Episode 280: Pete Enns - Pete Ruins Genesis (Part 2)
In this episode of The Bible for Normal People, Pete continues his exploration of the Book of Genesis, diving into Genesis 5-11 by examining the complexities of the genealogies and the flood narrative, identifying source criticism, and more. Join him as he explores the following questions:
What is the significance of the genealogies in Genesis chapters 4 and 5?
Why are there two different genealogies in Genesis, and how do they differ?
What is the purpose of the genealogies in Genesis chapters 10 and 11?
What is source criticism, and how does it apply to the flood narrative in Genesis?
Why do scholars believe there are multiple sources in the flood story?
What are some examples of inconsistencies in the flood narrative that suggest multiple sources?
How does the biblical flood story compare to other ancient Near Eastern flood myths, such as the Epic of Gilgamesh and the Atrahasis Epic?
Is the flood story in Genesis historical, or should it be understood as a myth?
What evidence is there against a historical interpretation of the flood story?
Why would ancient Israelites preserve different versions of stories in Genesis?
What is the significance of the story of Noah’s drunkenness and the curse on Canaan?
Why is the curse directed at Canaan rather than Ham, and what might this indicate about the text’s purpose?
How do the stories in Genesis 1-11 help to establish Israel's geopolitical and theological identity?
How do the narratives of Adam and Noah set the stage for the introduction of Abraham in Genesis 12?
Why do biblical scholars view the flood narrative as mythological rather than historical?
Quotables
Pithy, shareable, sometimes-less-than-280-character statements from the episode you can share.
“Genesis is the product of editing, not just one author writing things. And in the case of creation and the genealogies, these sources are easy to see because they're next to each other. In the flood story, however, things get a little bit more complicated because the two sources are woven together to make one story.” @peteenns@theb4np
"The two genealogies in chapters 4 and 5, although very similar because they cover the same ground, they're not identical. The names are virtually identical but they also have some variation in order and the spelling of the names. They are also two just very different types of genealogies." @peteenns@theb4np
"Source Criticism is about detecting the presence of multiple sources in a portion of biblical literature.” @peteenns@theb4np
“Source criticism is a way, and I think a very convincing way, of explaining the presence of two creation stories and the two pairs of genealogies. They come from different authors—sources—and they were edited together by whoever compiled these traditions in what we call the Book of Genesis." @peteenns@theb4np
"The main arguments for the presence of different sources in the flood story that were edited together into one are first of all linguistic...The other argument for the different sources is the inconsistencies in a story or the differences in perspective within Genesis 6 to 9. Hust to drive the point home, Genesis gives two different perspectives on creation and two different perspectives on these genealogies.” @peteenns@theb4np
"The first example for evidence of sources within the flood story is how many animals are brought into the ark. Now in Genesis 6:19 and 9:3, it is one pair of animals...in Genesis 7:2 and 8:20, the number is not two of each but seven pairs of clean animals and one pair of unclean animals." @peteenns@theb4np
"The Gilgamesh story is about a king who is seeking the secret of eternal life...The presence of these other stories, Atrahasis and Gilgamesh, is a basis for comparing them to the Bible and vice versa. That's comparative religions." @peteenns@theb4np
"If these mythic stories are indeed so similar to Genesis, then shouldn't we call the biblical flood story myth as well? And if you ask me, the answer is very clear: Yeah, obviously this is a myth." @peteenns@theb4np
"There is zero geological evidence of a global flood…[and] the notion of building a boat that can fit all animals of the earth is, I think, impossible." @peteenns@theb4np
"You might be asking why ancient Israelites bothered with all this editing business? Just pick your favorite version of the story and go with it. Well, the answer is likely that the editors of Genesis and the Torah desired to preserve Israel's diverse traditions."@peteenns@theb4np
"When Noah woke up he did of course what any of us would do with a splitting headache. He curses his grandson forever. …The fact that this story is so weird is alerting us that we might have to think a little bit here about what's going on." @peteenns@theb4np
"Names are shaped in order to make certain points. They're actually pieces of theology, not just 'let me give you an objective list of names.'" @peteenns@theb4np
"In the flood story, we don't have an objective historical account of a global flood. There was no global flood. Rather, we see Israel's version of a much older tradition to explain a local flood."@peteenns@theb4np
"With Abraham, who is introduced at the end of chapter 11, God is going to try a different tactic. God will take matters into his own hands. He will not rely on anyone's upright behavior as he did with Noah...Rather, he will elect someone for no apparent reason whatsoever and make promises to him about a future land and offspring." @peteenns@theb4np
"Eventually Israel will fall as Adam and Noah did. Eventually, they will go into exile. Eventually, they will be driven out of the land just as Adam and Eve were driven out of the garden. It's all full circle, folks, these stories."
Mentioned in This Episode
Class: September class “Get a Grip on the Context: New Testament Beginnings and Background” with Dr. Jennifer Garcia Bashaw
Books: By Richard Elliott Friedman & By Pete Enns
Join: The Society of Normal People community
Support: www.thebiblefornormalpeople.com/give
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Pete: You're listening to The Bible for Normal People, the only God ordained podcast on the internet. I'm Pete Enns.
Jared: And I'm Jared Byas.
[Intro music plays]
Some of you are headed back to school for real, like Pete here, but for those of you who just have an itching for more educational opportunities without leaving the comfort of your couch, we have an announcement for you.
