ELLA M. RYDZEWSKI

Each weekday morning I join other drivers on Maryland Route 29 commuting to work in the city. But these 30- to 40-minute rides are interesting. “No, no,” I say in exasperation and a moment later exclaim, “That’s right!” No, I don’t get stressed out by traffic. I’m listening to an audio book.¹ I have “read” everything from the Bible and philosophy to health books and stories. And this 10-volume series on Genesis² has been one of the most stimulating. It has increased my awareness of how the rest of the world perceives the first book of the Bible.

In this series a group of scholars converse on several biblical narratives: the creation of humans, their temptation and fall, Cain and Abel, the Flood, Abraham and Sarah in Egypt, the birth of Ishmael and Isaac, Abraham offering Isaac, Esau and Jacob, Jacob’s dream, and Joseph’s exile.

The participants include a Buddhist, two Muslims, Catholics, Protestants, and Jews who are educators in the fields of writing, theology, and psychology. They speak of the stories as reality (some assure us that they consider most of them as “parables” that never actually happened). The rabbis know the original languages of the Bible and contribute valuable insights. I noted only one evangelical Christian—an African-American—who gave important ethnic insights about the biblical context but little of its relation to Chris-tianity. He did make one reference to the “new covenant.” Another Christian quickly apologized to a rabbi for once mentioning the cross.

But these “intellectuals” appreciated the complete honesty of the narrative writer’s character descriptions. They enjoyed the richness and complexity of the stories but found much to analyze in the light of modern psychotherapy—including God’s motives. They saw God as a “learner” in His relationships with humans. One rabbi interpreted Isaiah 45:7 as saying that God had created evil. In their conversation, at least, they took the words literally. The Muslims, Jews, and Buddhists frequently brought their traditions to the discussion, while the Christians remained silent in this respect.

Any Seventh-day Adventist, whether laborer or scholar, knows that we find types of Christ throughout the Old Testament, as in Abraham offering his son. But no Christian mentioned the coincidental terms used to describe this event and how much it was like what God did in offering His Son. They puzzled over what “us” meant in the Creation story (Gen. 3:22) and did a dream analysis of Jacob’s ladder without mention of the true Ladder. I was amazed at how carefully they avoided such metaphors. Either through disbelief or to be politically correct, these scholars had dumbed down Genesis.

I learned some important points from these conversations that are worth passing on as we study the Bible or present it to someone else.

1. It is not possible for individual Bible stories to stand alone; we must take the Bible as a whole, comparing scripture with scripture.

2. The Old Testament makes less sense—other than the history of a people—without the New Testa-ment. The New Testament fulfills the Old Testament in its practical application of how God saves people.

3. The question of suffering is uppermost in the human mind. When we deny the existence of a devil and humanity’s fall, we lack even a partial answer to this important question. Without acknowledging personal evil, humans tend to blame God for suffering.

4. There is no concept of a universal controversy between good and evil in the mind of most intellectuals, and it seems absent from liberal theology. Though they talk about spiritual warfare, even evangelical Christians do not emphasize this concept or understand its cosmic proportions.

5. People become committed to a way of thinking by education, background, and peer influence that blinds them to the plainest truths. They easily misunderstand the character of God, often seeing Him as subject to the same weaknesses as humans.

6. Though biblical characters were not perfect, they were “listeners” to God and took Him seriously.

I feel my small denomination has much to share in the intellectual study of the Bible. But how do we get into the conversation? For now I’m looking forward to the ride home and the next story and discussion of Genesis.

¹This increasingly popular market should be noted by church publishers. Spirit of Prophecy books need to be on tape. New books could be read by their authors or any of the denomination’s excellent speakers.
²Bill Moyers, Genesis a Living Conversa-tion, the audio sound track to the Public Television series produced by Public Affairs Television, Inc., 1996, 10 volumes.
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Ella M. Rydzewski is an editorial assistant for the Adventist Review.