How The Snake Fooled The Woman
Stories
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Contents
"How the Snake Fooled the Woman" by Sandra Herrmann
"Temptation" by Keith Hewitt
* * * * * * *
How the Snake Fooled the Woman
by Sandra Herrman
Genesis 2:15-17; 3:1-7
The rabbis of old told stories about the biblical stories. Why, you ask? Because often the oral tradition was not complete in the written version. There are huge numbers of these stories, all pertaining to something we need to learn from the biblical stories that is not explicitly said in the scripture. This is one of them.
The LORD put the man he had made into the Garden of Eden, to work it and take care of it. He told the man, "You are free to eat from any tree in the garden, but you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. For when you eat of it, you will surely die." Although we often misquote this as "The day you eat of it... " that is not what God said. Death will not be immediate, but it will surely follow.
Then God made a partner for the human. This partner was taken from the very bone of Adam, not created separately like the rest of the animals, because while the other animals could certainly help the human being, only one that is truly a part of him could be a partner in all that he needed to do.
The snake seizes on this opportunity. He approaches Eve, the Mother of All Living. She is evidently loitering near the tree, admiring its fruit, no doubt. The snake leans over and says, "So, girl. Did I hear that you're not allowed to eat from all these trees you have to take care of?"
"Oh, no," says Eve, "we're allowed to eat from almost all of them."
"Almost all, did you say? What exceptions have been made, if I may ask?"
And Eve replies, "Well, we're not allowed to eat from this tree."
"This tree? Why not this tree?" And looking the tree up and down, he says, "What's this tree called, anyway?"
"The tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil." Eve imitates the snake in looking up at the fruit hanging from the tree.
"Really? So why did God say you're not to eat this fruit? It looks perfectly tasty to me."
"Well," Eve says, "if we eat the fruit, or even touch it, we'll die."
(Check out the text. Did God say that?)
"Really?" says the snake, and without warning, he pushes Eve against the tree, making her scream. "Funny. You seem to be alive, despite touching the tree." He folds his arms and leans against the tree with a sardonic smile.
"Seems as though God lied to you." The snake waits for a minute, then gazes up at the fruit again. "I wonder. Did God tell you that the fruit has special powers?"
"Not really," she says, following his gaze upward. "It has special powers?"
"Yes. Aside from the fact that it's especially juicy, and very tasty, it does in fact do something special."
"What would that be?" asked Eve.
"It will make you as wise as God."
"Really? What does that mean?"
"It means that you will know the difference between things that are good and things that are bad," he said, dumbing it down for her. "You know, then you wouldn't have to pester God to tell what to do or not do. He has much more important things to do that to wait on your little concerns, you know. I'm sure it annoys him when you're constantly coming to him with your petty problems."
Eve thought about that. "He's never said he doesn't like talking to us.... But then he's so good and kind, of course he wouldn't say that."
The snake hissed. "Of course he doesn't say that. He doesn't want you to think for yourself. He wants you to continue as his slaves, taking care of his garden and waiting on his every whim. He only pretends to be good. He's actually pretty much like the rest of us." The snake reached up and plucked a fruit and took a big bite of it. And he didn't die either.
Eve watched him eat the fruit. Then she reached up and picked one. She stood and looked at it for a long time. It would be unkind of her to get all that knowledge for just herself, she thought. So she picked a second fruit and went looking for Adam.
"Hi there, Eve!" Adam looked up from the plants he was tending. "What do you have there?"
"Fruit from the Tree of Knowledge," she answered, handing him one. "The snake and I had a long conversation, and he proved to me that the tree isn't poisonous. He eats it, and he doesn't die. We won't die. God lied to us. It's a special tree, all right. It gives wisdom to anyone who eats it. God just wants us to be his slaves. We do all the work, and he keeps the fruit for himself!" She handed him one of the fruits and took a big bite of the other. Juice ran down her chin, and she didn't die. Adam was stunned. And then he took a bite from his fruit. And he didn't die either.
But one thing did change. They looked at each other, and they were ashamed. They had a different feeling about their bodies, as though some parts were all right, and others were shameful. They picked some leaves, sewed them together, and made aprons for themselves. That took care of some of their shame, but not all of it. They spent the afternoon not looking at each other. They didn't play, and they didn't work. They sat until evening, feeling worse than they could have imagined. For the first time, they didn't laugh with each other, and they didn't touch each other. They weren't dead, but they would never again be as alive as they were before the snake tricked the woman.