Pete: Our fall class series is all about getting a grip on the New Testament, starting with our September class called Get a Grip on the Context: New Testament Beginnings and Background. All three classes in our fall series are being taught by our very own incredible Nerd in Residence, Dr. Jennifer Garcia Bashaw.
Jared: And in this class, we're going to explore the creation of the New Testament, the diversity of early Christianity, and the larger Greco Roman world that influenced the authors of the New Testament. The class is pre recorded, which means you get instant access to watch it as soon as you buy it, and it even comes with a study guide so you can follow along.
Pete: The class is pay what you can from September 1st through the 15th, and then it'll cost $25. There will also be a live Q&A for all three parts of the series on November 20th at 8pm Eastern time, so Jennifer can answer all your burning questions about the New Testament.
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Pete: Hey folks, welcome back to our series on Genesis. Now we covered chapters one to four last episode. Not a lot of ground covered if Genesis is 50 chapters long, and it is, but you know, not to worry. We're not going to keep up that snail's pace forever, but we will for this episode. It's just that so many of the pressing questions and even controversial issues of the Bible are found in the first part of Genesis, chapters 1 to 11.
And these chapters also set up the action later in Genesis and elsewhere in the Bible. So I feel like we can't rush it. In this episode, we're going to work through the rest of part one, chapters five through 11, and then dip our toes into the story of Abraham, which will be part two, which we'll cover in the next episode, which will be the third episode of this series.
[Teaser clip of Pete speaking plays over music]
Pete: “I am forever perplexed at why anyone would want to defend the historical nature of a story that has God drowning everyone by the time we get to Chapter 6 in the Bible. The standard defense is that if God does it, it must be right and good and moral. That's also the reasoning behind justifying the Canaanite Massacre, and the eternal conscious torment of non-Christians. So if someone asks me, do you believe the flood story is historical? My answer is, it had better not be.”
So the rest of part one covers two genealogies and the story of the flood and also the Tower of Babel story. So we're going to touch on the first two points with some detail, and I'm really just going to mention the Tower of Babel later in the episode. We're not going to give a lot of time to that, as interesting as it is, and it really is, but we can only do so much, right? Genesis just has so much stuff to talk about. We have to pick and choose just a little bit.
Alright, so let's look at the genealogies first. These genealogies are found in chapters four to five and also 10 to 11. Chapter four has a genealogy of the descendants of Cain. Now Cain is Adam's son, right? Who murdered his brother Abel. So. That's chapter 4. Chapter 5 has a genealogy of the descendants of Adam.
So, if you think about it, you'd expect to see maybe some overlap between these two genealogies, and in fact you do. These are two versions of the same genealogy. And this isn't the first time we've seen this kind of repetition, right? We saw it in the last episode. The two versions of the creation stories are laid side by side. That's chapter one, and then chapters two and three. We see two side by side versions of a genealogy here in chapters four to five. We will also see two versions of the flood story, and the two side by side versions of the other genealogy pair, which is chapters 10 to 11. A lot of doubling here, and that's sort of important. We're going to get to that.
Anyway, the two genealogies in chapters 4 and 5, although very similar because they cover the same ground, they're not identical. The names are virtually identical, but they also have some variation in order and the spelling of the names. They are also two just very different types of genealogies.
Chapter 4, is a, sometimes called a segmented genealogy, as opposed to chapter five, which is a linear genealogy. Now, what the heck does that mean? Well, a linear genealogy gives one name per generation. And that's the more, I think, familiar genealogy to most Bible readers, you know, so and so begat so and so, who begat so and so, and on and on. That's a linear genealogy, and that is what we see in chapter 5.
So for example, let me just read to you verses 6-8. “When Seth,” he's the son of Adam, “when Seth had lived 105 years, he became the father of Enosh. Seth lived, after the birth of Enosh, 807 years, and had other sons and daughters. Thus, all the days of Seth were 912 years, and he died.”
Now, again, some of you might be familiar with this type of genealogy from elsewhere in the Bible, you know, so and so begat so and so. It's a purely linear descent. The father is given, his age is given at the birth of his son, and then how many years he lived after the birth of his son, ending with the total years of the father's life.
So, in a nutshell, Genesis 5 is a no frills list of one name per generation with ages. It covers 10 generations. By the way, remember that when we get to chapter 11. But this covers 10 generations from Adam to Noah. So bridging the action from Adam, you know, from the Adam era to the Noah era, that's this genealogy's purpose. It drives the action forward.
Now even though the names are virtually the same in the two genealogies, the content and the purpose of the two genealogies differ. Genesis 4 is not a linear genealogy, but a segmented one, because it lists multiple offspring of the same generation. We can look here at verses 9 to 23, we're in chapter 4.
“Lamech took two wives. The name of the one was Adah, and the name of the other, Zillah. Adah bore Jabal. He was the ancestor of those who live in tents and have livestock. His brother's name was Jubal.” Just hear that. “His brother's name was Jubal. He was the ancestor of all those who play the lyre and harp. Zillah bore Tubal Kain, who made all kinds of bronze and iron tools. The sister of Tubal Kain was Nama.”
