Famine and Loathing in the Land of Canaan (aka Genesis 12)
I’ve been reading a lot of the Torah lately for my work on Two Pigeons. I haven’t been very happy with any of the translations-interpretations, though. There is so much good material that gets glossed over…so much wasted potential. So I decided to take a little stab at a version of my own — starting with Genesis 12.
This part of the Hebrew Bible features the original pact that YHWH made with a youngish Abraham, the Hebrew patriarch…with YHWH promising him great fame and the creation of “great nation” on a particular chunk of land. For some reason it’s called a pact in biblical literature but all I see is Abraham chasing riches and fame. Be that as it may, for many this story is foundational to the state of Israel…the first clause in a biblical deed that gives a right to the land. And it’s a story, as you’ll see, with a lot of comedy and dubious moral implications…for both this YHWH character and the people he anoints with His holiness.
—Yasha
PS: Read other installments as they drop.
Genesis 12
Abraham was minding his business, tending to his flock when a big voice came out of the sky. It was Yahweh again — buzzing in his ear like an annoying cicada. He was there again with his usual promises. “Hey Abraham,” he said. “It’s time for you to leave your father’s land. You gotta go this one spot I know. The land there is great! Wide open spaces. The grasses grow taller than your tent. The breeze is nice. Not too hot. You’ll be your own man, there. No relatives to nag you. You’re gonna be rich and famous. Everyone’s gonna know your name and respect you.”
Abraham groaned. Yahweh was at it again. Always booming down from the sky, always full of schemes. "My father Terah had all sorts of gods to talk to,” Abraham thought. “But I’m stuck with this one, talking about riches and fame at all hours, waking me up in the middle of the night to talk my ear off. ” Abraham tried to pretend he didn’t hear him but Yahweh wouldn’t shut up. All day he talked…on and on. “I will make of you a great nation. No. Not just a great nation. The greatest nation! Everyone’s gonna wanna be with you, to be you. I’m gonna bless you and make it so that everyone knows your name. I’m gonna make it so that everyone there treats you good, tоо. And if they don’t, or if they talk shit behind your back, I’m gonna infect them with boils! No one will dare cross you, I promise!” And when that was’t enough, Yahweh appealed to Abraham’s vanity. “I’m your God goddammit! And I have big plans for you and your children. You know you’re special. You know you’re my boy. I mean, you’re blessed. The whole of humanity depends on you!”
All this talk started to win Abraham over. “I’m already seventy-five, childless, I only have one wife and a few slaves, and really…what have I done with my life other than herd my sheep and goats and whatnot,” he thought. “If I’m gonna amount to anything I gotta do it now. I have what, maybe another 100 years to live? Max.”
So Abraham agreed. He took his wife Sarah and his loser nephew Lot and all the wealth and slaves they owned and set out for Canaan, Yahweh’s Promised Land. When they finally got there, Abraham realized that something wasn’t right. The land was already occupied. It was full of people, lots of people.
“What the hell man,” he said to Yahweh, raising his arms to the sky. “You promised that I was gonna become rich and famous here. I’m a herder, a nomadic man. I need pasture…I need land…to feed my flock. We’re all gonna perish here.”
“Don’t worry Abraham. Everything’s good. Just a little hiccup in our plans. Just gonna take a little more hustle and more grind to get there,” Yahweh said, his voice not quite as loud as usual, a bit of doubt creeping into the buzz. “Listen…You don’t have a nice young goat you can sacrifice for me? I mean it’s not for me. I know a guy up here that can make things happen. But you know how these gods are. They all like a little burned goat fat…you know to grease the wheels or palms…or however you mortals say it. I’d dip into my own stash but I’m all out of goats myself right now. End of the month. You know how it is?”
Abraham groaned. He shouldn’t have listened to Yahweh. But what could he do now? He was all alone out here in the Promised Land — no pasture, surrounded by hostile tribes, no friends or allies. So he set up an altar and sacrificed his best young goat to Yahweh. He then moved on, like Yahweh suggested. Maybe he’d have better luck if he kept moving. But the deeper into the land of the Canaanites he went, the more and more concerned he got. All around him people were dying of starvation. There was famine on the land!
He cursed Yahweh. “How could you send me here promising wealth and fame, when there’s nothing but death and suffering?”
“Hey, I’m God. What do I know? I’m not omnipotent,” Yahweh replied. “And don’t blame me for your bad decisions. No one forced you to listen to me.” And with that Yahweh disappeared and, for a time, no longer answered Abraham’s calls.
All alone out in a foreign land in the grips of a famine, Abraham had no choice but to seek help from an earthly authority: Egypt, a modern organized society that had plenty of food.
