Mike Winger Video 2.2 (Genesis 2)

1. My walk through Mike Winger's videos on women in ministry and leadership continues. He spends over an hour in his second video on Genesis 2. He goes through a lot of small arguments that various people make here and there. He seems especially to engage two resources.

First, I am glad that he has continued his dialog with Philip Payne. It seems to me he argues with him over small points. I went to those points in Payne's book and didn't get the same feel as you get from his video. I didn't disagree with Winger on most of his points in relation to these small points. There are so many arguments that have been made by so many people on both sides -- some are stronger than others.

The other source he engages significantly in this video is Two Views on Women in Ministry in the Zondervan Counterpoints series. It features Tom Schreiner and Craig Blomberg on the complementarian side and Linda Bellvue and Craig Keener (Asbury professor) on the egalitarian side.

You may be surprised to know that I agree with a great deal of what Winger says about the details of Genesis 2. In fact, he reminded me of some of the same reactions I had to various ideas in seminary. At Asbury, Don Joy was particularly fond of the suggestion that the initial 'adam of Genesis 2 might have been androgynous -- both male and female. I thought this was funny then. Joy had asked the Bible faculty at Asbury about the concept before he published his book Bonding. They told him they didn't see it, but he published it anyway.

I would say, though, that I don't think it's as outrageous as it might seem. I just don't think it's the right interpretation.

2. I do want to get to some key points of disagreement, though, before getting into minutia. Fairly early on in the video, he says that both complementarians and egalitarians both agree on the centrality of Genesis 2 for the debate. Let me say as an odd duck that I have never really felt this way. In my booklet, Why Wesleyans Favor Women in Ministry (2004), I didn't mention Genesis at all. I do mention it in my more recent, A Biblical Argument for Women in Ministry and Leadership because it is part of the debate, but it has never been the central part of the debate for me.

Why? Two reasons.

The first is something that I discussed in one of two posts I made in preparation for this one. We are in a phase of biblical studies and biblical theology that is characterized by what I have called "flatness." For most, it is a "pre-modern" or "pre-reflective" perspective. That is to say, it is based on a deficient understanding of how to read the books of the Bible in context.

I may actually be more annoyed at the prevalence of these "narrative" readings among post-liberals for whom it is a postmodern reading. These narrative readers deliberately minimize contextual readings in favor of reading the Bible as a single story. I am perfectly fine with this as long as you acknowledge that you are reading the Bible out of context to do so. 

The pre-modern reads the Bible as one book from God to us without awareness of context. But the post-liberal to a large extent ignores historical difference. For some, it's a matter of principle even. In my Who Decides What the Bible Means? I set out as legitimate 1) original meaning interpretations, 2) orthodox-consensus readings of Scripture, 3) church-community readings of Scripture, and 4) individual spiritual readings of Scripture -- the key being that the Holy Spirit is directing these readings.

3. But if we construct a biblical theology, it is clear that a Christian reading of Scripture must privilege New Testament conclusions on Old Testament issues over the original meaning of the Old Testament. [At this point, a number of evangelical Old Testament scholars break out in hives.]

For example, there is nothing in Leviticus to suggest that animal sacrifices (or the temple) will ever stop being offered. In this regard, Hebrews provides the authoritative perspective on those sacrifices. They were illustrations of the one effective sacrifice of Christ. Similarly, circumcision is the assumption of the Old Testament. But Paul tells the Galatians they will have fallen from grace if they get circumcised.

Finally, as I show in the previous post I mentioned, the New Testament has distinct interpretations of Old Testament passages that go well beyond what those passages meant originally. For example, we would not get the impression that Lot was greatly distressed about the sins of Sodom from Genesis, but 2 Peter 2:7-8 portray him as a righteous man vexed by the sins of the city. We can take 2 Peter to be making an inspired point through Lot without thereby changing our inductive interpretation of Genesis 19.

What are you getting at Ken? What I am getting at is that I am most concerned with what the New Testament has to say about men and women more than with what Genesis 2 by itself says. This is not because Genesis 2 isn't significant. It is because Christian theology prioritizes New Testament revelation as more complete and more precise. 

(Mind you -- I know I am creating challenges for myself hereby. Winger already mentions in this video that 1 Timothy 2:13 uses the order of Adam and Eve's creation to support 2:12. I will defer that discussion for later.) 

Let me illustrate this principle of NT privilege. Colossians 2:16 tells the Gentile Colossians to stand their ground about anyone who condemns them because they do not keep the Jewish Sabbath. Romans 14:5 similarly tells the Romans to decide as a matter of their own conscience whether they will consider one day above another -- a clear allusion to the Jewish Sabbath. In short, Paul did not consider the Jewish Sabbath to be binding on Gentile believers. For him, it was a matter of personal conviction for them.

