Numbers: More Laws and Balaam

Numbers seems to me to be pretty much the same thing as Leviticus, except for the fact that God expounds on a few more laws than he did in the previous book and there is no long list of how the tabernacle should look. Thanks for that.

While most of the book is extremely dull, there is at least one story that struck me as both fun and interesting a little more than half way through the book. We are introduced to Balaam, a man who is greatly respected for his apparent power to both bless and curse those whom he wishes. Balaam is recruited by one of the many tribes that live in the "promised land" to come and curse the Israelites so that the tribes can destroy them before the Hebrews decide that it is a good time to make war.

Balaam is an interesting man, however, in that he is one of the first people that we hear of not among the Israelites that worships the same God. So when he learns that it's Israel that he is supposed to be cursing, he immediately turns the curse into a blessing.

However, it is not until his return home that the true humor of the story kicks in. While Balaam is riding his donkey home, an angel appears before him. The donkey is the only thing that can see the animal and so will not budge from his spot. At which point Balaam proceeds to hit the poor animal who instantly whips around and asks him why he's doing that. It is only then that Balaam is able to see the angel and begs forgiveness of the higher being, though never of the donkey surprisingly.

I actually remember laughing out loud when I first read this story, not only because of the near absurdity of it, but because it reminded me of so many of the fables that I had read as a child that I could not believe that this was one of the stories that had been cut from my early bible education, if for no other purpose than the fact that it could have provided a lot more amusement than some of the same old stories over and over again. In the end, the story of Balaam and his donkey may end up being one of the most fundametally engaging stories in the entire bible because there is very little religion that seeks to overpower the simple nature of the narrative. Now if only some more of the Bible were that way, I might be in good shape.

Leviticus: Laws and Family Sorrows

Okay, so I read Leviticus and I can't help but wonder why Plotz doesn't understand that it is boring. Sure he may have other motives for reading the thing than I do, but at no point did I find the entire book to be interesting. Basically God expounds on the laws that he's already given Moses. That's right, pretty much this whole book God is talking to Moses on a mountain and I guess the poor guy has got to trek back and forth up and down this thing for a few weeks so he can get all of this down word for word. After all, it takes forty days to get the ten commandments and we know that the Israelites weren't slacking in his absence. Nope. They were busy building a golden calf. (By the way, Aaron did that and there is no mention of a punishment for him anywhere in the book.)

Anyways, if you pay close enough attention while Moses is writing all of these crazy laws down, two pretty brutal stories take place. The first comes just after God explains to Moses what needs to be burned on the altar and what kind of oils and incenses to use. Of course, two of Aaron's sons must have messed up somehow because as soon as they take the oil that they made into the tabernacle their fried. Now I'm imagining this scene was pretty gruesome, especially for Aaron who has to watch his son's die, but they aren't even mourned. Instead God admonishes both Moses and Aaron to be more careful next time. (Thanks for the warning system. One strike and you're out I guess.

The other story is just as short and pretty much as brutal. Two guys get in a fight and one of them happens to say God's name in a way that the big man doesn't like. Solution: have everybody stone him. First up are the people who heard him, which if I read it right includes the guy's entire family. That's right swear at God and he'll not only execute you but have your family do it. I'm starting to see God as something less than the family man I saw him as before.

Exodus: The Whining Manual

I'm not going to sugar coat this one. Some of the things that happen in Exodus scare the crap out of me. I'm glad that whatever God decided to destroy Egypt hasn't come to the conclusion that I need to be taught a lesson. I don't think that anyone in my family for about seven generations would be safe.

Okay moving on. The first person that you see trying to whine and moan his way out of responsibility is none other than Moses. (By the way, Moses is Aaron's younger brother. See previous post.) Rather than accepting what God has to say and going to the Pharaoh immediately with all the power of God behind him, Moses does everything that he can to get out of his responsibilities. What if no one believes him? He can't speak well... etc. The only excuse he doesn't seem to use is that his head hurts. Here Plotz notes an interesting point that this actually ingratiates Moses with God who is not actually looking for "yes-men" as much as he is competent tools that are willing to even question him if it means getting the job done satisfactorily.

As we move through the first half of Exodus, God pretty much flexes his muscles at the world, and shows how cruel he can be by pretty much laying waste to Egypt. Every time it looks like Pharaoh is going to concede and allow the Jews to leave, God "hardens Pharaoh's heart" and proceeds to send another more vicious plague at Egypt.

