,” and a vulnerable togetherness. I am face to face with One that loves to create, empower, companion, protect, and care. As evident in Genesis 3 as in the first two chapters. I see a God who does not add to my shame, but honestly articulates what I know in my Eve-awakened consciousness and knowledge: my good and bad choices, my functioning and dysfunctioning, my naming and un-naming. In these first three chapters God has remained with me; just as I walked in the garden in the cool of the day, now I step out of Eden and into the wilderness.

And now, in the wilderness (no less than in Eden) God remains - blatantly and powerfully evident in the first words spoken in Genesis 4.

Now Adam slept with his wife, Eve, and she became pregnant. When the time came, she gave birth to Cain, and she said, "With the Lord's help, I have brought forth a man!" (Genesis 4:1)

Do you recall the last words we heard from Eve? Then the Lord God asked the woman, "How could you do such a thing?" "The serpent tricked me," she replied. "That's why I ate it." Now, just verses later, we hear a much different perspective. Look at the two lines, one after the other:

The serpent tricked me – and I ate.

With God’s help – I have brought forth a man.

There is a definite shift. Can you see it? Do you feel it? For me, it points profoundly away from an abiding sense of shame and sin and toward an abiding sense of God’s love and care. In fact, it would appear that in fact, more shame and a sense of sin dwelled in Eden than in the wilderness. It is now, out of Eden, that Eve is profoundly aware of God’s providence and help, as well as the fullness and gift of life. That is worth noting and, far more, worth allowing to seep into every Scriptural narrative that follows (more on that in posts to come).

For most of us, we leave Genesis 3 and step into the rest of Scripture with this foreboding sense of gloom; once Adam and Eve left Eden all was difficult and dark. There is some validity to such, even as we hear God’s words upon their departure – the “curses” or “consequences” of their now-found consciousness and knowledge: toil and struggle, pain in labor, relational angst, futility and loneliness. I don’t doubt that such was true. I have certainly known all of these in palpable, storied ways – within the narratives of the text and within the narratives of my own life. What I haven’t been as aware of, however, is what Eve actually experiences, invites, births, and names - things that are hardly gloomy, difficult, dark, or steeped in a curse.

It is Eve who sets the stage for how we understand ourselves and God in this new terrain, in the wilderness. God is present. God offers help. Eve and God together bring forth life. And all of this in the wilderness.

Even more, I’m struck by the fact that the first words spoken (as recorded) outside of Eden are a woman’s. Amazing! Life begins anew – both in birthing and in word – through a woman.

And then verse 2:
Later she gave birth to a second son and named him Abel.

Amazing! In only two verses we have an entire flip-flopping of what I’ve always thought about the movement out of Eden – the “banishment,” as it’s been called: Eve is the first voice to speak outside of Eden – just as God spoke in Genesis 1. Eve is the first to create and bring forth life outside of Eden – just as God brought forth life in Genesis 1. And Eve is the first to name outside of Eden – just as God named in Genesis 1 and as she was equally empowered to do alongside Adam in Genesis 2.

Outside of Eden. Into the wilderness. It is Eve who makes us aware of God’s character and care, who brings forth life, who names. It is Eve who shows us that we need not be bound in shame or darkness as women (or as men); that our abiding narrative not be sin or “fallen-ness;” that outside the garden and now in the wilderness we are surrounded by life and God; that we are hardy disempowered, but called to praise, to birth, to name, to live!

I thought I’d get much further in this chapter today, but this is plenty. A woman in the wilderness. A beautiful thing to behold.

Another Glimpse at Genesis 3

I wish I had the energy today to write a new narrative - a re-telling of this story that inculcates what I've tried to think through in my last two posts. But I don't. That doesn't mean my mind has stopped or that my textual musings have ceased. It does mean that I'm relying far more heavily on the thoughts and musings of another. Gertrud Mueller Nelson in her book, Here All Dwell Free, tells the fable/myth of the Handless Maiden which mirrors many of the realities inherent in the Genesis story. I'll let her speak:

The feminine quality of curiosity that resides in all of humankind, the quality of wanting to know what is still unknown, is not an evil quality in itself. Certainly Eve or "the woman" is not evil--as one perspective on the issue of feminine curiosity has viewed it. Knowledge brings about wonders, but it can have terrible consequences. If we use knowledge for personal gain at the cost of others, or to further our blooming hubris in order to play at being gods, our unexamined motives are the cause of evil. That is the tragic flaw that is coupled with knowledge...

