BIBLE STUDIES

Jenny Dawson

Obedience has a dangerous history. Sometimes learning to say "no" can be crucial and life-giving - especially for women and young people. Learning to ask the hard questions can also shape the decision about whether obedience is appropriate or not - e.g. Who holds the power? Who is benefiting?

Obedience has often played a tragic role in human history, especially where there is an imbalance of power - e.g. big people and small people, big nations and small nations. Thus, obedience has involved fear, force, hierarchy, and control. Indeed, obedience is about life or death. For example, in education, obedience can involve fear, force and power so that the students experience dominance and learn the necessity - for their own good - of colluding with the status quo. However, there is another kind of obedience in education the kind that allows choice and empowerment, so that the real goal is transformation of the person and of society. And that is about IDENTITY.

In the life of Jesus, we see this way of looking at obedience. It is not authoritarian blindness or mere performance of duties. It is exercising choice. Jesus was obedient but his obedience involved seeking God's will, considering the context, and choosing the life-enhancing decision.

It's a whole new approach to obedience. Obedience in the sense of maintaining the status quo was not good enough for Jesus. He expected his followers to engage in changing the world - that required discernment, energy and spontaneity, not merely submission or what was deemed correct behaviour. His was the RADICAL OBEDIENCE (Matt. 5:22) - getting to the root of the old precepts: "You have heard that it was said .... but I say to you ...." With the "but" Jesus went deeper and further. He risked saying "I". Jesus knew who he was : obedience only makes sense when it is expressed by a person who is in harmony with him/herself. The more aware I am of my own identity, the easier it is for me to be open-handed, and let my freedom bring freedom to others.

"I say to you" : this message is for us and all disciples. Cultural systems must enhance and liberate human beings in their sense of self: wherever the way things are gets in the way of human need, then Jesus says to us: "But I say to you ...." Wherever our lives and our systems (political, social, economic - those systems that demand our obedience) get in the way of everyone' being received unconditionally into the kingdom, then repentance must follow ... because that great humanising factor - IDENTITY - has been forgotten.

The "identity" that humanises obedience is on two levels : self-identity and solidarity-identity (identifying with the poor). Genuine solidarity leads to a painful encounter with our imperial selves, both without and within. That is a process; and failure is central (not peripheral) to growth. Only by facing up to failure and death can we break its grip on history, the world and our lives. The old authorities that force us to obey - wealth, power status - become discredited, and true obedience is possible to a new authority -truth. And so obedience can be reclaimed. Transformation involves abandoning old obedience and discovering new obedience.

These studies are calling us into a process of transformation that goes back to the beginning of human history. For this first study on "Walking the path of obedience today", we'll do just that so that by going back, perhaps we can reclaim obedience.

Note: The work of Phyllis Trible, especially in God and the Rhetoric of Sexuality, has been important for this Bible Study.

GENESIS Chapters 2 & 3

Some of the ways this story has become distorted are seen in a litany written in Aotearoa-New Zealand by Janet Crawford and Erice Fairbrother which begins:

"I am Eve

I took the apple

Adam ate it too

But I got all the blame".

These chapters are traditionally thought of as a story about Adam and Eve, about a disobedient gullible woman and a dominating man. Worse than that is the allocating of blame : woman tempted man to disobey, and is thus responsible for sin in the world. As a result, woman is cursed by pain in childbirth, a more severe punishment than man's struggles to get the soil to produce. Clearly, woman's sin in this context is supposed to have been greater than man's. Woman's desire for man (3:16) is supposed to be God's way of keeping her faithful and submissive to her husband. God gives man the right to rule over woman - thus the male is superior and the woman inferior. Most of the thinking is not accurate or true to the biblical story. And if we're going to think about obedience, we'd better

get this one straight because it is so often used to require certain behaviour from both men and women.

I have already suggested that reclaiming obedience is about life and death. Life is about unity, fulfilment, delight. Death is about disintegration, hostility, dualism and tragedy. The subject of Genesis 2:4b - 3:24 is life and death. God is at the centre of the story.

In Gen. 2:25, we see the creation of two differentiated sexual beings from the one earth creature. It seems like life is paradise but the potential is there for death. We hear about a forbidden tree, animals that do not provide companionship. It seems that God has withdrawn and the human beings have increasing power and freedom. They are both dependent on God and responsible for themselves - a lethal mix? This may be like us. The only security for these two is obedience to God.

Gen. 2:24-3-7 is a short, sharp story of disobedience. The serpent (3:1) is described as the most crafty, wily, and sly of all the wild beasts that God has made. But like Adam and Eve, this creature was made by God and had both power and potential, both individually and in relationship. The serpent is not the devil (that's one false idea about this passage) but it becomes the tempter.

In Gen. 3:1, the serpent addresses the woman in plural verb forms : it treats her as the spokesperson for the couple when in fact they are a community of mutuality, bone of bone, and flesh of flesh, diversity in unity. She doesn't consult and the serpent engages with her alone. Individuals are very vulnerable! In Gen. 3:2, the woman assumes responsibility for obeying (but the commands that God gave were to the undifferentiated Earth Creature - v. 16).

