Okay, I already ranted about this over on Dark Window (which is a cool blog you should know about if you don't already http://darkwindow.blogspot.com/) but I'm going to rant some more, since, you know, it's my blog and I can do that.
What set me off is this Christian teeshirt which shows Jacob wrestling with an angel, graphics all sappy, with a text below saying, "For I have seen God face to face and my life is preserved."
Well, this once again leads me to apoplexy. Because why don't these fundies read their own text? Have they actually ever read the story of Jacob wrestling the angel? Do they know what it's about?
First off, according to the mostly likely reading of the text, it's not an angel Jacob wrestles with: it's God. (Hence the whole "I have seen God face to face" bit of their own damn quotation!)
Second off, the whole point of the story is that God can't beat Jacob. Jacob doesn't win, but then neither does God. It's one of the most interesting bits of the Torah, and I'm thinking these fundies wouldn't be putting it on a shirt if they knew what it actually meant: which is this: that God has put us on this planet in order to contend with him. Our job is to argue with God and to keep him from screwing up. Because, you know, he will, if we don't talk back and point out problems with his decisions.
Kind of like our job with the President, when you think about it.
Genesis 32.24. Go have a look.
3 hours ago
3 comments:
It's kind of like the book of Job. Do they really understand that up in heaven God and Satan are having this little poker game and they make a great big bet on who is going to win over this old non-Jewish good man. They essentially play with him and see how much they can take from him and who is going to be the owner of his soul. And now, preachers talk about the patience of Job and how God restored him with all this and that but wait! Who took it from the get go?
Zelda -- My Arkie students had the worst trouble with Job. Took me a week to figure out why. Turns out they couldn't get past the idea of God betting. Betting's a sin among the Pentacostals in Arkansas -- and God wouldn't be sinnin!
"Where does the truth in the scripture lie? You state that the interpretation for the text involving Jacob is "most likely" interpreted your way. Is that what constitutes truth?"
By "most likely" I meant "what the text actually seems to mean."
At Genesis 32.25-30, the Hebrew text says first that "a man" wrestles with Jacob; later, this being tells Jacob, "Your name shall no longer be Jacob, but Israel, for you have striven with God and have prevailed," indicating that it is God he is wrestling with. And "Israel" means (according to some readings of the word) "One who wrestles with God." Then Jacob names the place Peniel, which the text says means "I have seen God face to face and have survived."
All this supports my reading of the text: Jacob wrestles with God, it's a draw, and Jacob is given a significant name: Israel. This name, Those Who Wrestle with God, then becomes the name for the Jews: The Ones Who Contend with God.
Thus, then, as I said, according to this story, it is our job to content with God.
Is that the only truth? Eh. Truth is manifold. That's a truth I see this story telling.
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