Now, Lamech, in this genealogy, had two wives and two offspring by each wife. So, four children of the same generation. That's what makes it a segmented genealogy. Also, the chapter four genealogy here gives us no chronological information, no ages. And I'm sure you noticed as I read this, that this genealogy comes with commentary, not just names and ages, but talking about the impact, right? So it gives explanations of where things come from, like the origins of civilization, like nomadic life, the origins of music and metallurgy.
The purpose of Genesis 4 is not to bridge Adam to Noah. He doesn't even mention Noah. The purpose of this genealogy is to explain where things come from. This genealogist has an interest in the antiquity of history. The other genealogy wants to move things forward. See, like the two creation stories in Genesis 1, and then Genesis 2 and 3, you have the same topic with different presentations. The two genealogies have the same vibe. They're talking about the same thing, but these are two traditions laid side by side that differ in content and in purpose.
And you know, let's jump ahead to the next genealogical pair. We see the same pattern in the two genealogies in chapters 10 to 11. Genesis 10 is the genealogy of Noah's three sons after the flood, you know, where they migrated to.
And it's a pretty complex genealogy, but it does not go in a linear fashion. That's the point. A father had a son who had a son, blah, blah, blah. Rather, it branches out sideways. It's, again, a segmented genealogy, as is chapter 4. Noah had three sons. One of them, Ham, has four sons, and the many sons of these four are listed. You got all these names coming at you, right? The genealogies of the other two sons Shem and Japheth are also segmented. They branch out. The purpose of this segmented, and I've been using the term also called branched genealogies, but the purpose of this segmented post-flood genealogy is to explain why things are the way they are. In this case, how people came to settle where they did.
The genealogy in chapter 11, which comes right after the Tower of Babel story, it focuses on the genealogy of only one of Noah's sons, Shem, and it covers, once again, ten generations from Noah to Terok, and that's an important name because he's the father of Abraham.
But like chapter 4—chapter 11, that genealogy is a linear genealogy. One name per generation for 10 generations plus ages. The purpose of the genealogy in chapter 11 is not to explain how people groups came to settle their territories after the flood. It is another 10 generation bridge, like chapter 5, this one to get us to the story of Abraham, which is where the action in Genesis really takes off.
You know, folks, maybe I've piqued your interest to do what I've forced my students to do, which is to write out all four of these genealogies. side by side and compare them. You know, compare four and five, then compare 10 and 11. It's not the most exciting thing to do with your day, but I think it would help you appreciate a number of things.
First, the habit of Genesis 1 to 11 to have similar yet different stories side by side. And these stories are usually explained, I think, routinely explained among biblical scholars as different traditions that have their own points of origin that the editor of the Pentateuch brought together. So, it's good to see that.
So, also, digging into these genealogies will have some payoff. It will help us see how malleable genealogies are in the Bible. They're not just an objective list of names. Like, you know, if you go to the courthouse to find a registry of descendants of blah, blah, blah, whatever, you know, they're, I mean, it's, it's really the point of those genealogies is let's say factual historical information. But that is not how biblical genealogies work. Names are shaped in order to make certain points. They're actually pieces of theology, not just, “let me give you an objective list of names.”
And not to get off the topic, but let me illustrate this with the genealogies that we might be more familiar with. That's of Jesus himself, which appear in Matthew and in Luke. The genealogies of Matthew and Luke, they do overlap, but they're also very different in content and in purpose, just like the two genealogies of Genesis 4 and 5, and 10 and 11.
They're different in content because they serve different purposes. Matthew's genealogy stresses, among other things, Jesus’s status as a descendant of Abraham through David. See, that's a legitimation of his Jewish messianic role. Luke's genealogy, which is much longer, ties Jesus all the way back to Adam, not simply Abraham. And he seems focused on showing that Jesus is the Son of God.
That is his way of establishing Jesus's ancestry and therefore his legitimacy as one who has authority over even Caesar, who was hailed as a divine son of God. Anyway, that's really just an illustration of things that I'm talking about in Genesis 4 and 5 as well. And there's a lot more we could discuss concerning these genealogies, but I'm going to resist the temptation and move on. Although, if I were to talk about them, I would talk about how the two linear genealogies present Noah as a figure parallel to Adam. God presses reset in the Noah story and starts all over with Noah. He's a second Adam. And that doesn't turn out any better than the story of the first Adam. So both Noah and Adam are failure stories, let's call them fall stories.
But Abraham, well, this story will take things in a different direction. Abraham, you see, is the climax of these linear genealogies. I think of it as Genesis 1-11 as a whole is more or less an entrance ramp to the Abraham highway in chapters 12 to 26. But like I said, I'm not going to talk about any of that. The bottom line is that we have two pairs of genealogies that differ in content and purpose.
Okay, let's move on now to talk about the flood story. This is in chapters six through nine, which, you know, this story takes up more space than any other in part one. The flood story is a great example of two staples of biblical scholarship. And they're usually referred to as Source Criticism and Comparative Religions. Now I want to explain what those two things mean, especially for those of you who are not familiar with this podcast.
Some of you already know what Source Criticism is, right, in part because it comes up a lot here, but also because it's what we've been talking about with these duplications in the creation stories and the genealogies. I won't go into details here, again, we have to be somewhat brief so we can move through Genesis. To get right to the point, source criticism is a fundamental element of modern biblical studies and has been since the 18th century. With, uh, scholars, you know, anticipating it really for centuries before.