Now this is a straightforward observation, in my opinion. But it causes all matter of hives for the Flatlanders. "But, but, but." One person said to me once, "But the Sabbath goes back to creation!" (Gen. 2:3). "I know," I responded. "Isn't it crazy? Paul doesn't care."

4. So what does Genesis 2 say? Here let me invoke two posts I did recently in my Science and Scripture series, one of which mentioned different approaches to Genesis 2-3 in that regard and the second of which did some preparatory work on questions of genre. I'll leave the New Testament use of Genesis 2-3 for later in Winger's series.

First, Genesis 2-3 in context was an expression of the messed up state of the world. That is its point. I argued in the second post just mentioned that a comparison of Genesis 1-2 suggests that these are not to be taken as rigid history but as more "archetypal" -- expressing fundamental things. The reason is because Genesis 1 and Genesis 2 present a different order of creation. This doesn't mean one is wrong. It means that we are wrong to expect them to be literal presentations. They are doing something more profound. They aren't exactly poetry, but what they are doing is as "poetic" as it is literal, in my opinion.

The later of the two creation presentations, Genesis 1, puts male and female together as co-regents of the earth with no fall mentioned.

The second presentation in Genesis 2-3 culminates in three expressions of the state of the world. Men work hard to get the soil to yield its fruit. Both men and women will die even though God had intended for them to eat from the Tree of Life and live forever. Women will have painful childbearing and they will find themselves dominated by their husbands. And of course there are consequences for snakes too.

This is the point of Genesis 2-3. These chapters express the fallen situation of humanity. They are "etiological." They answer the questions, "Why do men have to work so hard on the land?" "Why do people die?" "Why do women have such painful childbirth?" "Why are women dominated by men?" (And why don't people and snakes get along?) [1]

In the process, the point of Genesis 2 is to picture the world before it was this way. As I have argued, it is probably not a video tape. If it were meant as a videotape, it would contradict the order of Genesis 1. Rather, it expresses that 1) men did not have to work hard before the Fall, 2) women did not have a painful life before the Fall, with their husbands dominating them and, of much less importance, 3) snakes and humans weren't on such bad terms before the Fall. 

For this reason, if there is hierarchy in Genesis 2, it is not the point. Indeed, the point is the harmony of Adam and Eve before the Fall, their peaceful cooperation. Their co-regency. The point of the way it is presented is the oneness and unity of Adam and Eve before the Fall -- the one fleshness of them and the distinction of them from the animals -- not Adam's authority over Eve. That almost goes against the point.

Shocker -- I am willing to say that there could be a light assumption of Adam's primacy in the way Creation 2 is presented. What I am saying is that, not only is that not the point. I am saying that to emphasize it is to miss the point of the story, which is the harmony of the two prior to their act of disobedience. 

In such a thoroughly patriarchal world, how might you present a pre-Fall situation that did not have man and woman at each other's throats? That is what Genesis 2 is about. It is the structure of the ancient world without the conflict, struggle, and bitterness. It is God meeting them in their assumptions and moving them from there. It gave an idyllic picture that was the opposite of dominance.

But God wants to do more!

5. So the street warfare that Winger engages in is all fine and good. I agree with him on almost every minute point of interpretation. But, at the risk of playing into his hands, I believe that this is a spiritual struggle. There are women who know they are called. There are men who know women are called. Some of the interpretations of some can be a little "creative," shall we say. (And Winger fully acknowledges that there are some crazy complementarian interpretations out there too.) 

But is because they see the trajectory of Scripture. They see the whole council of God. One of the problems with fundamentalism, in my opinion, is that it can get so involved with the verse-by-verse street warfare that it misses the Spirit of Scripture. It misses the big point because it is arguing about some detail of the letter. This is what the Princeton Calvinists did with slavery in the mid-1800s.

This is not putting experience above the Bible. Interpreting and applying the Bible is a complicated thing -- look at how many thousands of interpretations and applications there are out there. A little guidance from the Holy Spirit seems in order. Indeed, Bible technicians, "letteralists," can be dangerous because they can miss the heart of Scripture while focusing on the details (cf. Matt. 23:23-24).  

[1] I have no problem seeing the snake as Satan, but this was not part of the original meaning of Genesis 3. Not only is Satan not mentioned, but the understanding of Satan does not seem to have come into play until after this time -- later in the post-exilic period. It is not until the first century BC that any surviving Jewish writing equates the snake with Satan.