Sandra Herrmann is a retired United Methodist pastor living in Milwaukee, Wisconsin.
Temptation
by Keith Hewitt
Matthew 4:1-11
It was just sitting there.
Sitting where it had no right to be really.
It sat there and called to him with a smell as sweet as any Siren song ever sung to Odysseus. To be fair, he was sitting closer than he had any right to be -- something the vendor would be sure to point out once customers started showing up -- but it was such a good spot. The junction of the stand and the bank behind it formed a natural windbreak, and with the exhaust from the stand's gas heater venting into the corner, it formed a nice, cozy island of warmth.
He lowered his head and flipped up the collar of his jacket, tried not to look directly at it -- maybe that would help. But that scent -- that heavenly scent -- wafted over and seemed to get trapped in the dead space of his corner, settling over him like a cloud of possibilities.
What was that experiment -- somebody's cat? It was a thought experiment physicists use, to explain the observational effect in quantum physics. Take a cat, put it in a box with a vial of poison gas and a trigger tripped by the random decay of a radioactive element, then seal the box. Once the box is sealed, because the triggering of the poison is totally random, the cat can be thought of as both dead and alive, an amorphous cloud of outcomes... until the moment the observer peeks into the box. Then, the possibilities collapse into a single outcome -- either a dead cat or a live one, either result equally possible and both unknown and unknowable until checked.
He let the memory of that illustration build up, element by element, uncovering each bit of memory like some precious fossil, dusting it off carefully before assembling it with the others until it formed a whole thought, a whole memory from distant days. With some self-satisfaction at having recovered that particular memory, he held it before him and examined it, carefully turning it over and over and looking at it from every angle, trying to get lost and not think about the delightful aroma that surrounded him.
This went on for some time -- how long he did not know, as his watch now made its home on another man's wrist, having provided for a nice meal and a considerable amount of decidedly non-prescription medication. Eventually, though, the fresh baked aroma crept past his defensive indifference, began enticing him once again. Head still down, he glanced furtively at the counter, mentally measured his arm against the open space.
You can get it. There was no voice -- he had learned in the last few years not to mention the voices -- but the thought appeared in his consciousness as though a voice had spoken it, fully formed and perfectly audible... no, understandable. Not audible. They were never audible, he reminded himself sternly. They were just thoughts that someone put in his head, like dropping flashes of genius into humdrum conversation.
Those were the days, he thought warmly, when mathematical expressions -- sometimes whole equations -- would just pop up, surfacing from his subconscious into his conscious brain. He could set his mind to work on a problem, then go off and putter at something mindless, like chemistry or computer programming, confident that eventually the solution would pop up, birthing itself, a flash of insight in a murky world.
And then the insights stopped... or changed, anyway...
You can get it. Just stand up, reach confidently when his back is turned, and you can have it before he knows it's missing.
"What if I get caught?" He was unaware that he mumbled the question.
Be confident, and you won't get caught. Just reach out, grab it, and walk away into the train station. He'll never notice you. You can eat while you're moving.
That sounded plausible. He lowered his head again, calculating how quickly the vendor could get around the counter, how long the man would be willing to leave his stand alone to pursue him. As he calculated, the aroma called to him, and he began to salivate. Then he shook his head. "It's not right."
What's not right? You're hungry, aren't you? How long has it been since you've eaten?
He tried to work it out, using sleeps to measure days, but bogged down in uncertainty, because his sleeps were often broken up, and his recollection was a little foggy, and what was that experiment? The one with the cat? He set off down that trail again, in search of Schrodinger's cat, before the voice -- the thoughts, the thoughts -- brought him up short. So, are you hungry or not?
But it's not mine. I don't have a right to take it.
They don't have a right to starve you, either, do they? You have a basic human need, and they have the means to address it. It's almost like you're doing them a favor by taking action so they don't have to.
Take, don't take; starve, don't starve -- the possibilities were a cloud that made thinking difficult, and he tried to sort them out.
"You hungry, Doctor?"
It took the question being repeated, for him to realize that it was not another sentence dropped into his consciousness. He shivered slightly, more of a quick trembling that shot out from between his shoulder blades, and turned toward the voice. It was a young woman, from the looks of her, and he felt relieved. The last time there had been a voice, it had been all verbs and nouns jumbled together in angular shadows that floated about eye level above the ground. "Beg your pardon?" he asked and barely recognized the croak of his own voice.
The woman smiled, but her eyebrows crept together in concern. "I asked if you were hungry, Doctor Kemp." She paused, studying him, added after a moment, "You are Doctor Kemp, aren't you?"
