Where wast thou when I laid the foundations of the earth?
(Job 38:4)
"Another hit!" said the Astronomer.
"Now we have had nine innings, as it were,
And I would say that Darwin's lead is wide.
Would anyone suggest the score is tied?
One extra inning, though: did God create?
Now, Bible Scholar, step up to the plate."
The Scholar's Tale
"In the beginning God created." So
The Bible teaches. Science tells us, though,
That we evolved. Now by science I mean
Such persons as yourselves--here at the scene
Of Scopes's crime--whose job it is to test
Those scientific theories judged the best.
And so which shall it be? Did God create?
Did things evolve? Must we equivocate?
Your case is strong--I won't make the mistake
That Bryan made right here, for heaven's sake,
Before he died. 1 I'll let the fit survive
And, unlike Bryan, leave this town alive,
I'll grant that things evolve. What we must do
Is ask: "Can we still say the Bible's true?"
We can if "true" means something more than "free
Of error." We have seen it cannot be
True word for word, creation (both accounts
In Genesis) is hardly what amounts
To literal history. Creationists,
Of course, are biblical literalists
Who preach inerrancy; they say we must
Believe all that the Bible says, if trust
Or faith is to be placed in any part. 2
Well, I reject that view right from the start,
As do most other scholars, and I'll tell
You why: some passages don't speak too well
Of God if it is truth that they contain.
Should I believe that God would order slain
Women and children in some holy war
(With virgins to be kept alive, used for
The victors' pleasure--Numbers 31), 3
Or that he'd order death for anyone
Who won't mind parents, works on sabbath days, 4
May be a "witch," or has some cheating ways? 5
That's not my kind of God, I'd say that he
Reflects a warlike tribal deity
Peculiar to his times. I'd say as well
I can't believe all that the Book would tell
About creation. I doubt strongly that
This Earth of ours is really domed and flat; 6
In Genesis cosmology, we've got
The work of ancient scribes whose aims were not
Scientific but religious.
Genesis,
According to the best hypothesis,
Is not the work of one but many hands; 7
We can distinguish several different strands
In the "Five Books of Moses" (Genesis
Through Deuteronomy--they are not his
Nor claim to be, it's just tradition that
One author [Moses] wrote them). Looking at
Creation, we're concerned with J and P,
As scholars label the two sources we
Find in the first few chapters of the book
Of Genesis. Now J and P both took
What they desired from the mythology
Of Babylonia. But let us see
How they remolded it to fit Hebrew
Theology. (I should explain to you
That God's name in the J source is Yahweh,
Which starts with "J" in German--that's the way
The J source got its name. J's older and
More readable, less stuffy, than the strand
That's called the Priestly source or P.) With this,
Let's go now to the myths of Genesis.The Bible starts with P. It may seem odd
To find here Elohim the name for God
(The word means "gods"). But Elohim in P
Is what is called a "plural of majesty" 8--
Though clearly it evokes a Hebrew past
In which not only one God but a cast
Of deities was recognized. (Yahweh,
God's proper name in J, may be someway
Related to "to be." 9 It came to be
Too holy to pronounce--that's why we see
"The Lord" instead. "Jehovah"? That's a name
Mistakenly derived. But I don't aim
To spend more time on names.) Now let's go back
To P. Creation here would seem to track
Somewhat (though P had freedom to embellish)
The Babylonians' Enuma elish, 10
An ancient epic in which Marduk's got
To slay the awful dragon Tiamat,
Personifying the primeval sea
Of chaos. (The god Baal similarly
Must slay his rival Yam in Canaanite
Mythology, Yam meaning "sea.") 11 The fight
Is won by Marduk, who splits Tiamat
Right down the middle. Half of her is what
Marduk then uses to create the sky,
The chaos waters being held back by
This ceiling. This is paralleled in P, 12
Where God creates a dome (this came to be
The "firmament" in English, but the text
Refers to hammered metal) 13 that protects
The Earth below by a division of
The waters. P's God is, of course, above
Combat with chaos dragons; it is not
Coincidental, though, that Tiamat
And the Hebrew tehom (the "deep" in P)
Are two forms of one word, 14 or that we see
God having combat with a dragon in
Isaiah, Psalms, and Job. 15 I'll add that when
We note the order that P follows for
The world's creation, it resembles more
Or less the order in Enuma elish. 16
(I hope you see already why I relish
This kind of study: texts from Babylon!
Old Canaanite clay tablets! give me one
Dead Sea Scroll! It's a treat to read such things,
And contemplate the light such study brings
To bear upon the Bible and its times.
Creationists think we're committing crimes
Against God's truth; I say we make the Bible
All the more fascinating. But I'm liable
To stray off course here--let's get back to P,
Where J joins in.)Now chapter two's where we
First come to J. Some say J "complements"
The P account, but that, I fear, invents
New meaning for the word. J contradicts
P on creation; although J conflicts
In details only--so of course it's true
In both accounts that "God created"--you
Can see that where the stories vary, this
One's wrong if that one's right, so Genesis
Can't be inerrant. (This is not just true
Of the Old Testament, also the New
Has many contradictions, the events
Or sayings often vary 17--"complements"
Is once again a favorite word in use.)
