Now the serpent was more cunning than any beast of the field which the Lord God had made. And he said to the woman, “Has God indeed said, ‘You shall not eat of every tree of the garden’?” And the woman said to the serpent, … Genesis 3:1,2
Scripture is a masterpiece of understating and reporting extraordinary happenings with the most matter-of-fact declarations. This Genesis passage is a good example. In the reading of it, we mostly focus on the deception that is taking place, but stop for a moment and consider this: A serpent spoke to Eve and without batting and eyelash, she spoke back to it. What’s up with that?
A creature spoke in Eden and there is no indication that Eve thought it astounding. In my mind, this begs some questions. Was it a common occurrence for animals to speak in the Garden? Did God create man and beast to be able to communicate verbally?
There are several reasons these possibilities may be likely. That the account is recorded in Scripture is certainly one reason. Those who tend to think the Bible is filled with cultural mythology will disagree. However, if God is intent on communicating with the people he created to be in fellowship with him, he’s likely to be direct about it. As our Maker, he’s intimately acquainted with the limits of our intellects and imaginations.
Perhaps it is rebellious to the science world to consider that mankind and everything else may be in the process of devolution instead of evolution, but if nature tends to move toward disorder rather than toward order it may be that a communication once existed between man and beast and is now mostly lost. Perhaps the animal whisperers among us retain a vestige of this ability.
The first chapters of Genesis provide some interesting statements about animals and their relationship to humans. The beasts of the field and the birds of the air were formed out of the same materials as man. Genesis 2:7 says, “And the Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living being.” Similarly, Genesis 2:19 tells us that “Out of the ground the Lord formed every beast of the field and every bird of the air …”
The beasts and the birds lacked God’s breath of life given to man as well as God’s image, yet in Genesis 1:24 and 2:19 , they were referred to as living creatures, the same Hebrew term used for man in 2:7.
God declared his creation “very good” at the end of Genesis 1, yet in 2:18 he identifies something that was not good – that is man being alone. “I will make a helper suitable for him,” God said. This is where Eve enters the picture, right? Wrong.
The passage following this statement tells us it was the beasts of the field and the birds of the air God brought to Adam and goes on to add, “but for Adam there was not found a helper comparable to him.”
This seems to be saying that the beasts were created not just to procreate and inhabit the earth, but for the purpose of being helpers to man – similar, but not quite comparable to a human helper.
While Adam waited for the one who would become bone of his bone and flesh of his flesh, he got busy and named the creatures. Traditionally, we think of Adam as the first biologist here, classifying each creature according to their kingdom, plylum, class, order, family, genus and species, but the Hebrew word shem, to name, is used. By this, we find possible evidence that the animals in Eden were named for more than classification and esteemed for more than their beauty, companionship and usefulness.
According to The New Strong’s Complete Dictionary of Bible Words, shem is a primary word conveying the idea of conspicuous position; an appellation, as a mark of individuality; by implication honor, authority, character, fame, renown, report.
This is significant. When Adam named each creature, he was not saying, “You are a lion and you are a giraffe.” He gave each a distinct and individual name based on something unique he recognized about them. If Adam was merely classifying animals, we’d have to say that was also taking place elsewhere in Scripture where we find the word shem. It is used numerous times throughout the Old Testament to distinguish one man from another, as in Genesis 3:20 where Adam named his wife Eve, meaning life giver. In Genesis 17:5, God changed Abram’s name to Abraham, inserting ha, his breath. Both Leviticus 22:32 and Ezekiel 39:25 referred to God’s name. These are only a few examples.
If this seems farfetched, perhaps we need to broaden our thinking and loosen our imaginations. We only know what life is like after the fall, after the kingdom was divided, after God’s curse on all of creation was put into effect.
Originally, animals were not even part of the food chain we see today. They were herbivores, as was Adam an herbivore.
