Genesis and the Garden of Eden: It's Just a Just So Story

This quote, from Kevin K, was pretty much spot on in its thrust:

I honestly think people try to read too much into the tale. It's a "Just So" myth, that explains many, many things about the human condition, most-specifically why we are separate and apart from other animals in many ways.

Trying to read too much else into it is where everyone gets into trouble -- most especially Christian fundamentalists who hang their theological hat on "the fall" as being the sole reason for Yahweh-Jesus to come to earth to sacrifice himself to himself.

We don't try to find deeper, more-hidden "truths" in other myth-fables of that era. We don't grind Aesop into such fine particles, for example. The fox is just a fox, and the grapes are probably not really sour. It's only when you add the whole religious-industrial complex on top of the myth do we try to find deeper-hidden meanings.

It's just a story. About a garden, two proto-humans, and a cunning talking snake.

I really do think that the whole of the Bible has received so much analysis that it is hard to think that the writers would have put early as much thought into its writing and creation. Obviously, much of the analysis is looking into what the writers were consciously thinking, but there is also merit in analyses of other causal variables and meaning about which they will have been less aware.

In this case, as I have discussed over several posts, the Adam and Eve story makes little sense when taken literally, and when it is, so much ad hoc rationalisation must be done that the whole mess becomes overly complicated.

Shem the Penman isn't so convinced:

We don't try to find deeper, more-hidden "truths" in other myth-fables of that era. We don't grind Aesop into such fine particles, for example. The fox is just a fox, and the grapes are probably not really sour. It's only when you add the whole religious-industrial complex on top of the myth do we try to find deeper-hidden meanings.

We don't? Sure we do. Mythology and folklore are pretty complex subjects, and there are many ways to analyze and interpret the myths of our forebears. These stories were honed and modified over millennia, so they had to have features that resonated among people with different perspectives and sets of expectations.

Look at the Trojan Horse myth. It could be about simple deception, the ulterior motives involved in ostensible generosity, the pitfalls of judging things by appearances, or the nature of metaphor itself. Whether it literally happened is beside the point.

And yes, mythology does contain a lot of meaning; it's just that sometimes, in such desperation to see perfection in sacred texts, people do all sorts off overthinking and justifying.

The story of Adam and Eve is one that is clearly to be taken symbolically, as far as I can see. But how much symbolism is there? And are there too many attempts to create symbolic overlays? Almost certainly, as we can see from the different approaches provided by believers in the previous post.