Adam and Eve were now together and one day a serpent appeared and "forced" Eve to eat an apple of the tree of good and evil. Although Eve knew that God had prohibited them to eat of this tree, she couldn’t resist and decided to eat it. She offered some to her husband and they both ate and sinned. Then, they suddenly heard God coming and decided to his themselves. When Lord God saw them he said:
“Unto the woman he said, I will greatly multiply thy sorrow and thy conception; in sorrow thou shalt bring forth children; and thy desire [shall be] to thy husband, and he shall rule over thee.
“And unto Adam he said, Because thou hast hearkened unto the voice of thy wife, and hast eaten of the tree, of which I commanded thee, saying, Thou shalt not eat of it: cursed [is] the ground for thy sake; in sorrow shalt thou eat [of] it all the days of thy life…” (Genesis 3:16)
When I read these verses I thought this was so unfair. God cursed the snake and punished Eve, but didn’t do “anything” to Adam. I understand that Eve gave him the fruit, but he was the one who decided to eat of it. I got really mad while reading since this is very male chauvinist. Why does God decide that men should rule women? This gets me really upset since this might be one of the big reasons of why women were always treated inferior and didn’t have the same rights as men. I totally hate the believe or stereotype of women depending on their husbands and just taking care of home issues and their children. Today, many people have this believe, but women are rebelling and being more independent. The Bible really annoys and confuses me since I as a Catholic had never actually analyzed the Bible, and this makes me question myself a lot about my own vision of religion. Also I am now starting to notice how God has many human characteristics (he talks, walks, gets angry, etc.)
After all this happened, Eve conceives Cain, and later she gives birth to Abel. Cain was very jealous of his brother since God preferred him.
As stated by the narrator,
“But unto Cain and to his offering he had not respect. And Cain was very wroth, and his countenance fell.” (Genesis 4:5)
In effect, Cain ends up killing his brother and then, filled with regret, runs away and continues his generation. Adam and Eve also continue their generation by giving birth to Seth.
Now, I’m beginning to believe that God is extremely biased. Why did he prefer Abel? Couldn´t he just love them equally and save the jealousness between brothers? I really liked this part since I have a sister which is my same age. It is very common that at many occasions you feel jealous of her and think that she is better, but this is no reason to murder her. How can you kill your own sister? It would’ve all been better if God didn’t show preference for one of them.
As I said before, their generations continue after finally Lamech´s son, Noah, appears in the story. God, wanting to destroy evil, decides to send a flood and to kill everyone except Noah, his wife, his 3 sons, and a pair of animals of each species. He orders Noah to built an ark and to embark with his family and the animals. Noah follows his orders and they all survive the flood. I don’t understand God´s mood swings. He does not like evil, but by killing everyone with a flood isn’t he considered evil as well?
When the flood is over and he finally gets to a dry land the narrator states:
“And God blessed Noah and his sons, and said unto them, Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth.” (Genesis 9:1)
I found this verse very interesting since if they were the only humans alive they had to have sex with each other in order to reproduce. Don’t you think it’s like weird to have relationships with your family members? Well I think it’s VERY awkward. The only explanation I find to this is that these occurred in a totally different period of time. Another aspect that caught my attention was how these characters could live hundreds of years. I think their ages are kind of unrealistic, but maybe this stories were exaggerated by the persons who wrote them. Until now I have enjoyed reading The King James Bible and analyzing it since my perspective of the world is changing.
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