The Alien
Then the Lord God formed man of dust from the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living being. Genesis 2:7 NASB
Man– He was never born. He had no mother, no father. He didn’t come from a family. He had no cultural DNA. He had no country, no ethnicity, no expectations. He knew no community. At the beginning, he never experienced doubt, despair, difficulty or distress. He never had a childhood. He never felt a mother’s concern or a father’s discipline. He never tried to walk, never fell down, never learned a language, never fed at a mother’s breast.
Adam wasn’t like us at all. Adam was an alien. Nothing about his coming to be is anything like ours. If you thought you could relate to him, you haven’t thought very much. Even his interactions with God, and his eventual disobedience, aren’t like ours. When it comes to this story about the first man, it is as strange as it could be. Perhaps the only reason we even call him the first man is because the text says he is. Otherwise there is almost nothing in him that we would recognize as human.
This makes Paul’s comparison even more startling. “So also it is written, ‘The first man, Adam, became a living soul.’ The last Adam became a life-giving spirit” (1 Corinthians 15:45). While Adam is an alien, Yeshua is just the opposite.
He was born. He had a mother and a father. He had a family. He belonged to a particular culture. He had a country, an ethnicity, and community expectations. He knew what it means to belong to an oppressed people. He experienced difficulty and dissention. He grew up. He learned to walk, to speak, to work. In every way, he is like us. And in every way that Adam isn’t human, Yeshua is. When the Church treats “Jesus” as the universal Christ, doesn’t it really remove his humanity?
It strikes me that the attempts to cast Yeshua as more than human seem to introduce the alien nature of Adam into the Messiah. If Yeshua is the last Man, not the first, then isn’t it obvious that he must be a human being, not an alien aberration? Isn’t it critical that he notbe like Adam? When the author of Hebrews writes, “For we do not have a high priest who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses, but One who has been tempted in all things as we are, yet without sin,” doesn’t that imply that he is not like Adam? And isn’t that what we really need? Not a righteous alien, but rather an obedient human.
Topical Index: alien, Adam, Genesis 2:7, 1 Corinthians 15:45, Hebrews 4:15
But what IS a human? 1John 3:2 says “Beloved, now are we the sons of God, and it doth not yet appear what we shall be: but we know that, when he shall appear, we shall be like him; for we shall see him as he is.” Apparently, we are not going to even know our full identity until we see Him “as He is”, and “by beholding, we will become changed (back)”.
First of all, a human is NOT a universal ideal! (How Greek an assumption is that?) We were created to be a sum total – a medium, if you will – of a union between God and a planet. We do not exist ‘in our ‘own’ right’, so no description of us – without including the totality of what we were originally created to be, anyway – is going to be accurate.
I think there is no such thing as a human ideal, for we are created to be not only a symbiont with God – not only is our identity wrapped up in His identity – I think we are created to express the identity of the creation we were given stewardship over. I am not fully human until I am expressing the love (character) of God in my given role as steward of earth, binding all together in wholeness through that stewardship. When Adam fell, that stewardship role was usurped by (um, he handed it over to) the “prince of this world”, which Yeshua said He came to “cast down”. Now Yeshua holds that princely (stewardship) title, but what are we redeemed INTO? A new role sitting on clouds playing harps? Or BACK into that first role – fully human again at last – in an “earth made new”?
I am going to have to disagree with the LIMITING assumption that you gave us, because of the above verse: in other words, I don’t think a human is a human because of all the above list you describe, either. You say “He was born. He had a mother and a father. He had a family. He belonged to a particular culture. He had a country, an ethnicity, and community expectations. He knew what it means to belong to an oppressed people. He experienced difficulty and dissention. He grew up. He learned to walk, to speak, to work.” but, if you think about it, that list can also describe an ANIMAL – the experience of the yetzer hara, in fact – but does the mere experience of the yetzer hara make us HUMAN? Really?
Before we debate the “list,” point me to the verse that says Adam handed the stewardship role of the earth to “the prince of this world.”
Adam clearly forfeited representative status. Witness WHO represented the earth (i.e. a citizen of it) in the account of Job. It wasn’t a human. You know very well the verse where Yeshua makes the statement that He came to “cast down” the “prince of this earth”. Again, it wasn’t a HUMAN He was talking about.
To broaden the perspective a little, we are “children”; or, being generated FROM either “children of God” or “children of the devil” (2John 3:10). Therefore, by choosing who “reigns over us” we decide who is in charge of not only us, but of what we were given jurisdiction over. And, because we “all have sinned”, we have all forfeited the right to representative status that we enjoyed when we were still all “children of God”. This is not a very hard extrapolation from the text and its implications.
perhaps there is a lot more theological construct in your exegesis than you are aware of. aren’t you mixing eras, development and cultures, stuffing them all into one bag in order to make the claim, as evidenced by the very wide range from Genesis 3 to 2 John? Or are you assuming that what Genesis understood about the relationship is precisely the same as what John understood 3000+ years later?
