Added reading assignment: Exodus 20, will aid in answering question #2 on syllabus

Comparison of Genesis 1 & 2 creation stories
Genesis 1:
-"Elohim" (God)Means either God or Gods, depending on context or grammar
-Less detailed story
-Heaven, Earth (after light), and sea; sun, moon, and stars; fish, animals, birds, then man is created last
-More grandiose/cosmic, structured and orderly, more sophisticated account. God appears more transcendent (above it all)

Genesis 2:
-Yahweh (God's personal name) or Yahweh Elohim (the God Yahweh)
-Lots of detail of man and woman being created
-Mists, man, animals (as companions), then Eve (woman, from Adam's rib)
-More anthropomorphic (human-like); God speaks, walks, displays emotions, doesn't seem omniscient
-God is immanent

Babylonian Stories: Two stories similar to Genesis; 1st story: Enuma Elish, a creation story...the world is created when Marduk slays the female dragon Tiamat (world is created from her corpse). Ancient world creation stories involve sex and violence.
2nd story: Epic of Gilgamesh...hero named Gilgamesh battles against Gods with his side-kick Enkidu. Enkidu is killed and this impacts Gilgamesh heavily, driving him to seek a source for immortality. Upnaphishtem (Babylonian Noah) knows the secret (a plant) and tells Gilgamesh the location of the plant. After locating the plant Gilgamesh rests, while resting, a snake eats the plant and gets immortality instead.

Comparison of God and Serpent in Genesis 3, who's lying?
God: says that "in the day you eat of it" you will die
Serpent: says you won't die, that your eyes will be open and you will become wise like God, and know good and evil

Etiological Stories-ways that the curses from Genesis effect the way that the world is now:
-pain in childbirth (a curse from God)
-why farming is so difficult, why men have to work
-patriarchy and why women accept it
-death
-sin (disobedience to God) & sin-nature (Catholics call "original sin"), an inclination to sin
-language differences and separate nations
-fear of snakes, why snakes slither on the ground
-modesty, wearing of clothes
-Rainbows, a covenant that God made to never flood the earth again. Rainbows is proof that the rain will stop. Genesis9:8ff
-existence of stars, sun, and moon (constellations, phases of the moon, etc., for purpose of guiding man)

Why God doesn't just start over...he tried that and it didn't work. Thinking that he found the purest man alive, he saves Noah from the flood who disobeys God after the flood by getting drunk. Noah is father to Ham, Shem, and Japeth. Canaan is son of Ham.
-Noah got drunk and passed out naked, Ham walked in and saw his father's nakedness then went to his brothers and made a joke of what he saw. Shem and Japeth then do the right thing and cover their father's nakedness while shielding their eyes from it. As a result of Ham's behavior his son, Canaan, is cursed by God, a display of "group responsibility (found in commandments in Exodus 20). Canaan's land was taken from him and his descendants will be slaves.

Abraham- "father of Judaism" lived to about 2,000 B.C. His name was Abram (means exalted father), then God changed his name to Abraham (means father of a multitude).
First two-way covenant between God and man, Abraham is the first Jew (argumentatively, some scholars believe that the term "Jew" is not correct at this time in history because the Jewish religion did not exist yet). Covenant of circumcision: Abraham must circumcise all his male descendants and slaves bought with his own money, and himself, to show that they are obedient to God, and he does.

Abraham and wife Sarah are unable to bear children so Sarah offers her hand-maid, Hagar, to him and those two have a son, Ishmael (who settles in Northern Arabia, muslims claim to be descendents of Ishmael, therefore descendants of Abraham). When Abraham and his wife are nearly too old to have children, God grants them a son, wife Sarah gives birth to son Isaac. God tests Abraham's obedience by telling him to kill his son Isaac and just as Abraham is about to comply, an angel tells him to stop, God was only testing him and he passed. (Author Soren Kierkegaard wrote a book titled "Fear and Trembling" which outlines this particular story)

God wrestles with Jacob: God takes on human form to wrestle with Jacob, injuring Jacob's hip. Jacob does not cry out in pain, however, and God is impressed, changes Jacob's name to "Israel" (means he who wrestled with God). (Twelve tribes of Israel are from him)

Exodus 3:14ff, God says I am Yaweh...Worship Yaweh only, because he is a jealous God, not that other gods do not exist.

Early Judaism- Monolotry, means worship of one God even though other gods may exist

Later Judaism- Monotheism, the idea that only one God exists and God is transcendent, all powerfull, all knowing, spirit.