Genesis

"Behold behind him a ram caught in a thicket by his horns. (KJV)"

"And Jehovah’s angel called to Abraham a second time from the heavens, saying: “‘By myself I swear,’ declares Jehovah, ‘that because you have done this and you have not withheld your son, your only one, I will surely bless you and I will surely multiply your offspring like the stars of the heavens and like the grains of sand on the seashore, and your offspring will take possession of the gate of his enemies. And by means of your offspring all nations of the earth will obtain a blessing for themselves because you have listened to my voice.’” (NWT)"

"Esau selleth his birthright for a mess of potage."

"Esau was a cunning hunter, a man of the field; and Jacob was a plain man, dwelling in tents. (KJV)"

"And he sold his birthright unto Jacob. (KJV)"

"Behold, Esau my brother is a hairy man, and I am a smooth man. (KJV)"

"The voice is Jacob’s voice, but the hands are the hands of Esau. (KJV)"

"Thy brother came with subtilty, and hath taken away thy blessing. (KJV)"

"And he dreamed, and behold a ladder set up on the earth, and the top of it reached to heaven: and behold the angels of God ascending and descending on it. (KJV)"

"Surely the is in this place; and I knew it not. (KJV)"

"This is none other but the house of God, and this is the gate of heaven. (KJV)"

"And Jacob served seven years for Rachel; and they seemed unto him but a few days, for the love he had to her. (KJV)"

"The watch between me and thee, when we are absent one from another. (KJV)"

"There wrestled a man with him until the breaking of the day. And when he saw that he prevailed not against him, he touched the hollow of his thigh; and the hollow of Jacob’s thigh was out of joint, as he wrestled with him. (KJV)"

"I will not let thee go, except thou bless me. (KJV)"

"For I have seen God face to face, and my life is preserved. (KJV)"

"Now Israel loved Joseph more than all his children, because he was the son of his old age; and he made him a coat of many colours. (KJV)"

"Behold, your sheaves stood round about, and made obeisance to my sheaf. (KJV)"

"Behold, this dreamer cometh. (KJV)"

"Some evil beast hath devoured him. (KJV)"

"And she caught him by his garment, saying, Lie with me; and he left his garment in her hand, and fled. (KJV)"

"And the lean and the ill favoured kine did eat up the first seven fat kine. (KJV)"

"And the thin ears devoured the seven good ears. (KJV)"

"Jacob saw that there was corn in Egypt. (KJV)"

"Ye are spies; to see the nakedness of the land ye are come. (KJV)"

"Ye shall eat the fat of the land. (KJV)"

"See that ye fall not out by the way. (KJV)"

"Few and evil have the days of the years of my life been. (KJV)"

"Unstable as water, thou shalt not excel. (KJV)"

"The god is depicted... on his potter wheel... creating the body of the Pharaoh and his ka and his eternal soul by petrifying, by using clay. ...[H]e kneads humanity and the gods with clay and silt. ...[T]his is the Genesis that we are accustomed to read in the Bible, and it is also the type of Genesis that is depicted in the Quran. ...The ka is the soul in eternal stone."

"As the Mishnah records, the Rabbis of the House of Hillel and later Jewish law interpreted Genesis 1:28 to require a minimum of two children – specifically a boy and a girl, so that human creation would mirror divine creation. Couples who were able to have more children, however, were supposed to have as many as they could, based on the verse, “Sow your seed in the morning, and do not refrain from doing so in the evening,” interpreted to mean the beginning and later stages of life (Ecclesiastes 11:6). This undoubtedly reflected the reality of a time when fewer children survived to adulthood."

"The Biblical words about the genesis of heaven and earth are not words of information but words of appreciation. The story of creation is not a description of how the world came into being but a song about the glory of the world's having come into being."