From my perspective, Eve's curiosity and subsequent knowledge was hardly for personal gain or intentionally at the cost of others. Even to think she "played at being god" feels like it goes too far. Indeed, there were consequences to knowledge and consciousness, but the introduction of such was not pre-meditated, intentional, or evil in and of itself.

Mueller Nelson's statement is true and worth repeating: Eve is not evil. Believing such is hugely important and must be allowed to permeate our deepest stories, firmest-held theologies, and most significant understandings of ourselves as women - and men.

Out of one side of our mouths we say that it is a sin to become conscious, and out of the other we say that it is a sin to remain unconscious. In a family, when one member dares to become conscious - to become enlightened about the ways in which the family has functioned or, indeed, about how they have been dysfunctional for so long - his or her deviation from old family patterns is a heroic act that takes enormous energy...When someone shifts into consciousness and out of an assigned familial role it threatens to unbalance the whole family.

This shift into consciousness, even though it threatens unbalance, is not evil. Nor was Eve's - or Adam's. Undoubtedly, unbalance was created, but such is not always bad. Mueller Nelson continues,

Had we not committed the sin of consciousness, we would also never have brought heaven and earth together in the incarnation of God's own Son.

Indeed, Eden, the eating from the tree, and the resulting consciousness and knowledge are the very things that usher Jesus into our midst. In our own stories the same is true: it is our own movement into consciousness and knowledge - our good and bad choices, our functioning and dysfunctioning, our naming and un-naming - that bring heaven and earth together in poignant, felt, experienced ways. The converse is also true: when we refuse to step into consciousness and knowledge we refuse to let heaven and earth come together. We stubbornly keep at bay the feelings and experiences that, though often painful, remind us of our very need for God. It is our knowledge, consciousness, and honesty that bring God near:

When in trouble I sought the Lord,
all night long I stretched out my hands,
my soul refusing to be consoled,
I thought of God and sighed,
I pondered and my spirit failed me.

You stopped me closing my eyes,
I was too distraught to speak;
I thought of the olden days,
years long past came back to me,
I spent all night meditating in my heart,
I pondered and my spirit asked this question:

"If the Lord has rejected you, is this final?
If the Lord withholds favour, is this for ever?
Is God's love over for good
and the promise void for all time?
Has God forgotten to show mercy,
or has God's anger overcome God's tenderness? (Psalm 77:2-9)

These words could just have easily been spoken by Eve or Adam as David or the Israelite people. Heaven and earth come together in our questions, in our curiosity, in our deepening consciousness, in our knowledge of ourselves, of others, of life. We need not disavow Eve's curiosity or her resulting knowledge; rather, we can recognize ourselves in her and recognize an Eden that ushers God incarnate right into our midst. Mueller Nelson says that it is our very sin that is responsible for our reconciliation with God. Amazing. And a far different glimpse at Genesis 3.

O happy fault, O necessary sin of Adam,
which gained for us so great a Redeemer!

Night truly blessed when heaven is wedded to earth
and humankind is reconciled with God!

(From the hymn, the Exultet, used in the Easter vigil service)

Recovering "Shining Bliss"

[We] enter "a fairy tale world" but quickly discover that this world offers no "retreat from reality," nor does it invite us to a world of shining bliss. Rather, anguish and darkness are the fairy tale's prevailing tone--the anguish of a lost paradisiacal happiness and the inevitable darkness that enters every life. (Here All Dwell Free, Gertrud Mueller Nelson)

Genesis 3 continues, rife with exactly what Mueller Nelson states above: movement from shining bliss to inevitable darkness. Or does it? That’s certainly the choice we’ve made, opting consistently for the darkness and losing any memory of the shining bliss.