He considered the question, nodded stiffly. "I believe I was, Miss."
"I thought so. I heard... well, I heard... " and she trailed off, changed direction abruptly. "You look like you might be hungry, Doctor Kemp. Can I help you?"
"I, uh -- I --" He stood up, looked down at his hands and rubbed them on his legs and suddenly the aroma from the stand was overwhelming. "I am so very hungry, Miss," he admitted softly. "I really need to eat something."
She nodded toward the stand. "What would you like? A coffee, I know, but what else?"
What else, indeed? He licked his lips, said hesitantly, "I've really been looking at that pretzel, Miss. It's so big... and it smells so very, very good."
There was a quick, stifled movement in her face, almost as though she was about to laugh, and then she just looked sad. "We can do that," she agreed, and reached for her purse. "But there's one condition." She took out her wallet, opened it and stepped toward the stand, turning to look at him as she spoke. "After you've eaten, you have to agree that you'll come with me."
"Come where?" he asked suspiciously, dark memories flitting just beyond awareness.
"To somewhere -- some people -- that can help you. I know you're hungry, and we're going to take care of that, but you know the saying: Man doesn't live by bread alone. Are you ready to be helped?"
The question floated out there for a moment or two, then he just nodded -- and the cloud of possibilities collapsed into a single reality.
A reality of hope.
Keith Hewitt is the author of three volumes of NaTiVity Dramas: Nontraditional Christmas Plays for All Ages (CSS). He is a local pastor, former youth leader and Sunday school teacher, and occasional speaker at Christian events. He is currently serving as the pastor at Parkview UMC in Turtle Lake, Wisconsin. Keith is married to a teacher, and they have two children and assorted dogs and cats.
*****************************************
StoryShare, March 9, 2014, issue.
Copyright 2014 by CSS Publishing Company, Inc., Lima, Ohio.
All rights reserved. Subscribers to the StoryShare service may print and use this material as it was intended in sermons, in worship and classroom settings, in brief devotions, in radio spots, and as newsletter fillers. No additional permission is required from the publisher for such use by subscribers only. Inquiries should be addressed to permissions@csspub.com or to Permissions, CSS Publishing Company, Inc., 5450 N. Dixie Highway, Lima, Ohio 45807.
"How the Snake Fooled the Woman" by Sandra Herrmann
"Temptation" by Keith Hewitt
* * * * * * *
How the Snake Fooled the Woman
by Sandra Herrman
Genesis 2:15-17; 3:1-7
The rabbis of old told stories about the biblical stories. Why, you ask? Because often the oral tradition was not complete in the written version. There are huge numbers of these stories, all pertaining to something we need to learn from the biblical stories that is not explicitly said in the scripture. This is one of them.
The LORD put the man he had made into the Garden of Eden, to work it and take care of it. He told the man, "You are free to eat from any tree in the garden, but you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. For when you eat of it, you will surely die." Although we often misquote this as "The day you eat of it... " that is not what God said. Death will not be immediate, but it will surely follow.
Then God made a partner for the human. This partner was taken from the very bone of Adam, not created separately like the rest of the animals, because while the other animals could certainly help the human being, only one that is truly a part of him could be a partner in all that he needed to do.
The snake seizes on this opportunity. He approaches Eve, the Mother of All Living. She is evidently loitering near the tree, admiring its fruit, no doubt. The snake leans over and says, "So, girl. Did I hear that you're not allowed to eat from all these trees you have to take care of?"
"Oh, no," says Eve, "we're allowed to eat from almost all of them."
"Almost all, did you say? What exceptions have been made, if I may ask?"
And Eve replies, "Well, we're not allowed to eat from this tree."
"This tree? Why not this tree?" And looking the tree up and down, he says, "What's this tree called, anyway?"
"The tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil." Eve imitates the snake in looking up at the fruit hanging from the tree.
"Really? So why did God say you're not to eat this fruit? It looks perfectly tasty to me."
"Well," Eve says, "if we eat the fruit, or even touch it, we'll die."
(Check out the text. Did God say that?)
"Really?" says the snake, and without warning, he pushes Eve against the tree, making her scream. "Funny. You seem to be alive, despite touching the tree." He folds his arms and leans against the tree with a sardonic smile.
"Seems as though God lied to you." The snake waits for a minute, then gazes up at the fruit again. "I wonder. Did God tell you that the fruit has special powers?"
"Not really," she says, following his gaze upward. "It has special powers?"