And God said, “See, I have given you every herb that yields seeds which is on the face of all the earth, and every tree whose fruit yields seed; to you it shall be for food. Also, to every beast of the earth, to every bird of the air, and to everything that creeps on the earth, in which there is life, I have given every green herb for food”; and it was so. (Genesis 1:29,30)
Imagine then the sorrow and shame that must have shaken Adam when God killed some of these creatures of unique character and renown because of Eve’s disobedience and Adam’s lie. God shed the innocent blood of these companions and helpers and made coverings from their skins. It is a dramatic foreshadowing of what he would do to his own Son for us. The shed blood was for remission of sins. The animal skins covered Adam’s nakedness as Christ is our covering when we stand naked before our righteous God.
The first mention of God giving permission for man to eat animal flesh is in Genesis 9:1-3 just after Noah’s ark came to rest on Mt. Ararat. Here, he also put man and beast at odds with each other in this passage, creating a competition for survival between them.
Yet, it will not always be so. In the end, God will reunite his divided kingdom, restore creation to its former goodness and ultimately “bring all things in heaven and earth together under one head, even Christ.” (Ephesians 1:9,10)
What will that unity look like with regard to the beasts?
The wolf also shall dwell with the lamb, the leopard shall lie down with the young goat, the calf and the young lion and the fatling together; and a little child shall lead them. The cow and the bear shall graze; their young ones shall lie down together; and the lion shall eat straw like the ox. The nursing child shall play by the cobra’s hole, and the weaned child shall put his hand in the viper’s den. (Isaiah 11:6-8)
Interestingly the throne room is inhabited by living creatures or beasts as well. The Greek word in Revelation 4:6 is zoon, meaning animal. Some have contended that these beasts are angels, yet in Revelation 5, there is a distinction between the angels, the beasts and the elders that surround God’s throne. Together they number “ten thousand times ten thousand, and thousands of thousands,” John’s way of describing an inestimable number. Furthermore, all of these beings, including the animal beings, glorify God and exalt the Lamb. (Revelation 5:11-14)
Genesis makes it clear that animals are neither made in God’s image, nor did they receive his breath of life as did man. Nevertheless, they were important enough to have distinct names, to be companions and helpers, to be imbued with intelligence and to be exempt from Adam’s diet. From prophecy we see that God’s creation of beasts was so purposeful that his restored kingdom will teem with them and that they will once again interact and inhabit the earth without competition or threat to each other or to man. Revelation reveals that sovereign God will allow them admission to his throne room to worship him speaking their praise.
And every creature which is in heaven and on the earth and under the earth and such as are in the sea and all that are in them, I heard saying: “Blessing and honor and glory and power be to Him who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb, forever and ever!” (Revelation 5:13)
The Internet Monk Archives 
Woah – I stand corrected – here come the vegan tigers!
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Re Balaam’s donkey:
Can anyone confirm something I saw about that story/account on one of the documentary channels? The show either said or implied that in the original language, Balaam’s donkey’s speech included a sexual innuendo towards Balaam and implied that his “mistreatment” was sexual.
One of the talking heads said this was a comment on Balaam — as in “He’d do a donkey if you waved enough money under his nose!”
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And why can’t we be talking about fish, flowers, rocks and minerals as well as beasts??! If we’re going to talk about something as fantastical as this, why not go all the way? Why not have talking rocks and talking fish? Why not have more talking donkeys, like Balaam’s?
Why not talking lines on paper in the shape of an imaginary critter? Why not a talking subcreation of our imagination?
Because they are all part of the Cosmos. All part of Creation. All redeemed by Christ.
I’ve written two very emotional and autobiographical stories about imaginary critters breaking the Reality Barrier for a moment to “talk” their hopes and dreams. One was a Unicorn about to be guillotined during the French Revolution in the name of Reason (the source for my comment handle); the other was a Cobra in a White Dress whose creator/subcreator and his fans never thought of her in any other context than porn. In both, their only Hope at the end is Redemption and Resurrection, and their Hope of Resurrection is to be Resurrected from Imagination into Reality.
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A post on imonk that leans in a literal direction. I didn’t think I’d ever see one.
I appreciate that it was allowed, and I think Lisa has some interesting questions.
My wife and I had a rabbit once that communicated better than some humans.
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There was no place to click on Reply to Randy Thompson’s comment above where he wrote, “By the way, on a totally irrelevant note, I love the story of Balaam’s donkey. I wish the Bible had more donkey stories! I really like bears, too, but I’m a bit put off by the story of the rude boys in 2 Kings who were eaten by bears because they mocked Elisha’s baldness. It does make you think twice about mocking God’s anointed, though.”
