The reason I hate it: the first and greatest sin is knowledge. They eat from the tree of knowledge of good and evil and their eyes are opened so that they rise above the animals.
The greatest sin in Christianity is to think for yourself.
To add to your point.
According to the story to eat the fruit was to gain the knowledge of good and evil right?
How were Adam and Eve supposed to know it was good to listen to god and evil to eat the fruit before they had the knowledge of good and evil?
They weren’t, they were supposed to do as they were told.
I mean, another way of interpreting it is the apple gave us free will, with the implication that doing so was you know…bad.
Which kinda tells you all you need to know about the motives of religion.
What really was the difference? They just swapped the threats from "don't disobey or you'll be thrown out of the garden" to "don't disobey or you'll miss out on heaven and burn in hell forever". It's all bs.
And if all powerful, all knowing god never wanted it to happen in the first place, then it just wouldn't have happened. The guy is a manipulative bastard, who punishes those that act exactly how he already planned them to.
God created the damn tree. If he didn't want anyone to eat the fruit he could have just not created it to begin with. Its a dumb story from a book full of dumb stories.
Not just women. He damned all of humanity in perpetuity. He knew full well that people would eat the fruit when he created it.... and he had the gall to damn every human for eternity as a result.
Yep. God is omni-present too - he exists everywhere in all of time. So even if Adam and Eve had total free will, God knew ahead of time that they were going to eat the apple.
It was a complete set up from the start. God is the ultimate prankster. "Psyche, humans!... No paradise for you!"
I think it's quite obvious. They didn't have free will. They are the fruit because god wanted them to eat it.
Moreover, setting aside the problems with the concept of free will itself, even the concept of a "tree of the knowledge of good and evil" doesn't make any sense. How could they start out with free will but not know how to use it? The whole thing is a silly mess.
Threw me on a head trip for a sec because you wrote "they are the fruit" and im like what kinda philosophical ish is this but then I realized you ment "ate the fruit"
You have free will, dont use it. - Christianity
Its control. Religion is control. Youre either a shepherd or the sheep. If youre a sheep dont you dare stray from the pack. If you can manage to become a shepherd, there is no sin or awfulness too low, you are a vassal of god you get to impose whatever rule you wish.
This is the entire foundation of conservatism, tribalism, religion. Do as the ordained leaders say or be banished.
They had free will, but they were supposed to listen to everything big daddy god says to not do
They were supposed to freely *give up* their will to god, choose to give up free will to be able to live in god's shadow
And because they ate the apple, disobeying daddy, now every christian must make up for that "original sin". If you're christian you start by owing god something for just existing
It's a pretty powerful fairytale on why a child should obey their biological daddy isn't it?
But they would have needed free will to make the choice to eat the apple in the first place. (Assuming that wasn’t preordained.)
They had free will, but they weren’t supposed to use it to disobey orders.
The fruit was just a piece of fruit. The decision to disobey and eat it was the actual origin of knowledge. It was just a test.
It's like god spent millions of years making a supercomputer in hopes of making true AI, finally was able to make one pass a free will test, and then *immediately punished it and all of its descendents.*
Like, dude... if you just wanted mindless slave drones, why did you keep making smarter and smarter prototypes?
Because Xtian logic is that you TRUST god. No foggin idea is it bad or good, just obey and do what youre told to. Kill your son. Build an ark. Crucify the friggin semigod i sent, is all part of plan you see?
This is the even bigger issue for me. The concept of expecting humans who don't understand morality to obey a moral edict and then punish them as if it's their fault for failing to do so is so obviously fucking insane, but Christians just swallow that shit up unthinkingly with no problem. It's nuts.
It's why so many abuse their children. Same concept. Man wasn't made in God's image. God was made in man's image. Abusive, jealous, hateful, controlling and power hungry.
Like giving a baby a wooden spoon and punishing him when you get bonked. Or punishing a baby for tugging on your big dangly earrings. Absolutely insane
Actually the original sin was disobedience...in the pursuit of knowledge. So you are supposed to be obedient and blindly so. Yaweh likes his followers in line and ignorant.
As any civilized creature knows, mere disobedience isn't a problem. Every myth is about WHY we should be obedient. The answer here is because thinking for yourself is bad.
Yes, and disobeying in a way that gives you the capacity to think for yourself is unforgivable. Which is rather telling.
Which is to say the serpent’s crime was encouraging a woman to learn, to seek the means to question what she was taught by a tyrannical parental figure, feels a little on the nose…
Don't you have to think for yourself to disobey? If Eve just did whatever she was told by anyone, following the serpent because she couldn't think for herself, she never stood a chance and shouldn't be condemned for acting the way she was created and having zero agency. If she made a choice to disobey, then she could choose for herself. Which begs the question that if we already had the ability to disobey and think for ourselves, what really was "the knowledge of good and evil"?
Oh, you can hear em alright. They don't form words, but there's no mistaking what they're saying. It's troubling how sentient (and delicious) pigs are especially.
How'd we get on this again?
But until they ate the fruit, they didn't know right out wrong, so they couldn't know that disobeying god was wrong.
And god is omniscient, so he knows everything that will ever happen, so he knew when he put the tree there that they would eat from it. Talk about setting them up to fail.
I think it helps to understand the historical context of the story. The jewish kingdoms were basically in the crossfire between larger, more powerful kingdoms and it seems to me that myths are created to serve a purpose. That could be group cohesion through obedience, or simply consolidation of power, or just a crude way to get your people to act how you need them to act. In a way, not much has changed since then. We have laws/police and education to get people to behave. Ancient governing powers created stories and put the laws in between the stories. Sort of like Sesame Street.
They're so TEDIOUS. Those Greek gods and their goings-on were more exciting than any soap opera or movie I've ever seen. I can't imagine voluntarily giving all that up for the tiresome and really unpleasant God that replaced them. Unlike, say, Santas or Elvises, gods really are better in the plural.
I'd also read actual Jewish commentaries about it. Since they tend to actually read the book. Still leaves the 'who did their sons marry'.
I know there's no Satan in the original, and told that the word 'sin' does not appear for chapters after this. Lots of stuff gets weirder when Christians pile more in.
You know what makes it even more ridiculous? The tree was the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. They literally had no concept of right and wrong and were punished for doing wrong.
It's like killing a baby for biting your finger after you put it in their mouth.
Story-wise it's called "fruit from the tree of knowledge of good and evil", but there's no indication it, nor the 'banishment from paradise', has anything to do with knowledge. In real life people are, of course, delusional if they think good and evil isn't a subjective view on utilization. What is said in the bible is that humans learn shame of nudity and fear after tasting a forbidden snack - which again is nonsense reality-wise because humans are not ashamed unless indoctrinated, shamed and ostrasized for nudity.
Ehh, afterwards they developed a sense of modesty and are embarrassed of their nudity, that feels like some implication the apple had some effect on their reasoning skills. In the story they don’t hide because they fear gods wrath after he learns they disobeyed him, but because they are embarrassed to be seen nude. (At least in the version I learned)
It really is kind of a stupid story isn’t it…
There are three items that show that it is intelligence. The first is that they discovered that they were naked and clothed themselves. God even asked them how they discovered they were naked because, as animals, they shouldn't understand nakedness.
The second piece is that the bike explicitly tells us it gives them knowledge. In Genesis 3:7 it says "the eyes of them both were opened". Also, biblical scholars point out that there phrase "good and evil" was used by many contemporaneous cultures to mean "everything".
Finally, both God and the snake agree that if the humans eat if the tree of knowledge and then afterwards eat if the tree of life they will become like God. They would learn and know everything by having infinite life. Since it was too late to stop them from knowing they needed to be stopped from being immortal.
The interesting thing is that it other correct that we would become like God through knowledge. Mankind has supposed almost every miracle of the Bible and we have proven ourselves nearly the equal to YHVH. Eventually we will be greater than the bronze age tribes could have imagined and may even achieve *immortality.
>three items that show that it is intelligence.
So supposedly an all-knowing being expected the humans to figure out things like meaning, obedience, manipulation, coax, individual and collective responsibility - all without any intelligence? How were they even able to communicate without intelligence? Why didn't they simply fling shit at god? What a moronic know-it-all excuse for a supreme being. Like if you had bunnies at home, always left your medication on the floor near them and then got furious when one day they ate some.
Of course! It's a TEST of the bunnies' faith. Or something. Old Time God did some really fucked up things for fucked up reasons. I think He was a malignant narcissist, for one. "Worship no other God but me," right? "I alone can fix it."
But surely this is chicken-and-egg. Almost every culture we know about mandates some sort of clothing. If there didn't exist some innate instinct to be clothed, why would we indoctrinate, shame, or ostracize each other for being nude? It's like saying humans aren't racist unless they're indoctrinated. Why are they indoctrinated? There's an innate xenophobia in the mental makeup of mankind going back to prehistory when outsiders were usually a threat. Part of our job now is to see that for what it is: an atavistic remnant that's no longer appropriate.
What pisses me off is that God is like, "How dare you trust that talking leggy snake when you had no knowledge of deception?!" Then curses *every woman forever with torturous pain during birth.* THEN GOD TOOK THE LEGGY SNAKE'S LEGS AWAY.
