Launching my blog posts: A Sufi Look at Genesis, with a Tribute to King James
by: Jason Hamza van Boom on November 18th, 2009 | 4 Comments »
When a couple gets married, they traditionally have a wedding. When a child is born, people usually throw some kind of celebration. When a ship sets out on its maiden voyage, it is customary to break a champagne bottle against its bow.
A position as a blogger is, of course, nothing compared to those things. What are the opinions of one pundit, compared to a marriage, a new human life, or the ocean-crossing journeys of a ship? Nevertheless, all traditions teach us that origins are important, and that we should try to begin our first ventures as well as possible–even such humble ventures as this.
So, where to begin? Why not start with the most famous of all accounts of origins, the creation of humankind? But Genesis, by its very nature, covers so many things, so I shall cite just one aspect: its account of the spiritual reasons for human communication.
Genesis portrays the beginnings of communication with the existential need of human beings to be in union with other persons. We can have the whole of inanimate and animal creation brought before us. But we need to engage in the back-and-forth of linguistic communication (whether verbally or in body language) with another person. And the most profound kind of inter-personal communication is that of intimate love between two people.
We know the need for something from its lack. Genesis shows communication as a divine gift to overcome the pain of loneliness. The late Pope John Paul II spoke about this in his lectures on “The Theology of the Body.” Judaism and Islam have their own “theologies of the bodies,” which predate this development in Christianity. As a Muslim who loves poetry, both Eastern and Western, I have decided to give a poetical interpretation of the loneliness of Adam, as described in Genesis, from the standpoint of Sufism (or Islamic metaphysics).
A note on style: Many young people who have a love for traditional Western liberal arts think they have to be politically conservative to delve into the West’s literary canon. I myself once thought that way, but Shakespeare, Cervantes, Montaigne and Goethe helped lead me eventually to a more progressive stance. So, although I have not mastered traditional forms of English verse, I have composed this trifle in an old-fashioned style, just to counter that assumption . (Specifically, my very modest ditty springs from my love for the poetry of Andrew Marvell and George Herbert, poets in the days of King James VI and I, of “King James Bible” fame).
Also, one of the chief themes of Islamophobes is the allegation that Islam is incompatible with the Western tradition. To which I say: I’m a Muslim, and I read Cicero in Latin. So, if an Islamophobe claims to love the Western tradition but can’t even parse Introibo ad altare Dei, he or she can go fly a kite.
Adam, On His Singleness
“I dwell in God’s own Paradise,
Where reigns undimmed eternal Spring.
But all this green display is dust;
Dread solitude blights everything.
“I bear the names of majesty;
Every creature pays me homage.
But though I know the names of all,
What binds them to beauty’s image?
“This whole domain of sun and moon;
Mine own body, heart, rib, and soul;
Would I give in glad exchange,
For a glimpse of beauty’s show.”
Beautiful poem, Jason. I enjoyed it from the standpoint of being human.
I look forward to your future posts.
That comment is so funny. I spent four years at St. John’s College reading the great books, blissfully unaware that this was supposed to be the realm of the ultraconservative. Most of my classmates seemed unaware of their conservative nature as well and spent their spare hours reading Ken Kesey. In fact, I did not realize there was supposed to be a connection between St. John’s and conservatives until a professor in graduate school asked me how someone like me ended up at a school like St. John’s. I was horrified when I learned that Rumsfeld’s wife sat on the board and that he wanted to set up the St. John’s curriculum in Iraq.
It was a great school and a terrific education.. I loved every minute of it. I loved your post as well. Thank you!
A very touching and rather impressive expression of male loneliness without a female. It is a relaltively modern concept, fruit of developing undertanding of human nature and psychology. When in the Hebrew text YHWH states that it is not good for ha-adam (the single masculine creature) to be alone, I doubt that the type of loneliness described in this poem and many other comments of a similar sort was uppermost in his mind. YHWH had formed this solitary male earth creature and stated that it was not good that it remain solitary. “I will make a help (Heb ‘ezer) suitable for it. Why? because a single male creature cannot reproduce. So YHWH created all the animals from the ground, same substance as ha-adam, and they were all living creatures, just like ha-adam, but none of them was suitable. Why? because none of them could help ha-adam to reproduce, even though it might be physically possible for him to join sexually with some of those animals. Humankind, the human species, humanity, does not consist of ha-adam, a single male earthly creature. Humankind cannot BE without two genders, male and female. That’s why Elohim created both together at once, male and female, in the divine image (Gen 1.27), which embraces and transcends both genders, and called them Adam=Man (Gen 5.2 NJPS).
In tanakh the noun ‘ezer=help almost exclusively refers to Elohim/YHWH, who alone is the help who enables humans to do what they can’t do for themselves. Thus, ‘ezer is not a mere assistant or help-er, which is what most men really want their women to be, but a true sine que non–without which not. In tanakh the only time a human is called ‘ezer is precisely here in Genesis, and it designates the female, who supplies to the male what he cannot do for himself, namely reproduce.
Through the grace of creator Elohim/YHWH the woman does more that merely help reproduce, she does provide love, pleasure, companionship, and other gifts to overcome masculine solitude, ineptitude, and loneliness, but they are extra blessings over and above the primary purpose of her creation along with him. Of course she needs him to help reproduce, but her role involves the vulnerability of menstruation, pregnancey, parturition, lactation, and child nurturance, which makes it possible for him to rule over her. That’s another story, but it’s part of the sinfulness of Adam, consisting of both male and female.
One again, your idea is very
good.thank you!very much.