The Bible of Bibles; Or, Twenty-Seven "Divine" Revelations. Kersey Graves
love, wisdom, and goodness;" but let it be kept constantly in mind we are not presenting the history of such a being here, but the mere imaginary God of Moses and the Bible.)
38. As the Bible teaches that Adam named all the beasts, animals, and birds, it must have occupied a great number of years for the Lord God of Moses to have caught and taken the several hundred thousand species to Adam to receive names in all the three thousand languages, and then convey them back to their respective climates.
39. The question naturally arises, Why should Adam give them names by saying, "This is a horse, that is an ass, the animal yonder shall be called a hippopotamus," &c., when there was nobody present to hear it and be benefited by it? And nobody could have remembered half the names had they been present. Here we wish to call the attention of the reader specially to the fact that all the thoughts and language we have so far cited as being either that of God or Moses sounds like the utterance of ignorant children, and unworthy the dignity of an intelligent and sensible man much less that of a God.
40. The Bible teaches that "God made man in his own image." The reverse statement would have been true, "Man made God in his own image;" for this is true of all nations who believe in a God.
41. Here let it be noted the Bible contains two contradictory accounts of creation; one found in the first chapter of Genesis, the other in the second. In the first, animals are created before man; in the second, after man.
42. The first chapter of Genesis says, "Let the earth bring forth plants" (Gen. i. 11): the second says, "God created every plant... before it was in the earth" (Gen. ii. 9). A contradiction; and neither statement is true, there being no creation.
43. The first chapter has the earth created several days before the firmament, or heaven: the second chapter has it created on the same day (Gen. ii. 4).
44. The first represents fowls as originating in the water (Gen. i. 20): the second has them created out of the water.
45. After the first chapter says "God created man in his own image" (Gen. i. 27), the second says "there was not a man to till the ground" (Gen. ii. 4).
46. The first chapter represents man and woman as being created at the same time (Gen. i. 27): the second represents the woman as being created after the man.
47. The first implies that man has dominion over the whole earth: the second restricts his dominion to a garden. Which is the inspired story of creation?
48. The Mexicans claim that the first man and woman were created in their country. The Hindoos aver that the original progenitors of the race (Adimo and Iva) first made their appearance amongst them. The Chinese claim a similar honor. The Persians contend that God landed the first human pair in the land of Iran. And, finally, the Jews affirm that Jehovah created the first pair in Eden.
THE TREE OF KNOWLEDGE AND THE TREE OF LIFE.
Moses tells us God planted two trees in Eden, one of which he called "the tree of the knowledge of good and evil." This tree bore fruit which nobody was allowed to taste (Gen. ii. 9).
49. Why the tree was planted, or why its fruit was forbidden to be used, are problems which the Bible does not solve, and which set reason at defiance.
50. And then it looks like a senseless act to create a tree for the purpose of bearing fruit (as we can conceive of no other purpose for which it could have been created), and then decree that it should all go to waste.
51. It was worse still to create human beings with an appetite for this fruit, and place it in their sight, and then forbid them to taste it on penalty of death. Nothing could be more opposed to our ideas of reason and justice.
52. Did God create beings in his own image, and then treat them as if he wished to tantalize them and render them unhappy?
53. It would seem that he created man for no other purpose than to tease and torment him, and quarrel with him.
54. Common sense would suggest it to be the act of an ignoramus or a tyrant to implant in man the desire to eat fruit which he did not allow him to eat.
55. And would it not be unjust to punish Adam and Eve for doing what he himself had implanted in them the desire to do?
56. God must have known they would eat the fruit, if he were omniscient.
57. If he were not omniscient, he was not a God in a supreme or divine sense.
58. God must have had the power without the will to prevent the act of disobedience, which would make him an unjust and unmerciful tyrant.
59. Or else the will without the power, which would make him a weak and frail being, and not a God. (For a full elucidation of these points, see chapter sixty-nine.)
We will notice a few other points.
60. As God declared eating the fruit would make Adam "like one of us," that is, Godlike (and all men are enjoined to become Godlike), was not Adam, therefore, justified in eating the fruit in order to become Godlike?
61. In chapter sixty-nine it is shown, that, as Adam and Eve got their eyes open by eating the inhibited fruit, the act of disobedience turned out to be a great blessing, inasmuch as it saved the earth from being filled with a race of blind human beings.
62. And, as this blessing was obtained through the agency of the serpent-devil, we must admit "the father of lies" was a great benefactor of the human race, as shown in chapter sixty-nine.
63. As Adam could not very well exercise "dominion over every living thing that moveth upon the earth" (Gen. i. 26) while shut up in a little eight-by-ten garden, we can observe here another practical benefit of the act of disobedience which drove him from the garden.
64. Is it not a strange piece of moral incongruity to set Adam to tilling the soil in the garden as a blessing, and then doom him to till it outside as a curse? (Gen. iii. 23.) He first embarked in the business as a blessing, and then as a curse. How the same act could be both a blessing and a curse is a "mystery of godliness" which swamps us.
65. The Jews tell us the original tempter was a serpent (Gen. iii. 1); The Mexicans say it was a demon; the Hindoos call him a snake; the Greeks declare it was a dragon; Josephus supposes it was an ape; some of the East-India sects speak of him as a fish; but the Persian revelations make it a lizard. Which is right?
66. The Mosaic or Hebrew cosmogony represents the serpent as dealing out the fruit to the genus homo; while the Mexicans, the Egyptians, and the Persians set the serpent or "evil genius" to guarding the tree to protect the fruit. Which is right?
67. When God Jehovah announced to the trinity of Gods, "Behold, the man has become as one of us to know good and evil" (Gen. iii. 22), exactly as the serpent had predicted, instead of dying as Jehovah had predicted, does it not prove that the serpent was the best and most reliable prophet?
68. As Adam and Eve could know nothing of the nature of right and wrong until they attained that knowledge by eating the fruit, does not this fact prove it to be a justifiable if not a righteous act?
69. How could Adam and Eve know that any act was sinful before an act of any kind had been committed by which they could learn the character or consequences of human conduct?
69. Is it not a logical conclusion, that, if God created every thing, he can control every thing, and hence, strictly speaking, is alone responsible for the right performance of every thing?
70. The Christian Bible tells us the first pair of human beings sewed fig-leaves together for clothing; but the Chinese revelation say palm-leaves. Which is right? Who can tell?
71. As it is declared the voice of God was heard "walking in the garden" (Gen. iii. 8), we beg leave to ask, what kind of a thing is a "walking voice"?
72. We also beg leave to ask, who took charge of "the house of many