"Yes. Aside from the fact that it's especially juicy, and very tasty, it does in fact do something special."
"What would that be?" asked Eve.
"It will make you as wise as God."
"Really? What does that mean?"
"It means that you will know the difference between things that are good and things that are bad," he said, dumbing it down for her. "You know, then you wouldn't have to pester God to tell what to do or not do. He has much more important things to do that to wait on your little concerns, you know. I'm sure it annoys him when you're constantly coming to him with your petty problems."
Eve thought about that. "He's never said he doesn't like talking to us.... But then he's so good and kind, of course he wouldn't say that."
The snake hissed. "Of course he doesn't say that. He doesn't want you to think for yourself. He wants you to continue as his slaves, taking care of his garden and waiting on his every whim. He only pretends to be good. He's actually pretty much like the rest of us." The snake reached up and plucked a fruit and took a big bite of it. And he didn't die either.
Eve watched him eat the fruit. Then she reached up and picked one. She stood and looked at it for a long time. It would be unkind of her to get all that knowledge for just herself, she thought. So she picked a second fruit and went looking for Adam.
"Hi there, Eve!" Adam looked up from the plants he was tending. "What do you have there?"
"Fruit from the Tree of Knowledge," she answered, handing him one. "The snake and I had a long conversation, and he proved to me that the tree isn't poisonous. He eats it, and he doesn't die. We won't die. God lied to us. It's a special tree, all right. It gives wisdom to anyone who eats it. God just wants us to be his slaves. We do all the work, and he keeps the fruit for himself!" She handed him one of the fruits and took a big bite of the other. Juice ran down her chin, and she didn't die. Adam was stunned. And then he took a bite from his fruit. And he didn't die either.
But one thing did change. They looked at each other, and they were ashamed. They had a different feeling about their bodies, as though some parts were all right, and others were shameful. They picked some leaves, sewed them together, and made aprons for themselves. That took care of some of their shame, but not all of it. They spent the afternoon not looking at each other. They didn't play, and they didn't work. They sat until evening, feeling worse than they could have imagined. For the first time, they didn't laugh with each other, and they didn't touch each other. They weren't dead, but they would never again be as alive as they were before the snake tricked the woman.
Sandra Herrmann is a retired United Methodist pastor living in Milwaukee, Wisconsin.
Temptation
by Keith Hewitt
Matthew 4:1-11
It was just sitting there.
Sitting where it had no right to be really.
It sat there and called to him with a smell as sweet as any Siren song ever sung to Odysseus. To be fair, he was sitting closer than he had any right to be -- something the vendor would be sure to point out once customers started showing up -- but it was such a good spot. The junction of the stand and the bank behind it formed a natural windbreak, and with the exhaust from the stand's gas heater venting into the corner, it formed a nice, cozy island of warmth.
He lowered his head and flipped up the collar of his jacket, tried not to look directly at it -- maybe that would help. But that scent -- that heavenly scent -- wafted over and seemed to get trapped in the dead space of his corner, settling over him like a cloud of possibilities.
What was that experiment -- somebody's cat? It was a thought experiment physicists use, to explain the observational effect in quantum physics. Take a cat, put it in a box with a vial of poison gas and a trigger tripped by the random decay of a radioactive element, then seal the box. Once the box is sealed, because the triggering of the poison is totally random, the cat can be thought of as both dead and alive, an amorphous cloud of outcomes... until the moment the observer peeks into the box. Then, the possibilities collapse into a single outcome -- either a dead cat or a live one, either result equally possible and both unknown and unknowable until checked.
He let the memory of that illustration build up, element by element, uncovering each bit of memory like some precious fossil, dusting it off carefully before assembling it with the others until it formed a whole thought, a whole memory from distant days. With some self-satisfaction at having recovered that particular memory, he held it before him and examined it, carefully turning it over and over and looking at it from every angle, trying to get lost and not think about the delightful aroma that surrounded him.
This went on for some time -- how long he did not know, as his watch now made its home on another man's wrist, having provided for a nice meal and a considerable amount of decidedly non-prescription medication. Eventually, though, the fresh baked aroma crept past his defensive indifference, began enticing him once again. Head still down, he glanced furtively at the counter, mentally measured his arm against the open space.
You can get it. There was no voice -- he had learned in the last few years not to mention the voices -- but the thought appeared in his consciousness as though a voice had spoken it, fully formed and perfectly audible... no, understandable. Not audible. They were never audible, he reminded himself sternly. They were just thoughts that someone put in his head, like dropping flashes of genius into humdrum conversation.