7 Then the eyes of both of them were opened, and they realized they were naked; so they sewed fig leaves together and made coverings for themselves. 8 Then the man and his wife heard the sound of the LORD God as he was walking in the garden in the cool of the day, and they hid from the LORD God among the trees of the garden. 9 But the LORD God called to the man, "Where are you?" 10 He answered, "I heard you in the garden, and I was afraid because I was naked; so I hid." 11 And he said, "Who told you that you were naked? Have you eaten from the tree that I commanded you not to eat from?" 12 The man said, "The woman you put here with me—she gave me some fruit from the tree, and I ate it." 13 Then the LORD God said to the woman, "What is this you have done?" The woman said, "The serpent deceived me, and I ate." 14 So the LORD God said to the serpent, "Because you have done this, cursed are you above all livestock and all wild animals! You will crawl on your belly and you will eat dust all the days of your life. 15 And I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and hers; he will crush your head, and you will strike his heel." 16 To the woman he said, "I will make your pains in childbearing very severe; with pain you will give birth to children. Your desire will be for your husband, and he will rule over you." 17 To Adam he said, "Because you listened to your wife and ate from the tree about which I commanded you, 'You must not eat of it,' "Cursed is the ground because of you; through painful toil you will eat of it all the days of your life. 18 It will produce thorns and thistles for you, and you will eat the plants of the field. 19 By the sweat of your brow you will eat your food until you return to the ground, since from it you were taken; for dust you are and to dust you will return." 20 Adam named his wife Eve, because she would become the mother of all the living. 21 The LORD God made garments of skin for Adam and his wife and clothed them. 22 And the LORD God said, "The man has now become like one of us, knowing good and evil. He must not be allowed to reach out his hand and take also from the tree of life and eat, and live forever." 23 So the LORD God banished him from the Garden of Eden to work the ground from which he had been taken. 24 After he drove them out, he placed on the east side of the Garden of Eden cherubim and a flaming sword flashing back and forth to guard the way to the tree of life.

What if we could recover the shining bliss?

I sat in a lecture a couple of days ago and listened to Bob Ekblad talk of new ways in which we must interpret and understand Scripture. Admittedly, my paraphrase, here’s what I heard:

At least in the Modern, Western world we have come to the Biblical text and asked, “What am I supposed to do based on this text?” What we need to ask is, “Who is God and what has God done for us in this text?”

Nearly all of our theology has flowed from and focused on the first question. When we’ve looked at Genesis 3 we’ve said, “Given this sad state of affairs, what are we to do now? We’d best seek to explain and understand what has happened and then work like h___ to make sure it doesn’t happen again.” Our explanations have then taken forms we are all understand: the woman’s sin, the man’s temptation, the curse(s), the punishment, the banishment. The result of asking such? A near-total focus on sin, its accompanying cost, and its ongoing legacy.

The legacy is painful, one aspect of which I’m particularly aware: the price women have paid. Listen to voices of women who have reflected on Genesis, chapter 3, in A God Who Looks Likes Me: Discovering a Woman-Affirming Spirituality, Patricia Lynn Reilly)

“I was convinced that Eve was imperfect. She was fatally flawed in some way that made her “fall” inevitable. Her behavior proves the natural inferiority and fickleness of women.”

“Eve was bad. She did something wrong. She symbolized that women held a deep-seated corruption within them. Women were corrupters and manipulative temptresses. Eve was so evil that she persuaded the most righteous man to sin. She used her sexuality as a weapon to seduce and destroy him. Her body and beauty were tempting and negative.”

“Every time I experienced pain in labor and delivery, I cursed Eve for her sin. On a primal level beyond any churchy kind of memories, I believed she was the cause of my pain. I was being punished as her daughter. The pain and pressure of childbirth was to remind all of us that we are daughters of Eve.”

“As a child I was sure Eve’s sin had something to do with being curious. Women were curious. It killed the cat. Curious women who wanted to know about things got cast out of paradise. They turned into pillars of salt by angry male gods. They got sentenced to lives of pain and hard labor—in the fields and in childbirth. It was all supposed to hurt because Eve was curious.”

As a woman, I ache when I read these statements because I know how they’ve seeped into my bones, my reality, my understanding (and naming) of myself. They make me deeply sad. What’s more, these are not “truths” held uniquely by women. In nearly all the theology I’ve read as well as what has been taught to me predominantly by male pastors/leaders throughout my life, these statements would probably not be ones they would refute. They’ve seeped into men’s bones, reality and understanding (naming) as well. That should make all of us deeply sad.

