The Rise and Fall of Adam and Eve

As I was also finishing up Philip Pullman's Dark Materials trilogy (full disclosure: I am personally in entire agreement with Mr. Pullman's thoughts on organized religion), Greenblatt's book was a fascinating adjunct. He explores in detail this age-old, so-familiar story, but casts new light upon it by marshalling examples of other origin tales, contemporaneous and otherwise, and placing it in a complex historical and literary context. For example, did you know there were versions in existence in ancient times where Eve and the serpent were the *heroes* - rightfully resisting God's selfish prohibition and bestowing a fuller knowledge on humanity? Or that some scholars offered interpretations suggesting that Adam willingly shared the show more fruit with Eve because he knew he would otherwise be so lonely and miserable without the mate who had brought such joy to him? It is refreshing to find Greenblatt enthusiastically unearthing defenses and alternative interpretations to absolve That Woman of all the blame for the mess humanity has been in ever since. He weaves in examples of Adam and Eve in art, depicting the varying ways they are presented and understood. He explores the knotty problem faced by theologians in deciding whether the First Couple are meant as literal, anthropological facts, or allegories. As the centuries unroll and knowledge of the world expands, new questions must be wrestled with: what about all those indigenous people who came to the attention of the European explorers of the New World? Damned? Innocents? Shameless? Kudos to Greenblatt for his tribute to the Dominican Bartolome de la Casas who wrote powerfully and in anguish over the atrocities committed against the indigenous people by the Spaniards and did his best to protect them. Who DID Cain marry, anyway? Finally, along comes Darwin to really wreck the temple... many centuries after a Roman named Lucretius postulated an "atomist" history whereby living beings developed in tiny tiny increments of chance over enormous spans of time, and were NOT invented and set loose by a god or gods somewhere. Greenblatt also writes with great admiration (and length) about John Milton and his Paradise Lost: Milton creates a subtle, complex, and oh-so-human pair of people that in whom we recognize our own frailties. It's still a great story, and Greenblatt can offer no higher praise than that this fairy tale has become... literature. Having partaken of the knowledge Greenblatt has offered in this book, I feel like a better human being. show less

I was a little surprised by this book. I expected a discussion of the story of Adam and Eve, its historical interpretations, and the significance it still has on western thinking about our origins and our morality. And there is that, although Greenblatt discusses the hold that aspects of the story — original sin, the relationship between men and women, the dangers of pride, etc. — still have on western culture and morals less than I anticipated.

What turned out to be more interesting was Greenblatt’s treatment of the story as an historical idea, especially its uneasy status between mythology and literal fact with the faiths that adhere to it.

Greenblatt starts with historical context. I learned a lot here. The story as told in the show more Torah dates to the 5th century BCE. The Enuma Elish, from as early as the 18th century BCE, and the Epic of Gilgamesh, going back as far as 2100 BCE, not only predate Adam and Eve in some respects, they also provide a base to which the story responds.

For example, in the Epic of Gilgamesh (the Sumerian creation story), man, once created, truly becomes man by joining the city of Uruk. Enkidu, the first man, becomes human by leaving the garden and joining the city — only by doing so does he become other than another wild animal.

Somewhat similarly, in the Enuma Elish, the role of the city is emphasized as Marduk, the creator, approves the creation of the city of Babylon.

By contrast, the story of Eden turns the relation between the garden and the city on its head — it is in the garden that Adam and Eve are their purist selves. It is only in their fallen state that they leave the garden, with their son, Cain, eventually founding the city of Enoch. And of course, God punishes the city of Babylon with a proliferation of mutually unintelligible languages.

There are other apparently deliberate positions or decisions taken by the story of Adam and Eve that respond to cultural and historical context — an insistence on strict obedience to God, pridefulness as sin, a hierarchical relationship between man and woman, the moral prominence of shame, and the status of labor as a punishment (although it does appear that Adam and Eve may have tilled the soil of Eden).

Greenblatt discusses some of these aspects in depth, in historical interpretations given to them. He provides extended discussions of Augustine’s notion of “original sin” and of the historical treatment of Eve as primarily responsible for the fall.

But it is his discussion of attempts at literal interpretation of the story that most engaged my interest, especially as attempted by Augustine and Milton, and aided by the artists of the Renaissance.

There appears always to have been a spirit of interpretation of the story, and of Genesis in general, as allegorical or mythological, rather than literally true. But the pressure to strengthen the faith of believers such as Augustine and Milton produced successive attempts to articulate and defend the story as literally true. And these attempts figure critically in an historical decline in the significance of the story.

Greenblatt believes that the story of Adam and Eve may be a victim of its own success — that is, it became vulnerable as it became believed in that literal sense. Through the efforts of Augustine, the artists of the Renaissance, and Milton, the story was pushed toward a modern kind of realism — literal factuality. Greenblatt writes, “The collective success of all of these efforts by believers — the triumphant fulfillment of the old Augustinian dream of a literal interpretation — had an unintended and devastating consequence: the story began to die.”

