Adam and Eve were not the first people on earth. God created man and women in genesis 1:26. He created Adam and Eve in genesis 2:7. The world was already populated when Adam and Eve came around.
Either that or Gen. 2:7 is just a more detailed version of Gen. 1:26.
I suppose you also think that God created two skies because he created one in Genesis 1:1 and the other in Genesis 1:6-8. And two earths, because one was created in 1:1 and the other in 1:9-10.
Zev Steinhardt
What about the Jewish story about Lilith, Zev? I googled and found it may come from the Gnostics, but one book that is mentioned is [Hebrew Myths](http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0385263309/gnosisarchive
/002-8177515-4549601)
The early 20th Century Jewish Encyclopedia on Lilith.
Drat! Hit Subit instead of preview.
I notice in that article that there is no mention of the tradition that Lilith was Adam’s first wife who was put aside (due to her demonic nature?) so that Eve would be the mother of mankind as addressed in this SD Staff presentation, What’s the story on Lilith, Adam’s “first wife”?
I think that a lot of the bible is metaphorical and this is so that we can all draw our own conclusions from it. I’m a Catholic but I believe in evolution and I think that the Garden of Eden refers to mankind straying off the path of innocence, whenever that may have happened. But each to their own.
Thanks Tomndebb. The way I heard the story is that Adam wanted to have sex in the missionary position (male dominant) and Lilith wanted it the other way around.
I also have heard that the Hebrew word that was translated as “rib” could just as easily have been “side”. In otherwords, the original Adam could have been asexual and God simply split him/her in half. The Greeks believed that we all were looking for our other halfs. They had the idea that some couplings were male/female; some were male/male and some female/female. Then there is the belief in Ying and Yang.
That’s exactly correct. The Hebrew word used tzela is exactly the same word used in Exodus 36:25, where the meaning clearly is “side” and not “rib.”
It should be noted that the Midrash (a collection of Jewish teachings dating back a few thousand years) teach that Adam and Eve were created as a single being back-to-back and that God later split them.
Zev Steinhardt
That detail comes from “The Alphabet of Ben Sira”, which the staff report mentions, but doesn’t really go into detail about. “The Alphabet” is a work probably from around the 9th century. It’s a parody…22 stories, one for each letter of the alphabet. Each story is about a biblical hero…Adam, Abraham, Isaac, King David, etc., and puts him in embarrassing or sexual situations. From “The Alphabet”