Those were the days, he thought warmly, when mathematical expressions -- sometimes whole equations -- would just pop up, surfacing from his subconscious into his conscious brain. He could set his mind to work on a problem, then go off and putter at something mindless, like chemistry or computer programming, confident that eventually the solution would pop up, birthing itself, a flash of insight in a murky world.
And then the insights stopped... or changed, anyway...
You can get it. Just stand up, reach confidently when his back is turned, and you can have it before he knows it's missing.
"What if I get caught?" He was unaware that he mumbled the question.
Be confident, and you won't get caught. Just reach out, grab it, and walk away into the train station. He'll never notice you. You can eat while you're moving.
That sounded plausible. He lowered his head again, calculating how quickly the vendor could get around the counter, how long the man would be willing to leave his stand alone to pursue him. As he calculated, the aroma called to him, and he began to salivate. Then he shook his head. "It's not right."
What's not right? You're hungry, aren't you? How long has it been since you've eaten?
He tried to work it out, using sleeps to measure days, but bogged down in uncertainty, because his sleeps were often broken up, and his recollection was a little foggy, and what was that experiment? The one with the cat? He set off down that trail again, in search of Schrodinger's cat, before the voice -- the thoughts, the thoughts -- brought him up short. So, are you hungry or not?
But it's not mine. I don't have a right to take it.
They don't have a right to starve you, either, do they? You have a basic human need, and they have the means to address it. It's almost like you're doing them a favor by taking action so they don't have to.
Take, don't take; starve, don't starve -- the possibilities were a cloud that made thinking difficult, and he tried to sort them out.
"You hungry, Doctor?"
It took the question being repeated, for him to realize that it was not another sentence dropped into his consciousness. He shivered slightly, more of a quick trembling that shot out from between his shoulder blades, and turned toward the voice. It was a young woman, from the looks of her, and he felt relieved. The last time there had been a voice, it had been all verbs and nouns jumbled together in angular shadows that floated about eye level above the ground. "Beg your pardon?" he asked and barely recognized the croak of his own voice.
The woman smiled, but her eyebrows crept together in concern. "I asked if you were hungry, Doctor Kemp." She paused, studying him, added after a moment, "You are Doctor Kemp, aren't you?"
He considered the question, nodded stiffly. "I believe I was, Miss."
"I thought so. I heard... well, I heard... " and she trailed off, changed direction abruptly. "You look like you might be hungry, Doctor Kemp. Can I help you?"
"I, uh -- I --" He stood up, looked down at his hands and rubbed them on his legs and suddenly the aroma from the stand was overwhelming. "I am so very hungry, Miss," he admitted softly. "I really need to eat something."
She nodded toward the stand. "What would you like? A coffee, I know, but what else?"
What else, indeed? He licked his lips, said hesitantly, "I've really been looking at that pretzel, Miss. It's so big... and it smells so very, very good."
There was a quick, stifled movement in her face, almost as though she was about to laugh, and then she just looked sad. "We can do that," she agreed, and reached for her purse. "But there's one condition." She took out her wallet, opened it and stepped toward the stand, turning to look at him as she spoke. "After you've eaten, you have to agree that you'll come with me."
"Come where?" he asked suspiciously, dark memories flitting just beyond awareness.
"To somewhere -- some people -- that can help you. I know you're hungry, and we're going to take care of that, but you know the saying: Man doesn't live by bread alone. Are you ready to be helped?"
The question floated out there for a moment or two, then he just nodded -- and the cloud of possibilities collapsed into a single reality.
A reality of hope.
Keith Hewitt is the author of three volumes of NaTiVity Dramas: Nontraditional Christmas Plays for All Ages (CSS). He is a local pastor, former youth leader and Sunday school teacher, and occasional speaker at Christian events. He is currently serving as the pastor at Parkview UMC in Turtle Lake, Wisconsin. Keith is married to a teacher, and they have two children and assorted dogs and cats.
*****************************************
StoryShare, March 9, 2014, issue.
Copyright 2014 by CSS Publishing Company, Inc., Lima, Ohio.
All rights reserved. Subscribers to the StoryShare service may print and use this material as it was intended in sermons, in worship and classroom settings, in brief devotions, in radio spots, and as newsletter fillers. No additional permission is required from the publisher for such use by subscribers only. Inquiries should be addressed to permissions@csspub.com or to Permissions, CSS Publishing Company, Inc., 5450 N. Dixie Highway, Lima, Ohio 45807.