It became subject to the same kinds of questioning that any factual account is subject. What evidence stands for or against its truth? What about the internal consistency of the story?

Then, in this context, skepticism could grow roots. Where did Cain’s wife come from, if Adam and Eve bore only two children, he and Abel? Where did the inhabitants of the city that Cain founded come from? How could Adam have named all the animals of the world in half a day? What should we make of the newly discovered peoples of the New World, who apparently did not participate in the shame of nakedness that was the consequence for all humans of Adam and Eve’s transgression? What of the apparent age of the world as implied by ancient documents of Greece and the Aztec artifacts discovered in the New World?

I suspect that Greenblatt is tracing also an increasing split in general between the mythical and the factual, a distinction that if not peculiar to the post-Enlightenment world, is at least more sharply drawn from that point forward. Those questions were always available to any literal interpretation of Genesis, but they were not asked in the same spirit in which they required reduction to fact. Pre-Enlightenment, Augustine had certainly wondered about some of those same questions, and about the very idea of a talking snake, a magical tree, etc., but he took belief and faith as a challenge to be met. His literal interpretation of the story seems an aggressive expression of faith, rather than, in a later post-Enlightenment spirit, a sorting out of the facts.

Greenblatt is clear that he thinks something is lost with the demise of the story’s standing, and I found his position at least somewhat persuasive. The story of Adam and Eve gave us a framework, if not always answers (or acceptable answers), to questions about freedom, knowledge, choice, innocence and guilt, responsibility, and much more. By contrast, the modern story of our descent from extinct hominins leaves those things largely untouched.

Some do draw social Darwinism from the ironically mythologized version of evolution — “survival of the fittest” in Herbert Spencer’s words. Others look for the origin of human morality in our ancestors and closest relatives, the apes. But the former is cynical, reminiscent of Thrasymachus’s ill-fated version of justice in Plato’s Republic — “the advantage of the stronger”. And the latter is, at best, unfinished business and seemingly a very messy story from which to draw guidance for moral thought.

It’s one thing to talk in generalities of an age of realism and fact. It’s another to show in some detail the evolution of one core component of western culture toward that age. By doing so, Greenblatt enables us to see, for better and for worse, how the role the story of Adam and Eve plays for us has changed. show less

This elegant examination of the story of Adam and Eve shows how key moral issues were shaped by changing interpretations of the very brief account in Genesis. Greenblatt starts out with various creation stories, comparing them to the one presented in the Hebrew Bible to find some similarities and some differences. He then moves forward in time, showing how some religious thinkers regarded Adam and Eve as an allegory. St. Augustine strongly rejected this view, insisting on the literal truth of the story. This led him to dark views on innate human sinfulness and the nature of women. These views had a major impact on Christian thought, on the attitudes of the Church, and on the social position of women. Greenblatt's next stop is the show more Renaissance, where he discusses artistic representations of Adam and Eve, notably Durer's "The Fall of Man". He then turns to literature, in a fascinating section on how Milton came to write "Paradise Lost". If this was the apotheosis of Adam and Eve, the decline was not far behind. The Enlightenment bred skepticism, and the great scientific discoveries of the nineteenth century dealt a mortal blow. Many individuals do still believe in the literal truth of Adam and Eve, but as a widely held cultural and social truth its time has passed. This book is well worth reading, both for the interest of the overall topic, and for the light it sheds on specific thoughts and works. show less

I found great enjoyment in reading The Rise and Fall of Adam and Eve by Stephen Greenblatt. He examines the stories humans have created of our first parents, from prehistory's myths to the challenge of scientific evidence shaking a literal reading of the Bible.

Adam and Eve is one of the great stories in Western literature, a tale that has morphed from folklore to Christian canon to inspiration for artistic and literary masterworks and finally become relegated again to myth--a story with meaning--it's historic veracity disproved by science.

In the beginning we humans created stories to explain the world and our place in it. Stories from societies immemorial have come down to us via clay tablets, the Enuma Elish and the epic Gilgamesh. show more These known four-thousand-year-old tales are but 'later' contributions in human history.

In the Western world, the biblical story of Adam and Eve had its roots in the earlier myths but soon displaced them with the spread of Christianity. Early theologian St. Augustine insisted on a literal reading of the story. Renaissance art focused on Biblical stories, bringing Adam and Eve come to life as real people. John Milton, a radical in many ways, wrote his masterpiece Paradise Lost, which consolidated Christian's vision of the 'real' Adam and Eve.