"Certain portions of the text of the Bible, if taken literally, cannot possibly be regarded as in any way conducive to a high moral standard. In Genesis XII:10-20, for example, Abraham passes his wife off as his sister that Pharaoh may possess her. His motive in doing so was that his life might be spared and he be greatly rewarded. Isaac transgresses similarly and for the same reason, as stated in Genesis XXVI:6-11. In this latter case the Lord God blessed Isaac and he becomes rich and prospers. Genesis XXVII:1-45, recounts a most deplorable example of deliberate deceit by Jacob, who later becomes a favoured patriarch under the inspiration of the Lord."

"...the great Book of Genesis—a marvellous cup filled with the “wine” of the esoteric knowledge of the Sanctuaries of ancient days. Temples of the Ageless Wisdom exist to-day, even if less easily discoverable, and in them are to be found the selfsame teachings, laws, successions, Initiations and radiations of the light of Truth. World changes are not reflected in the Mysteries, which are repositories and conveyors of eternal and unchanging Ideas. A sack of corn containing a silver cup awaits every Benjamin who finds himself called by a Hierophant (Joseph) from the “famine-stricken” outer world to the “storehouse” from which an elder brother (a Master) Who has already attained will, in prodigal abundance, supply a gift of the golden grain of eternal verities."

"Genesis 1:28 is not a commandment, but a blessing. It does not refer to what humans must do to please God, but to what God does for and through humankind. The text says, "God blessed them, and God said to them, 'Be fruitful and multiply'" (RSV). Fertility is not a command but a blessing that God gives to his creatures, to animals as well as humans (Gen. 1:22). The filling of the Earth is a gift of God's wisdom and shows forth his glory as Creator (Ps. 104:24, 31; Isa. 6:3)."

"If Genesis 1:28 were a ‘command’ that applied to every individual, then Paul would have been disobedient in his apostolic singleness. Paul and everyone else would be obligated to pursue marriage and to order their marriages to produce many descendants."

"Who that has understanding will sup­pose that the first, and second, and third day, and the evening and the morning, ex­isted without a sun, and moon, and stars? and that the first day was, as it were, also without a sky? And who is so foolish as to suppose that God, after the manner of a husbandman, planted a paradise in Eden, towards the east, and placed in it a tree of life, visible and palpable, so that one tasting of the fruit by the bodily teeth obtained life? and again, that one was a partaker of good and evil by masticating what was taken from the tree? And if God is said to walk in the paradise in the evening, and Adam to hide himself under a tree, I do not suppose that anyone doubts that these things figuratively indi­cate certain mysteries, the history having taken place in appearance, and not literally. Cain also, when going forth from the presence of God, certainly appears to thoughtful men as likely to lead the reader to inquire what is the presence of God, and what is the meaning of going out from Him."

"[F]or all this reverence, the Bible is one long celebration of violence. In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth. 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 soul. And the Lord God took one of Adam’s ribs, and made he a woman. And Adam called his wife’s name Eve; because she was the mother of all living. And Adam knew Eve his wife; and she conceived, and bare Cain. And she again bare his brother Abel. And Cain talked with Abel his brother: and it came to pass, when they were in the field, that Cain rose up against Abel his brother, and slew him. With a world population of exactly four, that works out to a homicide rate of 25 per cent, which is about a thousand times higher than the equivalent rates in Western countries today. No sooner do men and women begin to multiply than God decides they are sinful and that the suitable punishment is genocide. (In Bill Cosby’s comedy sketch, a neighbor begs Noah for a hint as to why he is building an ark. Noah replies, “How long can you tread water?”) When the flood recedes, God instructs Noah in its moral lesson, namely the code of vendetta: “Whoso sheddeth man’s blood, by man shall his blood be shed.”"