They discuss theology; they talk about God not using the sacred name "Yahweh" but the general name "Elohim", which makes a distance, and God becomes an object to be discussed instead of the subject of all life. This lack of relationship sets up the potential for disobedience. The serpent asks the woman a question : "Did God say ...." phrased very cunningly. There is not a simple yes/no answer. The woman gets hooked into responding : she reports God's words faithfully. Obviously she is intelligent and careful. She understands - so obedience is in fact possible.

In verses 2 and 3 the woman expresses uncompromising obedience. But the serpent's next statement makes a huge claim, "Indeed you will not die" - thus claiming to have God's knowledge. Remember, humans were to have authority over animals (1:26, 2:19). But here an animal assumes authority - AND GOD IS SILENT! Suddenly there are no limits : according to the serpent, the tree offers knowledge that will remove the limits and boundaries from humanity also. It is proper relationships within creation that allow all things to live healthily - but the serpent has threatened the integrity of creation.

Traditionally, woman has been criticised for acting independently of the man (and women ever since have been told what an unwise thing this is!). True she doesn't ask his permission or his advice, but she is open about what she is doing. She takes responsibility -and she takes THE FRUIT. She takes, eats and gives.

Verse 7 says that the man was with her - but he has remained silent, passive, uninvolved. The story does NOT say that she tempted him. "And he ate" means that while being passive, his going-along-with is still ACTION. He benefited! Both are therefore responsible for their actions, but they are described in different ways. They do not talk to each other. Consultation is difficult between diverse people any time, but these two didn't even try. Nor did either of them consult their Creator.

Now, instead of what the serpent promised ("you will know good and evil"), they are OVERWHELMED by their helplessness, their insecurity, and their defencelessness. They have lost their only true security which is obedience to God, and they are both filled with shame, they try to hide, and they are aware of the destruction of the integrity of creation. Instead of gift, life becomes a PROBLEM that they must solve and a danger that they must deal with. (Let us note here that capitalism is all about self-protection, threat, control). The obedience relationship has changed.

In verse 3:8 - God returns (Yahweh God - i.e. the sacred name, not the name the serpent used. God hasn't changed!). God is walking in the garden, showing a comfortable and easy relationship with creation. The man and the woman hide. The scene becomes like a law court, with cross-examination, explanations, justifications, and tricky rationalisations. "I heard, I was afraid, I hid" all reflect guilty self-centeredness. Disobedience becomes fear, not because of who God is, but because of exposure.

The man is questioned alone: he is responsible for himself. But in v. 12 he blames the woman, then God, and then confesses, "I ate". The man has turned against the woman - whatever happened to "bone of my bone" and "flesh of my flesh"? What about solidarity? It seems that there is a struggle between community solidarity and individual responsibility.

In v. 13 the woman also is regarded as responsible for herself. She blames the serpent - but doesn't blame God. She also says "me" not "us" as the man did. She separates herself from the man - they are now divided. Ironically, they have a new unity - by confession -in a broken world.

Now God the prosecutor becomes God the judge. The judgements are about a living death and are quite specific, for the two people and for the serpent.

The story is about human obedience and disobedience. The man and woman are equal and responsible: the judgement on them makes clear their individual accountability and the evil of hierarchy (rule over). Sexuality becomes perverted as the man dominates the woman ("and he shall rule over you"). Note that the hierarchy is part of the corruption. Neither hierarchy nor gender destiny is built into the creation story. Fulfilling work has become alienated labour and human oppression prevails.

Eve's name is ironical : it is from the Hebrew word "life", meaning "mother of all the living". Now she is limited to this role and dependent.

But there is hope : God remains kind (v. 21) and makes clothes for them (note: this work is a woman's task and to be a seamstress is a female attribute). However, they are still immediately expelled from the garden. In v. 24 note that the word "man" here excludes the woman. She is invisible and doesn't count. Human freedom is gone. They are expelled "to serve/till the ground. Many echoes of the opening verses of chapter 2 - but now it has all gone wrong. Joy becomes tragedy, with disobedience as the turning point, the whole of creation is affected. But Genesis 3 is not the last word. This study has been about what obedience is not. The next one, "Prophetic Lifestyles" is what obedience is.

Questions for Discussion:

1. Recall the image of God as seamstress. Two kinds of obedience were described at the beginning : blind submission to authoritarianism or transformation through awareness of identity. How do the images of God that you know and use reflect either of these approaches?

2. In your own context, how is the integrity of creation being destroyed? Are there attempts to keep this hidden? What are the fig-leaves (the cover-up) being used to keep this hidden?

3. The invisibility of woman at the end of chapter 3 is a consequence of disobedience. In your church, student group, country, how does this continue?

4. In what ways are you personally working to develop mutuality and equality between women and men? What are the blocks to doing this?

5. To whom are you obedient? Have you ever decided that disobedience to authorities is more life-giving than obedience? What happened?

6. Is there a conflict between individual responsibility and community solidarity?