Pages

Wednesday, June 8, 2011

A Case of Bad Parenting, Genesis 1-6

Misbehaving children and fornicating angels? 

I'm not a bible scholar and at this point even if I did call my self a Christian I would have to admit to feeling like an unfaithful one for having and sharing these thoughts.

The whole of Genesis just seems like out of control children with no real guidance from their parent figure. Do what ever you want just don't eat from the tree of knowledge? Really? Anyone with kids knows that isn't going to work. 

God has set these innocent and assumably naive beings, Adam and Eve, loose in the Garden of Eden. Did he spend any time with them teaching them the difference between right and wrong? Did he explain to them at all why they were forbidden to eat the fruits from the Tree of Knowledge or did he just tell them no and expect them to obey? 

It didn't seem to take the serpent any time or much persuasion at all to get Eve to take a bite. All kids want to be like their parents. Is that wrong? We look up to our parents, they are our teachers and our guardians. I got in trouble for putting on (ruining) mom's lipstick when I was a kid but I didn't get banished from the house for doing it. I just wanted to be like my mom, I loved her and I thought she was amazing. I wanted to be like that too. 

God did show some mercy. He didn't kill Adam and Eve for eating the fruit. No he punished his children with pain, shame and banishment. In our society when a parent punishes their children in such a harsh way we call it abuse. The man who treats his children in such a way is probably a sinner and going to hell.

It seems like this might have been a mistake on God's part. Adam and Eve went on to have kids who also seemed not to have much guidance or control over their emotions. I mean Cain killed Abel out of jealousy. God liked Abel's gift better. Any parent knows that it is important to praise both their children for doing well not just the one who did better. You definitely can't just ignore the other child. Then God went and rubbed salt in Cain's wounds by calling him a baby. 

Don't get me wrong, Cain totally over reacted. Killing your brother is not OK. But, he does seem to be a misguided child. I think today's courts would have taken pity on him too. A bit dangerous since he seemed to show no resentment for what he had done. His only concern was for his own welfare and the fear that others would cause him harm for what he had done. Sociopath? 

Cain doesn't appear to have had any additional outbursts of rage. You'd hope he was a little mature being that he was most likely in his 100's by this time. I'm guessing he wasn't totally upstanding though because it appears that his offspring all turned out to be horrible sinners. I'm not sure what they did but it must have been bad since God decided to just wipe everyone out with one fail swoop. 

Didn't God feel any responsibility for what had become of his creation? He gave man free rein on the earth, Genesis 1:28 "Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over every living thing that moves on the earth". 

It looks like things were really going crazy. Not only was man totally out of control but it appears that God's angels were fornicating with the man's woman. Genesis 6:2 the sons of God saw that the daughters of man were attractive. And they took as their wives any they chose." I didn't make that up, there is a little note in my bible that says the sons of God were likely a group of fallen angels. 

Seriously God seems to have been losing control over his house around this time. How did it get so out of control that God had to create a flood to rid the world of the "wickedness" of man? Were the animals evil too? Seems a bit harsh that they all had to die along with man. 

Again he took pity and didn't wipe out everyone. He saved Noah and his family. We'll see how that goes. 

No comments:

Post a Comment