What's the story behind Adam and Eve and fig leaves.

by jam 41 Replies latest social family

• 

  bafh

  I have been thinking about this...Are you familiar with Brene Brown's work? She is a sociologist who studies shame and vulnerability. Shame is a human experience, and it drives a lot of our negative behavior that gets catagorized as "sin". Since I've left, I now feel that what gets catagorized as "sin" is not inheritly right/wrong but often falls into the catagory of "that is not good for you/society, so don't do it" - for example, fornication. There is not anything inheritly wrong with having sex with someone you are not married to - but it is better for society to have stable families and it is not good for a person to sleep around with anyone and everyone...so it becomes a cautionary "sin"...

  If you believe the story of Adam and Eve, their sense of shame over being naked - that sense that something is wrong with me - came from a break in their relationship to God. Their "sin" was their disregard a spiritual need.

  Maybe this story is telling us the origin of the sense of shame we all feel at times, or maybe it is a story set up to explain it away and normalize it.
• 

  kaik

  Jeannette, some Jewish thinkers and rabbis say that Cain was a product of Eve and Serpent, which is reason why Eve is called mother of all living, while this is not mentioned about Adam. When Eve had bear a child with Serpent she said "At his birth, the exclamation was wrung from Eve, 'I have gotten a man, through an angel of the Lord". Other texts say something similar: "And Adam knew his wife, who had desired the Angel; and she conceived, and bare Cain; and she said, I have acquired a man, the Angel of the Lord." and "And Adam was aware that Eve his wife had conceived from Sammael the angel, and she became pregnant and bare Cain, and he was like those on high, not like those below; and she said, 'I have acquired a man, the angel of the Lord [the serpent of the Lord]." The fallout of Adam and Eve was not eating forbidden fruit, but having unatural relationship with Serpent. God gave Adam an opportunity to admit the crime, but he refuses and blames Eve. Reading various materials I have not seen any specific meaning to the fig leaves except to the references where all flora refused to hide Adam and Eve, and only fig tree felt pitty and hid them from the wrath of God.

  Also Talmud mentions that Eve picked the forbidden fruit and fed it to the animals as well, therefore, all living was corrupted, not only mankind. Genesis without deep explanation is incomplete that it does not make much sense.
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  Jeannette

  My goodness.
• 

  Apognophos

  I've never really had interest in Talmudic interpretations, midrash, etc. To me they seem like so much fanfiction based on the original stories. I'm interested in what the original storytellers and audiences were thinking when they listened to the stories, but the rabbinical interpretations came centuries after the oldest Bible stories.
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  kaik

  Apognophos, fanfiction is also Genesis. Nobody knows what was the original story, but what we have in OT is filtered extract from numerous archaic civilizations and cultures that vanished thousands years ago. Midrash give a bit more explanation but in general they were written several hundreds and 1000 years after the complition of Genesis. Even Jews back then knew that Genesis was not sufficient; however, Christians for 2000 years believe that story of Adam and Eve are literally true.
• 

  J.C.

  What's the first thing Adam said to Eve ? Stand back ! I don't know how big this thing gets ...... Baaaaaaahahaaaaaaaa.
• 

  Deputy Dog

  bafh

  If you believe the story of Adam and Eve, their sense of shame over being naked - that sense that something is wrong with me - came from a break in their relationship to God. Their "sin" was their disregard a spiritual need.

  I've used this whenever JWs show me tracts about "Paradise Earth". If sin is eliminated in the "new system of things" and paradise is restored to Eden like condition, why does the WT show clothing on everyone? There should be no shame in being naked before God. So far I’ve yet to hear an answer.
• 

  Separation of Powers

  They are large and cover a good bit of area. Depending on just when they were gathered, if, for example, they were gathered when the fruit was ripe, then they would more than likely be a bit sticky because of the fig juice dripping on them from when birds would eat the fruit. That would make them adhere to the body better...
• 

  jam

  A teenager in bed with a young lady, mother come home

  early and catch them both under the cover. The two hiide

  their nakedness. Why, because he knows he has done wrong.

  Of course Mom have seen her son naked before, but now he feel

  ashamed..
• 

  Phizzy

  Yea, but has Mom seen him "standing to attention" before ?