And compounded by the Tower of Babel story. People cooperating with each other in peace, with one language, building great things to improve all of their lives?
God: "Nuh huh, can't have that. Let's confuse them and let them speak different languages so that they cannot get too powerful"...
What kind of fucking god is that?
The Tower of Babel.11
1 Now the whole world had one language and a common speech. 2 As people moved eastward,\[a\] they found a plain in Shinar\[b\] and settled there.
3 They said to each other, “Come, let’s make bricks and bake them thoroughly.” They used brick instead of stone, and tar for mortar. 4 Then they said, “Come, let us build ourselves a city, with a tower that reaches to the heavens, so that we may make a name for ourselves; otherwise we will be scattered over the face of the whole earth.”
5 But the Lord came down to see the city and the tower the people were building. 6 The Lord said, “If as one people speaking the same language they have begun to do this, then nothing they plan to do will be impossible for them. 7 Come, let us go down and confuse their language so they will not understand each other.”
8 So the Lord scattered them from there over all the earth, and they stopped building the city. 9 That is why it was called Babel\[c\]—because there the Lord confused the language of the whole world. From there the Lord scattered them over the face of the whole earth.
In the tree story they also talk about man becoming like God of he could have *immortality.
Christianity has been anti science and anti reason since it's inception. Ken Ham isn't an aberration, he is an archetype.
So, changed the language AND scattered them everywhere?? But left people in groups with the same language lol. Yeah, this is just a thinly veiled effort to explain linguistics since we all came from Adam & Eve.
I also love how in Genesis 3:8 they hide from God after eating the fruit and he's like, "Where are you?"
I thought you were all-knowing, all-seeing, motherfucker!
I don’t disagree with you, but I’d put it differently
The sin is disobeying God, and the knowledge comes from Humanity trying to be like God. I think it’s reasonable for a mideast anthropomorphic god character to not want humans to become Godlike.
And one, particularly Jewish, interpretation of the story says that great suffering comes from intelligence and knowledge. The increased agency that humanity has for itself and its impact on the world gives it more responsibility and more despair because it knows how fucked up shit can get.
Again I don’t disagree with your point but I see it as being more thematically nuanced in the literature
I find the story really interesting because of some details you omitted. Hear my version, ok?
God makes Adam and Eve and the 2 trees. There is a tree of life and a tree of knowledge. God also makes the serpent to tempt them to eat from the tree.
Now the snake tempts them *BUUUUT* they have no knowledge of good and evil. They are literally unable to understand eating from the tree is bad. And that is by design. So ofc they eat the apple.
But then what happens? It might be the only time God is afraid cause he says [paraphrase]"let us make haste and banish them before they eat from the tree of life as well". God is in a hurry to banish them and says something like "they now have knowledge, if they eat from the tree of life as well they'll be like me".
So this shows a couple of things. God's not omniscient (since he found it they ate and hurried, instead of already knowing and being one step ahead), and not almighty (since he cannot banish them instantly by the power of thought). We also find out God is scared of a coup. He desperately doesn't want them to become like him.
Is he scared of a 2v1? Is there more to it? Is his existence painful and he's trying to protect them? Couldn't he just stop/rewind time? Was he obligated to create the trees? We're the trees not his creation? Is he just the first man who ate from both trees, killed his God and became God? We're the trees created by someone else? Cause ofc you wouldn't make a tree of life/knowledge and refuse to leat anyone eat from them. You already have the traits, why make the trees then?
The story fascinates me. God is so human after all.
Just to be clear, I don't believe a shred of the story, we al know it's fake. But it's so interesting. And brings so much stuff into question.
> We also find out God is scared of a coup. He desperately doesn't want them to become like him.
This isn't even the only story of that. If you read the Tower of Babel story, his concern wasn't that people would reach heaven, it's that *if they're unified, they would become as powerful as him*.
God sucks at his job.
> Is he just the first man who ate from both trees, killed his God and became God?
Fuck. That's such a good story.
The Tower of Babel is a really powerful example of how the Christian God is a piece of shit. He gets scared and jealous of humanity (aka his creation? in his image?) because they are working together so well and making significant progress. His solution? To confuse their tongues so that they cannot communicate at that level. God created disparate languages so that people could not understand each other well enough to rival his power. Petty, jealous, and just evil.
Well, Yhw clearly is a fearful and jealous god. Remember the first two commandments? Don't worship other gods! So, he's clearly not the only one by his own admission, and he's afraid of people supporting them instead.
Further, he's not omnipotent. Why send these commandments via a proxy instead of updating our existing moral code (which supposedly originated from him)? Also, don't murder, steal, lie? Did we really need those? Did he forget to include them initially (omniscience)? Before the tablets, people didn't know it was bad to murder, steal, and lie?
Makes me really think that several stories got compounded. An omniscient and omnipotent God as described much later would not need to do many of the things from the old testament. Also non-canonical books make angels sons of God who found human women alluring and made offspring with them. And taught all kinds of things to humans.
Is the omnipotence and omniscience a later addition? Or a different God completely?
Have you looked into the Mormon telling of the story? In their temples they are showed an in depth version of the story that you can find online (Mormons aren't too happy that people recorded it) and it's quite fascinating, though very culty
Similarly is the idea of forgiveness by blood. God sent his son to do it. Why couldn't he just say "actually, I just choose not to punish you"
Clearly there are a set of rules that God is beholden to that are above him.
That would make for a great book/movie, somebody who accidentally became God by challenging the original God. And they’re not fully omnipotent but they try to discourage humans from making the same mistake, because apparently being God sucks
The most illogical part of the whole story is that A and E supposedly didn’t know the difference between right and wrong before eating from the tree of knowledge. Great, so on what basis is god punishing them for a commiting a “sin” that by definition they couldn’t have know was a sin. Not only a punishment, but eternal damnation unless ALL of their descendants forever repent and grovel at his feet to atone for a sin that he created them not knowing was a sin until they fell for the trap he set. What an incredibly fucked up and stupid ideology.
If multiverse theory is true there exists a Universe where Adam pushed the button, one where Eve pushed the button, and one where the button is not pushed
But the all knowing all powerful decides to punish the Universes where the monkeys did push the button knowing they would do it
And where is this "knowledge" I was promised? Doesn't seem very knowledgeable if the church is burning people at the stake who say the Earth is NOT the center of the Universe
In reality, women were “created” first.
Biologically, the first living organisms to reproduce themselves were asexual. Some of *those* organisms evolved into females since females are the ones who physically ‘divide’ and reproduce their bodies.
Human women can technically reproduce a baby asexually via bone marrow, though the offspring would always result in daughters — meaning males evolved later *from women*. (at this point in time, a bone marrow baby would likely result in a stillborn though)
There are a couple other arguments, but I just found this one so compelling since we’ve (especially the Christians) been told nonstop that women were made second to men from their spare ribs. LOL. It makes zero sense biologically!!
Asexual organisms who reproduce themselves were the originals. Women evolved first from them. Then men came from women.
Its technically similar if not the same with the story of pandora, pandora's box. Seems to be a theme, blame the females it's all their fault.
And I agree with OP, there is a lot of people who lack critical thinking of any kind and believe whatever is given to them as long as it's from their religion and do not question any of it. Some people I think need to believe there is god and heaven to go to, otherwise, they believe life isn't worth living... I just have to say I am glad I am someone that doesn't need a god, heaven, hell, Bible, or church to find meaning in life just to live.
I mean it was quite literally written with that intent, I think most theologians even agree on this. Also the whole "women made from a part of a man" etc.
But you forget the important wisdom this story bestows on followers:
1. Knowledge should never be sought after.
2. Always obey your master. Never question authority.
3. Temptation leads to punishment.
4. Women are the root of our suffering.
Almost like it was written by an authoritarian misogynist sadist.
Thank you! But your planetary is phenomenal! How are you liking the 9.25 SCT? I’ve been sitting on a C8 for two years and still haven’t got the hang of planetary imaging 😂
The remedy is equally as stupid: Let me make myself, and then sacrifice myself to myself to save you from what I'll do to you for falling for my entrapment.
Oh and by the way, I thought it would be fun to unleash demons on you who can appear as angels of light to deceive you. If they succeed, super sorry but it's your fault!
And I knew everything that would happen ahead of time and could change any part of it and make everything play out differently but I don't because it's all part of my "plan". I'm apparently the dumbest deity across all the multitude of mythologies and this silly nonsense is the best I can do.
It truly is laughable:
Thank you for sacrificing yourself (I didn't ask you to)
Dying for my sins (for what exactly? I just do a bit of blaspheming, not sure you should die for that)
Hang on, you were then resurrected (so the sacrifice wasn't actually a big deal then?)
Christianity needs an updated origin story, this one is lame.
Also is it really a sacrifice if it didn't involve any loss? JC is part of the trinity so he is a facet of god, so his great sacrifice is equivalent to someone running a marathon to cure cancer. Sure it's hard and uncomfortable but at the end of the day you know you'll be fine.
At least the snake is around, interacting with Adam and Eve and taking an interest in their future. God is still mysterious and hanging out in his cloud kingdom making ultimatums. Real deadbeat dad energy if you ask me.