8.2 Science and Scripture: Situating Genesis 2-3

continued from the last Science and Scripture post
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8.2 Situating Genesis 2-3
1. How then should we understand the genre of Genesis 2-3 and situate it within Genesis, the Pentateuch, and the Bible? We might start with the fact that the creation story of Genesis 1 and the creation story of Genesis 2 seem distinct from each other. A number of possibilities have been offered for how they might relate to each other, but which one is most likely? 

First, what are the main differences between the accounts? The most obvious difference is the apparent order of creation. Plants are created on Day 5 in Genesis 1. Then animals first on Day 6. Finally, humans -- male and female -- are created later on Day 6.

By contrast, in Genesis 2:4, "on the day when Yahweh God made land and skies," God first creates "the man" or "the human" (אָדָם -- 'adam). At that point "there was no plant of the field on the land nor herb of the field" (2:5). Here we immediately note three differences. First, Yahweh, the name of God, is used throughout Genesis 2-3. His proper name was absent from Genesis 1, where only the generic reference of God ('elohim) was used.

Second, the impression of 2:4 is that creation of humans, plants, and animals took place altogether on the same "day" as the creation of the land and skies. Finally -- and perhaps most striking -- the man is created before there were any plants in the land. It is not until 2:9 that Yahweh Elohim makes all the plants of the land.

The animals then are not created until Genesis 2:19. Like the man (ha'adam), God creates all the animals out of the ground and brings them to the man to name them. Interestingly, the creation of the animals was preceded by God's observation that the man should have a helper. So finally after the animals are created, God creates a "woman" ('ishshah).

Thus we see two other differences between Genesis 1 and 2. The animals are created after the man, and the woman is created last. To this point, the man and woman are not named Adam and Eve. 'adam so far would seem to be generic for a man, and the woman is simply the generic 'ishshah.

There are other differences that are perhaps less important for our purposes. Creation in Genesis 2 seems more personal and relational. Creation in Genesis 1 is by divine command and seems more formal. In Genesis 1, there is a plural used in the creation of humanity -- "Let us make." Genesis 2 only speaks of Yahweh God. 

Textbox: Differences between Genesis 1 and 2
1. Creation in six "days" versus one "day"
2. Different name/reference to God
3. Man created before plants and animals
4. Creation of woman separated from creation of man

2. What are we to make of these differences? If we take both accounts "literally" in relation to the same event of creation, they do not objectively seem to cohere together. That fact would leave us with three basic options: 1) they refer to different events, 2) they are different perspectives on the same event (e.g., different genres), or 3) one or both of them is incorrect in some way.

Let us assume that both of them are correct in some way. They do not seem to refer to different events, for 2:4 indicates that Genesis 2 took place on the day that God created the skies and the land (i.e., the heavens and the earth). And are we to think that God created other men and women before the man and the woman of Genesis 2? While that idea would fit well with the perspective of evolutionary creation, it seems like a doubtful (anachronistic) meaning for the biblical text.

That leaves us with the second option, namely, that Genesis 1 and Genesis 2 both relate to the creation of humanity but in some different way. Chiefly, it leads us back to the question of genre. Presumably one or both of the accounts functioned as more than mere literal history. It would be fully in keeping with the genres of the Ancient Near East (ANE) if the stories are much more "archetypal," as John Walton has put it, rather than fully literal." [1]

3. At this point it is fitting to ask the question of sources. Most Old Testament scholars agree that Genesis reflects the integration of multiple sources, though there remains substantial debate about their exact number, nature, and dating. Nevertheless, it would not be deeply controversial to suggest that Genesis 2-3 come from an epic of Israel's story that goes back at least to the time of the early monarchy (e.g., the tenth century BC). Similarly, it would not be greatly controversial to consider Genesis 1 as an introduction to the entire Pentateuch written in the late exilic or post-exilic period (sixth or fifth centuries BC).

The origins of this consensus began in the 1700s with the observation not only that a number of stories in the Pentateuch are very similar to each other. But they have one key difference -- the name of God. For example, there are two very similar stories of Abraham telling a powerful figure that Sarah is his sister. In Genesis 12:10-20, Abram tells this to Pharaoh. In Genesis 20:1-18 (when Sarah is 90 years old in the flow of Genesis, incidentally), Abraham tells this to Abimelech. In the first instance, God is referred to as Yahweh. In the second, God is referred to as Elohim.