And because of such, we should be that much more compelled to instead, ask the second question: Who is God and what has God done for us in this text?

Who is God?
In chapter 1 and 2 we encounter a God who has created beauty and perfection for us; a God who has empowered us to walk in its midst, naming and defining all that we see, all that we are; a God who has walked with us, talked with us, been in relationship with us. And nothing changes in chapter 3. God continues in relationship with us, seeking, pursuing, desiring. Even as movement away from beauty and perfection occurs, God’s presence remains – manifested in further naming of what life will now be like, covering, and care. Who is God? God is a present, generous, desiring of relationship One.

What has God done for us in this passage?
God has given us plenty and extravagance. God has given us autonomy and freedom. God has given us relationship. God has given us differentiation from God’s self and even creation. God has given us grace, love, and care. God has given us one another. God has given us life.

By asking these questions we shift our focus from the weight of Original Sin and an entire doctrine/theology designed to explain our inherent darkness (with women responsible for a particularly large portion of that depiction) to a God who still offers a taste of “shining bliss.” By asking these questions we shift our focus from our pride, willfulness, or even curiosity to a deeper awareness and appreciation of a God who knows us, sees us, and endlessly pursues and cares for us. By asking these questions, we shift our focus from an exhausting, narcissistic emphasis on our own sin and subsequent quest for salvation to a God who saves, redeems, and loves – not just someday, but in the thick of Eden, in the thick of our everyday lives.

Read the text again, looking for clues about who God is and what God has done for us. Read the text again and hold at bay your tendency to critique (the text and yourself), to attribute blame, to sigh with the heaviness of it all. Read the text again and wonder anew at a God who offers such freedom and spaciousness combined with such intimate pursuit and care. Read the text again and wonder how you might re-think not only Genesis 3, but the pages of your own story when God is the lens and not yourself.

I’m a bit overwhelmed by the idea of such. My mind quickly goes to multiple narratives, multiple scenes, multiple dialogues in my own life. I have to un-do much when I ask the same question, “Who is God in my text, my story, and what has God done for me?”

There’s definitely more to unpack in Genesis 3, but for now I just want to sit for a while in even the remote possibility that I don’t have to figure out what to do and instead can just rest in what God has done. That feels like a taste of “shining bliss,” a portion of Eden recovered, a portion of me renewed, redeemed, renamed. And that sounds like God saying, “It is good…still.”

Once upon a time...

Once upon a time…

Once upon a time there was a certain miller who bit by bit had fallen into poverty. He had nothing left but his mill and a large apple tree which grew behind it. One day the miller went into the forest to cut wood.

We look especially at the first line of a fairy tale because it tells us the state of affairs. It pronounces the diagnosis of the culture as much as it describes the condition of the story. (Here All Dwell Free: Stories to Heal the Wounded Feminine by Gertrud Mueller Nelson)

Once upon a time…

An amazing tale (whether fairy or not) begins in Genesis 1 and 2. It is rife with beauty and imagination, powerful meaning and theology. We’d love for the fairy tale to continue; for these first two chapters to be our happily ever after. But because the story is so good, because it piques our imagination and our deepest longings and hopes, we keep turning the pages. It’s not too long before we happen upon Genesis 3. And truth be told, this is the part of the narrative that has captured our attention, our imagination, our patterns, our pathology for hundreds if not thousands of years. It is Genesis 3 that has done (and undone) much as it relates to men and women, the powerful and the marginalized, our imagery of God, our experience of shame, our understanding of evil. It is Genesis 3 that feels so familiar and so laden – with a tree, an apple, a serpent, a woman, a man, accusation, guilt, misunderstanding, disappointment, banishment. What if there was a different way to tell it? What if we could start again?

Once upon a time…

Adam and Eve walked freely through the Garden, discovering every creature and naming each one. They explored every plant, flower, and yes, tree then named all but one. Given such, neither happening upon a tree with beautiful apples nor a serpent that talked would send them reeling. You have to wonder if they were surprised at all. What else would they have known? What sake of comparison could they possible proffer? Why would they, even for a moment doubt or question anything around them given that their entire reality was subsumed in amazing creativity, endless generosity, and an embodied love in the God with whom they walked in the cool of the day? If we can even begin to imagine this setting, this freedom, this love, then it seems we can also imagine anew the dialogue between Eve and the serpent.

