The Book of Genesis: A Biography by Ronald Hendel

Seems like ages since I featured a work of nonfiction. Don’t worry, just because I’ve been reading a lot of international fiction of late doesn’t mean I’ve lost my love of nonfiction. I’ve also been reading some nonfiction. One those books, The Book of Genesis: A Biography by Ronald Hendel I finished only a few days ago. Published in 2012 and part of the Lives of Great Religious Books series from Princeton University Press, I stumbled across a copy in the new books section of my public library. Years ago, after encountering books like Genesis: A Living Conversation, God: A Biography, and The Harlot by the Side of the Road: Forbidden Tales of the Bible I’ve believed for a long time that the book of Genesis is rich in meaning, history and importance. Agreeing with both Hendel and his publisher Princeton Press that such a book is worthy of a biography of its own, I grabbed The Book of Genesis: A Biography and made my way to the automated check-out machines.

Once I began reading it, I found this a deceptively sophisticated book. As I suspected, Hendel began by assessing the book of Genesis within the context of modern scholarship – you know, all that stuff having to do with the ancient E, J, D and P sources. From there Hendel chronicled how Genesis as well as the rest of the Hebrew Bible has been interpreted by the great minds of Western thought, starting with the Greek-influenced Neoplatonists like Philo of Alexandria (and arguably to some degree St. Paul), the figurative interpreters of the Middle Ages like St. Augustine and the eventual backlash centuries later with the rise of more literal interpreters like Rashi and Luther. (By the 16th century, as more Europeans gained access to printed vernacular Bibles, public opinion turned against this medieval-era practice of Biblical interpretation. According to Hendel, proof of this popular contempt can be found in the ribald and satirical words of Francois Rabelais’ The Life of Gargantua and of Pantagruel.) With the rise of modern world bringing us the theory of evolution, critical Biblical scholarship and a greater understanding the earth’s advanced age, such literal interpretations of Genesis started to fall out of favor. (Hundreds of years earlier, the discoveries of the New World and the heliocentric solar system helped begin the erosion of the antiquated version of Biblical literalism.) Lastly, with the rug of literalism pulled out from under it, literary artists like Emily Dickinson and Franz Kafka would mine Genesis for its artistic value.

Dry at times and maybe a tad repetitive, nevertheless Hendel’s book covers a lot ground. I found his approach insightful and above all, erudite. If it’s anything  like the others in Princeton’s Lives of Great Religious Books series, I can’t wait to read them all.