lmbarre

I am not understanding you. Could you please clarify?

Toto

Getting kids to postpone having sex is a modern concern, where puberty happens early and marriage is supposed to be delayed. I just don't see this.

There are undoubtedly sexual overtones in the Eden story, but where do you see anything about persuading teenagers not to have sex too early?

There is much more to the serpent.

lmbarre

It seems like you didn't understand me at all. The argument was one in which the plot, the characters, and things, like the magic tree, are symbols utilized in an allegory. Note that the snake was created by Yahweh and that his salient characteristic was his craftiness with a single, sexual agenda who will employ this craftiness to get laid. I offer this interpretation as evidence that there were indeed parental teachings about the proper time to have sex (and so also children). A similar directive regarding sexual activity is found near the conclusion of Song of songs:

8:8 We have a little sister,

and as yet she has no breasts.

What shall we do for our sister

on the day when she is spoken for?30

8:9 If she is a wall,31

we will build on her a battlement32 of silver;

but if she is a door,

we will barricade33 her with boards34 of cedar.35

In the same book, we find the repeated exhortation:

3:518 I admonish you, O maidens of Jerusalem,

by the gazelles and by the young does of the open fields:

“Do not awake or arouse love until it pleases!”

I take "until it pleases" to mean "until the time is right."

As for the genre of allegory, also from the wisdom tradition we have this allegory from Qoheleth (Ecclesiates):

12:1 So remember1 your Creator in the days of your youth –

before2 the difficult3 days come,

and the years draw near when you will say, “I have no pleasure in them”;

12:2 before the sun and the light4 of the moon and the stars grow dark,

and the clouds disappear5 after the rain;

12:3 when those who keep watch over the house6 begin to tremble,7

and the virile men begin to stoop over,8

and the grinders9 begin to cease because they grow few,

and those who look through the windows grow dim,10

12:4 and the doors along the street are shut;

when the sound of the grinding mill11 grows low,

and one is awakened12 by the sound of a bird,

and all their13 songs14 grow faint,15

12:5 and they are afraid of heights and the dangers16 in the street;

the almond blossoms17 grow white,18

and the grasshopper19 drags itself along,20

and the caper berry21 shrivels up22 –

because man goes to his eternal home,23

and the mourners go about in the streets –

12:6 before the silver cord is removed,

or the golden bowl is broken,

or the pitcher is shattered at the well,24

or the water wheel25 is broken at the cistern –

12:7 and the dust returns to the earth as it was,

and the life’s breath26 returns to God who gave it.

Or this observation, again from the wisdom tradition from Proverbs:

30:18 There are three things that are too wonderful for me,51

four that I do not understand:

30:19 the way52 of an eagle in the sky,

the way of a snake on a rock,

the way of a ship in the sea,

and the way of a man with a woman.53

Male mastubation is mentioned only once in the Hebrew Bible with regard to a certain Onan. Female masturbation is not mentioned. Should we conclude that the women of Israel never masturbated because it is not mentioned? Should we then relegate it to only modern society? I find it unrealistic to think that parents did not discuss the matter of sex, the appropriate age and time for sex. The Song of solomon explicitly addresses this issue.

I think you don't "see it" because you are not informed on the topic, or so it would seem.

Finally, what are the sexual overtones that you mentioned?

There is much more to the serpent.

I did not intend to offer an exhaustive, sole understanding of the mythological significance of snakes.

PhilosopherJay

Hi barre,

Yes. i think temple prostitute or priestess was pretty much the same job description in those days. Sex was a way of getting to heaven and the Gods and the temple priestess was the way.

Warmly,

Jay Raskin

Toto

Could you format that post? It's hard after a while to tell what is a quote and what is your writing.

The snake is not trying to get laid. The snake probably represents pagan wisdom and is just trying to enlighten the silly humans. God lied to Adam and Eve but the snake told the truth - that they would not die if they ate the apple.

From this: it appears that sex with a prepubescent girl is not a good thing, even if she is given in an arranged marriage. That's a far cry from trying to persuade pubescent teenagers to postpone sex.

sotto voce

The story uses physical nakedness as a figure for guilt, which is the subject the whole Bible is concerned with, right to the last word of Revelation. The Eden story is no more concerned with sexual sin than it is with any other sort.

A&E (who represent all of humanity but Christ) feel shame at their nakedness. They take fig leaves to cover themselves. But then they hear God approaching, and they hide. They hide because they feel guilt, so the fig leaves do not help. God discovers them, and their disobedience, and makes clothes of animal skins for them. Animals must die if they are to provide skins; so we have here the divine principle of 'blood' being shed in order to overcome guilt, one seen many times after this in the books of the Bible. The deaths of mere animals are a mere stop-gap and pre-figurement, and cannot provide atonement, but skins are provided with a promise. A&E are still actually guilty (i.e. are banished from Eden), but pending the coming of the Seed promised in Gen 3:15 as a human born of a woman who would 'crush' Satan, i.e. the tempter serpent.

Chili

Sorry, shame exists only in the concious mind and that was engaged with the apple allegoy in the tree of Knowledge = conscious mind. The fig leave allegory just shows that they were no longer naked to wit and consciously knew that they were naked and so also knew that they would die as there now was 'two of each.'

So this here then is where Adam was first created by conjecture with no material cause of his own = just an illusion or ususrper identity. Bottom line: God did not create Adam but man in his own image.

aeebee50

Thanks.

lmbarre

Yo did not quote the entire passage.

Chili

Nothing to do with sex but with perplexity and so the serpent is the temple tramp to solve problems in the conscious mind. She is all we have as our best friend outside of Eden, where she is our pleasure, our riddle and our rat, and will always surprise us and teach us to crawl when the going gets tough. It so is said that a vivid Eve makes for an interesting life and never a life as a drone for whom sex is 'as if the end of happiness' itself.

Yes she is erotic and sexy but valliant and virgin foremost to make sense perception known to us so that consumation can be reached . . . or there would be marriage in heaven still. She is our desire, if you wish, and we are the dummy she must lead around (note that Magdalene was redundant and left in the dark and hence desire is a thing of the past in heaven = no tanha in Buddhism either).

To understand her better please do a little Shakespeare where she is always elevated as the charm of life as it is. She was Valeria in Coriolanus who was the maid Aufidius had married: "Know thou first,/ I loved the maid I married (IV.v.114-15). and this little speech goes on to honor her more. Beautiful lines about life but not the dirty job that we call sex, surely not, however satisfying that may be. She is the lesser serpent in Gen.3:15 who strikes at our heel.

The rising action in this play is where Valeria becomes redundant in the life of Aufidius who goes to heaven, i suppose.