New Evangelizers Post: Creation and Society

I have a new article up at NewEvangelizers.com

CREATION AND SOCIETY

The creation stories in Genesis are so incredibly rich in their insight and wisdom.  There is a reason that our Lord consistently referred his critics back “to the beginning” when He would make a point about the world or human nature.  It would be foolish to try and unpack all of the depths of those 2 first chapters, but I would like to focus on what it tells us about society.

Whenever God created anything in the first chapter of Genesis, He said that it was good.  But when God looks at Adam, for the first time in the Bible He says that something is not good.

God says that it is not good for the man to be alone.  But how could Adam be alone?  He was living with God in “paradise,” which is literally translated as “the pleasure park.”  What could Adam be lacking?  We were made by God for God and our deepest longing is for the presence of God in our life.  Adam had all that.

But man was incomplete.  Humanity was incomplete.  God made the beasts, but none were suitable partners.  And that is still true for us today.  Pets and animal companions can fill our lives with affection and care, but they will never fulfill us in the way that we truly need.

So God made woman.  There is actually a play on words in the Hebrew text.  The word “woman” in Hebrew is “ishshah.”  Adam says that he calls her this because she was taken from “her husband,” which in Hebrew is “ishah.”  The point is that the two are cut from the same cloth.

You can read the whole thing here