Lost In Translation: Genesis 12-50
A guide to understanding the most difficult passages of Genesis 12-50.
Video transcript of Lost in Translation: Genesis 12-50, created by Church of the City:
Last time, we explored Genesis 1-11 and saw how keeping genre and plot in mind can help us navigate even the most challenging passages. Now we’re turning the page to Genesis 12-50 where the writer zooms in on one family and their many opportunities to choose their way or God’s.
Genre
Genesis 1-11 was a creation narrative. Genesis 12-50 is a historical narrative—more detailed and concrete, closer to the kind of storytelling we’re familiar with.
It was written through people whose culture was very different from ours. When we get lost here, we need to slow down and try to see how those ancient people would have understood what we’re reading. Understanding cultural context will be crucial. It’s also helpful to understand the unique way Jewish historical narratives are put together. They’re built as a series of interconnected stories. Look for key words, places, and symbols from one story to reappear in another—that’s a clue that the stories are linked. An ancient Jewish audience would’ve noticed these connections and understood each story in light of the others. Let’s think through a couple of the most troubling passages in all of Scripture using cultural context and interconnectedness as our guides.
Lot’s Daughters
Let’s begin in Genesis 19, when Lot invites two angelic visitors into his home at the center of Sodom. All the men of the city, young and old, surround the home, demanding to have sex with Lot’s guests.
Lot does something disturbing—he offers his own daughters to the mob instead. It’s a moment that has shocked readers throughout time and across cultures. It raises important questions.
Why would Lot do such a horrible thing? Why is this even in the Bible?
Let’s start with Lot’s cultural context. In Lot’s world, hospitality was everything. For nomadic herdsmen in the ancient Near East, hospitality required the head of the family to protect his guests at all costs—this was honorable. This may explain Lot’s disturbing behavior; perhaps it was simply how people defined “good” for themselves in his culture.
Or maybe Lot acted irrationally out of desperation. Facing a violent mob, he may have panicked, offering his daughters as a last resort to try to defuse the situation.
A third theory is that Lot had become morally compromised by Sodom’s culture. Ezekiel 16:49-50 says Sodom was destroyed by God because of its arrogance, excess, and disregard for the poor and vulnerable. Hospitality is a good value, but perhaps the values of his culture twisted it. The good practice of hospitality became corrupted, leading Lot to value hospitality over the lives of the most vulnerable.
Some scholars point out that, living in an ancient patriarchy, Lot may have prized the honor of his male guests and feared the mob’s violence more than he valued the lives of his own daughters. Disturbing, but not uncommon in the ancient world.
Regardless of which view is correct—or if it’s a combination—Lot’s actions in Genesis 19 show humanity once again defining “good” for themselves—or allowing society around them to define “good”—and this endangers the most vulnerable.
Sometimes, when we’re reading the Bible, the best we can do is say, “This is awful. I don’t understand how anyone could do something like this.” And sometimes I think that’s the point. We’re supposed to agree with God that this is evil. To help us do that, the story of Lot and Sodom is connected to the story of Noah and the Flood. In both stories evil became so pronounced and pervasive that God was justified in bringing destruction, to prevent it from taking over completely. Let’s look at how the writer connects these two stories together.
First, let’s see what the writer places before and after each story.
Before the Flood story, the “sons of God” crossed boundaries with the “daughters of men”—possibly spiritual beings seeking intimacy with humans. After the flood, Noah’s son Ham commits a forbidden act with one of his parents, and alcohol is involved.
Before the Sodom story, its a human mob pursuing intimacy with spiritual beings—Lot’s angelic guests. After the Sodom story, Lot’s daughters get him drunk and commit incest to preserve the family line. By the way, can you think of other stories in Genesis where people try to keep their family lines going through sinful acts? In a Jewish historical narrative, a story may be connected to many others.
What happens before and after Sodom and the Flood shows us that these two stories are connected somehow. But there’s another way of showing that connection. In Sodom, Lot’s family and the angelic visitors stay safe from the mob inside a “house” at the center of the city. “House” here is the Hebrew word for “ark” spelled backward.
