From Eden to Golgotha

Mysteries of the Bible

H. H. Charles

• Publisher: Resource Publications
• Year: 2021
• Print ISBN: 9781725297302, 9781725297319
• eBook ISBN: 9781725297326
• Topic: Theology & Religion
• Subtopic: Biblical Studies

As is well known, there are various versions of the Bible. But what is perhaps more important to understand is that the various versions of the Bible are the result of the work of thousands of unknown and unknowable persons who worked over several millennia on the text of various written records in different languages. Biblical authorities and scholars who have studied and interpreted these texts usually arrive at a consensus of a correct, or nearly correct, version of the biblical text. Accepting that today's biblical texts result from studied consensus of the texts of the Bible, From Eden to Golgotha offers interpretations and suggested understandings that challenge and/or contradict standard and accepted interpretations. Some examples: Why did God select the Jews as his chosen people? Is there a basis for the universal condemnation of sex? Of divorce? Did God conclude he made a mistake in creating mankind? Having foretold millennia ago the fate of the Jewish people, does history down to this day document his foretelling? How much of Jesus' examples and teachings have been ignored by those who today flaunt their "Christianity"? Has G. K. Chesterton's insight that "it's not that Christianity has been tried and failed. It's that Christianity has never been tried" been proven true?

Genesis—“Man’s”1 Creation and Fall

To begin, “God said, ‘Let us make mankind in our image and likeness. . .’”2 Then it is recorded that “God created man in his image. . . Male and female He created them. . .3 [In NOAB, Genesis 5:1–2, it is written also—“When God created man, he made him in the likeness of God. Male and female he created them, and he blessed them and named them Man when they were created.” To similar effect, NIV, Genesis 5:1–2.] Yet it is then recorded, “The Lord God planted a garden in Eden. . . and He put there the man He had formed. . .4 to till and keep it”5 and commanded the man that “from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you must not eat; for the day you eat of it, you must die.”6

Later, finding that it was “not good that the man is alone;” God said, “I will make him a helper like himself.”7 He cast the man into a deep sleep and while he slept, took one of his ribs and closed up its place with flesh. And the rib which the Lord God took from the man, He made into a woman, and brought her to him. Then the man said, ‘She now is bone of my bone, and flesh of my flesh; she shall be called Woman, for from the man she has been taken.’”8

Not all Bible’s passages are to be taken literally. So, for example, here, the first metaphorical passage establishes that man and woman are equal, both being created in God’s image. It implies no superiority of man over woman. However, God places man in the Garden of Eden and instructs him to enjoy all it has to offer, save for the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. Only after this does God decide that it is not good for man to be alone. After providing several possibilities and finding them wanting, He puts man to sleep and takes from him a rib creating woman to be man’s companion. When presented to man, he seemingly acknowledges her as his equal and then bestows on her the status of total equality. “For this reason [she, being bone of his bone and flesh of his flesh] a man leaves his father and mother and clings to his wife, and the two become one flesh.”9 [The NOAB, Genesis 2:24 uses “cleaves to his wife and they become one flesh,” and the NIV, Genesis 2:24 uses “be united to his wife, and they will become one flesh.”]

The chronology here is puzzling. Adam and Eve being the first man and woman, he could not leave a father and mother. One plausible explanation may be that Moses, writing much later in time, focused on the importance of the relationship between man and woman.

But then there’s the story of Eve and the serpent. Could it be that Moses was inspired to write an explanation for man’s [used here to include men and women], downfall and failures to be the creation God intended? As a man, would Moses be more likely to use Eve as instigator, as a dupe for the serpent?

Start with the fact that God had placed a tree in the Garden eating the fruit of which would make one “like God.”10 That is, able to know good and evil.11 When confronted by God, Adam shifts blame to Eve. Eve blames the serpent’s deception.12 Then in order, God condemns the serpent, then Eve and then Adam.13 Only by being divinely inspired it would seem would Moses have been able to record God’s curse on the serpent, His putting enmity between the serpent and “the woman,” and the ultimate crushing of the serpent’s head.

The punishment of Eve (women), pain in giving birth and longing for her husband “though he have dominion over you”14 maybe less Divinely inspired than Moses’s knowledge of a woman’s labor in giving birth and a reflection of man’s own hubris. [In NOAB Genesis 3:16, it is added that “your [woman] desire shall be for your husband and he shall rule over you. In NIV Genesis 3:16 reads: “I will greatly increase your pains in childbearing; with pain yo...

Table of contents

• Title Page
• Preface
• The Old Testament
• Genesis—“Man’s”1 Creation and Fall
• Man’s Second Fall
• Early Man’s Ultimate Failure
• Lot in Sodom and Gomorra
• Jacob’s “Struggle”
• The Book of Exodus
• Leviticus
• Numbers
• Deuteronomy (“Repetition of the Law”)
• Deuteronomy
• The Song of Moses167
• Joshua
• Judges
• Ruth
• 1 Samuel
• 2 Samuel
• 1 Kings
• 2 Kings 1 and 2 Chronicles494
• The Books of Ezra and Nehemiah
• Esther
• Job
• Book of Psalms and Book of Proverbs
• Ecclesiastes
• Song of Songs
• Isaiah
• Jeremiah
• Lamentations
• Ezekiel
• The Book of Daniel
• The Book of the Twelve or the Minor Prophets
• Amos 780–750 BC
• Hosea 785–725 BC
• Isaiah or Isiah 750–695 BC
• Micah, Nahum, Zephaniah
• Habakkuk 620–610 BC
• Obadiah—Haggai—Zechariah
• Malachi 420–397 BC
• The Time Between Testaments
• The New Testament
• Introduction
• The Saint Joseph New Catholic Edition (Nce)
• The New Oxford Annotated Bible (Noab)
• The Zondervan Niv Study Bible (Niv) (1984)
• Surprising Passages—The Search
• Selected Passages—The Son Of God