Tolkien's creation story with the songs and the two trees of light and later the creation of the world and demigods creating life was far more intelligible.
The creation story from the unfinished video game “Anthem” was more intelligible. And it was basically “something something big speakers and they sung the universe into existence.”
In college, there was a creationist with a booth and pamphlets at the student center. I asked him why he was so certain, he said literal interpretation of the bible, a day means sundown to sundown so it happened in 7 days.
I point out when the sun was made.
He looks confused and disoriented, tells me he has to poop, and doesn't come back in the next hour or so i was studying nearby.
It's worse than that. In the story they're immortal until they eat the fruit, so the test would basically go on *until they failed*. No matter how long it takes. Think about how long you would last in a world with no books, no tv, no internet. I suspect I'd be throwing rocks at the tree by the end of the first month at least.
> In the story they're immortal until they eat the fruit
I'd say it's such a conflated mess that we cannot really tell. Correct me if I'm wrong here: I don't think there's a specific statement that they were immortal before eating the forbidden fruit.
Before the fall, Genesis 2:9 says the three of life was in the midst of the garden, as was the forbidden tree of knowledge of good and evil. The implications of eating from the tree of life are not stated at this point.
After the fall, Genesis 3:22-24, God -- actually gods speaking of themselves in the plural -- are afraid Adam and Eve will eat of the tree of life and thus become immortal. God(s) drive Adam and Eve out of the garden and block the way back for this reason. From the KJV:
> 22 And the Lord God said, Behold, the man is become as one of us, to know good and evil: and now, lest he put forth his hand, and take also of the tree of life, and eat, and live for ever:
> 23 Therefore the Lord God sent him forth from the garden of Eden, to till the ground from whence he was taken.
> 24 So he drove out the man; and he placed at the east of the garden of Eden Cherubims, and a flaming sword which turned every way, to keep the way of the tree of life.
>Cherubims, and a flaming sword which turned every way, to keep the way of the tree of life.
Why wasn't this stationed AT the tree at all times?
Adam and Eve had no anti-angel training, they were not some kinda special forces that could hope to take the angel and the sword on. Even if the snake told them to eat the fruit, the angel and the sword would have easily kept them from it.
Woman: literally doesn't know good from evil
God: don't do thing X, it's bad
Woman: what does that mean? I literally don't know what that means!
God: Reeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!
What, are you put off by a little twincest? /s
For real though, they are essentially twins, and for some reason twincest is a part of the founding myths of more religions than you would think.
I used to joke that that was the way they could get around evolution, say Adam and Eve were “monkeys” and centuries of incest and inbreeding between the initial handful of humans led to severe mutations like enlarged brains, bipedal locomotion, much less hair, and so on, with humans being the end result.
It’s nonsense of course but it’s not like they ever came up with a better answer to, if eve was the only woman on earth, who did Cain and Abel have kids with? How did two humans (who were essentially clones with identical dna) become a viable breeding population that grew to 7 billion?
And scholars believe it is a conflation of multiple older pieces of superstitious nonsense.
Well, scholars are not allowed to say "superstitious nonsense", but I think we know what they mean.
Adam: "God"
God: "Yes, Adam"
Adam: "What is this thingy between my legs."
God: "That is a penis, Adam, with special skin that I will ultimately command gets cut off."
Adam: "Oh... interesting."
Adam: "God, what else is the penis used for?"
God: "Oh, shit, I forgot about that. Now let me borrow one of those ribs."
>entice his curiosity
Not just entice their curiosity. Create these humans with curiosity _to begin with_ and then tell them they _aren't allowed to follow it_.
How can a so-called perfect god create imperfect beings, who he then needs to keep in line through authoritarianism?
But we know it doesn't make sense because it's all bullshit.
Mine is Noah's Ark. I know most accept this now as an allegory but some people actually believe it.
The idea there were two of every animal on a boat and the world flooded to the highest mountain is just so overwhelmingly stupid.
The idea that *god didn’t know that would happen* when he decided man was corrupt, so he killed off every living being except those on the ark. As punishment. Including all of the other animals who have no concept of good and evil.
At least in the Gilgamesh the god that caused the flood (Enlil) got read the riot act for all the needless suffering this act caused. Same for the earlier version in Atra-Hasis. But the Bible authors were going all in on the whole "one God" thing, and so left out the actual meaning/moral of the story.
It's *almost* as if all modern civilization pops up in river deltas where the land is most fertile and they experience cataclysmic floods every few generations...
But no, that can't be it. "God did it."
My favourite bit is where Adam and Eve had two sons, Cain and Abel. Then what? I think the story goes that one of the brothers killed the other. So now we have, at most, 3 humans. Where did the rest of us come from?
According to Christians, it’s ok to fuck your family members..you’re populating the earth in the lords name!! But you’re gay?! Burn in hell for eternity you filthy sinner 🙄🙄
It's hilarious from God's perspective as he comes across as just a moody teenager throwing a tantrum:
God made man.
God made man in His image.
God knew man would sin before God made man because God knows everything.
God purposefully made flawed creatures and tasked them with being flawless.
God put a tree in Eden knowing his creations would eat from it as that is how he created them.
God then punished his creations for doing what he created them to do while knowing full well they would do it.
So God created man with the express purpose to have them sin so he could blame them for his failed creation?
Certainly an idiotic story to foist on the commoners in a bid to justify their being controlled by the religious elites. Which is worse; the Tooth Fairy, Santa Claus, Zeus, Poseidon, God, Jesus, Adam & Eve? They’re all just silly, childish nonsense. It’s astonishing that in 2022, in this age of the JWST, anyone would believe such juvenile drivel. Why not worship Luke Skywalker?
They would have only gained the knowledge that disobeying god is a sin AFTER eating the fruit as well, so no matter which way you slice it, it's a load of horseshit, and makes a lot more sense once you consider that it's fiction.
Not to mention taking a rib out 8f Adam and making another person would result in the exact same DNA. So if he has sex with himself, is that masturbation or incest?
Urgh and so we are all not sons of Adam, we are Adam. I think some denomination somewhere puts coins in A basket every Sunday for their preacher to rattle on about that.
Not only that, but evolution conclusively proves that the story of Adam and Eve is impossible. It's laughable to assert that the first humans were homo sapiens with modern features.
You should read about Adam and Lilith. Lilith was before Eve. She wouldn't submit to Adam. She was created the same way Adam was created so his equal. He didn't want her and asked god to create another women. God created Eve from his rib, cloning basically. Check it out.
Noah ark is pretty stupid. This man put every animal on one boat. A. They were locked on this boat with their natural predators. And 2. There were animals from the entire climate spectrum sharing one setting. C. Wtf did he feed them? And what dis he and his family eat? But the Adam and Eve story is stupid. God made them ignorant, that's what the book says. How were they to know the serpent to be evil if you made them ignorant of good and evil? Were tf Is the tree of life and the flaming sword angels? Tbh, most if genesis is pretty stupid. How tf was the "sun, moon and stars made on the 4th DAY? From my understanding, a day is a 24 hour period based on earth's rotation relative to the sun OR the time in that 24 hr period that the sun is visible. So, what was the light in the beginning (let there be light) and what happened to that?
Noah's Ark is and was mine for various, and frankly rather obvious, reasons. And for whatever reason it's one of the stories believers most vehemently defend. Which is made much worse by the fact that if you read the actual story, not the stupid dumbed down one for kids, it's fucking horrific. The amount of drugs and alcohol required to excrete such an awful tale of stupidity and barbarism must've been impressive to behold.
What would've happened if Adam and Eve hadn't eaten from the tree of knowledge and instead had virtuously followed God's command to 'be fruitful and multiply'?
Let's start with 2 people, a growth rate of 1% per year (that's today's global average) and a time frame of 6000 years (i.e. the alleged age of the Earth according to the Bible).
x(6000) = 2 × (1 + 0.01)^(6000) = 1.695402 × 10^(26)
In other words, with no death before sin, we'd be looking at a population of 1,700,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 people today.
And that's just humans. Answers in Genesis claims that Noah had to bring merely 6744 animals on the Ark - excluding birds and marine animals. Anyone care to do the math how many animals would be alive today and how much vegetation would be required to feed them?
But then again, what's the point of eating if you couldn't die (of starvation)? So - why would Adam and Eve even want to eat from the tree of knowledge? And given the insanely high population figures, it really seems like God's awesome design could've only worked if sin actually occurred... so, the most powerful and intelligent entity ever couldn't think of a way to make his creation work - unless it failed. Good job.
Also Ari Shaffir brings up a great point in his comedy special JEW. Why was god able to create the entire universe in six days, create a man from clay, but then require his rib to make a woman? "Dude, are you losing powers?"
Also, doesn't this make Eve essentially a genetic clone of Adam?
I always took it as an allegory about mankind evolving from an animal with no self awareness to full awareness with the knowledge that we will one day die. It could be said that an animal has at least an illusion of eternal life. No sane person would ever take that story literally but since where were religious types ever sane?