I just wanted to say, Randy, that I loved the story of Balaam’s donkey too! He had more on the ball then even Donkey in “Shrek.” I like that Jesus rode on a donkey into Jerusalem. We always see illustrations of Mary riding to Bethlehem on a donkey, but I don’t think the scriptures actually tell us that. I wish the Bible had more donkey stories too.
And yes, we had better be careful about mocking God’s anointed. Never know when a bear may eat you! (In Maine, a bear did recently bite a hunter. But the hunter was trying to kill the bear, so, the bear had his reasons.)
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And why can’t we be talking about fish, flowers, rocks and minerals as well as beasts??! If we’re going to talk about something as fantastical as this, why not go all the way? Why not have talking rocks and talking fish? Why not have more talking donkeys, like Balaam’s? Once we start speculating about such (peripheral) matters as these, there is no end of the absurdity. It’s only another step from talking animals in Eden to speculations about Adam’s conversations with badgers or whether Eve had healthier relationships with other kinds of reptiles.
By the way, on a totally irrelevant note, I love the story of Balaam’s donkey. I wish the Bible had more donkey stories! I really like bears, too, but I’m a bit put off by the story of the rude boys in 2 Kings who were eaten by bears because they mocked Elisha’s baldness. It does make you think twice about mocking God’s anointed, though.
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“The Bible is a sprawling story written over centuries by different authors with different sources and defies all attempts to neatly systematize it.”
Good point, Randy. I agree.
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Sometimes I do wonder about us eating meat and wonder if it wouldn’t be better to be vegetarian. But then, I think,…Jesus made a breakfast of fish for the disciples after he resurrected. He would have had to kill those fish. Did he smack them on their little heads? Did he just let them flop around until they died? And he would have eaten lamb at the last supper like all other good Jewish people. (I think that’s right.) And we remember him asking for fish to eat when he appeared before his disciples (again, after the resurrection) to let them know that he was not a ghost, but was a being who could still eat and drink.
But sometimes, I have to say, when I see cattle with their big eyes and all, I think, “I’m eating that?” You would think it wouldn’t be so hard to eat birds. But then, I read about a person living with an owl and another with a….oh, what was it?….some little bird, and I realize there is so much more going on within animals than we realize. I even feel bad for fish in fish tanks sometimes. Oh well…I will still be eating all these things.
I read a story about a woman who had a horse that she loved and took good care of. She had a boyfriend who was abusive, though, and one time when he was hitting her, that horse came and ran into the man and knocked him down. I guess it made the man think. The horse was acting better than he was.
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I see and sympathize with your problem. I feel it myself. But, it seems to me that this is a problem on the level of systematic theology and not so much at the level of Scripture. Systematic theology is not the same thing as Scripture, as much as it tries to pretend that it is. The Bible is a mixed bag of literary genres, and each genre needs to be read according to the “rules” of that genre. One reads Paul’s letters to the Corinthians or Galatians very differently than one reads Revelation, or the Psalms, or Song of Solomon. The Bible is a sprawling story written over centuries by different authors with different sources and defies all attempts to neatly systematize it. it’s purpose is to make us know who we are, who God is, and what God has done for us, the Gospel. It’s chief purpose is not to be grist for doctrines (as important as they may be, by the way).
I wish God wasn’t speaking in parables in Genesis 1-13. For that matter, I wish our Lord spoke plainly and clearly sometimes, rather than in parables. (I would have like to have been there for the question and answer time after Jesus told the parable of the dishonest steward!) But, parables are central to Jesus’ mode of teaching, and I assume that is his Father’s will.
I would really love to have clarity and certainty about any number of things, including exactly and specifically how God created everything, and how human beings fell. Instead, God gave us a story, a parable. And, the point of parables is to make you think and engage with the story. Jesus, in Mark’s Gospel, tells his disciples that he speaks in parables so that the crowd will have ears and not hear, and have eyes and not see. One has hears and doesn’t hear when one hears a parable and doesn’t engage with it and think about it. The point of the Creation account is to make us aware that God is good, His creation is good, and that we human beings have severed ourselves from this goodness, preferring the freedom to go our own way and determine for ourselves what is right (for “me”) and what is wrong (for “me”). I would have preferred a detailed, historical account with lots of footnotes, but that’s not what God gave us.