Are you accusing God of making an ‘alien’ that, somehow, AFTER he fell, ‘became’ a ‘real human’? If you are, then you have left nothing for Lucifer worshipers to do, for they assert that the Fall was a fall UPWARDS toward a “real” human. Please assure me we are not going there!
As for the “understanding of Genesis”, I was not aware we were debating that; I thought we were debating what a REAL human is. Has that evolved? I thought humanity DEvolved (fell). Did God make a perfect human or didn’t He? Is John deviating from Genesis? Is that your question? Why would he? I don’t think so.
Rest assured. All the importing of “Lucifer” and all the other “evil spirits” stuff is something I do NOT find in these opening texts. And the fact that Adam is alien doesn’t make him non-human. It just means that there was a finishing component needed, which no longer became necessary after the Fall. But, then again, I don’t treat these at event-history. In my view, we are reading deep tribal mythology, very important, very necessary for a biblical worldview in opposition to other worldviews available at the time, but not like a newsreel rerun of what happened on Day 1, Day 2, etc. The questions are much bigger than “What time did Adam have breakfast before he and the woman meet the serpent?”
OH, BTW, the text in Genesis 3 does NOT support the idea that Adam gave away his vice regency stewardship role. In fact, when God clothes him, the language suggests Adam in reinstated as the original priest, just as he was assigned that role in Genesis 2. See Flame of Yahweh
If Genesis is no longer “event history” then we are arguing apples and oranges. If a real human is established by myth and not by an act of God, I have no reference point.
As for being the “god of this world”; Adam may have been reinstated as priest, but does that mean he was able to rule (“god”) the world again? I don’t think so. The Fall MEANS that we are now either “servants of sin” or “servants of righteousness”; now we gotta serve somebody.
P.S. I wasn’t referring to Lucifer in Genesis; I was referring to the worship of him in your hometown and all around you right now. The “fall upwards”, according to Blavatsky, IS the core tenet of that worship.
Skip, Laurita this is very good, If we are able to “see” adam for who he was, is, don’t we also need to “see ” the other actors in the stage ??? While I am just getting the souls of my feet wet as I weigh in the river I have come to “see” the adversary not as a person but a personification of our desires . Does it not say that out of OUR hearts comes evil of every imaginization The capital S for satan and all its other names were added later from particular paradigms of a theological slant? And the passages used in the cut and paste doctrine of SATAN the great Deceiver I know this is a bit of a rabbit trail and we need to stay the course,… It was (haRold Smith: on Hethathas anear.com and the article “chasing lucifer” that hebraically sets in context adam, Yeshua, me , you and the rest of the actors on this stage? Shalom
The brilliance of creation!
Adam was just the start. A mere shell. Dust with breath.
. . . and also given a gift: free choice. He faced a steep learning
curve that was passed on to a lineage that slowly progressed to
being ready and able to “really see” just what God’s loving reality
is truly all about.
The “last” Adam “finished” the process in breathtaking ways, the least
of which was the resounding defeat of death. His resurrection revealed
to all men that man is indeed a living spirit residing temporarily in an alien
body. Yeshua’s words cleared any confusion: “The Spirit gives life; the flesh
counts for nothing.”
The evidence is in creation itself. Paul tells us how His invisible qualities,
specifically His eternal power and divine nature “have been clearly seen, being
understood from what has been made, so that men are without excuse.”
It’s not where we are looking. It’s WHO we’re looking at.
That’s His creation. Absolutely brilliant!
Skip wrote “obedient human”… This statement is much more important that most believers think…
I like this affirmation: “Adam was an alien.” It makes 99.99% people to be perplexed by it…
Adam earth from Earth. Now we are flesh from flesh. No longer earth. Or wait reading it wrong again. I doubt. Yes Skip Adam was alien from Earth. Eve from flesh the first human being we can relate to. Adams origin was unique everyone after Eve were exactly the same origin. Just mere fleshly vessels. This origin makes no difference in our relationship with God or other humans. Our born through the will of God is what creates the required relationship.
You hinted on more than just a creation reality Skip, you have reminded us that God never duplicated his creation. He permitted the creation to duplicate itself. If this natural reality is the truth we need to look at the spiritual transformation.
God gave the blueprint the ten letters. He has permitted us all since Mosses to relay this message as we understand it.
Back to Alienation. Through being born from above we are alienated from this natural creation so it seems we cannot relate to Adam and his purpose we need to relate to Yeshau and his purpose. Just an opposite possibility…
Skip, you argue
“If Yeshua is the last Man, not the first, then isn’t it obvious that he must be a human being, not an alien aberration? But Yeshua, himself argues against you and claims He is an “alien aberration” sent by His Father to earth as a human being like Adam, in fact the last Adam and the 2nd man. For some reason you failed to complete the idea Paul was developing in 1 Corinthians 15. In verse 47 he states plainly:
“The first man is from the earth, made of dust; THE SECOND MAN IS FROM HEAVEN”.