Source Criticism is about detecting the presence of multiple sources in a portion of biblical literature. And I know, I just, I'm, I'm hearing myself, and I know this is confusing. If you have an interest, I would recommend that you listen to two other podcast episodes at some point. Episode 48 and episode 125, where some of this business is teased out a bit more.
So, source criticism is a way, and I think a very convincing way, of explaining the presence of two creation stories and the two pairs of genealogies. They come from different authors—sources—and they were edited together by whoever compiled these traditions in what we call the Book of Genesis. See, Genesis is the product of editing, not just one author writing things. And in the case of creation and the genealogies, these sources are easy to see because they're next to each other. In the flood story, however, things get a little bit more complicated because the two sources are woven together to make one story. I sort of think of shuffling a deck, you know, you got cards on one hand and the other, and you sort of fan them together. That's sort of what's happening in the flood story, although not random. It's, it's very thought out by the editor, but still we have two sources.
The main arguments for the presence of different sources in the flood story that were edited together into one are, first of all, linguistic. This is a major issue in biblical scholarship. It requires knowledge of Hebrew. But scholars can see different voices in scripture based on the kinds of vocabulary they might prefer to use. That is a big issue. And again, if you want to look at those podcast episodes that I mentioned before, 48 and 125, that may make things a bit clearer as to the role of linguistic evidence for arguing and defending the notion of multiple sources in not just the flood story, but in Torah as a whole. So that's the first, is linguistic.
The other argument for the different sources is the inconsistencies in a story or the differences in perspective within Genesis 6 to 9. Now, again, we saw that with the creation stories and the genealogies. Not to be repetitive, but just to drive the point home, Genesis gives two different perspectives on creation and two different perspectives on these genealogies.
The same evidence that we see there in Genesis and the genealogies is found in the flood story, but woven together like a deck of cards, not side by side. So, let me stop yammering here and let me give a couple of, just a couple of examples. The first example for evidence of sources within the flood story is how many animals are brought into the ark.
Now, in Genesis 6:19 and 9:3, it is one pair of animals, you know, the famous two by two. In Genesis 7:2 and 8:20 the number is not two of each, but seven pairs of clean animals and one pair of unclean animals. Now, where did that come from? Well, I have seen people really twist themselves into knots trying to reconcile these numbers in order to avoid the idea that there are multiple sources edited together. I'm not sure why people want to do that, but you know, I'm convinced that these numbers can't be massaged to mean the same thing. A number is a number. Nor should we even try. I mean, it is what it is.
The reason for one tradition having seven pairs of clean animals and one pair of unclean is because this tradition that's responsible for this idea of seven pairs of clean animals, this tradition is actively engaged in promoting the notion of sacrifice. You see, only clean animals can be sacrificed, not unclean. Now, if you're familiar with the Bible, you might recognize this idea of clean and unclean as something you find in the book of Leviticus. Which is, you know, very big on the idea of sacrifices and clean versus unclean animals or many other things.
In fact, to simplify a much more complicated issue, again, see those podcast episodes I suggested earlier. To simplify a more complicated issue, source critical scholars routinely conclude that Leviticus and this part of the flood story that talks about clean and unclean animals are from the same source.
And that source is usually referred to as the priestly source, for shorthand, because this author is concerned with priestly matters like clean and unclean and sacrifices and things like that. The other source in the flood story, the one that only has one pair of each animal. makes no distinction between clean and unclean, and doesn't require sacrificial animals.
And this is labeled the Yahwistic source, which is shorthand because this source favors the use of God's name Yahweh in its stories, rather than the generic word in Hebrew, it's Elohim, and in English it's just translated as God. That's one example of, you know, the number of animals brought into the ark, that's one example of an internal inconsistency that alerts scholars that we may be dealing with more than one author, and the words have been edited together.
Another example is the length of the flood. Sometimes we read 40 days and 40 nights, other verses suggest 150 days. Again, if you're really interested in this, it's best just to read the flood story for yourself. Make it a project. Make it a homework or something. You know, just, I'm going to spend this week just reading these chapters of the flood story. And you can see it for yourself. Though I would suggest, to make this a little bit easier, that you do this with a good study Bible. In other words, a study Bible that recognizes the existence of sources. If you want to know which study Bibles I recommend, I do have a very old blog post on this, which you can search on our website. Just search for study Bibles and it will come up.
I think a study Bible, a good study Bible, has to recognize the existence of sources in Genesis, and we'll just lay them out for you, and you'll be so much better off. Your life will change. It'll be fantastic. So, you can pick up a good study Bible, or I think even better, spend a little money if you're interested and pick up a copy of a book written by Richard Elkiott Friedman, who is a Hebrew Bible scholar, and this is his 2003 best selling book, The Bible with Sources Revealed.
Now, Richard Elliott Friedman, what he does is he takes the entire Torah, the entire Pentateuch, and he color codes it according to sources. And even source critical scholars may debate some nuances, some fine points, you know, is this really that source, might it be something else? That doesn't matter.
That's an internal debate. You can still rely on this color coded version to give you the strong gist of how scholars read the flood story. See, when you see these sources, and then in your mind separate them, unshuffle the deck, what emerges is essentially two coherent flood stories that could more or less survive on their own.
You see, the flood story is a huge piece of evidence for the existence of sources that were edited together by the compilers of the Bible. You have linguistic difficulties, you have difficulties in consistency, And that just alerts biblical scholars that something's going on here. Here's a question that is a very good question, a very legitimate question to bring up.