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Certainly, Lewis’ statement is true, but we are not talking about trees and flowers and rocks and minerals. Genesis does not speak of them as it does of the beasts. And if we suddenly find ourselves on speaking terms with a beast, we are likely to be in a restored earth and not the beast’s dinner food.
The book of Numbers says that if an animal kills a human, that animal should die.
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Oops, sorry, Jeff and Lisa.
Great post, Lisa!! 🙂
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Martha wrote, “Since we are unique amongst the other creatures of this world, no wonder we speculate about fairies or aliens from other worlds; another intelligent creature that can communicate with us, can share our experiences.”
That’s a very interesting consideration, Martha.
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To say that God could and/or would make “animals to speak and have intelligence” can be pushed into other directions, too:
God could make trees speak and have intelligence.
God could make flowers speak and have intelligence.
God could make rocks and minerals speak and have intelligence.
And the list could go on. C.S. Lewis once said, somewhere, that nonsense is still nonsense even when you put “God can . . .” in front of it.
As to animals, sin and salvation, it’s a matter of perspective. I think a talking (and presumably intelligent) rabbit would feel pretty strongly that the coyote about to eat him (or her) would be sinning, to the say the least. Certainly, if I was cornered by a Siberian Tiger and was about to be eaten, and if I was, at that moment thinking theologically, I would be thinking about the fall, sin, forgiveness, and the nastiness and wickedness of hungry tigers, especially if tigers once upon a time were on speaking terms with human beings. If tigers ate grass in Eden, than a) I am owed an apology by the tiger for eating me, and b) the tiger, in this line of thought, needs to be forgiven for my murder.
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Also, he was heterosexual.
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Those Mangani are pretty racist, though.
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You know, on the other thread people were speculating about whether Christ might have incarnated as an alien on some other planet…? Well Snoopy or Pikachu is the Christ of talking animals. (I’m pretty sure Mickey would be the Anti-Christ.) Junk food for thought.
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“OK. Stephen Jay Gould had to stress this in essay after essay”
Absolutely true.
Chesterton, in speaking out against the eugenics movement seemed to grasp this quite well for his time. Not so much in a scientific approach but from sound logic.
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Oh, Slacktivist’s comment thread massmind had a field day with that one; to the point it became a running joke — “Steaming Piles of Fresh Produce, Drenched in Butter!” became one of that blog’s standard comeback lines about dumb/weird ideas about Heaven. (A subject which has been broached often on this blog, as well.)
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“Evolution†as I understand it means adaptation and modification by natural selection – i.e., “survival of the fittest.â€
More like retention of traits through reproductive success. Being “unfit to survive” doesn’t mean extermination, just lack of success at reproduction and the resulting inability to pass your DNA (and whatever adaptations and mutations you possess) to descendants. For example, I was never able to reproduce — too nerdy to ever attract a woman/mate.
(“Survival of the Fittest” has been used to justify some real nasty stuff; ever noticed each advocate of applying this outside of physical biological change over time ALWAYS counts themself as among “the fittest”? “Natural Selection” became Cosmic-level justification of My Will Be Done as “God Saith!” had been centuries before — the original meaning of “Taking God’s Name in Vain.” The more it changes, the more it stays the same…)
The idea of biological change over time had been batted around for some time — Darwin just worked out a plausible mechanism as to how/why some traits are inherited and continued and some are not and die out.
On the other hand, Darwin’s concluding paragraph seems to support the idea of upward directionality:
Darwin was a Victorian Englishman; despite being original enough to make his breakthrough, he might still have retained some of the Victorian Englishman’s blind spots.
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Even if you are a YEC literalist (and I’m not) – –
Just because Genesis 1:30 says that herbs were given for every beast, bird and creeping thing, this does not necessarily mean that plant life was their ONLY source of food, nor does it exclude carnivores.
Clearly there are carrion birds, with beaks uniquely suited to picking apart flesh.