Once upon a time…

1 Now the serpent was more crafty than any of the wild animals the LORD God had made. He said to the woman, "Did God really say, 'You must not eat from any tree in the garden'?"

Is “crafty” bad? Other translations say shrewd, clever, or even subtle. I don’t think I’m alone in making this nearly instantaneous judgment when the serpent appears on the scene. But I wonder what would happen if we didn’t, if we, like Adam and Eve, had a bit more curiosity about yet one more of the Garden’s miraculous beings as it appears on the scene. And likewise, must we jump to “temptation” when Eve is asked this relatively innocent question by the serpent? Let’s get through at least a few more sentences before we let the plot get (taken) away from us…

2 The woman said to the serpent, "We may eat fruit from the trees in the garden, 3 but God did say, 'You must not eat fruit from the tree that is in the middle of the garden, and you must not touch it, or you will die.' "

Eve answers the question placed before her – simply, clearly, appropriately. Over time (not shockingly) we’ve moved from the serpent’s textually-stated craftiness to an even more acute and explicit stating of Eve’s. We’ve been taught that she is cunning and conniving in her response – adding to God’s words, doing her own interpretation (not so shocking when we acknowledge her as a co-namer with Adam), and setting wheels into motion she can’t undo. Really? Listen anew. With a fresh and untainted perspective, with a moment to breathe and imagine, we might just hear Eve do nothing but respond in conversation – with awareness, context, and even consequence. It continues…

4 "You will not certainly die," the serpent said to the woman. 5 "For God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil."

Truth be told, I still don’t find anything all that evil, crafty, or cunning taking place here. The serpent speaks the truth, nothing more. Truth be told, if we fast forward the story, once the fruit was eaten Adam and Eve did know the difference between good and evil, their eyes were opened, the reality in which they had been living and that they had named, would now change. Not a temptation. Questions. Answers. Responses. Rather, a conversation.

6 When the woman saw that the fruit of the tree was good for food and pleasing to the eye, and also desirable for gaining wisdom, she took some and ate it. She also gave some to her husband, who was with her, and he ate it.

Adam and Eve walked freely in the garden. They had the power to define and shape every reality around them. Because of such, the act of eating whatever they came upon does not seem out of character, as though some evil event has just occurred, tipping all of creation on its axis. The only thing different about this fruit was that it came from the one tree they had not named; which, in many ways, would only increase their God-given curiosity and hunger. How could they have had any way to understand their behavior as “wrong,” “shameful,” or “bad”? They would have known nothing of any of this. Even God’s earlier words to them, telling them not to eat of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, would have been an odd and easily-ignored request. It would be like a much–loved infant being given the rules of the house – a house in which she is provided for, safe, completely entrusted into the care of a parent. When she is told to not touch the hot stove she hears the words and even the warning, but can’t possibly understand the consequences or the ramifications. Nothing bad has ever happened. No pain has ever existed. No punishment has ever ensued. Adam and Eve, like this child, function in a world that has never betrayed them; a world they have never betrayed. How could they possibly know?

And if they did not, how does this change the way we see them, the way we’ve interpreted them over the years? Our telling of the story has significance. And how it begins makes all the difference. Once upon a time matters.

The same is true in our own stories. We have often had our own lives interpreted one particular way for so long that we have no ability or imagination to see them any other way. And, not coincidentally, the way we tell our own stories is often very similar to the way we’ve (been) told about Genesis 3. Our stories are filled with craftiness (usually interpreted as our own), temptation (usually interpreted that which we’ve succumbed to), shame, evil, guilt, etc. What would happen if, just like with the Biblical narratives, we did the good and hard work of re-imagining; of re-telling some of our own age-old stories in ways that leave room for curiosity and the possibility that we might just not be as “bad” as we’ve always believed? Our own once upon a time matters.

And once upon a time is never the end of the story, is it?

