Readings:
The Holy Book
The Inmates of the Ark
The Flood
Noah Leaves the Ark
The Curse of Drunkenness
Noah’s Descendants Spread Abroad
The Depravity of Mankind
Nimrod
The Tower of Babel
When reading these common stories in the Bible, the reader (including myself) never really sits and thinks about all of the details of what actually happened in these situations- we just infer that what they are telling us is the complete explanation. Nothing can go that smoothly, and Ginzberg does an excellent job at opening the mind of the reader to the sinful nature of mankind, even beloved Biblical names such as Adam and Noah, sin and are not as they seem.
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| Sin is not always what it seems |
The Holy Book: One thing that was strange to think about was the fact that the fish didn’t have to be accounted for during the flood- I never would have thought of that on my own. To continue, this story makes Adam out to be a murderer of a child, which was very tough to read about. When sitting in Sunday school, one never really sits and thinks about how Adam and Eve didn’t possess social cues or know right from wrong when they first experienced sin.
The Inmates of the Ark/The Flood: Thinking of Noah as a power hungry dictator is another perspective I never could have put into consideration. The selection process of which animals to take on board and which to leave behind is one that is rarely thought about, simply the basic principle (two of each) is. Once on board, simple things such as feeding the animals the correct things and at the right times are not items typically discussed, but over the forty days and forty nights, Noah certainly would have had to feed the animals the correct items in order to keep the peace.
Noah Leaves the Ark: This reader portrays God as a harsh, gruesome ruler, not gentle or forgiving whatsoever. The very last passage in this really rubs the message in, saying “God enjoined particularly the command against the shedding of human blood. Whoso would shed man's blood, his blood would be shed. Even if human judges let the guilty man go free, his punishment would overtake him. He would die an unnatural death, such as he had inflicted upon his fellow-man. Yea, even beasts that slew men, even of them would the life of men be required.” This sounds unsettling and does not align with Biblical reference, but makes for the story to be a bit more interesting.
The Curse of Drunkenness: The interaction between Noah and Satan here is rather entertaining, especially when Noah agrees to go in on a business partnership to sell a holy drink with the devil himself. The comparison of man to each of the various animals depending on how much of the liquid he or she drinks was also extremely humorous:
before drink- “innocent as a lamb”
drinks moderately- “strong as a lion”
drinks more than he should- “resembles the pig”
drinks until he is drunk/intoxicated- “then he behaves like a monkey, he dances around, sings, talks obscenely, and knows not what he is doing”
Noah’s Descendants Spread Abroad/Depravity of Mankind: Noah split the earth among his sons, giving them power. Over time, the populations began to grow feisty. This was a new look on the story of Father Abraham, and his peace; the author put Abraham in an almost Godlike form, which is not what the Bible did whatsoever.
Nimrod: First off, the name Nimrod is hilarious. His father being named “Cush” made it even more hysterical. God giving him “skins” that had “wonderful property” is funny. The skins gave “he who wore them [the ability to be] both invincible and irresistible]”. Basically, God was giving a corrupt man godlike power, something dangerous. Nimrod eventually ended up being represented as horrific and Satan-like, which is a parallel to Satan himself, since he was one of God’s angels who fell.
The Tower of Babel: During the building of the tower, the author put three different types of builders into the picture (below are direct quotes from the reading)
Builder 1: “let us ascend into the heavens and wage warfare with Him”
Builder 2: “let us ascend into the heavens, set up out idols, and pay worship unto them there”
Builder 3: “let us ascend into the heavens, and ruin them with our bows and arrows”
The author later has a woman give birth while building, proving that is all they did day in and day out. Then, before the finish there was the conception of language, which just adds to the disarray even more than before.
Book 1, Chapter 4
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