Finally, after every firstborn son (again with the hating of the firstborns), the Israelites leave. They're not even in the desert for five minutes before they start complaining. Why are they complaining to a guy who just proved that he's like the ultimate smiter (my spell-check hates me for this)? Who in their right mind decides its a good idea to complain to someone that can snuff you out in an instant? God, though, seems pretty patient with Israel for some reason. There is the occasional smiting for disobeying and at one point he almost kills everybody for making a golden calf. In the end though, for some reason, God is very patient with Israel. Though he doesn't actually take them to the promise land, instead condemning them to wander the desert for 40 years.

Genesis- the fall of the first born

Okay so it's about time that I started blogging on this big book that I've been reading for the past couple of weeks. I thought I'd start where it all began, in Genesis. Of course we all know the story of Adam and Eve, many of us have heard the stories of Noah and Abraham. Some of us can even recall the details of Issac, Jacob, and Joseph. While I was reading though, I noticed something that was rather interesting. That is that God seems to be more fond of the second or third child in a family than he does the firstborn. First of all is weird because you would think in this kind of culture that the firstborn son would be the most important and that God would favor him, but I cannot find a place in Genesis where that is actually the case.

First there is Adam, who may or may not be the first man on Earth. (I haven't actually decided that yet.) We see a creation in Genesis one and then another in chapter two, but whether or not the two are two separate events or two varying accounts of the same event is unclear. I like to think of them as separate because that supports my God and the younger sibling theory.

Anyway, after Adam and Eve get to "know" each other, Cain and then Able are born. Who does God favor? Able of course, the younger son who is also the one that is willing to sacrifice animals to him rather than the vegetables that his brother offers. God, therefore, adores Able, and Cain, being the rational older brother that he is, decides to kill the upstart.

Time passes and we come to Abram, or Abraham, whether or not he is a younger brother I can't say, but I know for a fact that Isaac is younger than Ishmael, but it is to Isaac that God passes the covenant he made with Abraham. Ishmael is, instead, forced to wander the land, and although God promises to help him as well, the overall effect is that he kind of gets shafted even though he is the first born.

Of course, most of us know that Jacob steals his older brother Esau's birthright, and Joseph eventually has his brothers kneeling at his feet. Even when Jacob is dying in Egypt he blesses the younger son of Joseph, Ephraim, over his older brother Manasseh. In other words, God continually shows favoritism not to the eldest son, but to a younger brother. I like this actually because I'm the youngest so that means that I've got a good shot at having about a million kids some day.

In the Beginning...

First thing's first. I thought that I would put out some of my initial thoughts about the bible before I got started reading it just to see how much I remember give myself a place to go from here.

I grew up in the church but I never really read the bible until after I stopped going full time. Being a little too young for the task, much of what I read simply washed over my head as I sat in my bedroom trying to understand why there were so many lists and why the book itself was so long. After finally wading through it a first time my plan had been to go back and read it more slowly a second time through, but I got somewher near the end of Leviticus or Numbers... one of those really elaborate books on rituals and temples and stuff that I really didn't care about at all before I finally gave up and quit the process all together. I never really stopped to think about what I had read the first time through.

Now that I am in this class however, I have kind of taken a moment to think back on the one time in my life when it seemed like I had nothing better to do than read a 1500 page book and some of the things that came to mind astounded me.

The first thing that really struck me is the difference between the two Gods in the old and new testament. Yaweh (not sure if that's how you actually spell it, so don't get too mad if it's wrong) I've decided is the guy you want on your side in a fight. You know what, scratch that. He's the guy that you just want as your friend because you know that anyone that messes with you is going to be in for a serious ass whipping, along with everybody else that that guy knows. He's like the best bodyguard ever, if that bodyguard had bipolar disorder and sometimes decided he didn't really appreciate you too much either. At those points you've just got to kind of make yourself invisible.

God the father from the new testament reminds me of like a rich father that you never knew you had. He'll make sure that you get everything that you want or need in time as long as you trust that he can do it without any proof. Otherwise, he'll make sure you go to the worst prison on a small deserted island with the worst criminals in the world. So maybe they're not so different after all.

I also noticed, after reading the first chapter of Good Book that there are two creation stories. The first occurs in chapter one of Genesis when man and woman are created together. The second occurs in chapter two when woman is created from man. Was God not happy with the results of his first creation, he seemed to think that "it was good" at the end of the first chapter but after day seven he creates man again. This time though there is no mention of creating in his image but only from the dust of the earth.

It's something to think about anyway as we get started. Did the writers of the Bible not notice the contradiction or are they trying to imply something different? Food for thought.

Okay, deep breath. here we go.

"In the beginning..."