You might be asking, why ancient Israelites bothered with all this editing business? Just pick your favorite version of the story and go with it. Well, the answer is likely that the editors of Genesis and the Torah, they desire to preserve Israel's diverse traditions. And I know this can be an irritating thought to some of my more conservative brothers and sisters, but it's puzzling to me why some would spend so much time denying the existence of these diverse traditions when it seems clear that the biblical editors themselves went to such lengths to preserve them.
In fact, it's not a great editing job, if you ask me. You know, the sources are pretty easy to see once you get into it a little bit. So. What value is there in denying what is there, evidence of these traditions, you know, in order to maintain a theory about the Bible that the evidence doesn't support? I hope that's not too convoluted. I'm just saying, listen, if there are sources, there are sources. If there are tensions in the flood story, linguistic and content-wise and logical and all that kind of stuff, then there are. Well, look at that and take that into account and come up with a theory that might explain that. And that's exactly what biblical scholars have done, in I think a very, very convincing way.
Now, so much for the sources in the flood story, let's leave that alone. Now let's chat for a minute about the second thing I mentioned, which is comparative religions. This term refers to the comparing of Israel's religion, which of course is found in the Hebrew Bible, with the religions of Israel's neighbors.
And folks, this is a huge topic, but it only became a thing when archaeologists began discovering writings and artifacts from these other cultures and seeing how they overlap, and sometimes a lot overlap, with the Bible. And this happened in particular in the 19th century, which is when archaeology as a discipline really took off, thanks to a dude named Sir Flinders Petrie.
Archaeology really became a structured, not just digging in the desert, but really a structured, controlled, quasi scientific endeavor in the 19th century. And we found that flood stories exist in some ancient cultures outside of the Bible, namely in the Epics of Gilgamesh, which I'm sure many of you have heard of, and also maybe something a little less known, the Atrahasis epic.
Both of these, Gilgamesh and Atrahasis, predate the Bible. And they're written in, not Hebrew, but in the Akkadian language, which is the language of the Akkadians, and a dominant people group, and also, um, you know, generally speaking, the language of the Babylonians, another dominant people group. And the Akkadian language is, it is a Semitic language, but an East Semitic language, which is a very distant cousin to Hebrew, which is a West Semitic language.
The Gilgamesh story is about a king who is seeking the secret of eternal life. And in his quest, he tracks down a character named Ut Napishtim, who is the Noah figure in this myth. and who is granted eternal life because of his role in the saving of humanity. So he wants to ask him for stuff. Doesn't work out the way he likes, but that's the point is that there is a flood story embedded in the Gilgamesh epic and Atrahasis, well, that's the name of the Noah figure in that epic.
All right. So we have these two stories, Gilgamesh and Atrahasis. Now, some similarities between these stories and the biblical flood story are, for example, uh, the building of a boat to save a human remnant. The boat is built according to exact specifications. The sending out of birds to see if the waters had subsided.
And the flood, the big thing, the flood being brought on by divine anger for something humans did. Now, if you're familiar with the Flood story, I mean, you know, alarms should be going off right now. There are some strong similarities between all these stories. There are, of course, differences between all these accounts. You know, Gilgamesh and Atrahasis, they don't match exactly, and neither one matches the Bible exactly, but that's not the point. All three of these stories breathe the same ancient air. And they write stories about a flood that has undeniable similarities. In my opinion, there is absolutely no question that the biblical story of the flood, at the very least, repeats motifs that are common to these other stories.
The biblical story and how it goes is in part shaped by this earlier tradition. And specifically, in the case of Atrahasis, many have remarked that the writer of Genesis may very well have been explicitly engaging that tradition. Because Genesis 2 through 8 and the Atrahasis epics, they share the same plotline.
By the way, if you're interested in some bibliography on this, I recall that in my book, The Evolution of Adam, which came out in 2012, I have a bibliography there and I mentioned some of these scholarly sources that talk about the connection between Genesis 2 through 8 and the Atrahasis epic. So the presence of these other stories, Atrahasis and Gilgamesh, is a basis for comparing them to the Bible and vice versa.
That's comparative religions. And you see, here's the real difficulty, the real hurdle, or even kick in the pants for many Christians. This is where all the controversy comes from. These other stories, Gilgamesh and Atrahasis, are clearly mythological. They involve activities of the gods, and in Atrahasis, there is some conflict between them.
But these are mythic stories. So, if these mythic stories are indeed so similar to Genesis, then shouldn't we call the biblical flood story myth as well? And if you ask me, to me, the answer is very clear. Yeah, obviously this is a myth. We can entertain all sorts of theories about whether the flood story is historical or not, but the presence of these other traditions, well, that presence narrows our options.
Any defense of the flood story as historical needs to explain the similarities between it and these other older texts. And I think where most scholars have concluded is that the historical nature of these stories, of this story rather, in the Bible is no more historical than the stories of Gilgamesh and Atrahasis. And I agree with that. I don't think the flood story in the Bible is a historical account, but except, I mean, think about this, except in one sense, one very general sense. We know, let's talk about evidence, right? We know from geological evidence that there was a massive local flood in Mesopotamia around 2,600 BCE.