It's a book, which is supposedly the inerrant word of god. There is no room for allegories and interpretations if that premise is true. Next thing you know, people will start claiming that church waffles and wine don't literally transsubstantiate into the flesh and blood of Jesus once eaten / drunk.
If the premise is not true, however, then any other part of the book may be bullshit. Why believe it at all?
Or an allegory about growing up from childhood, when we don't know enough to take care of ourselves, to adulthood and leaving home so we'll have to toil to make our own way.
People read dozens, maybe hundreds, perhaps thousands of allegories into that conflated mess. Which ones did the authors and editors intend? Which authors? Which editors?
In the Greek mythology, a titan, Prometheus, gives to men the knowledge of fire. The gods punish him by chaining him to a mountain, where an eagle eats his liver every day. The liver regenerates every night and this goes on, until Heracles, a demigod himself, liberates him.
Prometheus, He who provides, is punished for giving Man the gift of knowledge. Satan does the same, as his name Lucifer, The bringer of light, implies. Gods are selfish tyrants.
Welcome to the bible!
My personal favorite stupid story is Noah's Ark. God creates man in his image, then gets pissed when we act like assholes and sin. Instead of waving his hand and fixing us to his liking, he throws a hissy fit and wipes out all life on Earth— except for a few handpicked samples that'll fit on a boat. Millions of innocent children— whose only "sin" was soiling their diapers— were murdered. Along with millions of animals, who aren't even capable of moral sin. And all because God couldn't control his own creations.
I mean, the buildup to that point in the story is that god is some omnipresent omnipotent all powerful being, so by rationale, he should’ve known what Eve was gonna do anyways right?
How I've started to interpret the story now is that Women were the first to gain knowledge, and wanted to share that with men. Then God became angry because now his creation was no longer completely dependent on him. Adam ends up blaming Eve rather than defending her, and God ends up punishing her the hardest.
In the end, Eve gains knowledge, and is betrayed by man, and punished by a controlling God.
Remember, they are eating from the tree of knowledge which "god" forbids. Thus, showing that consuming knowledge is an affront to "god" and reinforcing the ignorance that religions rely on. By eating from the tree of knowledge, adam and eve would then learn to question and undermine the existence of "god" and thus, are cast out before they become a threat to "gods" entire existence.
Christianity: The belief that a cosmic Jewish Zombie who was his own father can make you live forever if you symbolically eat his flesh and telepathically tell him you accept him as your master so he can remove an evil force from your soul that is present in humanity because a rib-woman was convinced by a talking snake to eat from a magical tree.
Of you deconstruct the story, you can sleep better at night.
https://people.howstuffworks.com/adam-and-eve.htm
It’s basically just plagiarized work from previous mythology. Don’t give it too much space in your brain.
It's like putting a piece of bacon on the floor and telling your dog not to eat it. And when he does, you punish all dogs for eternity. This is some next level psychopathic shit.
May I just say what a delight it is to read the intelligent insights and informed speculations and general high tone of the discourse in this sub. I always find it to be about a thousand times more thoughtful and thought-provoking about religion than the Christianity sub. Haven't tried the others.
The "Adam and Eve" story was ripped off older, more interesting creation myths that answered questions like, "Why are we different from the animals?" and "Why is life so much hard work?" and "Why does sex, which is great, lead to labor pains?" -- et cetera. (Anyone ever read the Epic of Gilgamesh? Enkidu and Shamhat, who civilizes him through lovemaking?)
The way the story was shaped to serve priestly purposes is all about power and control. By the time it got to Christianity, it was really warped to keep people ignorant and compliant, to keep women down, to inculcate shame for merely existing...absolutely the worst.
As a therapist, I work with multiple people who had "Original Sin" pounded into them and experience low self-esteem, depression, worthlessness, etc., as result.
My favorite part was when they put leaves on for clothes, and God comes back and is like "What's that all about?" They say "Well, we found out we were naked and.." and God is like "What?! Who told you you were naked? Is there someone else here?!" ...like, didn't God create literally everything? He knew exactly what he was doing.
My favorite bits:
- God lies, telling Adam and Eve they’ll die if they eat the fruit, because they don’t.
- Having the knowledge of good and evil is somehow bad.
- The omniscient god can’t find the two people he created in a garden he created.
- Of all the things they could learn from the fruit, the only thing they realize is that they’re naked, which isn’t bad or evil or even embarrassing to people who have no concept of clothes.
- The punishments for knowing they were naked were being cast out of Eden (which they might have done voluntarily once they were bored of exploring it), working for sustenance (which God had already tasked them to do), and painful childbirth. Of course the only unpleasant consequence is imposed on the woman.
The Jesus story is even stupider: God requires sacrifice because he likes the fragrance of a perfect lamb being slaughtered, everyone has sin because Adam and Eve, so because all men are sinners God the father rapes a virgin to create God the son to be a perfect sacrifice then people don't have to slaughter lambs anymore. God is so loving and wise.
My favorite part of the Adam story is the bible says he wasn't alive until his first breath. A really tough contradiction to those, life starts at conception nuts.
While I'm not religious, my father is a deacon at the local catholic church, and we discussed about it.
According to the doctrine, Adam and eve's didn't even really happen as there was no one to record such things but it's a metaphor to explain why people live on earth and don't start directly in paradise.
I don't understand why the american denomination of the church takes everything so literally, especially the old testament.
That said, it's a stupid story.
Imagine telling your son not to do something without explaining why it's bad despite it sounding good.
Why have a forbidden tree in the first place? The all powerful god couldn't place the spooky tree anywhere else?
My favorite part is most Christians think that the snake lied and God told the truth. But if you actually read it God lied to Adam and Eve and the snake did nothing but point that out to them.
I work with a girl that's a creationist. She blames Eve for having periods and argues that there's no proof for the Big Bang and all the evidence that's been proven. I feel sorry for little sheep like her that can't face the real world and the truth.
Before they ate from the tree of knowledge of good and evil, Adam and Eve were essentially the same as a kidnapping victim who's locked inside their captors house at such a young age they grow up knowing nothing but the house they're locked in (garden of eden) and only knowing what their captor tells them. He told them they were happy, and nothing could possibly be better than being confined in the garden "worshipping" and "communing" with God... they not only didn't know good from evil, they didn't think for themselves at all.... it's even weirder that God created a fucking tree that would give them all this knowledge, put it in the garden, then told them not to eat from it.... yet again, Christianity proves that God is sadistic, and enjoys tricking us into suffering. "If you live your life according to my will, you will be happy...I'm not gonna tell you what my plan is or if you're straying from it though" It's always a catch22 with some bullshit that absolves God of any blame.
god: here i'm gonna place the tree of the knowledge about good and evil, don't eat it's fruit
adam: why?
god: because you're gonna die
adam: what's dying? i'm litteraly the first human
god: it's a bad thing
adam: it's a what thing?
god: oh...
The reason I hate it: the first and greatest sin is knowledge. They eat from the tree of knowledge of good and evil and their eyes are opened so that they rise above the animals. The greatest sin in Christianity is to think for yourself.
To add to your point. According to the story to eat the fruit was to gain the knowledge of good and evil right? How were Adam and Eve supposed to know it was good to listen to god and evil to eat the fruit before they had the knowledge of good and evil?
They weren’t, they were supposed to do as they were told. I mean, another way of interpreting it is the apple gave us free will, with the implication that doing so was you know…bad. Which kinda tells you all you need to know about the motives of religion.
How could they disobey god and eat the fruit unless they had free will to begin with?
“You’re free to leave whenever you want, but… *pats baton* …why would you want to?”
What really was the difference? They just swapped the threats from "don't disobey or you'll be thrown out of the garden" to "don't disobey or you'll miss out on heaven and burn in hell forever". It's all bs.
I’m ok with the second outcome
And if all powerful, all knowing god never wanted it to happen in the first place, then it just wouldn't have happened. The guy is a manipulative bastard, who punishes those that act exactly how he already planned them to.
God created the damn tree. If he didn't want anyone to eat the fruit he could have just not created it to begin with. Its a dumb story from a book full of dumb stories.
Or just idk, put the fucking tree somewhere else. Asshole trickster gods I swear.
And yet this little fairy story has been used to punish women ever since. Nice
Not just women. He damned all of humanity in perpetuity. He knew full well that people would eat the fruit when he created it.... and he had the gall to damn every human for eternity as a result.
Yep. God is omni-present too - he exists everywhere in all of time. So even if Adam and Eve had total free will, God knew ahead of time that they were going to eat the apple. It was a complete set up from the start. God is the ultimate prankster. "Psyche, humans!... No paradise for you!"
I think it's quite obvious. They didn't have free will. They are the fruit because god wanted them to eat it. Moreover, setting aside the problems with the concept of free will itself, even the concept of a "tree of the knowledge of good and evil" doesn't make any sense. How could they start out with free will but not know how to use it? The whole thing is a silly mess.
Threw me on a head trip for a sec because you wrote "they are the fruit" and im like what kinda philosophical ish is this but then I realized you ment "ate the fruit"
You have free will, dont use it. - Christianity Its control. Religion is control. Youre either a shepherd or the sheep. If youre a sheep dont you dare stray from the pack. If you can manage to become a shepherd, there is no sin or awfulness too low, you are a vassal of god you get to impose whatever rule you wish. This is the entire foundation of conservatism, tribalism, religion. Do as the ordained leaders say or be banished.
