Easter 2006, The Pope cries about "the Anti-Genesis"? BRAVO! LET us UNDO the DAMNATIONS and MURDERS of Genesis!
The Bible is, plain and simple, the greatest example of PROPAGANDA in modern history, certainly in Western history. The bible is a document where murder, betrayal, denial, violence, misogyny, massacres, massacres of innocents, rage, blood-lust, revenge, adultery, and dozens of other sins are all at times PORTRAYED AS part of GOD's WORK, God's PLAN.
Somehow, in the telling and retelling of bible stories, we, the audience, appreciatively nod our heads and say, "AMEN!", even as the incidents we are discussing reveal murder on a wide scale.
Ok, "murder" is, by definition, not applicable to the supreme being? How about "HOMICIDE"?
Every Easter we celebrate the events that started with the last supper, and culminate with the crucifixion (torture and execution by state authorities) of Chirst. The Last Supper, in term, was the supper where Christ and the disciples observed the Jewish Passover.
"Passover", in turn, while having a positive and uniting connotation in the Jewish and Christian faiths, actually marks HOMICIDE on a large scale. For the very word "Passover" means that the Lord's ANGEL OF DEATH "passed over" the homes of Jewish families, on "the mission" to assassinate every First-born Egyptian male, AS A WARNING to Pharaoh to allow the Jewish slaves to depart Egypt. In short, this mission of homicide was a POLITICAL mission. The Angel of Death's errand was a RELIGIOUS-Political mission, religion and politics both being synonymous with POWER - the power of the state - for most of human history. Could not an almighty being, the God of the Universe, make some majestic gesture, some awesome event (such as the parting of the Red Sea), some divine confrontation with the Pharaoh to make the instruction "Let the Jewish people go free" a little more more urgent, a little more "here and now"?
No such luck. Instead we have a God working in riddles; a god perfectly willing to assassinate the children and infants of one faith (Egyptian) to enable the future of the infants of another race; a god who USED the people of Egypt to SAVE the Jews from a famine OF HIS OWN MAKING, then a generation or two later, crushes the Egyptian army (protectors of their people) ina a wall of water, the Red sea crashing in on the, if one holds to the more dramatic interpretation of the bible. Indeed, Exodus relates to us THAT GOD MADE PHARAOH's HEART HARD"
All this horror is only from ONE chapter (Exodus) of the bible, and doesn't BEGIN to address the horrors, homicides, and injustice of GENESIS. For the short-wrap on that, we have God almighty not only committing GENOCIDE of ALL races save for Noah and his immediate family, but of course in the process The Lord committing INFANTICIDE on a global scale. In the story of Cain and Abel The Lord FAVORS Abel's blood sacrfice (the KILLING of sheep, rams, and lambs on the altar of sacrifice) over Cain's offering from the fields (a good, healthy vegetarian offering!), but there is not much for Abel to savor in being "God's favored", for he his murdered by his jealous brother, driven to that jealous rage by a God who plays favorites!
As if THAT story isn't bad enough, it is compounded: God, "AWOL" in his role as PROTECTOR of Abel, now plays "twenty questions", or at least Grand Inquisitor, demanding of Cain "WHERE IS THEY BROTHER?!" as if he didn't know. Cain evades by his response; "AM I MY BROTHER's KEEPER?" to which the Lord answers with (yet more) damnation and judgement. But if you can skip past all the Sunday school moralizing, and the whole "mark of Cain" silliness, we see that Cain goes on to sire a long line of descendents; that he becomes the founding father of a great city, and, ergo, CAIN BECOMES A KING. So if you skip past the superficial Sunday school sermonizing, Cain INDEED IS REWARDED for his murdering his brother; just as Richard III grabs the powers of state by having his brother(s) and nephews killed in the Shakespeare play by that name.
And finally, let us visit the ORIGINAL SIN: the vicious DAMNATION, the VINDICTIVE judgement against Eve and ALL HER DESCENDENTS, as related in the Biblical story of Creation, GENESIS.
According to Genesis, The Lord creates Adam, inserts him into the paradise of the Garden of Eden, and instructs Adam that he may lord it over ALL the creatures and plants of the garden save for one: Adam must never, under any circumstance, eat of the Tree of the fruit of Knowledge. WHY does God leave THAT tree in the Garden, where it may TEMPT Adam? Why not place the tree on some remote island, or some remote planet, altogether inaccessible by humankind's sole being? Well, we never really ask that question, but next thing you know, EVE has BEEN CREATED to ACCOMPANY Adam, and in a moment away from her mate, she is beguiled (seduced?) by the serpent in the garden, who tempts Eve into eating the FORBIDDEN FRUIT. Even brings the Fruit to her mate.. SHE WAS NOT EVEN CREATED when God has put the prohibition on it!
Adam either forgets or neglects his instructions NOT to eat the damn fruit, and once again we see (as in God's confrontation with Cain, above, which actually comes later in the bible), God donning his PROSECUTOR's cape, DEMANDING of Adam, "WHAT HAVE YOU DONE?!"
We ALL KNOW what Adam has done... he has DISOBEYED a specific instruction, but so far, no more, and no less. IT IS GOD's RESPONSE to Adam's action that is so HORRIFIC for the human race; for not only does God CURSE humanity through Adam, not only does he EXPELL the couple from Eden; but God CREATES A WORLD OF DAMNATION where humans can, may, and will PROFIT FROM MURDERING EACH OTHER. (As we have just read in the retelling of the Cain and Abel story.)
As if throwing a meager bone into a pack of starving dogs isn't bad enough (to use a natural metaphor for the world that social humans find themselves in once they are expelled from Eden), the Lord next COMMITTS HOMICIDE and INFANTICIDE on a MASSIVE, GLOBAL SCALE: he tells Eve that she AND ALL HER DESCENDENTS shall be cursed to BEAR THE PAINS of CHILDBIRTH from thence on to eternity, as long as there are mothers and young women in maternity.
We all know that the PAINS of CHILDBIRTH are often accompanied by DEATH: of mothers (maternal mortality), of babies (infant mortality), and of infants still in the womb, from either stillbirth, spontaneous abortions, death during delivery, or other causes.
IF you believe the bible LITERALLY, then God HIMSELF is responsible for the Death, the Destruction, of TENS of MILLIONS of infants and mothers through the process of childbirth complications, infant mortality, and maternal mortality.
The God of Genesis MAKES MOLECH look like a piker by comparison! The Topheth, or cemetary of those sacrificed by fire to Molech and other fire dieties, being only a tiny fraction of the women, children, and infants who have died over history due to "natural" or GOD CREATED CAUSES.
(see http://www.roytaylorministries.com/am01224.htm)
IF the Pope wants to REVIST Genesis, I say "BRAVO!"
WHERE is it written that Time is IRREVERSABLE?
Where is it ordained that God's justice may not be re-examined over centuries of human misery and progress?
WHERE is it written that God's judgement in Eden, has killed far more victims than any sacrificial offerings to evil, pagan, or abhorant lesser gods?
IN the name of true justice and divine perfection, let us, indeed, revisit the original damnation!