That's 1,600 years before King David. Now, some scholars think that this event, this Mesopotamian flood around 2,600 BCE might have been the impetus for the various flood stories we find in that region, including the biblical one. Incidentally, if you're interested, another historical candidate for the inspiration of the flood stories is a much larger event that involves the overflowing of the Black Sea to the north at about 10,000 BCE.
Now we can't get into all that, but whichever might have been the inspiration for the flood stories, these flood stories have one thing in common. They are all attempts to explain how such a thing could have happened. And the answer to that question is for all these stories, divine anger and punishment, especially in the Atrahasis Epic. Divine wrath was a response to something the humans did, namely the human population was getting too large and making too much noise. It seemed like a good idea at the time, but goodness gracious, the neighbors are so noisy, what are we going to do with them, right?
Now, in the biblical story, the increase in population is not a bad thing, it's a good thing, you know, be fruitful and multiply. But, so the cause of God's wrath, which is still in the flood story, but the cause is different. In chapter 6, verse 5, we read that God sees that, quote, “Every inclination of the thoughts of their hearts was only evil continually.” See, humanity had gotten so disobedient, so corrupt, so persistently evil and sinful, right? Not noisy, that's not the problem. The problem is sin. It got so bad that something had to be done.
Enter the flood. You wouldn't be faulted, at least by me, you wouldn't be faulted for asking whether this state of affairs really deserves global drowning, as if there is no other option open to the Almighty. But the ancient Israelites, living among cultures with flood stories of their own, well, they created a story that reflects something of their own view of God and humanity. In other words, in the biblical flood story, we see something of Israel's theology. In the flood story, we don't have an objective historical account of a global flood. There was no global flood. Rather, we see Israel's version of a much older tradition to explain a local flood.
Now, in that ancient world, it might have looked like a global flood, although even the Hebrews have been ambiguous there. It doesn't say the world was flooded, it says the land was flooded, which could mean the earth is flooded. So, it doesn't mean land or earth, and most people have taken it as earth, but still, it's a little bit ambiguous there.
But, so, the biblical writers. Remember, we had these two traditions in the flood story. They drew on these older stories, but made them their own. They were not merely copying what others said, but shaping those traditions to express their theology. And the fact that these stories speak of the activity in the divine realm, you know, what the gods were planning and thinking, well, that's what puts these stories in the realm of myth, not history.
And myth—this is, folks, I really can't stress this enough, I know myth is sort of a bad word for a lot of people—but in biblical studies and in the study of religion in general, myth does not mean, you know, untrue or false or a lie or a scam or something like that. That is a lay use of the term, not an academic use. In academia, myth simply refers to telling stories of the divine realm behind the scenes, and how those divine thoughts and actions affect us down here. And that is certainly happening in the flood story. Now, other reasons why I, and I'd say most everybody, do not consider the flood story to be historical are the following.
Number one, there is zero geological evidence of a global flood. And by the way, just to nip this in the bud, the fact that cultures around the world have flood stories does not in any way, shape or form mean that there was one global flood. It means that floods happened all over the world, and they had to be explained.
Second, the notion of building a boat that can fit all animals of the earth is, I think, impossible. Now, yes, God can do anything, sure, but, you know, we have the dimensions of the boat in the book of Genesis. It's not even a decent sized zoo. Anyway, third, the study of the human genome and tracing it back through time does not bring you to a population of eight flood survivors a few thousand years ago, but rather a population of about 5,000 to 10,000 hominins living in Africa about roughly 100,000 to 150,000 years ago. So genetically, it's really hard to give validation to the biblical story.
And the fourth, you know, this is a little bit more subjective, perhaps, but, you know, drowning the world as punishment for sin is the act of an immoral monster king. And I can't help but think of Joffrey from Game of Thrones. Is this really the act of the God of all existence? The God who pours out God's love? I, I just, I can't, I can't see that, you know, it made sense for ancient Iron Age Israelites to write stories like this that fit well in the literary and religious mindsets of the day. But I mean, I'm just expressing my view here and it's a rather strong one. If this is what God is truly like, in other words, if the flood story is actually a historical event, uh, then in my opinion, there's no God.
“That's subjective.” Yeah, it's subjective. It's based on my experience and my understanding of theology and reading scripture, and I've come to these conclusions. Others come to different conclusions. I understand that. But that's where I am. I do not believe that the ground of all existence, the ground of all being, the God of the multiverse, wants to drown people.
So, disagree if you wish, that's fine. But before you do that, before you send me angry emails and social media comments, you need to know I am very familiar with how some Christian apologists defend the flood story against these sorts of attacks that I'm apparently making. But those responses, I'm going to be very clear about this, are based on pseudoscience, and frankly, a lack of understanding of the mythic nature of these stories, including the biblical story, and a just complete lack of imagination and historical curiosity for why these stories exist at all.
Let me push this a little bit further. I am forever perplexed at why anyone would want to defend the historical nature of a story that has God drowning everyone by the time we get to chapter 6 in the Bible. Some are so viscerally motivated to defend the complete historical truthfulness of the Bible that they are utterly unfazed that God would do such a thing. The standard defense is that if God does it, it must be right and good and moral. And, you know, that's something I might call the sovereignty of God defense. Whatever the sovereign God does is right. That's also the reasoning behind justifying the Canaanite massacre and the eternal conscious torment of non-Christians. So if someone asks me, do you believe the flood story is historical? My answer is, it had better not be, or perhaps a more patient response would be, I think it is a mythic story rooted in a historical event that needed to be explained theologically by the ancient Israelites.