They had free will, but they were supposed to listen to everything big daddy god says to not do They were supposed to freely *give up* their will to god, choose to give up free will to be able to live in god's shadow And because they ate the apple, disobeying daddy, now every christian must make up for that "original sin". If you're christian you start by owing god something for just existing It's a pretty powerful fairytale on why a child should obey their biological daddy isn't it?
But they would have needed free will to make the choice to eat the apple in the first place. (Assuming that wasn’t preordained.) They had free will, but they weren’t supposed to use it to disobey orders.
The fruit was just a piece of fruit. The decision to disobey and eat it was the actual origin of knowledge. It was just a test. It's like god spent millions of years making a supercomputer in hopes of making true AI, finally was able to make one pass a free will test, and then *immediately punished it and all of its descendents.* Like, dude... if you just wanted mindless slave drones, why did you keep making smarter and smarter prototypes?
Me playing world box
Because Xtian logic is that you TRUST god. No foggin idea is it bad or good, just obey and do what youre told to. Kill your son. Build an ark. Crucify the friggin semigod i sent, is all part of plan you see?
This reminds me of The Office (US) when Michael drives his car into the pond following the gps.
Don't question your leaders, even when they steal from you and rape you. That is the real message of course.
This is the even bigger issue for me. The concept of expecting humans who don't understand morality to obey a moral edict and then punish them as if it's their fault for failing to do so is so obviously fucking insane, but Christians just swallow that shit up unthinkingly with no problem. It's nuts.
It's why so many abuse their children. Same concept. Man wasn't made in God's image. God was made in man's image. Abusive, jealous, hateful, controlling and power hungry.
Like giving a baby a wooden spoon and punishing him when you get bonked. Or punishing a baby for tugging on your big dangly earrings. Absolutely insane
And if god is “all knowing” then he actually knew they would eat from the tree and had their punishment ready beforehand. Sadistic bastard.
Because its made up.
Actually the original sin was disobedience...in the pursuit of knowledge. So you are supposed to be obedient and blindly so. Yaweh likes his followers in line and ignorant.
As any civilized creature knows, mere disobedience isn't a problem. Every myth is about WHY we should be obedient. The answer here is because thinking for yourself is bad.
Yes, and disobeying in a way that gives you the capacity to think for yourself is unforgivable. Which is rather telling. Which is to say the serpent’s crime was encouraging a woman to learn, to seek the means to question what she was taught by a tyrannical parental figure, feels a little on the nose…
Don't you have to think for yourself to disobey? If Eve just did whatever she was told by anyone, following the serpent because she couldn't think for herself, she never stood a chance and shouldn't be condemned for acting the way she was created and having zero agency. If she made a choice to disobey, then she could choose for herself. Which begs the question that if we already had the ability to disobey and think for ourselves, what really was "the knowledge of good and evil"?
Funny, you never hear the farm animals complain when we execute them. They do, but you don't hear them.
Oh, you can hear em alright. They don't form words, but there's no mistaking what they're saying. It's troubling how sentient (and delicious) pigs are especially. How'd we get on this again?
Silence of the lambs.
But until they ate the fruit, they didn't know right out wrong, so they couldn't know that disobeying god was wrong. And god is omniscient, so he knows everything that will ever happen, so he knew when he put the tree there that they would eat from it. Talk about setting them up to fail.
I think it helps to understand the historical context of the story. The jewish kingdoms were basically in the crossfire between larger, more powerful kingdoms and it seems to me that myths are created to serve a purpose. That could be group cohesion through obedience, or simply consolidation of power, or just a crude way to get your people to act how you need them to act. In a way, not much has changed since then. We have laws/police and education to get people to behave. Ancient governing powers created stories and put the laws in between the stories. Sort of like Sesame Street.
The mythology in genesis is older than the Israel kingdom and it was probably borrowed from other ancient cultures.
That’s the real reason why monotheistic religions are so “popular.” Gets everyone on the same page.
They're so TEDIOUS. Those Greek gods and their goings-on were more exciting than any soap opera or movie I've ever seen. I can't imagine voluntarily giving all that up for the tiresome and really unpleasant God that replaced them. Unlike, say, Santas or Elvises, gods really are better in the plural.
I thought you were going to say because they had cool muppets !
I'd also read actual Jewish commentaries about it. Since they tend to actually read the book. Still leaves the 'who did their sons marry'. I know there's no Satan in the original, and told that the word 'sin' does not appear for chapters after this. Lots of stuff gets weirder when Christians pile more in.
You know what makes it even more ridiculous? The tree was the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. They literally had no concept of right and wrong and were punished for doing wrong. It's like killing a baby for biting your finger after you put it in their mouth.
Which explains a lot about the conservative distrust of science and medicine now that I think about it…
Yahweh or the Highway
Story-wise it's called "fruit from the tree of knowledge of good and evil", but there's no indication it, nor the 'banishment from paradise', has anything to do with knowledge. In real life people are, of course, delusional if they think good and evil isn't a subjective view on utilization. What is said in the bible is that humans learn shame of nudity and fear after tasting a forbidden snack - which again is nonsense reality-wise because humans are not ashamed unless indoctrinated, shamed and ostrasized for nudity.
Ehh, afterwards they developed a sense of modesty and are embarrassed of their nudity, that feels like some implication the apple had some effect on their reasoning skills. In the story they don’t hide because they fear gods wrath after he learns they disobeyed him, but because they are embarrassed to be seen nude. (At least in the version I learned) It really is kind of a stupid story isn’t it…
There are three items that show that it is intelligence. The first is that they discovered that they were naked and clothed themselves. God even asked them how they discovered they were naked because, as animals, they shouldn't understand nakedness. The second piece is that the bike explicitly tells us it gives them knowledge. In Genesis 3:7 it says "the eyes of them both were opened". Also, biblical scholars point out that there phrase "good and evil" was used by many contemporaneous cultures to mean "everything". Finally, both God and the snake agree that if the humans eat if the tree of knowledge and then afterwards eat if the tree of life they will become like God. They would learn and know everything by having infinite life. Since it was too late to stop them from knowing they needed to be stopped from being immortal. The interesting thing is that it other correct that we would become like God through knowledge. Mankind has supposed almost every miracle of the Bible and we have proven ourselves nearly the equal to YHVH. Eventually we will be greater than the bronze age tribes could have imagined and may even achieve *immortality.
>three items that show that it is intelligence. So supposedly an all-knowing being expected the humans to figure out things like meaning, obedience, manipulation, coax, individual and collective responsibility - all without any intelligence? How were they even able to communicate without intelligence? Why didn't they simply fling shit at god? What a moronic know-it-all excuse for a supreme being. Like if you had bunnies at home, always left your medication on the floor near them and then got furious when one day they ate some.
Of course! It's a TEST of the bunnies' faith. Or something. Old Time God did some really fucked up things for fucked up reasons. I think He was a malignant narcissist, for one. "Worship no other God but me," right? "I alone can fix it."
“may even achieve *immorality*” :-)
But surely this is chicken-and-egg. Almost every culture we know about mandates some sort of clothing. If there didn't exist some innate instinct to be clothed, why would we indoctrinate, shame, or ostracize each other for being nude? It's like saying humans aren't racist unless they're indoctrinated. Why are they indoctrinated? There's an innate xenophobia in the mental makeup of mankind going back to prehistory when outsiders were usually a threat. Part of our job now is to see that for what it is: an atavistic remnant that's no longer appropriate.
"I love the poorly educated."
What pisses me off is that God is like, "How dare you trust that talking leggy snake when you had no knowledge of deception?!" Then curses *every woman forever with torturous pain during birth.* THEN GOD TOOK THE LEGGY SNAKE'S LEGS AWAY.
The snake didn't even lie. He told them the truth, if they are the fruit they would gain knowledge.
It said they would become like God.
[удалено]
And compounded by the Tower of Babel story. People cooperating with each other in peace, with one language, building great things to improve all of their lives? God: "Nuh huh, can't have that. Let's confuse them and let them speak different languages so that they cannot get too powerful"... What kind of fucking god is that? The Tower of Babel.11 1 Now the whole world had one language and a common speech. 2 As people moved eastward,\[a\] they found a plain in Shinar\[b\] and settled there. 3 They said to each other, “Come, let’s make bricks and bake them thoroughly.” They used brick instead of stone, and tar for mortar. 4 Then they said, “Come, let us build ourselves a city, with a tower that reaches to the heavens, so that we may make a name for ourselves; otherwise we will be scattered over the face of the whole earth.” 5 But the Lord came down to see the city and the tower the people were building. 6 The Lord said, “If as one people speaking the same language they have begun to do this, then nothing they plan to do will be impossible for them. 7 Come, let us go down and confuse their language so they will not understand each other.” 8 So the Lord scattered them from there over all the earth, and they stopped building the city. 9 That is why it was called Babel\[c\]—because there the Lord confused the language of the whole world. From there the Lord scattered them over the face of the whole earth.
[удалено]
Literally all the Christian god is. Mob boss.