Genesis 1:30 makes no mention of water-based creatures, such as whales that eat krill and plankton. The point about mosquitoes, or any other parasites, is valid.
I wish they were all vegetarians, because it sounds peaceful and life-affirming; the same part of me would also like to think that before the fall there was no death, but that is not stated in the creation story either. In fact, God’s warning to Adam (that on the day you eat of the tree of knowledge of good and evil, you will surely die) would be a meaningless warning unless Adam already had a clear understanding of the meaning of “death”. At most, it moves death from the category of “possibility” to the category of “certainty”.
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Interesting… that reminds me of some stuff I’ve been hearing from one of my theology professors as well as NT Wright about how the redemption of the rest of creation comes via Christ redeeming man. Very, very interesting.
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Kosher, but not kosher pareve.
Unless the butter gets resurrected into margarine…
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I suppose we can’t help but think of evolution as upward, that being our idea of human progress.
But there opposite examples, elephants evolving into pygmy elephants when the population is restricted to an island, for example.
A more interesting example (perhaps) is the relatively high incidence of social disorders among leaders in the information technology space. The guy who founded facebook is borderly autistic, with aspergers syndrome, I believe.
As our environment changes from one marked by in-person social relations to one typified by the impersonal, multisensory world of the internet, the “type” of human who is best adapted to that new environment will also change. The environment shifts so that the ‘disfunctional’ person becomes supremely functional — and vice-versa.
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So in Heaven we’ll be vegetarian but not vegan.
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“Evolution” as I understand it means adaptation and modification by natural selection – i.e., “survival of the fittest.” This implies to me at least relative/comparative superiority to what currently exists or what came before – i.e., an “upwardness” (i.e., improvement/progress) in direction (again, relatively speaking). I don’t think it by definition implies or requires that such progress be proceeding toward some Chardinian Omega Point.
On the other hand, Darwin’s concluding paragraph seems to support the idea of upward directionality:
“It is interesting to contemplate a tangled bank, clothed with many plants of many kinds, with birds singing on the bushes, with various insects flitting about, and with worms crawling through the damp earth, and to reflect that these elaborately constructed forms, so different from each other, and dependent upon each other in so complex a manner, have all been produced by laws acting around us. These laws, taken in the largest sense, being Growth with Reproduction; Inheritance which is almost implied by reproduction; Variability from the indirect and direct action of the conditions of life, and from use and disuse: a Ratio of Increase so high as to lead to a Struggle for Life and as a consequence to Natural Selection, entailing Divergence of Character and the Extinction of less-improved forms. Thus, from the war of nature, from famine and death, the most exalted object which we are capable of conceiving, namely, the production of the higher animals, directly follows. There is grandeur in this view of life, with its several powers, having been originally breathed by the Creator into a few forms or into one; and that, whilst this planet has gone cycling on according to the fixed law of gravity, from so simple a beginning endless forms most beautiful and most wonderful have been, and are being evolved.” (Charles Darwin: On the Origin of Species Sixth edition, 1872. CHAP. XV. Conclusion. page 429)
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Perhaps it is rebellious to the science world to consider that mankind and everything else may be in the process of devolution instead of evolution…
OK. Stephen Jay Gould had to stress this in essay after essay but:
Evolution Does Not Imply Directionality. Change over time has no intrinsic direction. The reason it does in common belief is that Victorians used the word to also imply Directional UPWARD Progress — “The Victorians thought history ended well because it ended with the Victorians” (Chesterton) — and Darwin’s idea inherited that baggage. According to Gould, Darwin himself didn’t like the term “evolution” for just that reason; he preferred “Descent, with modifications”. Which does not imply Progress, Regress, or any Directionality like “Evolution” or “Devolution”.
Now watch somebody ring in Ken Ham/AIG in reply, and the flamewars begin anew.
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Romans 8:19-21: “For the anxious longing of the creation waits eagerly for the revealing of the sons of God. For the creation was subjected to futility, not willingly, but because of Him who subjected it, in hope that the creation itself also will be set free from its slavery to corruption into the freedom of the glory of the children of God.”
Jesus died to redeem human beings, and to make an end of sin & its effects. There’s no need for “another incarnation, this one for the animals” because the consequences that befell the beasts due to human sin are covered by Christ’s death and resurrection.