This pattern is so pervasive in Genesis that, in 1753, Jean Astruc suggested that perhaps Moses had synthesized two different sources together in the creation of Genesis, one of which used Yahweh in reference to God (later called the "J" source, since Yahweh begins with a J in German) and the other of which used Elohim (later called the "E" source). The details of such a theory have been debated back and forth for over 250 years. For our purposes, it is enough to note the consensus that Genesis 1 and Genesis 2-3 come from different sources. [2]

Given that consensus, it is easy to conclude that Genesis 1 and 2 had distinct purposes. In chapter 4, we argued that Genesis 1 was ancient cosmology. It amazingly seems to give man and woman an equal status as created in the image of God with dominion over the rest of the land with its creatures. Genesis 2-3 had its own distinct purposes. It does not fit precisely with Genesis 1 on the level of detail, suggesting that the truths we are to take from these chapters is more theological than precisely historical. 

4. What were those truths? We have been developing an approach to Scripture in the preceding chapters that takes fully into account this truth: revelation always starts with the language and categories of those to whom God reveals himself and then moves them from there. God does not expect us to climb the mountain to him or we would never understand what he wishes to reveal. Rather, he stoops to our weakness and elevates our understanding.

We thus should think of biblical revelation as "incarnated" truth. We collectively have to use discernment, guided by the Holy Spirit, to distinguish between the "that time" and the "all time," so to speak. There is always "that time" in revelation because that is the nature of all meaning. It is always contextual.

A second prong in our appropriation of Scripture recognizes that the same words can be given different emphases and even different meanings in different times and places. Thus, even within the Bible itself, the same passage may be taken differently by different authors -- with each different meaning inspired of the Holy Spirit. Thus, the original meaning of Genesis 2-3 may be different from the way various New Testament authors take various elements of these chapters. And yet each different meaning can be inspired!

What was the original point? ...

[1] John H. Walton, The Lost World of Adam and Eve (IVP Academic, 2015) -- especially his proposition 9. It is important to note that Walton considers Adam and Eve to have been historical individuals. Perhaps I should also note that he sees Genesis 1 and 2 as sequential rather than two different presentations of the same creation (see his proposition 7).

[2] It is hard to underemphasize the significance of an editor intentionally integrating sources together that were not fully harmonizable on a literal historical level. It reveals that our modern sensibilities and default expectations of the text were apparently not those of the original authors and editors. It was wrong of an earlier generation of scholars to demean the biblical authors for practices that were fully appropriate for them. Similarly, it is inappropriate for modern scholars to preclude such possibilities -- operating on the same modern assumptions as the liberal scholars of an earlier generation.

8.1 Science and Scripture: Approaches to Genesis 2-3

Although I've been a little distracted by Michael Winger's videos, I did intend to write in the later part of this week on Science and Scripture. So why not jump to the proposed Genesis 2-3 chapter of the Science and Scripture book I've started working on? Previous posts covered all but the final piece of chapter 1.
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8.1 Approaches to Genesis 2-3
1. In chapter 4, we began to explore questions about Genesis' structure, genre, and historical context. We argued that these were often crucial elements in the interpretation of Genesis 1-3 as they relate to questions of science and faith. We showed how young earth creationists, old earth creationists, and evolutionary creationists each lean toward a different understanding of the genre of Genesis 1.

For example, young earth creationists often claim to take Genesis 1 "literally." We saw, however, that their interpretations were only selectively literal and that a literal interpretation of Genesis 1 would probably result in a picture of the cosmos that is quite different from the one with which they normally operate (e.g., a flat earth with waters above a dome and stars below the dome). An individual like Ken Ham tends to interpret Genesis 1 as historical narrative.

By contrast, old earth creationists tend to take Genesis 1 at least somewhat figuratively with the word day referring to an unspecified but large period of time, likely millions of years. This is the "day-age theory" which on days five and six allows for the millions of years of the fossil record -- with God stepping in with a special creation at the appropriate developmental points. Nevertheless, the structure of Genesis 1 is still largely seen as historical narrative -- just a less literal one.

Finally, the so-called "framework hypothesis" takes Genesis 1 not as a historical narrative but a theological one. We saw that John Walton, as an example, wonders if Genesis 1 was a liturgy for the new year whose fundamental purpose was to re-enact the installment of Yahweh as king of the world each year. Others might see a less specific situation. Clearly, Genesis 1 presents God as sole creator of the world. It indicates that God's creation is orderly. It situates humanity -- male and female -- as the pinnacle of creation.