Both stories show evil becoming so pervasive and destructive that God mercifully intervenes to stop its spread. Humanity is locked in a pattern of choosing evil and harming one another. God steps in repeatedly to save us. But evil can’t be eradicated completely by a flood or a fire—it persists in the heart of every survivor and continues to spread as we decide to go our own way.
The Binding of Isaac
Let’s navigate one more troubling passage leaning on cultural context and interconnectedness.
I imagine that everyone who’s ever read Genesis 22 has asked, “Why did God tell Abraham to sacrifice his son, Isaac?” Some say Abraham was learning how the Living God was different from the gods he knew. In Abraham’s culture, people believed they had to bribe the gods to get things like rain, a good harvest, or children. If one sacrifice didn’t work, a more costly one was required, escalating until the ultimate sacrifice—their own child. So, some suggest that God wanted to reveal how Abraham expected gods to behave and then show him that the Living God is not that cruel. The Living God does not require child sacrifice before giving us what we need to live.
But many scholars believe that, while all this may be true, it misses the main point. They say this story is a do-over. Abraham and Isaac face the same choice that Adam and Eve did, but this time there’s a very different outcome.
The author connects Adam and Eve in Genesis 3 with Abraham and Isaac in Genesis 22 by repeating key words, places, and symbols from the first story in the second. Let’s take a look at how that’s done.
In Genesis 22, the story begins with God telling Abraham to go to Moriah, a high place like Eden. High places and trees in the Bible often mark spots where people meet God and make life-changing choices. So we the place from Genesis 3 repeated in Genesis 22.
Abraham rises early, prepares for the journey, and splits the “wood.” This word for wood is translated as “tree” in the Eden story. This is the first of several key words from Genesis 3 that are repeated in Genesis 22.
Abraham and Isaac travel for three days toward Moriah, which means “to see.” Abraham “sees” the mountain in the distance. When they arrive, he “takes” the wood and the fire and a “knife” (a strange Hebrew word is used here for a knife. It literally means “the eater”). All this language points us back to Eden, where Eve saw the tree, took the fruit, and ate.
In Eden, God said, “Don’t take from the tree.” At Moriah, God tells Abraham, “Take your son… and offer him.”
In both stories, two people face a test—it’s a choice. And it’s the same choice: Will they trust God or not?
In each story, humans must trust in God’s promise. In Eden, Adam and Eve are promised life, provision, and peace if they obey God. For Abraham, God promised that Isaac would live to become a great nation, bringing the blessings of life, provision, and peace to all people. The author wants us to see the similarities between these two stories.
And to see their important differences.
Unlike Adam and Eve, Abraham trusts that God will keep His promises, so he believes that God will either provide a substitute sacrifice or miraculously raise Isaac from the dead.
At the last moment, a voice stops Abraham, saying, “Now I know you fear God.” Adam and Eve feared God only after their disobedience. Abraham’s fear of God is expressed through his trusting obedience.
Where Adam and Eve’s choice brought death to those meant for life, Abraham’s obedience brings life to one prepared to die.
Genesis 22 is like a do-over of Eden. Abraham and Isaac succeed where Adam and Eve failed. Where their rebellion brought death, scarcity, and conflict, Abraham and Isaac’s trust in God brings life, provision, and peace.
In the end, God provides a ram to take Isaac’s place, connecting this story to yet another one—the story of Jesus. One day, God would provide Jesus as our substitute, providing life and peace to all of us.
Conclusion
So, today we’ve picked up a couple of really useful tools to help us better understand the most challenging parts of the Bible: Interconnected stories and cultural context.
First, when we get lost in a historical narrative, it helps to see if the story we’re reading is connected to other stories we know. We can spot these connections by watching for repeated words, places, and symbols. Then, we can compare how the connected stories are similar and different. This may help us discern the main ideas we’re supposed to grasp.
Second, when the Bible’s stories shock or confuse us, it’s often because they were written through a culture very different from ours. We need to slow down and try to understand these stories as someone from that culture would have.
This takes practice, so keep using these skills as we continue reading through the Bible together. More videos like this one are coming your way soon, with more helpful tools we can use when it feels like something’s been lost in translation.