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I want to close out our discussion of the flood story by mentioning one episode in that story, because that episode will provide a segue to, uh, one final point I want to make about part 1 of Genesis, chapters 1 to 11. Now, this scene is found in the flood story in chapter 9. As the well known story goes, after the flood, Noah planted a vineyard and then got hammered. And, like a college freshman, collapsed naked inside his tent in a drunken coma. Now, one of his sons, Ham, by the way, pronounced Ham, but I'll keep saying Ham because Ham is awkward, but that's how it's pronounced. One of his sons, Ham, went into the tent, and he saw his father lying there naked, which apparently is a very, very horrible thing to do.
Now, let's dig into that a little bit more. The phrase used in chapter 9 verse 22 is that Ham “saw the nakedness of his father.” Now, I don't want to get to all of it here, as interesting as this is. This is actually a very crucial line of the story. But that phrase, saw the nakedness of his father, is similar to another phrase we see elsewhere in the Bible that has sexual overtones. And that phrase is to uncover the nakedness of the father, which means for the son to have sexual relations with the mother. Now, I want to be clear, Genesis 9 is not saying Ham had sex with his mother. And, you know, if that was the author's intention, he would have said that Ham uncovered the nakedness of his father, but instead he says he saw the nakedness of his father. They're two different, uh, expressions.
And, you know, I don't think they mean the same thing, but here's the point. The phrases are so similar, it just plants the idea in your head that, goodness gracious, what kind of a guy is this? Let's unpack this just a little bit more. The exact nature of what Ham did is a little ambiguous.
The only thing that's clear is that it's a really bad move. But does it simply mean that Ham saw his father in a naked state? And I have to tell you, just to, you know, jump ahead here, bottom line, I think that is what it means in this story. He saw his father's naked state. Remember his brothers? They saw what Ham did, and to correct the situation, they walked into the tent backwards, you know, averting their eyes and covered up their father's naked body.
And in doing so, chapter 9 verse 23 puts it, “they did not see their father's nakedness.” It seems like he's just, naked just means naked, that's all. And they had it covered up. But see, what's raised questions throughout history is, why seeing a father naked is such a grave offense? I mean, what's the big deal?
So interpreters have taken the 90 percent similarities between the two phrases, you know, seeing versus uncovering the father's nakedness. They've seen that similarity as just a hint that maybe something more serious may have happened or at least a hint that the writer is wanting you to sort of be grossed out by Ham and not just by him, but by somebody else. We'll get to that in a second.
Folks, this is a literarily brilliant story. This is a teaser. You know, “what happened?” “I don't know, but it sounds pretty bad.” It's, if you may allow me an analogy, it's sort of like saying, Tom went in to his mother.
Hmm, does that mean he had sex with her? Or that he went into the house or something to where his mother was?
See, if I were writing a story like that, I would never say Tom went into his mother. If I meant to say, Tom went into the house of his mother, I wouldn't. That is, unless I was trying to plant in the reader's mind the notion that Tom is a bit of a scoundrel without actually saying it. That's actually what I think is happening in the phrasing of Ham saw his father's nakedness, which sounds so much like uncovered his father's nakedness. And I think the writer is just being incredibly clever here at this point.
But despite all this ambiguity, which is, frankly, folks, part of reading Genesis and the Bible as a whole, get used to ambiguity. But despite all this ambiguity, this incident is intended to paint someone in a bad light. But who? Is it Ham? Nope. It's not, even though he's the one who, quote, saw his father's nakedness.
Let me read verses 24 to 27. “When Noah awoke from his wine, and knew what his youngest son had done to him,” again, exactly what did he do? But anyway, “he, Noah, said, Cursed be Canaan, lowest of slaves shall he be to his brothers. He also said, Blessed by the Lord my God be Shem, and let Canaan be his slave. May God make space for Japheth and let him live in the tents of Shem.” So Shem's pretty important, and Canaan's pretty bad. I mean, you just take a step back. See, when Noah woke up, he did, of course, what any of us would do with a splitting headache. He curses his grandson forever. See, Canaan is one of Ham's descendants.
I mean, the first words out of Noah's mouth weren't, geez, what a night, what was I thinking? I'll never do that again. But cursed be Canaan, one of Ham's sons. Lowest of slaves shall he be to his brothers. This seems a bit over the top. It actually seems misdirected. Curse an entire bloodline and only part of a bloodline?
If it said, “cursed be Ham and all of his children,” fine, but it doesn't say that. Cursed be Canaan. Why curse Canaan, who is only one of Ham's four sons? Why should Ham's entire line through Canaan be cursed to be slaves to the descendants of Shem? This definitely seems like an overreaction and misplaced anger, but let's look at the big picture.
The fact that this story is so weird, it is alerting us that we might have to think a little bit here about what's going on. There's something happening here that is worth thinking about. See, Noah says that Canaan will serve Shem. Well, Shem's descendants will include the Israelites. You know the word Semite or Semitic, right? That comes from Shem. And as if to make the point, Ham's descendants include not only the Canaanites, but the descendants of his other sons. Kush and Mitzrayim, Upper and Lower Egypt, respectively. See, those people that held the Israelites in slavery for a few hundred years in the Exodus story, that's, this line of Ham is not a very good one. It spells problems for the Israelites later on in the story.