Genesis 1 also, arguably, introduces the Pentateuch. In chapter 4, we briefly discussed questions of Genesis' authorship and noted that most see Genesis as the synthesis of both oral tradition and literary sources rather than a single document produced by Moses. In such hypotheses, Genesis 1 serves as a kind of introduction to the Pentateuch, written somewhere between the late sixth century and mid-fifth century. In this view, Genesis 1 "grounds" the Pentateuch in the sole authority of Yahweh, the God who brings order out of chaos.

Approaches to Genesis 1 that see it as historical narrative on some level do lead to tensions with modern science, especially the young earth creationist interpretation. However, interpretations that see Genesis 1 as a more poetic, theological presentation of creation leave ample room for theories of modern cosmology such as the Big Bang. Indeed, we argued in chapter 3 that the Big Bang theory actually supports faith in the special creation of the universe quite well. Science has no evidence-based theory on what caused the expansion of the universe from a singularity or why it expanded when it did. Faith in a Creator thus is in perfect alignment with current cosmological hypotheses. 

2. In this chapter, we want to continue this discussion into Genesis 2-3. Here we once again have three basic interpretations of the biblical text. First, young earth creationists (YEC) see Genesis 2-3 as historical narrative. Adam and Eve are understood to be literal historical individuals, the first humans to exist on the earth. Genesis 2 is seen as a template for ideal humanity, and Genesis 3 is seen as an explanation -- or etiology -- of why humanity is as it is today. Let us call this the traditional literal view.

Textbox: An etiology is an origin story that explains a particular practice or social reality

The old earth creationist (OEC) also takes Genesis 2 somewhat literally but situates it within a flow of millions of years. For example, the main difference between an old earth creationist and a young earth creationist on Genesis 2-3 largely has to do with what precedes and follows it. An old earth creationist would see Adam and Eve as the first humans on earth. They would see Adam and Eve as literal, historical individuals fashioned by the special creation of God. 

However, they might see God having created other hominins prior to Adam and Eve by special creation as well. For example, they might see God stepping into the flow of history to create Neanderthals and Denisovans some 100,000 years before he created homo sapiens. Another key difference has to do with the continuity of natural law. The young earth creationist might follow the traditional Augustinian approach and see a dramatic change in natural law after the Fall of Adam and Eve. For example, a YEC might see the second law of thermodynamics as a consequence of the fall (see chapter 12).

By contrast, an OEC would not likely see any wholesale change in natural law after the sin of Adam and Eve. For example, animal death would have existed before the Fall. The law of entropy would have existed both before and after Adam and Eve's sin. However, one might still propose that the power of Sin exacerbated the corruptive forces of the world after the Fall.

Because old earth creationists differ from young earth creationists primarily on matters that are outside of what Genesis 2-3 say, we will include it in the first interpretation of Genesis 2-3 that takes this story as historical narrative. The differences, as we mentioned, have to do with what happened before Genesis 2. OEC still takes Genesis 2-3 fairly literally. Adam and Eve are still literal, historical individuals.

3. A second interpretation of Genesis 2-3 still considers Adam and Eve to be literal, historical individuals like the young and old earth creationists. Like the old earth creationists, it sees Adam and Eve in a flow of millions of years that have preceded Genesis 2. However, this particular concordist view would situate Adam and Eve within a flow of evolution. I am calling this a distinct interpretation of Genesis 2-3 because Adam and Eve are not seen as the first homo sapiens but perhaps as representatives of the species before God. Let us call it the representative Adam view.

While this approach considers the key elements of Genesis 2-3 to be historical, it involves enough reinterpretation of the context of Genesis 2-3 to seem to warrant its own category. That is to say, the Genesis 2-3 story seems to be taken less literally than the old earth creationist takes it. It is a creative attempt to integrate the predominant scientific theory of human evolution with a mostly literal reading of Genesis. 

In the previous chapter, we have already discussed the question of whether genetics allows for two individuals to be either the direct or genealogical ancestors of the human race. The views of Walton and Swamidass both would allow for a somewhat literal interpretation of Genesis 2 within a flow of evolutionary development. However, we would need to infer that Adam and Eve are not the only humans around at the time, and the Fall would not result in as dramatic a change as in the traditional literal view. For example, death would have been present before and after Adam and Eve's sin -- not only for animals but for humans as well.

The genre of Genesis 2-3 in this approach seems less straightforwardly historical. John Walton would call it Ancient Near Eastern theological narrative. [] Adam and Eve are archetypes of humanity although not the first or only humans. The story is thus as much or more a parable of humanity as a historical story, although based on events that Walton believes literally happened.

4. A third interpretation sees Genesis 2-3 as myth in the technical sense or perhaps as a parable of humanity...

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