[We] enter "a fairy tale world" but quickly discover that this world offers no "retreat from reality," nor does it invite us to a world of shining bliss. Rather, anguish and darkness are the fairy tale's prevailing tone--the anguish of a lost paradisiacal happiness and the inevitable darkness that enters every life (Here All Dwell Free, Gertrud Mueller Nelson)

Once upon a time does not quickly segue to happily ever after. Just like all stories, the plot thickens...

I’ll write more, but before I do, I want to let this re-imagined once upon a time abide for just a little bit longer. Just as I want to understand Genesis 1 and 2 in a different way, a way that offers me a taste of equal valuing in God’s eyes, of freedom and empowerment, of defining my own reality; so Genesis 3. I deeply want to see and experience Adam and especially Eve in a redeemed, non-evil, non-tempted, non-“it’s the woman’s fault” way. It might just change how I look at the story that follows – and my own. That feels important.

I’d love to hear your thoughts about hitting “refresh” on this text.

What are the risks inherent in not making the serpent quite so clearly (and quickly) the villain?

How do you understand Adam and/or Eve differently if you don’t jump to temptation quite so quickly?

How might you re-imagine God’s interactions with Adam and Eve as a loving, all-protective parent vs. a disappointed, disobeyed one?

Where are the texts in your own life that are so laden with evil or temptation (in other words, your mistakes and sins) that you’ve never been able to imagine anything other? Is it even remotely possible that you might be able to change the once upon a time in your own story?

I hope so. Once upon a time really does matter.

Naming re-imagined: "It is good."

In the 1st chapter of Genesis, the first creation story, God co-missions Adam and Eve to subdue and rule over all they see around them; in effect, to name - to define and call forth all that is. Naming is hugely significant; in such we define our reality, clarify ourselves in relation to people and things, and come to understand our place in the world. In the first creation story this ruling, this naming, was a co-mandate, a privileged task given to Adam and Eve. God understood the importance of naming; it would not only give meaning, definition, and character to all that, but would enable them to give the same to each other and even to themselves. In naming we come to see ourselves as distinct, differentiated individuals.

In the 2nd chapter of Genesis, the second creation story, Adam is alone when the commission to name is given. As he names he discovers none like himself, “no suitable helpmate,” and Eve is then created. And even after her advent into Eden, Adam’s exclusive naming continues: he names her. In the second creation story, Eve’s meaning, definition, and character is determined by Adam. Woman does not take part in defining reality. Because she does not name, she cannot (nor can Adam) see her as distinct and differentiated. She is defined by her name-er. Not surprisingly, it is this second story that has permeated our theology. This loss of co-naming has perpetuated a reality that women have not defined, but instead have been defined by.

I could go into great detail about why this occurred, the cultural realities through the ages that created a hierarchy of order placing man at the top, then women, children, animals, and finally, the earth at the very bottom. But this space is not for that critique. Instead, what I’d rather consider is what might happen if we re-imagined a created world in which a woman’s naming is a given, is assumed, is requested and sought; where a woman’s naming creates meaning, definition, and character not only for the reality in which we live, but for ourselves.

Before I go further, let me state how important it is that we not only understand, but also not abandon the second story. It has its own element of “naming.” In it we can recognize and define what has been lost with the absence of a woman’s mandate to co-name. In many ways, we regain that voice by reading this story anew and seeing clearly the way it’s been misunderstood and misused; by naming that this trajectory began in our very first story (within the Judeo-Christian tradition), our earliest embedded memories, the beginning of the beginning; by re-naming it in ways that offer it and all of humanity a re-entry into Eden.

To name is to define and shape reality. For eons women have accepted male naming as a given, especially in the spiritual realm. The fact is, for a long time now men have been naming the world, God, sacred reality, and even women from their own masculine perspective and experience and then calling it universal experience. As a feminist culture critic, Elizabeth Dodson Gray points out, this naming tended to benefit men’s needs and concerns and in lots of cases to oppress women. Was it such a wild thought that women might start naming God, sacred reality, and their own lives themselves? (The Dance of the Dissident Daughter, Sue Monk Kidd)

There is opportunity here to re-create, to re-enter Eden, to re-tell the story, and to re-name not only ourselves but the God with whom we walk(ed) in the cool of the day.