(Incidentally, in one of his sermons on Romans 8, John Wesley said, “May I be permitted to mention here a conjecture concerning the brute creation? What, if it should then please the all-wise, the all-gracious Creator to raise them higher in the scale of beings? What, if it should please him, when he makes us ‘equal to angels,’ to make them what we are now, — creatures capable of God; capable of knowing and loving and enjoying the Author of their being?”)
As for how exactly we bear the imago Dei, it goes beyond speech and reason. Angels are capable of that.
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I’ve also heard a number of people propose that vegetarianism was what God intended and that will be the norm in the consummated Kingdom.
That’s what LaHaye & Jenkins did in Left Behind: Volume 13 (or was it Volume 16?). Where what all the Saved eat is (Jenkins’ exact words) “STEAMING PILES OF FRESH PRODUCE, DRENCHED IN BUTTER!” For all Eternity.
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If we think God couldn’t make animals to speak and have intelligence, we limit him. If we think he wouldn’t, then we limit our imaginations. That animals would speak and have intelligence doesn’t mean they require salvation as we do. Man was made to be in fellowship to God, whereas it seems that by the Genesis account animals were made to be in some kind of fellowship or relationship to man. Animals did not bring sin into the world; man did. Man requires the salvation, yet Paul points out in Romans 8:19-22 that creation was subjected to futility and longs to be delivered from the bondage of corruption. All of creation suffers because of man’s sin.
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“Even now more animals than you might expect are ready to adore man if they are given a reasonable opportunity: for man was made to be the priest and even, in one sense, the Christ, of the animals — the mediator through whom they apprehend so much of the Divine splendour as their irrational nature allows.”
C.S. Lewis, The Problem of Pain in the chapter titled “The Fall of Man”
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Exactly. This kind of myth is full of truth. Sometimes even good fiction has a truer ring to it than so called non-fiction.
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A problem I see with treating the Creation and Fall as fabular is the impact and effect(s) that has on Paul’s Christology and soteriology and hamartiology and the resulting ramifications.
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Or How can we eat? Why do we eat? and Where shall we have lunch?
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If there were talking snakes, chickens and bears in Eden, how did Adam and Eve differ from them? Doesn’t this odd theory water down what it means to be created in the image of God? If you could carry on an intelligent conversation with a wombat, for example, how can we possibly say the wombat doesn’t also bear the image of God? And, did Christ die for snakes, chickens and bears (and wombats) as much as he did for human beings? Or, are we awaiting another incarnation, this one for the animals?
From what I can make out, the ancients didn’t make much of a distinction between myth, history, legend and tribal memory. Why can’t we read texts such as Genesis 1-11 as they would have read them? They make a lot more sense that way (as does reality).
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The only problem I have with considering the opening chapters of Genesis to be “story” instead of “history” is, at what point in the text does it become literal? The two gospels that contain geneology consider it to be an unbroken chain from Adam to Jesus. I guess just because the gospel writers considered Genesis to be literal doesn’t make them right, maybe? I don’t know. What did Jesus think about Genesis? Odds are that he took it literally. Could Jesus have had wrong beliefs? Did Jesus believe the earth went around the sun or visa versa? I think Michael would have said that Jesus had the same scientific beliefs of the average man of his day, which could have made him wrong, but still God incarnate somehow.
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I agree. It is. But it is, as Lewis calls it, a TRUE myth. There is a big difference between fantasy and myth…
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I have seen these types of questions asked by a number of different sources. I’ve heard a number of attempts at explaining them. One I’ve heard that I find most interesting is that perhaps there were Satanic forces at work in the evolutionary process as well as God’s plans. So just because a feature exists in nature it doesn’t necessarily mean that is God-ordained.
I’ve also heard a number of people propose that vegetarianism was what God intended and that will be the norm in the consummated Kingdom. One issue I have with that idea, though, is that Jesus ate meat while He was on earth – even after He was resurrected. I have a hard time reconciling those facts with the idea that all creatures will be vegetarians again at some point in the future. If it were something that we were supposed to get, I suppose I think Christ would have demonstrated it.