Now which one's playing rather fast and loose
With all the "facts"? The Earth initially
Was a dry plain, says J. 18 Does that mean P
Was wrong about the Earth first being a
Watery chaos? 19 How can P first say
That man (both "male and female") was the last
Thing God created, 20 and then J comes fast
Behind to say man was the first? 21 Since P
Says man and woman simultaneously
Came into being, does J tell a fib
When it says Eve came later (from a rib
Of Adam)? 22 Obviously we're dealing here
With two distinct traditions, and it's clear
The purpose of the Bible's editors
Was to preserve them both. While one prefers
Consistency today in what one reads,
That didn't rank too high among one's needs
In ancient times, if judging by our text. 23
The message was the thing.I'll mention next
That just as P reworked the myth about
Marduk, in part the J source used from out
Of Sumer, it appears, an ancient myth
About a god named Enki, dwelling with
A god named Ninhursag in Dilmun (much
Like Eden, so it seems). 24 This Enki's such
A fool: he eats some plants, which brings a curse
From Ninhursag; the pain gets worse and worse
In Enki's rib, until there is a cure
From goddess Ninti. Certain things here sure
Do sound familiar--oh, and Ninti's name
Involves a pun: "lady of life," the same
As "lady of the rib." 25 Forbidden fruit
In paradise, a curse, a rib to boot,
And Ninti's name "lady of life" (as Eve
Means "life" in Hebrew): motifs, I believe,
That aren't coincidental. More motifs
From ancient pagan texts and bas-reliefs
Include the cherubim, a tree of life, 26
And--just as he ruined Adam and his wife--
A wily serpent who brings man to grief. 27Now let us move along to the belief
In a worldwide deluge. Both J and P
Tell us how Noah and his family
Took animals aboard an ark when God
Sent waters "to destroy all flesh." 28 (It's odd
To me that this is taken literally
By the same people who see cruelty
In evolution--something that, they say,
God never would allow. 29 What crueler way
Could God behave than to destroy all flesh?
Sometimes their thinking simply doesn't mesh
With common sense. As I touched on before,
They also seem to think that holy war
Is fine and dandy.) J and P conflict
(Or "complement" again) as they depict
The flood. For seven pairs, Yahweh declares,
Of all clean animals and single pairs
Of all the rest should go aboard the ark:
So we are told in J. Yet all embark
By twos in P. 30 J says the waters rolled
For forty days and nights, in P we're told
A hundred and fifty days. 31 In any case,
That ark sure must have been a smelly place,
It couldn't be a very balmy cruise,
With every kind of animal in twos
On board and with a crew of only eight
To clean the stalls. 32 One cannot overstate
The mess on Noah's hands. But then, of course,
No ark like Noah's could withstand the force
Of such a mighty flood: a wooden boat
Three hundred cubits long (or, I should note,
Four hundred and fifty feet) would have such stress
That it would break apart before one mess
Could be cleaned up. And anyway we know
The tale of Noah's flood resembles so
The tale of Utnapishtim, some degree
Of Hebrew borrowing, whether it be
Direct or not, must surely have occurred.
From the god Ea Utnapishtim heard
A flood was coming, built a vessel, saved
Some animals, in general so behaved
That the familiar Noah would seem fresh
Out of the Babylonian Gilgamesh
Where Utnapishtim's found. 33 What's different is
That God is judging sin in Genesis,
And that's the message. In an older myth
(By way of contrast), the concern's not with
Man's immorality: it's Atrahasis
Who builds the boat, the flood caused by the masses
Having become so noisy that Enlil
The god can't sleep! 34 (A myth that's older still
Has Ziusudra, a Sumerian king,
Construct the boat; here we're not told a thing
About why man is drowned; some of the gods
Are mad about it, though--they are at odds
With such a cruel decision--that's why one
Warns Ziusudra.) 35Yahweh isn't done
With judging man after the flood: we find
Man ever prideful, the rebellious kind,
And so we have the Tower of Babel myth; 36
It's not a history lesson dealing with
The origin of languages (though that,
Of course, is what the myth was aiming at
Originally): 37 the myth is used to stress
God's judgment on man's pride and wickedness.
For what's the Bible all about if not
That which we're told in Micah? Here is what
The prophet says: "What does the Lord, O man,
Require of you? Do justly as you can,
Show love and mercy, and walk humbly with
Your God." 38 And it's through prescientific myth
The Bible speaks about creation by
This personal God whom science can't deny
And can't confirm. That myth speaks to us now,
Says "God created." It can't tell us how
God did it. 39 We can't limit God, and so
We can't prescribe his methods, even though
We seek to know them. 40 Our mythology
Is different now, it's called cosmology:
The Big Bang, stellar nucleosynthesis,
These are our scientific Genesis.
And so--Excuse me? Oh, of course: it's time
To close. And I am almost out of rhyme.A closing thought, then, if you'll bear with me,
And I won't mention God or deity.
Each one of us should thank his lucky star;
Made of the elements, we truly are
Star children, that is no exaggeration.
In heaven, not on Earth, was our creation.
So where's the contradiction that's involved
If science also tells us we evolved?
Creation, evolution: both are true.
I'll have my cake, by gum, and eat it too.