Greenblatt contends that this very elevation of the story of Adam and Eve from a story with meaning to 'historic truth' was in fact its downfall. There are too many questions that arise. I recall, back in the early 1980s, when a man asked, "Where did Cain get a wife? " He told me he figured that Cain took an ape as wife and that is where people of color come from. This is the awful kind of problem that literalism leads to!

Darwin's observations during his time on the HMS Beagle led to his life's work proving and testing the theory of evolution. Theologians scrambled to reconcile science and the literal reading of the Bible.

I was taught (auditing a seminary class) that a myth is a story with meaning, humanity's endeavor to put into words the unknowable. It is not diminished because it is not literally true. Science holds the Theory of Evolution as a theory, the best understanding that scientific evidence and observation and testing can offer us at this time. Oddly, DNA evidence offers us an "Eve"-- a common first human ancestor.

I enjoyed how Greenblatt brought everything together into a rich narrative.

I received an ARC from the publisher in exchange for a fair and unbiased review. show less

La storia, la leggenda, il mito, chiamatelo come volete, il racconto di “Adamo ed Eva” serve sia come punto di arrivo che di partenza, per prendere in considerazione la storia della condizione umana. A pensarci bene, la vicenda dei nostri progenitori segnò allo stesso tempo, una fine ed un principio, creando la sintesi per ogni vita vissuta in quel lasso di tempo. La fine di uno “status” poi definitivamente perduto, ma segnò anche il tempo di quando gli uomini (e le donne!) divennero non solo agenti sessuali e intelligenti, capaci di pensare e di creare, ma anche di dover accettare una condizione di provvisorietà esistenziale, confrontarsi cioè con quello che viene chiamato “il fine vita”, senza aver saputo o capito show more nulla, o quasi, del senso, del significato di quell’inizio e quella fine. Restano intatte le ragioni di quella curiosità che portò alla disobbedienza.

Tutto sommato, per sapere poi cosa? L’autore di questo libro non risolve il problema, non riesce a dare una risposta a questi interrogativi e le cose restano come sono da quando tutto cominciò. Noi continuiamo a non sapere e a non capire. E’ chiaro che, se la storia di Adamo ed Eva andò veramente come la conosciamo, ci fu qualcosa che tra i due e il loro Creatore che non funzionò. Segnò la loro “fine”, nel senso che da “immortali” che erano stati destinati ad essere, “uscirono” dall’eternità ed “entrarono” nel tempo. Divennero “mortali”.

A noi, uomini del XXI secolo, non resta altro da fare che sperare in una futura immortalità, magari proveniente dalla moderna tecnologia. L’ “uomo dio” riuscirà a rimettere in sesto il tempo, oppure si perderà ancora una volta nella nebbia del tempo come non si stanca mai di predicare da tre millenni Qoelet? show less

La storia, la leggenda, il mito, chiamatelo come volete, il racconto di “Adamo ed Eva” serve sia come punto di arrivo che di partenza, per prendere in considerazione la storia della condizione umana. A pensarci bene, la vicenda dei nostri progenitori segnò allo stesso tempo, una fine ed un principio, creando la sintesi per ogni vita vissuta in quel lasso di tempo. La fine di uno “status” poi definitivamente perduto, ma segnò anche il tempo di quando gli uomini (e le donne!) divennero non solo agenti sessuali e intelligenti, capaci di pensare e di creare, ma anche di dover accettare una condizione di provvisorietà esistenziale, confrontarsi cioè con quello che viene chiamato “il fine vita”, senza aver saputo o capito show more nulla, o quasi, del senso, del significato di quell’inizio e quella fine. Restano intatte le ragioni di quella curiosità che portò alla disobbedienza.

Tutto sommato, per sapere poi cosa? L’autore di questo libro non risolve il problema, non riesce a dare una risposta a questi interrogativi e le cose restano come sono da quando tutto cominciò. Noi continuiamo a non sapere e a non capire. E’ chiaro che, se la storia di Adamo ed Eva andò veramente come la conosciamo, ci fu qualcosa che tra i due e il loro Creatore che non funzionò. Segnò la loro “fine”, nel senso che da “immortali” che erano stati destinati ad essere, “uscirono” dall’eternità ed “entrarono” nel tempo. Divennero “mortali”.

A noi, uomini del XXI secolo, non resta altro da fare che sperare in una futura immortalità, magari proveniente dalla moderna tecnologia. L’ “uomo dio” riuscirà a rimettere in sesto il tempo, oppure si perderà ancora una volta nella nebbia del tempo come non si stanca mai di predicare da tre millenni Qoelet? show less

A terrific learning experience. Comments on the credibility of the Adam and Eve narrative run from cover to cover: major voices from history include Augustine's literal interpretation, Voltaire's sarcasm, Darwin's proof of evolution and Mark Twain's hilarious Adam and Eve diary entries - they're the gems of the narrative. The misogyny inherent in the Adam and Eve origin narrative is unrelenting.