mattbraunlin
Member
Bad Writing in the Bible (And why that's good)
After one of Rick and Morty's more blasphemous escapades, Rick informs Morty that their mortal enemy, Story-Lord, is trapped for eternity 'in every writer's hell: the Bible.'Now here's a doozie for you: while I would not word it that way, he's not entirely wrong.
Obviously, the Bible is brimming with riveting storytelling. From the staunch faith of the Patriarchs and Joseph's vindication in Egypt, to Ruth's beautiful folktale, to Elijah's heroic showdown with evil, to Christ's fourfold story of love and sacrifice, and the terrifying majesty of Revelation, the Bible is an inexhaustible volume of masterful true stories, woven by God himself.
But while the Bible is indeed the Greatest Story Ever Told, it disregards the rules of storytelling with surprising regularity. It brings the flow of its narrative to a screeching halt to take us in entirely new directions. It spends huge amounts of time listing names and numbers that seem boring and arbitrary. And it continuously portrays its key characters (excluding Jesus) practically as anti-heroes, making costly, comical, or even downright evil mistakes. Even experienced believers sometimes struggle with the layout of certain sections of the Bible.
However, this should not discourage us. In fact, in this blurb I hope to help you understand that these frustrating portions of God's word can, in fact, bring us immensely positive insights and even Joy and wonder if we approach them from the right angle.
There is one overarching rule to remember when reading the Bible, and it is crucial to keep in mind at these points we are discussing: the Bible was written by God. Not men and women. God's thinking is fundamentally different and infinitely greater than our own. It therefore should not be surprising that sometimes God's idea of storytelling should not run precisely parallel to ours.
Now if you are a skeptic you would scoff at such a statement. You would say that one could excuse anything with thinking like that! And of course you are right. But allow me now to delve into some specific examples, to see if I can help you to understand more precisely what I mean.
I will begin at the beginning (or more precisely, just after the beginning) with Adam and Eve.
If there is one couple in the Bible who from a writer's point of view are simply baffling, it is the parents of us all.
God's Creation of the heavens and the earth is the most beautiful and heartbreaking story in all the world. After Adam and Eve's brief but lovely sinless romance, their cursing of themselves and the world, and their casting out from Paradise, someone reading the Bible for the first time would be chomping at the bit to find out what happens to them next. Oh, it's gonna be good…
And within fifteen minutes, that person would be flipping back, asking, 'Did I miss something?'
Nothing happens to Adam and Eve. Pretty much literally nothing. Eve has three babies, and Adam lives to be 930. That's all we are told. And then the story moves on, and they play no further direct role in the Bible whatsoever.
By any human standard of storytelling, this must surely be the most enormous and glaring missed opportunity in the history of literature.
The possibilities for what this writer could have done at this point with Adam and Eve are simply endless. They could have become heroic adventurers who redeemed themselves of their sin. They could have been slain or banished by their children in vengeance. They could have become evil tyrants who enslave future generations. They could have become Yoda-like mystics through whom God teaches others. We could have been treated to a truly epic romance, as Adam and Eve learn how to love each other as sinners.
No one - NO ONE - who had just finished writing something so masterful as the Creation story would have so flippantly tossed aside such a goldmine of literary potential.
No one but God.
The only explanation for such a bizarre and illogical ending to Adam and Eve's story is that the writer was not using human logic; he was using divine logic.
God, in his unfathomable wisdom, decided that we did not need to know about the centuries they spent together, struggling to survive in the world they had cursed. And so he passed them by, and did not stop skimming blithely through the centuries until he reached Noah.
God gives us what we need. Or more precisely, he gives us what he knows we need. How very often we are confused and frustrated and angered when we encounter moral and logical dilemmas in his word, or when the prayers of our desires go unanswered. But while God's words and actions have so often seemed weird and cruel and unjust in my own life, I look back on some of those moments and get chills at the thought of how catastrophic it would have been if my Saviour had let me have my way.
Sometimes God explains Himself very clearly. But more often he keeps his motives and intentions shrouded in mystery, and all we can do is take his hand and let him lead us step by step in faith.
This principle is true in our lives and in God's word, and if you are not willing to accept it, you will reap no meaningful reward in either.
Next, let’s look at chapter 7 of the Book of Numbers.
The term that immediately comes to mind when I try to describe this chapter is 'literary suicide.'
After the completion of the Holy Tabernacle and altar, the twelve tribes of Israel are called upon by God to make a sacrifice commemorating this important event.
On the first day Nahshon son of Amminadab, leader of the tribe of Judah, presented his offering.
His offering consisted of a silver platter weighing 3 pounds and a silver basin weighing 1 pound (as measured by the weight of the sanctuary shekel). These were both filled with grain offerings of choice flour moistened with olive oil. He also brought a gold container weighing four ounces, which was filled with incense. He brought a young bull, a ram, and a one-year-old male lamb for a burnt offering, and a male goat for a sin offering.
For a peace offering he brought two bulls, five rams, five male goats, and five one-year-old male lambs. This was the offering brought by Nahshon son of Amminadab.
This is an interesting passage, I suppose, but nothing most people would obsess over.
And God found it interesting enough to describe the identical offering, with identical language, for the head and representative of each tribe on each consecutive day. And there were twelve tribes of Israel.
The passage you just read is essentially repeated twelve times! Numbers 7 is the third longest chapter in the Bible, and it consists almost entirely of the most exasperating repetition you are likely to find in a book.
Why would God do this? Adam and Eve's ending is illogical, but this is just… well, annoying. The offering could easily have been summed up just once, and the heads of the tribes presented in a compact list. What reason could even God have for stretching it out into such a painfully protracted drudge?
Well, I only have one theological theory, and it ain't much: it emphasizes the importance of the individual tribes of Israel. These tribes are of resounding importance in the history of Israel and this was still a very early period in their development. And at this crucial moment of the dedication of the Tabernacle, God saw fit to honour each tribe by including their sacrifices in full.
*Shrug.*
But I do have another point to make which seems relevant here: God has a sense of humour.
God is not an idiot. He knew exactly how much this stupid chapter would confound his people through the ages. Maybe, just maybe, it is the Greatest Practical Joke Ever Pulled? Maybe when he sees us struggling to stay focused as we read it, wanting to scream as we copy it out, or spending our valuable time analyzing and justifying it the way I am now, he is snickering into his chest? Maybe he and Moses shared a private laugh as Moses recorded it!
But seriously folks, I have one further reflection on Numbers 7: the fact that it exists in its lumbering original form is a testament to the faith of generation after generation of God's people. For thousands of years the Bible was written out by hand, and though they might have groaned when they reached this chapter, scribes all over the world faithfully insisted on writing it as God spoke it. They knew that, however strange it might seem to us, it is God's word, and not to be edited in any way, shape or form.
The very absurdity of the chapter makes crucial statements about the beauty of faithful submission to the Lord, and I bless and praise him for it!