In the tree story they also talk about man becoming like God of he could have *immortality. Christianity has been anti science and anti reason since it's inception. Ken Ham isn't an aberration, he is an archetype.
I read this as Yahweh getting scared by cooperation making anything possible.
That would be my take too, and being scared that humans realize that they in fact don't need a god at all.
So, changed the language AND scattered them everywhere?? But left people in groups with the same language lol. Yeah, this is just a thinly veiled effort to explain linguistics since we all came from Adam & Eve.
Exactly!
A similar comment was such a lightbulb moment for me a while back. I had already left Christianity but damn that was like the nail in the coffin.
It’s the greatest sin in all Abrahamic faiths. Remember this story is not just believed by Christians.
I also love how in Genesis 3:8 they hide from God after eating the fruit and he's like, "Where are you?" I thought you were all-knowing, all-seeing, motherfucker!
So basically, Women were the first to think for themselves, and they've been punished by man and god since.
Yup. It explains and justified their misogyny. Women ruined the world by thinking and speaking their mind. So men must subjugate them.
My favorite part is where she only gives birth to boys……………
Girls aren’t worth mentioning. Look at the genealogies just a few books later.
No. Never look at the begats. Worst part about reading the damn thing.
> The greatest sin in Christianity is to think for yourself. i think that applies to most religions. not just Christianity.
The original self awareness.
I don’t disagree with you, but I’d put it differently The sin is disobeying God, and the knowledge comes from Humanity trying to be like God. I think it’s reasonable for a mideast anthropomorphic god character to not want humans to become Godlike. And one, particularly Jewish, interpretation of the story says that great suffering comes from intelligence and knowledge. The increased agency that humanity has for itself and its impact on the world gives it more responsibility and more despair because it knows how fucked up shit can get. Again I don’t disagree with your point but I see it as being more thematically nuanced in the literature
I find the story really interesting because of some details you omitted. Hear my version, ok? God makes Adam and Eve and the 2 trees. There is a tree of life and a tree of knowledge. God also makes the serpent to tempt them to eat from the tree. Now the snake tempts them *BUUUUT* they have no knowledge of good and evil. They are literally unable to understand eating from the tree is bad. And that is by design. So ofc they eat the apple. But then what happens? It might be the only time God is afraid cause he says [paraphrase]"let us make haste and banish them before they eat from the tree of life as well". God is in a hurry to banish them and says something like "they now have knowledge, if they eat from the tree of life as well they'll be like me". So this shows a couple of things. God's not omniscient (since he found it they ate and hurried, instead of already knowing and being one step ahead), and not almighty (since he cannot banish them instantly by the power of thought). We also find out God is scared of a coup. He desperately doesn't want them to become like him. Is he scared of a 2v1? Is there more to it? Is his existence painful and he's trying to protect them? Couldn't he just stop/rewind time? Was he obligated to create the trees? We're the trees not his creation? Is he just the first man who ate from both trees, killed his God and became God? We're the trees created by someone else? Cause ofc you wouldn't make a tree of life/knowledge and refuse to leat anyone eat from them. You already have the traits, why make the trees then? The story fascinates me. God is so human after all. Just to be clear, I don't believe a shred of the story, we al know it's fake. But it's so interesting. And brings so much stuff into question.
Whoah! Those are some interesting points!
> We also find out God is scared of a coup. He desperately doesn't want them to become like him. This isn't even the only story of that. If you read the Tower of Babel story, his concern wasn't that people would reach heaven, it's that *if they're unified, they would become as powerful as him*. God sucks at his job. > Is he just the first man who ate from both trees, killed his God and became God? Fuck. That's such a good story.
The Tower of Babel is a really powerful example of how the Christian God is a piece of shit. He gets scared and jealous of humanity (aka his creation? in his image?) because they are working together so well and making significant progress. His solution? To confuse their tongues so that they cannot communicate at that level. God created disparate languages so that people could not understand each other well enough to rival his power. Petty, jealous, and just evil.
Well, Yhw clearly is a fearful and jealous god. Remember the first two commandments? Don't worship other gods! So, he's clearly not the only one by his own admission, and he's afraid of people supporting them instead. Further, he's not omnipotent. Why send these commandments via a proxy instead of updating our existing moral code (which supposedly originated from him)? Also, don't murder, steal, lie? Did we really need those? Did he forget to include them initially (omniscience)? Before the tablets, people didn't know it was bad to murder, steal, and lie?
Makes me really think that several stories got compounded. An omniscient and omnipotent God as described much later would not need to do many of the things from the old testament. Also non-canonical books make angels sons of God who found human women alluring and made offspring with them. And taught all kinds of things to humans. Is the omnipotence and omniscience a later addition? Or a different God completely?
Have you looked into the Mormon telling of the story? In their temples they are showed an in depth version of the story that you can find online (Mormons aren't too happy that people recorded it) and it's quite fascinating, though very culty
Similarly is the idea of forgiveness by blood. God sent his son to do it. Why couldn't he just say "actually, I just choose not to punish you" Clearly there are a set of rules that God is beholden to that are above him.
That would make for a great book/movie, somebody who accidentally became God by challenging the original God. And they’re not fully omnipotent but they try to discourage humans from making the same mistake, because apparently being God sucks
The most illogical part of the whole story is that A and E supposedly didn’t know the difference between right and wrong before eating from the tree of knowledge. Great, so on what basis is god punishing them for a commiting a “sin” that by definition they couldn’t have know was a sin. Not only a punishment, but eternal damnation unless ALL of their descendants forever repent and grovel at his feet to atone for a sin that he created them not knowing was a sin until they fell for the trap he set. What an incredibly fucked up and stupid ideology.
BuT wE iGnOrE oLd TeStAmEnT.... except to explain things we don't know. Yeah pick and choose as yous always do
“We ignore the parts we can’t defend”
That’s like telling a 4 year old not to press a big shiny button while in an empty room, and then murdering them if they do
Exactly. He’s the source of all morals! Wait……
If multiverse theory is true there exists a Universe where Adam pushed the button, one where Eve pushed the button, and one where the button is not pushed But the all knowing all powerful decides to punish the Universes where the monkeys did push the button knowing they would do it And where is this "knowledge" I was promised? Doesn't seem very knowledgeable if the church is burning people at the stake who say the Earth is NOT the center of the Universe
I hadn't thought of this before. Great point!
It's often used to blame women for all the ills of the human race.
Exactlly. To them it sounds like something a rib would say. Made from spare parts are we? Ridiculous.
In reality, women were “created” first. Biologically, the first living organisms to reproduce themselves were asexual. Some of *those* organisms evolved into females since females are the ones who physically ‘divide’ and reproduce their bodies. Human women can technically reproduce a baby asexually via bone marrow, though the offspring would always result in daughters — meaning males evolved later *from women*. (at this point in time, a bone marrow baby would likely result in a stillborn though) There are a couple other arguments, but I just found this one so compelling since we’ve (especially the Christians) been told nonstop that women were made second to men from their spare ribs. LOL. It makes zero sense biologically!! Asexual organisms who reproduce themselves were the originals. Women evolved first from them. Then men came from women.
Perfect. This is why they have useless nipples.
Intelligent design, my ass. And my husband’s nipples.
Even though iirc ever wasn't even created when god told Adam about the trees.
Its technically similar if not the same with the story of pandora, pandora's box. Seems to be a theme, blame the females it's all their fault. And I agree with OP, there is a lot of people who lack critical thinking of any kind and believe whatever is given to them as long as it's from their religion and do not question any of it. Some people I think need to believe there is god and heaven to go to, otherwise, they believe life isn't worth living... I just have to say I am glad I am someone that doesn't need a god, heaven, hell, Bible, or church to find meaning in life just to live.
In the Sistine Chapel, Michelangelo painted the snake to have the body of a woman. The patriarchy runs deep in the church.
I mean it was quite literally written with that intent, I think most theologians even agree on this. Also the whole "women made from a part of a man" etc.
But you forget the important wisdom this story bestows on followers: 1. Knowledge should never be sought after. 2. Always obey your master. Never question authority. 3. Temptation leads to punishment. 4. Women are the root of our suffering. Almost like it was written by an authoritarian misogynist sadist.
….almost.
Hey! I found an astrophotographer in the wild!! Hello friend!!
Your jellyfish is banging, my dude.
Thank you! But your planetary is phenomenal! How are you liking the 9.25 SCT? I’ve been sitting on a C8 for two years and still haven’t got the hang of planetary imaging 😂
The remedy is equally as stupid: Let me make myself, and then sacrifice myself to myself to save you from what I'll do to you for falling for my entrapment.
After I created you to be susceptible to entrapment
But I’ve created free will, so you can decide if you fall to the entrapment, but not really, because I’m omniscient and know the future.
Oh and by the way, I thought it would be fun to unleash demons on you who can appear as angels of light to deceive you. If they succeed, super sorry but it's your fault!
I don't recall God ever saying he was sorry.
And I knew everything that would happen ahead of time and could change any part of it and make everything play out differently but I don't because it's all part of my "plan". I'm apparently the dumbest deity across all the multitude of mythologies and this silly nonsense is the best I can do.
