Beginning again: Rereading Genesis

If asked to rank my top books, Genesis/Bereshit would be right up there. Reading and re-reading it is endlessly compelling, fascinating, enriching and astonishing, both for its beauty and for its depiction of the complex mix that lives within the human psyche. Our annual reading of it on a weekly basis in shul is just beginning.

Of course, it is so much more than a work of literature and to place it on a list of ‘top ten’ best books is to diminish its status as a work of holiness and the founding document of our people, indeed of western civilization. Nevertheless once we start with the stories of Abraham and Sarah and their descendants (from Chapter 12 approximately), the setting shifts from the mythical to the human, even the domestic. So much so that the details of the lives of these figures make them relatable and familiar and, to lean into these terms, like relatives, like family. I know almost nothing about my family beyond 100 years ago; even within that time frame, my knowledge is blurry. This is in contrast to my Genesis family that is so vivid in its evergreen hues.

So when my one of favourite authors, Marilynne Robinson (author of Housekeeping, Gilead, Home and many other works of fiction and non-fiction) published a book on Genesis earlier this year, there was a convergence of two superlatives and I couldn’t wait to read what this greatest of writers had to say about this greatest of books. I knew that Robinson, a devout Calvinist, would be approaching the text at an angle different from Jewish readings (although they themselves are so varied).

Reading Reading Genesis was, is, a delight. Robinson’s voice and powers of observation are apparent from the very start. Even the structure of the book, with its simplicity, is classic Robinson. There are no chapters, no introduction or acknowledgements. Just a sustained reading of Genesis that extends from pages 1 to 230 (there are some occasional double-line breaks to signal a shift) and then pages 233 to 344 give us the King James version of the text.  So enamoured am I with Robinson’s insights and how she expresses them that my notes on the book run for over 17 typed pages and are close to 10,000 words! This and this and this!

For over half of the world’s eight billion people, for Christians, Muslims and Jews, the book of Genesis is our shared account of the nature of reality and ultimate reality, the origins of the universe and the emergence of humanity. Four and a half billion of us turn to it to gain understanding in our search for answers to timeless questions about existence, such as why are we, do we have any special significance, why is there suffering, how should we relate to each other, to the world around us, is there a Supreme Being and, if so, what is their nature? 

A recent exhibition I visited at the Israel Museum in Jerusalem explores the role of light, the first act of creation, in each of the monotheistic religions and their shared reverence for it as a manifestation of the divine. ‘Let there be light’ (Gen 1:3) - was there ever a more beautiful phrase and a more profound hope? No sooner is it expressed then it is so.

As part of the ‘Old Testament’, Genesis is sacred to Christianity. It reads the story of Adam and Eve eating the fruit of the forbidden tree and views it as ‘the Fall’ of humanity, deriving from this that all humanity is tainted by this fateful first sin. Islam draws on Genesis in its account of creation narrated in the Koran and the Hadith, in which Allah creates over a series of seven days, culminating in Adam and woman (unnamed). An image of Islam’s prophets as depicted at Melbourne’s Islamic Museum conveys our common ancestry going right back. All of which begs the question: if members of the monotheistic religions, historically and in the present, acknowledge we are all the children of Adam and Eve, Noah and his wife, Abraham and his wives, then how did the divisions become so entrenched and so murderous?

Robinson’s understanding of Genesis is that it is a work of theology, not just a primary text and collection of stories on which beliefs are based. It is 'a theodicy, a meditation on the problem of evil. This being true, it must take account of things as they are. It must acknowledge in a meaningful way the darkest aspects of the reality we experience, and it must reconcile them with the goodness of God and of Being itself against which this darkness stands out so sharply.’

In her reading, Robinson describes the ongoing relationship between God and humanity, its beginnings in the pristine and idyllic Garden of Eden and steadily moving through a series of ‘declensions’ as a result of disappointing decisions made by us, ‘flawed and alienated’ creatures. The God of justice could punish Adam and Eve, Cain or all of sinful humanity at the time of the flood more severely for their sins but, on each occasion, withholds significantly in favour of mercy and grace. Throughout the early chapters and into the latter, Robinson insists that for all our failings, we are ‘still sacred, still beloved’ of God.

As Jewish commentators have done for centuries, Robinson grapples with the many details and stories in Genesis that do not reflect well on our founding family: Sarah’s harsh treatment of Hagar, Jacob’s deceit of his father Isaac, the cruelty of the brothers in their treatment of Joseph, Judah’s neglect of Tamar, to name but a few. While the text is certainly holy to Robinson, she posits that at some point a group of people brought together different sources and made them one. Their fidelity to these narratives and to individuality, when they could have edited out the unbecoming moments, is a quality she admires deeply, describing it as a ‘generous rigour’.

She works with this feature throughout her analysis. People err, make poor decisions, deviate from the path and these moments have their consequences at a human level. Simultaneously, God has a plan for this particular people and for humanity that is at work through and at times at odds with human plans, giving Genesis its coherence as a whole: ‘The mind of the text hovers over a very long space of time, during which an absolutely singular providence works itself out through and among human beings who are fallible in various ways and degrees and who can have no understanding of the part their lives will play in the long course of sacred history.’

When it came out this year, Reading Genesis immediately made it to The New York Times’ bestseller list. The fact that a book purely devoted to theology could reach such a wide audience and so quickly speaks volumes about Robinson as a writer and Genesis as a text. Ezra Klein interviewed her about the book on his podcast.

Robinson doesn’t deal with the state of the world or the state of Israel explicitly in her book, nor does she get drawn into discussion of specifics in interviews. Still it’s impossible to read Reading Genesis without reflecting on current events and the chasms dividing the descendants of Abraham. Robinson reminds us of Genesis’ radicalism in insisting that every human is created ‘in the image of God’. She observes that this herding family may have been chosen to carry forward God’s plan for humanity but also experiences such profound unhappiness that ‘When we consider what the favour of God can look like, Jacob and his sons should surely be borne in mind’. On the ethics of justice, compassion and generosity that are being forged as central and unique to this nascent nation, Robinson is empathetic when it  falters in living up to them: ‘If Israelites fell short of this high standard, notably after their entry into Canaan, so do we all, and in much less exigent circumstance. As always, to their great credit, they cherished their mingled heritage and preserved it.’

In our shared origin text we are reminded of the fundamental concepts on which our shared future depends.