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Am I asking questions that should not be asked?
You’re asking the kinds of questions that cause some people to conclude (perhaps rightly?) that the first few chapters of Genesis and its depictions of “paradise” are more fable than fact. But I suspect in their many writings and conversations the rabbis have asked these same questions, and more. Maybe the Talmud includes some of the speculations and answers.
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“Myth” does not mean “Automatically False”, Neuropuck.
“Myths” mean the stories that define a culture or a people and explain their cosmos — their origin stories, their destiny stories, their cosmology, their oral tradition and common-knowledge history.
“Who Are You? What Do You Want? Where Are You Going?”
— J Michael Strazynscki, Babylon-5
“Where do we come from? Where are we going? And why do we spend so much time in between wearing digital watches?”
— Douglas Adams, Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy”
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Couple questions that bother me. The teeth of carnivores and herbivors are vastly different. Herbivors have flat teeth in the back and carnivors have sharp, pointed teeth all around- ill suited for chewing plants. So the question is, before the flood, did animals like tigers and wolves have flat teeth in the back, which then quickly morphed into sharp ones after the flood? Also, what did organisms like mosquitoes eat before the flood? Am I asking questions that should not be asked?
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Although it’s speculation, I’ve thought about this extensively. Why do stories about talking animals — from Narnia to Doctor Doolittle to fairy tales and even cartoons — somehow seem to ring true to a deep part of our consciousness? A buried genetic memory?
Maybe God is a FURRY?
I’ve been involved in Furry Fandom for the past 10-20 years, long before you all heard about it “as one of the weirder Internet fandoms.” And had a soft spot for upright talking animals as far back as I can remember. Here’s an excerpt from the autobiographical story where I got my Internet handle, “Conversation with a Dying Unicorn”:
“… my hyperactive, runaway imagination that had spaced me out until I was well into my twenties, and how that awe and wonder had worn down over the years — like my father, who had lost his ability to dream by the time I was old enough to notice.
“How imaginary critters like her had been a part of that imagination as far back as I could remember — classic Poul Anderson and Andre Norton “aliens†with fur and tails, mythical critters like herself, a noble young white lion, a one-shot skunkette glamor-actress, two-legged talking beasts of every species. Then my own critters; imaginary playmates becoming safe rehearsals for how to act on dates which never came, finally growing into full-fledged characters and stories and art as I aged, all expressing what C.S. Lewis had expressed the best:
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When all you have is a Young Earth Creationism hammer…
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I think there is a beautiful truth in these words from Lewis.
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Mr. Rogers was a vegetarian because, as he said, he could never eat anything that had a mother. 🙂
(I learned this from reading I’m Proud of You: My Friendship with Fred Rogers by Tim Madigan.)
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I agree. I appreciate the insight of the post, but I still think it may be a little off point. Perhaps the reason the writers of the Bible nonchalantly mention these things is because they weren’t really all that important to the original audience of the story–they simply set the stage for the greater purpose behind the tale.
It’s like when people get worked up about ha-satan (the adversary) going to God in the book of Job, discussing the intricacies of the relationship between God and what is traditionally misunderstood as the devil. It’s not the point–it’s simply part of the build-up for the greater question inherent in Job: why do good people suffer? We might do well to ask the same questions about the Hebrew genesis myth: what’s really going on here? What’s the big picture?
That being said, however, I thought the post was certainly interesting. I’ve long pondered the relationship of animals to humanity.
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We lost our cat the same year our son went off to college. This cat had been my companion since my son went to kindergarten. I took his death hard, particularly since I was already feeling the empty nest blues.
Anyway, during the weeks after he was gone a neighbor’s cat came to visit me every day. He had never come that near before but suddenly was there rubbing against my leg and letting me pet him whenever I went outside. This went on for a couple of weeks while I was feeling the worst grief. I really felt he sensed my grief. Then, like that, he stopped the behavior.
I will add that about a week after that I was ready to go down to the humane society and find a new cat companion. She keeps close – my shadow.
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Assisi.
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Perhaps it is only a coincidence, and perhaps not, that this post was published on the Feast Day of St. Francis of Assis. (I am not Roman Catholic, but I read a lot.) I love it, Lisa.