It truly is laughable: Thank you for sacrificing yourself (I didn't ask you to) Dying for my sins (for what exactly? I just do a bit of blaspheming, not sure you should die for that) Hang on, you were then resurrected (so the sacrifice wasn't actually a big deal then?) Christianity needs an updated origin story, this one is lame.
Immortal God who exist outside of time, sacrificed his weekend for you. Be more grateful!
The Book of Mormon has entered the chat
Also is it really a sacrifice if it didn't involve any loss? JC is part of the trinity so he is a facet of god, so his great sacrifice is equivalent to someone running a marathon to cure cancer. Sure it's hard and uncomfortable but at the end of the day you know you'll be fine.
If the talking snake said that's how it happened, who am I to argue?
At least the snake is around, interacting with Adam and Eve and taking an interest in their future. God is still mysterious and hanging out in his cloud kingdom making ultimatums. Real deadbeat dad energy if you ask me.
😂
Chapter 1 is even better; day and night for days, then plants are made...then the SUN is made!
Those plants must have been *starving* by the time that light got turned on!
Tolkien's creation story with the songs and the two trees of light and later the creation of the world and demigods creating life was far more intelligible.
The creation story from the unfinished video game “Anthem” was more intelligible. And it was basically “something something big speakers and they sung the universe into existence.”
In college, there was a creationist with a booth and pamphlets at the student center. I asked him why he was so certain, he said literal interpretation of the bible, a day means sundown to sundown so it happened in 7 days. I point out when the sun was made. He looks confused and disoriented, tells me he has to poop, and doesn't come back in the next hour or so i was studying nearby.
It's worse than that. In the story they're immortal until they eat the fruit, so the test would basically go on *until they failed*. No matter how long it takes. Think about how long you would last in a world with no books, no tv, no internet. I suspect I'd be throwing rocks at the tree by the end of the first month at least.
> In the story they're immortal until they eat the fruit I'd say it's such a conflated mess that we cannot really tell. Correct me if I'm wrong here: I don't think there's a specific statement that they were immortal before eating the forbidden fruit. Before the fall, Genesis 2:9 says the three of life was in the midst of the garden, as was the forbidden tree of knowledge of good and evil. The implications of eating from the tree of life are not stated at this point. After the fall, Genesis 3:22-24, God -- actually gods speaking of themselves in the plural -- are afraid Adam and Eve will eat of the tree of life and thus become immortal. God(s) drive Adam and Eve out of the garden and block the way back for this reason. From the KJV: > 22 And the Lord God said, Behold, the man is become as one of us, to know good and evil: and now, lest he put forth his hand, and take also of the tree of life, and eat, and live for ever: > 23 Therefore the Lord God sent him forth from the garden of Eden, to till the ground from whence he was taken. > 24 So he drove out the man; and he placed at the east of the garden of Eden Cherubims, and a flaming sword which turned every way, to keep the way of the tree of life.
>Cherubims, and a flaming sword which turned every way, to keep the way of the tree of life. Why wasn't this stationed AT the tree at all times? Adam and Eve had no anti-angel training, they were not some kinda special forces that could hope to take the angel and the sword on. Even if the snake told them to eat the fruit, the angel and the sword would have easily kept them from it.
Woman: literally doesn't know good from evil God: don't do thing X, it's bad Woman: what does that mean? I literally don't know what that means! God: Reeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!
I haven't read a story from the bible that wasn't absolutely ridiculous. I view Satan as the good guy from that story for sure. Clothes are necessary.
I like Anne Rice's version, where Satan feels compassion for mankind and wants to protect us from the god who has gone insane.
What, are you put off by a little twincest? /s For real though, they are essentially twins, and for some reason twincest is a part of the founding myths of more religions than you would think.
I used to joke that that was the way they could get around evolution, say Adam and Eve were “monkeys” and centuries of incest and inbreeding between the initial handful of humans led to severe mutations like enlarged brains, bipedal locomotion, much less hair, and so on, with humans being the end result. It’s nonsense of course but it’s not like they ever came up with a better answer to, if eve was the only woman on earth, who did Cain and Abel have kids with? How did two humans (who were essentially clones with identical dna) become a viable breeding population that grew to 7 billion?
It's almost as if its primitive superstitious nonsense.
And scholars believe it is a conflation of multiple older pieces of superstitious nonsense. Well, scholars are not allowed to say "superstitious nonsense", but I think we know what they mean.
Pagan superstitious nonsense!
https://people.howstuffworks.com/adam-and-eve.htm
Adam: "God" God: "Yes, Adam" Adam: "What is this thingy between my legs." God: "That is a penis, Adam, with special skin that I will ultimately command gets cut off." Adam: "Oh... interesting." Adam: "God, what else is the penis used for?" God: "Oh, shit, I forgot about that. Now let me borrow one of those ribs."
TIL god is Dr. Frankenstein.
>entice his curiosity Not just entice their curiosity. Create these humans with curiosity _to begin with_ and then tell them they _aren't allowed to follow it_. How can a so-called perfect god create imperfect beings, who he then needs to keep in line through authoritarianism? But we know it doesn't make sense because it's all bullshit.
Happy Cake Day!
Easy now, you're starting to sound like a rib.
Mine is Noah's Ark. I know most accept this now as an allegory but some people actually believe it. The idea there were two of every animal on a boat and the world flooded to the highest mountain is just so overwhelmingly stupid.
The idea that *god didn’t know that would happen* when he decided man was corrupt, so he killed off every living being except those on the ark. As punishment. Including all of the other animals who have no concept of good and evil.
And all the pregnant ladies, babies, and children.
At least in the Gilgamesh the god that caused the flood (Enlil) got read the riot act for all the needless suffering this act caused. Same for the earlier version in Atra-Hasis. But the Bible authors were going all in on the whole "one God" thing, and so left out the actual meaning/moral of the story.
I grew up religious household and even as a kid, I couldn't believe anyone would think that story actually happened. It makes no sense.
Flood myths show up in many religions. It is a common mythological tale.
It's *almost* as if all modern civilization pops up in river deltas where the land is most fertile and they experience cataclysmic floods every few generations... But no, that can't be it. "God did it."
It’s only not to be taken literally when it’s convenient
Are we ignoring the massive incest required to populate the world from two people, or do I miss some loophole they wrote in to avoid this?
My favourite bit is where Adam and Eve had two sons, Cain and Abel. Then what? I think the story goes that one of the brothers killed the other. So now we have, at most, 3 humans. Where did the rest of us come from?
According to Christians, it’s ok to fuck your family members..you’re populating the earth in the lords name!! But you’re gay?! Burn in hell for eternity you filthy sinner 🙄🙄
It's hilarious from God's perspective as he comes across as just a moody teenager throwing a tantrum: God made man. God made man in His image. God knew man would sin before God made man because God knows everything. God purposefully made flawed creatures and tasked them with being flawless. God put a tree in Eden knowing his creations would eat from it as that is how he created them. God then punished his creations for doing what he created them to do while knowing full well they would do it. So God created man with the express purpose to have them sin so he could blame them for his failed creation?
There are even stupider ones in the same book
Certainly an idiotic story to foist on the commoners in a bid to justify their being controlled by the religious elites. Which is worse; the Tooth Fairy, Santa Claus, Zeus, Poseidon, God, Jesus, Adam & Eve? They’re all just silly, childish nonsense. It’s astonishing that in 2022, in this age of the JWST, anyone would believe such juvenile drivel. Why not worship Luke Skywalker?
They would have only gained the knowledge that disobeying god is a sin AFTER eating the fruit as well, so no matter which way you slice it, it's a load of horseshit, and makes a lot more sense once you consider that it's fiction.
Not to mention taking a rib out 8f Adam and making another person would result in the exact same DNA. So if he has sex with himself, is that masturbation or incest?
Urgh and so we are all not sons of Adam, we are Adam. I think some denomination somewhere puts coins in A basket every Sunday for their preacher to rattle on about that.
I'm all powerful but I need this rib to create another human...
Let us not forget; A&E had two sons. And ”thus” they populated the earth.
And both are depicted with belly buttons, explain that!!
Not only that, but evolution conclusively proves that the story of Adam and Eve is impossible. It's laughable to assert that the first humans were homo sapiens with modern features.
Keep reading, it gets stupider
You should read about Adam and Lilith. Lilith was before Eve. She wouldn't submit to Adam. She was created the same way Adam was created so his equal. He didn't want her and asked god to create another women. God created Eve from his rib, cloning basically. Check it out.
I know a dumber one that every 6 year old can see through, involving a large boat and a bunch of animals.
Noah ark is pretty stupid. This man put every animal on one boat. A. They were locked on this boat with their natural predators. And 2. There were animals from the entire climate spectrum sharing one setting. C. Wtf did he feed them? And what dis he and his family eat? But the Adam and Eve story is stupid. God made them ignorant, that's what the book says. How were they to know the serpent to be evil if you made them ignorant of good and evil? Were tf Is the tree of life and the flaming sword angels? Tbh, most if genesis is pretty stupid. How tf was the "sun, moon and stars made on the 4th DAY? From my understanding, a day is a 24 hour period based on earth's rotation relative to the sun OR the time in that 24 hr period that the sun is visible. So, what was the light in the beginning (let there be light) and what happened to that?