Eve walked through the garden with Adam and saw what he did – for the first time. She was not escorted, her arm held politely, with Adam introducing, informing, teaching, or shepherding her through all lay before them. No. She walked freely, humbly, authoritatively, with awe, intuition, and primal knowledge flowing from her. All that surrounded was hers, theirs, equally. Everything to “rule and subdue,” to name was hers, theirs, equally. Together, equally, woman and man walked through the Garden; side by side, in unison, in mutuality, in freedom and joy, in shared and differentiated relationship with God.

Did they have disagreements about what to name a particular animal or plant? Did they cast lots to make the final call? Did they take turns? Did Adam’s choice have the most weight? Or did they just know and trust one another and the beauty and extravagance within which they walked – enough to hear, see, and name with complete acceptance?

We must re-imagine in this way…and then some. We must consider anew and with great creativity how these scenes might be re-envisioned and re-named again and again. We’ve heard these stories for thousands of years, and nearly always the same way. We must re-tell them and re-place ourselves within them – not as we’ve been told, as has been assumed, but as we only dare to dream. And then we must let the tapes roll forward, re-playing each and every scene and narrative that follows, recognizing that everything begins to change within and because of this first story.

To understand why the Eden story is so important we have to remember the extraordinary way origin myths operate in our psyches. In a way humans are not made of skin and bone as much as we’re made of stories. The Eden myth perhaps more than any other floats in our cells, informing our vision of ourselves and the world. (The Dance of the Dissident Daughter, Sue Monk Kidd)

And for me, the ramifications are vaster and more profound than I can possibly contain within this post. The power to name changes everything – past, present, and future. Though this is a blanket statement, women through the ages have had everything named for them. Their reality has been defined outside their own power or influence. There has been little to no distinction of women apart from men and the pursuit (or even intimation) of such has been wracked with tension and pain from the beginning. Yes, more and more frequently we now seek and even find such, but often at great cost, great pain, and great un-naming of all that we had once known.

What if we claim the first creation story as our own and step boldly into what God offered, invited, and intended in these earliest of texts? How might we name and define ourselves? How might we name and define our worlds? And how might we name and define our god(s)? Undoubtedly, in all three of these realms, new naming (and perhaps even re-calling names that have only been whispered by brave women through the ages) would occur.

The limits of space and time press on me – already, just over 1000 words in. The desire to name even what this post summons in me is powerful. If unlimited and truly free to name at will all of creation, I would be unbridled, untamed, unlimited. I would go back through every story – from Genesis to Revelation – and re-name what I’ve been told (and what my daughters have been told) in new, redemptive, powerful, and transformative ways. (That is, in large part what this blog site is for!) I would go back through every one of my own stories – from birth to today, at 47 years old – and re-name what I’ve experienced in new, truth-filled, un-censored, beautiful, and freedom-filled ways. I would listen to the stories of countless women, those I know and millions around the world – and celebrate wildly as they boldly and authoritatively re-name themselves, their worlds, their god(s).

I must stop, at least for now, knowing that the thrill, privilege, and responsibility of much re-naming and re-imagining remains in posts yet to follow. For now, here’s what I ask you (and myself) to consider:

What has been lost in accepting the 2nd creation story as the sense-making/reality-naming one?

How do I now re-create a world in which the 1st creation story is at least an equally abiding template through which I understand my role, my importance, my relation to men, my value to God?

Where have I accepted the names I’ve been given, the names that have been given to my reality?

Can I begin to imagine the name I’d give myself if it was up to me?

Can I begin to imagine a god that I have named from my own perspective, experience, and reality vs. a god that has been imaged, understood, and experienced through nearly exclusive naming by men?

Here’s a start…

Genesis 1: 27 So God created humankind in her own image, in the image of God she created them; female and male she created them. 28 God blessed them and said to them, "Be fruitful and increase in number; fill the earth and subdue it. [Name what you see and experience!] Rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air and over every living creature that moves on the ground." 29 Then God said, "I give you every seed-bearing plant on the face of the whole earth and every tree that has fruit with seed in it. They will be yours for food. 30 And to all the beasts of the earth and all the birds of the air and all the creatures that move on the ground—everything that has the breath of life in it—I give every green plant for food." And it was so. 31 God saw all that she had made, and it was very good.