"Abraham has a nephew, Lot, who settles in Sodom. Because the residents engage in anal sex and comparable sins, God immolates every man, woman, and child in a divine napalm attack. Lot’s wife, for the crime of turning around to look at the inferno, is put to death as well. Abraham undergoes a test of his moral values when God orders him to take his son Isaac to a mountaintop, tie him up, cut his throat, and burn his body as a gift to the Lord. Isaac is spared only because at the last moment an angel stays his father’s hand. For millennia readers have puzzled over why God insisted on this horrifying trial. One interpretation is that God intervened not because Abraham had passed the test but because he had failed it, but that is anachronistic: obedience to divine authority, not reverence for human life, was the cardinal virtue. Isaac’s son Jacob has a daughter, Dinah. Dinah is kidnapped and raped—apparently a customary form of courtship at the time, since the rapist’s family then offers to purchase her from her own family as a wife for the rapist. Dinah’s brothers explain that an important moral principle stands in the way of this transaction: the rapist is uncircumcised. So they make a counteroffer: if all the men in the rapist’s hometown cut off their foreskins, Dinah will be theirs. While the men are incapacitated with bleeding penises, the brothers invade the city, plunder and destroy it, massacre the men, and carry off the women and children. When Jacob worries that neighboring tribes may attack them in revenge, his sons explain that it was worth the risk: “Should our sister be treated like a whore?” Soon afterward they reiterate their commitment to family values by selling their brother Joseph into slavery."

"The first chapter of Genesis... is a hymn to an orderly and bountiful cosmos. ... It is obvious to everyone except creationists that this chapter was never, not even when it was first written, intended as a historical description of the history of the cosmos. It described the work of creation as categories, not as a timeline."

"A Merry Christmas & Happy New Year compliments of Elizabeth Cady Stanton Genesis Chap I says Man & Woman were a simultaneous creation Chap II says Woman was an afterthought Which is true?"

"The sun is a type of God, and the moon of man. And as the sun far surpasses the moon in power and glory, so far does God surpass man. And as the sun remains ever full, never becoming less, so does God always abide perfect... But the moon wanes monthly, and in a manner dies, being a type of man; then it is born again, and is crescent, for a pattern of the future resurrection. In like manner also the three days which were before the luminaries, are types of the Trinity, of God, and His Word, and His wisdom. And the fourth is the type of man, who needs light."

"The tree of knowledge itself was good, and its fruit was good. For it was not the tree, as some think, but the disobedience, which had death in it. For there was nothing else in the fruit than only knowledge; but knowledge is good when one uses it discreetly. But Adam, being yet an infant in age, was on this account as yet unable to receive knowledge worthily."

"And God showed great kindness to man in this, that He did not suffer him to remain in sin for ever; but, as it were, by a kind of banishment, cast him out of Paradise, in order that, having by punishment expiated, within an appointed time, the sin, and having been disciplined, he should afterwards be restored. Wherefore also, when man had been formed in this world, it is mystically written in Genesis, as if he had been twice placed in Paradise; so that the one was fulfilled when he was placed there, and the second will be fulfilled after the resurrection and judgment... And as to God’s calling, and saying, Where art thou, Adam? God did this, not as if ignorant of this; but, being long-suffering, He gave him an opportunity of repentance and confession."

"The Genesis story of the reason why Adam and Eve were driven out of the Garden of Eden was not that they had tasted of the Tree of Knowledge, as is popularly conceived, but the fear lest they should disobey a second time and eat of the Tree of Life and live forever."

"I rather think that the Genesis story of the Creation needs to be rewritten all over again. In the Chinese novel Red Chamber Dream, the boy hero, a sentimental mollycoddle very fond of female company and admiring his beautiful female cousins intensely and all but sorry for himself for being a boy, says that, "Woman is made of water and man is made of clay," the reason being that he thinks his female cousins are sweet and pure and clever, while he himself and his boy companions are ugly and muddle-headed and bad-tempered. If the writer of the Genesis story had been a Paoyü and knew what he was talking about, he would have written a different story. God took a handful of mud, molded it into human shape and breathed into its nostrils a breath, and there was Adam. But Adam began to crack and fall to pieces, and so He took some water, and with the water He molded the clay, and this water which entered into Adam's being was called Eve, and only in having Eve in his being was Adam's life complete. At least that seems to me to be the symbolic significance of marriage. Woman is water and man is clay, and water permeates and molds the clay, and the clay holds the water and gives its substance, in which water moves and lives and has its full being."