On Being Eve

My ministers, Rev. Bob and his wife, Rev. Lilly, are enlightened. Nevertheless, like all the males I've met (my own husband included) he's occasionally a little chauvinistic . Lilly keeps this in check and Bob's friends know he's well-intentioned and ignore it. Yet, I was a little surprised he did a recent article on the Adam & Eve story where women get all the blame. He was talking about esoteric symbolism and I'm pretty sure he doesn't take Genesis to be literal. He did, however, kind of blame women for evil. So is it our fault?

Yes...and no. Only half the story was told, Adam's view point. I've got an alternate version:

"Good morning, Eve. Fine morning in the garden isn't it?"

 "Hi, Mr. Slither. I haven't seen you around here before."

"I just came by to pay my respects to His newest creation. Thought I should warn you, tho. His majesty is being a little deceitful about the whole "leave the magic fruit alone thing."

  "What do you mean deceitful?"

"To start with, what did he say to you Eve?"

 "Me? He didn't say anything to me. He told Adam not to eat from the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil lest we become like gods."

"See! Isn't that a little misleading? How are you and Adam supposed to choose the good if you can't tell the difference?"

 "You've got a point. Sometimes it's hard to figure what he really wants from us."

"Besides, he never actually said anything to you about the fruit, did he, Eve?"

 "Well, no. Not to me."

"Who are you created for? Didn't he make you as a help-mate to Adam? Shouldn't you be looking out for Adam and not His Majesty? Don't you want Adam to become like a god? Come on, now Eve. Don't you think he set this up so you could pick the apple for Adam? Then he won't be breaking His Majesty's commandment."

 "I guess if I ate it first we won't be breaking his commandment." Eve takes a bite. "Wow, this apple thing is pretty good. Awesome! It changes your whole world view!  Duality! Two valued logic.! I can see divisions of choice everywhere!"

"See! Now that you can see what's what, you can see that this whole thing is a setup. His Majesty rigged the game. Now you can enlighten Adam as to the difference between right and wrong. Between left and right. Between black and white. Between good and evil."

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I love to blame my husband for pretty much everything that's wrong with life. After all, wasn't it Adam's fault for not being able to handle things without a help-mate. To blame our whole sex for evil just because we discovered it, well that's just not the whole story is it?  

Since it's not the whole story, I'm going to need a part 2 to come...