He crossed the desert and everything seemed good there. But there was one big problem: Abraham’s wife, Sarah, was too hot for his own good.
“I can’t go to Egypt with you as my wife,” he yelled at her. “They’ll see how beautiful you are and will kill me to make you free and available!” So he told her to pretend that she is his sister. “Yes, I’ll probably have to pimp you out to some Egyptian. But it’s the only way I can survive! Blame it on Yahweh. He promised me riches and look instead…”
"Look honey, my wife, my darling, Yahweh abandoned us and now I have to pimp you out to not die."
His plan worked better than he expected. In Egypt, word of Sarah’s beauty quickly spread and reached the ears of the Pharaoh himself. He inspected her personally, liked what he saw, and took her as one of his consorts. From then on things went very well for Abraham. While Sarah worked the sheets, Pharaoh showered Abraham with gifts: sheep, oxen, asses, camels, and male and female slaves. “Who needs this Yahweh loser?” Abraham thought. “I’m rich. Everyone in court knows my name. I’m doing better than ever all thanks to the Pharaoh, who everyone says is a living god.
Meanwhile…Yahweh wasn’t taking Abraham’s calls but he wasn’t idle, either. He saw all and was not happy. He didn’t like being upstaged by the Pharaoh, a mere mortal strutting around like some sort of deity. Sure Yahweh couldn’t build a pyramid like Ra. But he could infect people with boils. He knew how to do that for sure. That was his specialty!
And so Yahweh sent a bunch of diseases down on the Pharaoh, making everyone at the court sick. Abraham became distraught. He realized the sickness was probably due the work of Yahweh. Abraham threw up his hands to the sky and complained.
“What are you doing! The Pharaoh’s been good to me. Look how rich and famous I’ve become!” he said. “Are you messing everything up out of jealousy…because the Pharaoh gave me the things you could not? If so that’s really petty for a god! I believed in you. You’re the one who abandoned me in a foreign land during a famine!”
Yahweh replied, breaking his long silence: “What? I’m not jealous. No way. Not at all. Why would you even think that? I’m doing this for you. I’m just defending your honor, you see. I mean, this is your Sarai, your darling, your one love, your cutie, we’re talking about here…being defiled by the Pharaoh day in and day out. And let me tell you she’s loving every second of it. You should hear her moan with pleasure. It’s keeping us gods all awake up here.”
“You think I care who she moans with? Take a look at how many sheep I have now? Too many to count!” Abraham replied. “And thanks to the Pharaoh I have a new slave girl moaning in my own bed every night.”
“Really? They’re moaning? I can’t I hear anything coming out your apartments at night,” said Yahweh.
“Oh they’re moaning alright. Ok. Maybe they’re not screaming. But they're—”
At that point their conversation got interrupted by someone banging loudly on Abraham’s door. In walks the Pharaoh. He is covered in weeping open sores. Someone had tipped the Pharaoh off that this curse was sent down by Yahweh, Abraham’s personal god. Yes it was a minor god that no one had heard of. But this Yahweh character clearly had some powers. He could clearly plague the Pharaoh with venereal disease…all an account of the Pharaoh had taking Abraham’s wife as his own without knowing who she was.”
“I had no idea she was your wife! What’s wrong with you man?” yelled the Pharaoh. “Have you no sense of decency…or honor? Look at what you did to me! And I’m blameless in all this. I’ve treated you like a prince, like my own relative! What kind of people are you!”
Abraham tried to explain but it was no use. The Pharaoh stormed out and a squadron of soldiers streamed in. Abraham thought that this was it…the end. He’d be tortured and cut up into little pieces and fed the Pharaoh’s cats. But no…the soldiers took up all of Abraham’s possessions — all his flocks and slaves and herdsman — and kicked him out of Egypt.
Standing there in the Negev desert, with Sarai by his side, Abraham wiped the sweat from his brow. He whistled. “That was a close one,” he said. “This whole situation could’ve gone much worse for me. Much much worse.” He looked at Sarai but she stood there in silence. She was not allowed to speak.
Abraham then looked at all the wealth that was amassed about him. The camels, the oxen, the slaves, the donkeys, the sea of tents that now housed his little tribe. He was rich and he was famous — all in Egypt knew his name! “Maybe Yahweh wasn’t so wrong after all,” he thought. “God sure does work in mysterious ways!”
Keep reading: The Art of the Deal (aka Genesis 13)
PS: Changed Sarai to Sarah to avoid confusion. Sarai becomes Sarah later on, changing her name Yahweh’s command.
PSS: Gah. So many typos in this holy text. I blame YHWH.
my word of god is the only word of you god you are allowed to read.
Dude. Have you read R. Crumb's Genesis? I think you'd dig it.