If this had been on some other Christian sites, it would have been ripped to shreds or laughed to scorn. In Jesus’ name, of course.
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Thanks for pointing this out. I thought I had read it, but couldn’t find it in Genesis so didn’t want to write it.
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I’ll stick with this hypothesis: this story is a myth.
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It’s all there in Lewis:
Such natural love twixt beast and man we find
That children all desire an animal book,
And all brutes, not perverted from their kind,
Woo us with whinny, tongue, tail, song, or look;
So much of Eden’s courtesy yet remains.
But when a creature’s dread, or mine, has built
A wall between, I think I feel the pains
That Adam earned and do confess my guilt.
For till I tame sly fox and timorous hare
And lording lion in my self, no peace
Can be without; but after, I shall dare
Uncage the shadowy zoo and war will cease;
Because the brutes within, I do not doubt,
Are archetypal of the brutes without.
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Many years ago I was in a deep depression. My dog never left my side during those two years. I have always thought he had some sense of what I was going through and wanted to comfort or protect me in some way.
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I’ve got a friend who has a theory that the animals’ role toward man in the Kingdom will be similar to the angels’ role toward God.
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One of my daughters is married to a dairy farmer. Her whole family has very deep love for the creatures that dwell on the farm. Barn cats, house cats, dogs, calves, 4-H animals, and whatever else might stray into their existence. I’m always amazed at the closeness they have to each other, animals to humans, humans to animals that is evident when I’m around them. When I see my 17 year old grandson hug and love our dog, and the dog always so very excited when he comes to see us, I can’t help but thinking, yes this will be part of God’s new Creation, a new Heaven and Earth after the resurrection.
The dog we care for, also cares for us. We watch out for her, she watches out for us. With her eyes she talks to us. And she listens very closely to the tone and intention of our voices. When someone takes her place on the sofa, she might stare at them until they get the point. She communicates surprise, elation, happiness, and satisfaction. She knows in advance when we are getting ready to leave her for a time. And she gives us a grand welcome when we return.
Some day we will dwell with these creatures in a Kingdom of peace. Will they communicate with us? Of course.
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Works the other way too; as man evolved from being a more primitive creature (even if it was a great ape) to a higher level, he left behind his companions the beasts and became isolated by his special consciousness.
Since we are unique amongst the other creatures of this world, no wonder we speculate about fairies or aliens from other worlds; another intelligent creature that can communicate with us, can share our experiences.
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Well, I guess I’ll take the bait and mention Numbers 22.
On another note, as Lisa indicates, we learn in a matter-of-fact way that the Antediluvian diet was vegetarian. Was that the basis of such extraordinary longevity? Were the Nephilim beefed-up giants because they were meat-eaters in rebellion with God’s purposes? Oh, so many possibilities to write fanciful and irrelevant books and make lots of money catering to modern Christian reading tastes.
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Thanks, Joanie–but this is from Lisa. Believe me, I wish I was this insightful.
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Of course man can talk to the animals. Have you never read any Tarzan novels?
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That’s a very interesting insite….made me smile a bit just to imagine what God has in store for us someday!
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“For the fate of humans and the fate of animals are the same:
As one dies, so dies the other; both have the same breath.
There is no advantage for humans over animals, for both are fleeting.
Both go to the same place,both come from the dust,
and to dust both return.” (Ecc 3:19-20)
Animals do have the same breath of life as man.
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Great post, Jeff! I love the emphasis on the animals and their part in creation, both before and after the fall and after heaven and earth are one.
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Although it’s speculation, I’ve thought about this extensively. Why do stories about talking animals — from Narnia to Doctor Doolittle to fairy tales and even cartoons — somehow seem to ring true to a deep part of our consciousness? A buried genetic memory? I think communicating with the animals is perhaps only one of many abilities that we lost with the fall. I would not be a bit surprised to find that Adam and Eve had many traits we would consider “super-powers” — after all, they were created in God’s image. And I’m also convinced that animals will be part of the new heaven and new earth. I think there’re a lot of good things waiting for us!
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Come now. Eat from the fruit of reason, and ye shall become as gods, knowing evolutionary biology and biblical criticism.
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