But you see, the Canaanite line, already here in chapter 9 of the Bible, is being singled out to receive harsh treatment long before they even exist. Why? Because this story is in part a justification for the harsh treatment the Canaanites will receive at the hands of the Israelites when they conquer Canaan and kill people and take their land.
These Canaanites, well, they've been cursed since before they were born. They were set up for failure from the beginning. As soon as they came on the scene, they were doomed to a subhuman legacy of everlasting subordination to the Israelites. No treatment, no, even extermination, no treatment will be too harsh for these people whose ancestors saw his father drunk and naked.
So here's my point. Part of the author's purpose in bringing up Canaan at all is because he is drawing already here, in part one of Genesis, he is drawing Israel's geopolitical map. A geopolitical map that really only has relevance much later in Israel's story. See, this author is living at least sometime late in the monarchy, and more likely during or after the Babylonian exile, which is in the 6th century.
He's drawing a geopolitical map, and this is part of the national story the Israelites would tell in retrospect, looking back over their history. Why are things the way they are? How did we get here? Who are these people groups around us? The storyteller, he takes care of the dreaded Canaanites by telling their origin story. And they are a cursed people from the beginning.
And this drawing of the geopolitical map doesn't end here. The Babylonians also come up in Genesis 1 to 11, twice in fact. It's very much agreed upon among biblical scholars that the creation story in Genesis 1 mimics themes from the Babylonian creation myth, which is called Enuma Elish, named after the first two words of the story, which in English is, “when on high.” Genesis 1 mimics this Enuma Elish.
The Israelite author mimicked that myth for the purpose of showing the superiority of Israel's God over those of the Babylonians. And the Babylonians also appear as the bad guys in the Tower of Babel episode in Genesis 11:1-9 as an arrogant people whom God throws into confusion.
And this geopolitical map will continue to be drawn later in Genesis. Two of Israel's immediate neighbors, the Ammonites and the Moabites, we are told, are descendants of Lot impregnating his own daughters. This is not a flattering depiction. The other neighboring nation, Edom, and we read about them in the Jacob and Esau story because Esau is Edom. That's sort of code, but you know, that word Edom even shows up.
But the relationship between these two blood brothers is a little more complicated. They are blood brothers after all, but they also are constantly fighting. They can't get along. And I should want to leave this more for when we look at part three of Genesis, but let me just say here that parts of the Jacob and Esau story set up this difficult political relationship between the nation of Israel and the nation of Edom during the time of Israel's monarchy. So, as we come to the end of this episode, let's chat about Abraham for a second, just to set up the next episode.
As I mentioned, creation, the whole thing's not going well. Adam and Eve sinned, which ruined everything, and then plan B was to start over with Noah, a second Adam, press reset on creation, flood everything back again, have the floods recede, and just start over with a new batch of people that are surely gonna get it right. But that also went nowhere. And incidentally, uh, both the Adam and Noah stories involve something bad happening in a garden, which involves covering up nakedness, right? So it's fair to read this story of Noah's drunkenness as a second fall story, but let's not digress here.
With Abraham, who is introduced at the end of chapter 11, God is going to try a different tactic. God will take matters into his own hands. He will not rely on anyone's upright behavior as he did with Noah, that failed, that was not reliable. Rather, he will elect someone for no apparent reason whatsoever and make promises to him about a future land, an offspring, promises that this God is going to be covenant bound to produce. Neither land or offspring will come by Abraham's own muscle, both will be an act of God. See, the story of Abraham is a story of Israel's origin. This is really where it begins. This will be the true beginning of Israel's covenant with God, a covenant that God alone initiates for no apparent reason. What Yahweh requires of the Israelites in this covenant is that they worship and obey Him exclusively.
But, as we all know, Israel will have a hard time doing that. Eventually, Israel will fall as Adam and Noah did. Eventually, they will go into exile. Eventually, they will be driven out of the land, just as Adam and Eve were driven out of the garden. It's all full circle, folks, these stories.
That's enough for this episode. We will return to Genesis and the Abraham story in the next episode in this series. In the meantime, again, folks, thanks for listening and we'll see you next time.
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Outro: You've just made it through another episode of the Bible for Normal People! Don't forget you can catch our other show, Faith for Normal People, in the same feed wherever you get your podcasts. This episode was brought to you by the Bible for Normal People team: Brittany Hodge, Stephen Henning, Wesley Duckworth, Savannah Locke, Tessa Stultz, Danny Wong, Natalie Weyand, Lauren O'Connell, Jessica Shao, and Naiomi Gonzalez.
[Outro music ends, a beep that sounds like a voicemail tone signals the start of a blooper clip]
Pete: I'm sorry, Stephen, my cat is crawling all over my mic, you probably can't hear it. Marmalade, get out of here. Go on. Okay, thank you.
Right, there's sort of two groups. So let's look at the first group. Chapter four has a genealogy of the descendants of Cain. I want to say that again because my cat's been messing around here. Chapter four has a genealogy of the descendants of Cain. That's—kitty. Come on. Okay. Now she's purring into the mic. [Loud purring noises in microphone]
I got to pause. Okay. I'm back. I had to feed my cat. That may help.
So for example, let me just read to you. My cat just, you know—
Thus all the days of Seth were 912 years and he died. I hope my cat doesn't start meowing. I want to say that last part again.
[Beep signals end of episode]