Will you name? The privilege, opportunity, and power is yours and mine. Imagine it! It is very good!

Women will starve in
silence until new stories
are created which confer
on them the power of
naming themselves.
Sarah Gilbert & Susan Gubar

Next up: Genesis 3 and the possiblity of re-imagining the serpent, The Fall, the woman...

From Silence to Lyricism

These words come from The Dance of the Dissident Daughter by Sue Monk Kidd. With four sections to the book, Awareness, Initiation, Grounding, and Empowerment, it's from the final one, Empowerment, that she offers a few paragraphs titled, From Silence to Lyricism. She tells the story of Sappho, a poet of ancient Greece who

"...was not silent at all but extravagantly lyrical. In Sappho, the Western world heard perhaps for the first time in written history the lush, creative voice of the female. Her lyric voice graced the world with a power that was unsurpassed. While male poets of her day were writing and singing of war, politics, and worldly commerce, the lyric Sappho sang poems about love and suffering, about orchids and crickets and the moon in its roundness. At times her voice was joyful and sublime, other times insulting and ironic, but it was always fired with individual truth."

Monk Kidd continues,

"The silent Sappho came later, as her voice was condemned by patriarchy. In 350 C.E. the bishop of Constantinople ordered her writings burned wherever found. Today, of the more than five hundred poems she wrote, only seven hundred lines or fragments remain...The lyric Sappho is [an] image of an empowered female self. She is the woman in us who takes up her real work, creates, sings her verses to the world."

I want to be that woman - one who takes up my real work, creates, and sings my verses to the world. At the same time, I know of my own resistance to such; the voice inside me that says I have nothing worthwhile to create or sing, that no one would really want to hear me. Again, Sue Monk Kidd speaks to my doubt:

"The first step toward lyricism is simply acknowledging our creativity. Second, we must explore it. Ask yourself, “What is my deepest passion, really? What moves me profoundly?” And let the answer float up from the truest, most vulnerable place in your heart. Greet this answer like it is your own newborn self being placed in your arms. Love it. Bond with it. Feed it. Don’t push it aside, minimize, make excuses, and starve this thing of beauty, because this answer is the window into your creative life."

So, that's what this blog is for: a place for me to answer the question, "What is my deepest passion, really?" A place to serve as a window into my creative life - into the truest, most vulnerable place in my heart.

At least at this point in time, my deepest passion is to re-tell Biblical narratives, particularly those of women, in ways that allow us to re-imagine ourselves as deeply connected to and part of the Divine; to know, celebrate, and live out our profound beauty and power; to know the blessing, strength, and validation generously offered and invited through new images of God and self, to understand who we are as imago dei - amazing, glorious, and silent no more - indeed, lyrical.

Even as I type these words I feel a shudder of excitement; a nervousness, yes, but even more, an awareness that I might just be stepping into what I'm most about. Truth be told, what I most desire to offer other women is what I most desire for myself: to move from silence to lyricism, from edited thoughts and words to freedom and truth, from self-doubt and condemnation to a lived-into-awareness of carrying the Divine within me and offering it to the world around me.

Another quote from The Dance of the Dissident Daughter speaks profoundly to me and articulates even further what I hope to create in this space:

"The ultimate authority of my life is not the Bible; it is not confined between the covers of a book. It is not something written by men and frozen in time. It is not from a source outside myself. My ultimate authority is the divine voice in my own soul. Period."

Because I have come, albeit haltingly, to hear the divine voice in my own soul, I now feel like I can return to the Bible, to the stories it tells, to the women in its pages and let the Divine voice speak anew - through me, through each of them - to women that need to hear, to my daughters that need to hear, to a church that needs to hear, to men that need to hear, to a world that needs to hear.

Daunting? Yes. But it is time for me to "simply acknowledge [my] creativity..." I must "let the answer float up from the truest, most vulnerable place in [my] heart...[not] push it aside, minimize, make excuses, and starve this thing of beauty..."

May I (and all of us) be like the lyric Sappho. May she be "the woman in us who takes up her real work, creates, sings her verses to the world."

From Silence to Lyricism. May it be so.

Oh...and my next post? Starting from the beginning: Genesis 1-2.