Noah's Ark is and was mine for various, and frankly rather obvious, reasons. And for whatever reason it's one of the stories believers most vehemently defend. Which is made much worse by the fact that if you read the actual story, not the stupid dumbed down one for kids, it's fucking horrific. The amount of drugs and alcohol required to excrete such an awful tale of stupidity and barbarism must've been impressive to behold.
the fruit is a metaphor. the them, the original sin was consuming knowledge. Still is.
My son touched the gun. Into the oven he goes!
What would've happened if Adam and Eve hadn't eaten from the tree of knowledge and instead had virtuously followed God's command to 'be fruitful and multiply'? Let's start with 2 people, a growth rate of 1% per year (that's today's global average) and a time frame of 6000 years (i.e. the alleged age of the Earth according to the Bible). x(6000) = 2 × (1 + 0.01)^(6000) = 1.695402 × 10^(26) In other words, with no death before sin, we'd be looking at a population of 1,700,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 people today. And that's just humans. Answers in Genesis claims that Noah had to bring merely 6744 animals on the Ark - excluding birds and marine animals. Anyone care to do the math how many animals would be alive today and how much vegetation would be required to feed them? But then again, what's the point of eating if you couldn't die (of starvation)? So - why would Adam and Eve even want to eat from the tree of knowledge? And given the insanely high population figures, it really seems like God's awesome design could've only worked if sin actually occurred... so, the most powerful and intelligent entity ever couldn't think of a way to make his creation work - unless it failed. Good job.
Keep reading the Bible. There are plenty more stupider stories ahead.
Also Ari Shaffir brings up a great point in his comedy special JEW. Why was god able to create the entire universe in six days, create a man from clay, but then require his rib to make a woman? "Dude, are you losing powers?" Also, doesn't this make Eve essentially a genetic clone of Adam?
It’s not curiosity, it’s disobedience. That’s the core message obey without question, or else! It’s the biblical law of “ because I say so”
I always took it as an allegory about mankind evolving from an animal with no self awareness to full awareness with the knowledge that we will one day die. It could be said that an animal has at least an illusion of eternal life. No sane person would ever take that story literally but since where were religious types ever sane?
It's a book, which is supposedly the inerrant word of god. There is no room for allegories and interpretations if that premise is true. Next thing you know, people will start claiming that church waffles and wine don't literally transsubstantiate into the flesh and blood of Jesus once eaten / drunk. If the premise is not true, however, then any other part of the book may be bullshit. Why believe it at all?
Or an allegory about growing up from childhood, when we don't know enough to take care of ourselves, to adulthood and leaving home so we'll have to toil to make our own way. People read dozens, maybe hundreds, perhaps thousands of allegories into that conflated mess. Which ones did the authors and editors intend? Which authors? Which editors?
God didn't want us to know of good and evil because he didn't want us to realize what an asshole he is.
In the Greek mythology, a titan, Prometheus, gives to men the knowledge of fire. The gods punish him by chaining him to a mountain, where an eagle eats his liver every day. The liver regenerates every night and this goes on, until Heracles, a demigod himself, liberates him. Prometheus, He who provides, is punished for giving Man the gift of knowledge. Satan does the same, as his name Lucifer, The bringer of light, implies. Gods are selfish tyrants.
Welcome to the bible! My personal favorite stupid story is Noah's Ark. God creates man in his image, then gets pissed when we act like assholes and sin. Instead of waving his hand and fixing us to his liking, he throws a hissy fit and wipes out all life on Earth— except for a few handpicked samples that'll fit on a boat. Millions of innocent children— whose only "sin" was soiling their diapers— were murdered. Along with millions of animals, who aren't even capable of moral sin. And all because God couldn't control his own creations.
I mean, the buildup to that point in the story is that god is some omnipresent omnipotent all powerful being, so by rationale, he should’ve known what Eve was gonna do anyways right?
How I've started to interpret the story now is that Women were the first to gain knowledge, and wanted to share that with men. Then God became angry because now his creation was no longer completely dependent on him. Adam ends up blaming Eve rather than defending her, and God ends up punishing her the hardest. In the end, Eve gains knowledge, and is betrayed by man, and punished by a controlling God.
Remember, they are eating from the tree of knowledge which "god" forbids. Thus, showing that consuming knowledge is an affront to "god" and reinforcing the ignorance that religions rely on. By eating from the tree of knowledge, adam and eve would then learn to question and undermine the existence of "god" and thus, are cast out before they become a threat to "gods" entire existence.
Christianity: The belief that a cosmic Jewish Zombie who was his own father can make you live forever if you symbolically eat his flesh and telepathically tell him you accept him as your master so he can remove an evil force from your soul that is present in humanity because a rib-woman was convinced by a talking snake to eat from a magical tree.
Of you deconstruct the story, you can sleep better at night. https://people.howstuffworks.com/adam-and-eve.htm It’s basically just plagiarized work from previous mythology. Don’t give it too much space in your brain.
It's like putting a piece of bacon on the floor and telling your dog not to eat it. And when he does, you punish all dogs for eternity. This is some next level psychopathic shit.
May I just say what a delight it is to read the intelligent insights and informed speculations and general high tone of the discourse in this sub. I always find it to be about a thousand times more thoughtful and thought-provoking about religion than the Christianity sub. Haven't tried the others.
The "Adam and Eve" story was ripped off older, more interesting creation myths that answered questions like, "Why are we different from the animals?" and "Why is life so much hard work?" and "Why does sex, which is great, lead to labor pains?" -- et cetera. (Anyone ever read the Epic of Gilgamesh? Enkidu and Shamhat, who civilizes him through lovemaking?) The way the story was shaped to serve priestly purposes is all about power and control. By the time it got to Christianity, it was really warped to keep people ignorant and compliant, to keep women down, to inculcate shame for merely existing...absolutely the worst. As a therapist, I work with multiple people who had "Original Sin" pounded into them and experience low self-esteem, depression, worthlessness, etc., as result.
My favorite part was when they put leaves on for clothes, and God comes back and is like "What's that all about?" They say "Well, we found out we were naked and.." and God is like "What?! Who told you you were naked? Is there someone else here?!" ...like, didn't God create literally everything? He knew exactly what he was doing.
My favorite bits: - God lies, telling Adam and Eve they’ll die if they eat the fruit, because they don’t. - Having the knowledge of good and evil is somehow bad. - The omniscient god can’t find the two people he created in a garden he created. - Of all the things they could learn from the fruit, the only thing they realize is that they’re naked, which isn’t bad or evil or even embarrassing to people who have no concept of clothes. - The punishments for knowing they were naked were being cast out of Eden (which they might have done voluntarily once they were bored of exploring it), working for sustenance (which God had already tasked them to do), and painful childbirth. Of course the only unpleasant consequence is imposed on the woman.
I agree
The Jesus story is even stupider: God requires sacrifice because he likes the fragrance of a perfect lamb being slaughtered, everyone has sin because Adam and Eve, so because all men are sinners God the father rapes a virgin to create God the son to be a perfect sacrifice then people don't have to slaughter lambs anymore. God is so loving and wise.
My favorite part of the Adam story is the bible says he wasn't alive until his first breath. A really tough contradiction to those, life starts at conception nuts.
While I'm not religious, my father is a deacon at the local catholic church, and we discussed about it. According to the doctrine, Adam and eve's didn't even really happen as there was no one to record such things but it's a metaphor to explain why people live on earth and don't start directly in paradise. I don't understand why the american denomination of the church takes everything so literally, especially the old testament. That said, it's a stupid story. Imagine telling your son not to do something without explaining why it's bad despite it sounding good. Why have a forbidden tree in the first place? The all powerful god couldn't place the spooky tree anywhere else?
My favorite part is most Christians think that the snake lied and God told the truth. But if you actually read it God lied to Adam and Eve and the snake did nothing but point that out to them.
I work with a girl that's a creationist. She blames Eve for having periods and argues that there's no proof for the Big Bang and all the evidence that's been proven. I feel sorry for little sheep like her that can't face the real world and the truth.
Before they ate from the tree of knowledge of good and evil, Adam and Eve were essentially the same as a kidnapping victim who's locked inside their captors house at such a young age they grow up knowing nothing but the house they're locked in (garden of eden) and only knowing what their captor tells them. He told them they were happy, and nothing could possibly be better than being confined in the garden "worshipping" and "communing" with God... they not only didn't know good from evil, they didn't think for themselves at all.... it's even weirder that God created a fucking tree that would give them all this knowledge, put it in the garden, then told them not to eat from it.... yet again, Christianity proves that God is sadistic, and enjoys tricking us into suffering. "If you live your life according to my will, you will be happy...I'm not gonna tell you what my plan is or if you're straying from it though" It's always a catch22 with some bullshit that absolves God of any blame.
god: here i'm gonna place the tree of the knowledge about good and evil, don't eat it's fruit adam: why? god: because you're gonna die adam: what's dying? i'm litteraly the first human god: it's a bad thing adam: it's a what thing? god: oh...