Radical Judaism_ Rethinking God and Tradition - Arthur Green [24]
How, indeed, can one live after Eden, after Cain? “Cursing and blaspheming” is certainly one understandable response to that question, a path chosen by many. The early generations, according to the rabbis, discover idolatry, a form of contrareligion, one that blasphemes by its very acts of worship.12 You need something to worship in a world like this. But how could those generations revere the universal One when everything felt so fragmented? The original “natural religion” of Eden (we might think of it in Rousseau-like fashion as childhood's innocent embrace of life) was forgotten, so it is claimed, and “false gods” began to appear. But multiple deities only underscore human divisions, and represent tribes in continuing and worsening the aggressive, competitive behavior that is our evolutionary legacy, rather than checking it in the name of sacred oneness, which our shared humanity should give us the ability to do. By the time of the Flood, humans are so filled with violence that God nearly decides to end the great experiment, sweeping them all away. “This evolutionary path called Homo sapiens was nearly a blind alley,” the tale of the Flood seems to say, bearing an implicit warning to future generations, including our own. Morally speaking, humanity was no progression over the apes. The best human that God could find in that generation was one who locked himself away in his own relative virtue. Noah does not plead for his fellow creatures, does not argue with God's outrageous plan; he merely builds an ark. Only his own family, among humans, will be saved from the Flood. Some hero!13 Ultimately the self-indulgence that gives the lie to his “righteousness” is revealed in the intentionally ugly story of Noah's drunkenness that follows the Flood. His successors are not much better. They build the Tower of Babel, a monument to their own religious delusions.
Taken collectively and sequentially, these mythic tales of God's ongoing encounters with this new human species, created and blessed in the closing hours of the sixth day, give us a glimpse into the personal growth and education of the Creator, the true subject of all biblical myth. The One who had been alone for countless ages now has sought to find a partner, one with whom to enter into the dance of mutual relationship. This is not entirely easy or comfortable, given the strong and willful creature who has come forth, perhaps in a process that did not happen altogether as anticipated. (How was He to know?) Only with Abraham, whom God loves so greatly, does the tide of failure begin to turn.14 We will have more to say later about the patriarchal tales and the origins of Israel.
But the value of this process of divine involvement with humanity — and that is the core of biblical myth — will be proven only later, when God comes to redeem Israel from Egyptian bondage. God sees the suffering of Israel and “knows” (Ex. 2:25), as though He too had shared in their suffering. God comes down from the heights to learn what it means to enter into relationship with humans. Just as Israel is purified and transformed in the “iron furnace” of Egypt, so too has God, as it were, become prepared for a true and lasting covenant of love. Having accepted the right of his beloved Abraham to argue for the people of Sodom, God has learned to turn away from His own fuming anger. This will prepare Him to back down from His fierce intent to destroy Israel after the Golden Calf. He responds with