In John 8:23 Yeshua says:
“And he said unto them, Ye are from beneath; I AM FROM ABOVE ye are of this world; I AM NOT OF THIS WORLD ” And in John 3:12-13: “If I have told you earthly things, and ye believe not, how shall ye believe, if I tell you of heavenly things? And no man hath ascended up to heaven, but HE THAT CAME DOWN FROM HEAVEN even the Son of man which is in heaven”. Also in John 3:31
“He that COMES FROM HEAVEN IS ABOVE ALL, he that is of the earth is earthly, and speaketh of the earth: he that cometh from heaven is above all.” Finally ( not that there aren’t more, but 5 is sufficient)
John 1:14:
“And the WORD WAS MADE FLESH, AND DWELT AMONG US (and we beheld his glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father,) full of grace and truth.”
To make Yeshua “only” human and Adam “wholly” other is to not only create a straw man, but to set it on fire as well.
Both came from YHWH, but the one who was obedient (and therefore beloved and who was rewarded with eternal Headship and Kingship) was the one who relied on YHWH’s guidance and power rather than his own endowed human capacities or a promised ability to know ‘good and evil’ from a source outside YHWH. That is why we are to be now bound and found in Messiah (the last Adam) and no longer the first man Adam who failed and fell.
And to complete Paul’s argument in I Corinthians 15:
“The first man is of the earth, earthy: the second man is the Lord from heaven. As is the earthy, such are they also that are earthy: and as is the heavenly, such are they also that are heavenly. And as we have borne the image of the earthy, we shall also bear the image of the heavenly.” I once was in Adam and bore his image and spiritual character like a father and son, but then I met the 2nd man and last Adam and changed my alliance, allegiance and identity to His. I may not yet bear well His image, but I shall. You have His word on it.
I’m just reading Teilhard de Chardin’s Christ-Omega and the visible emergence of the soul of the world as an absorbing & inevitable reality..we are no longer actors or spectators on a cosmic stage but part of the process of becoming. Could it be the first man Adam became a living soul, the soul rightly not being born of a mother & father like ‘flesh & blood’ is, but is a development of life choices which will determine what I become? I see the spirits of evil as soulless desiring a human soul to possess. Saw the movie about the British rock band “Queen” and the lyrics to Bohemian Rhapsody suggests this kind of possession “Beelzebub has a devil put aside for me, for me, for me”. The last Adam, 2nd man, became a life-giving spirit because of the choices Jesus made as man. He opened a new & living way that with & in this fleshly body we can in our soul indwell the Spirit of Christ (Heb 10:5-20). Julian of Norwich in her Revelation of Divine Love says, “Our good Lord showed himself in various manners, both in heaven and on earth but I saw him take no other place but in the human soul” (16th revelation).
Yet all creatures in Genesis 1 are without mother and father, plus they receive the same nefesh chayya as ha-Adam. Shall we think of these creatures as “aliens”, as well?
In Paul’s juxtaposition of the ‘first Adam’ with the ‘last Adam’, looking at the broader context, his point was that the former required breath from YHWH in order to give him physical life, whereas the last Adam provides spiritual life to those who follow Him. The former became a psychēn zōsan (living soul), the latter provides zōēn aiōnion (life eternal) to believers, to include a new “spiritual body” (sōma pneumatikon).
Craig, let me guess: He probably doesn’t provide that spiritual life from His yetzer hara-type experience. I, for one, am sick and tired of being stuck in this flesh reality. I want what somewhere in my memory remembers: I want it ALL again. I believe Yeshua came to return me to that, plus some. I don’t think I am impressed with the idea that He was somehow ‘qualified’ to do that because He was limited to an earthly experience. That idea may make it easier (possible?) to believe that He was ‘just a man’, but I have a hard time figuring out how it fits the textual description of His mission or capacity.
Clearly, He was human–but He wasn’t merely human.
Let me change that: He was clearly human– but He wasn’t merely human.
Much better ring to it.
I like the ring. Error will always find resonance somewhere in the flesh, for error exists to ‘justify’ flesh, but truth only resonates with itself; which is to say, reality.
If you want to make me believe something, show me how it corresponds with (works in) reality. I believe truth always will do that.
SomeBODY had to be first. But he was a father of children, He and Eve played parenthood together he started a long long line of relatives. Does that mean the first and last are really that different? If he was an alien I must be an alien,. I’m a distant relative. What “mud puddle” are we in now.
Shalom
For me, reading Skip’s former posting of June 15, 2012, “The Human God”, alongside this posting, “The Alien” provides perspective and helps clarify the underlying sense of both.
Thank you, Richard, for that connection.
And to everyone, who remembers the (probably) bumper sticker that read something like “my karma just ran over your dogma”? Which has more recently been reworded to “my karma just ran over MY dogma”. As we read the comments this morning I had the feeling/vision of a multi-paradigm collision on a black-iced roadway.
Thank you, Skip! I just erased my whiteboard some more… and found a few things in permanent marker again. Where’s the rubbing alcohol?