Table Of ContentThe Garden of Eden
and the Hope of Immortality
The Read-Tuckwell Lectures for 1990
James Barr
SCM PRESS LTD
First published 1992
by SCM Press Ltd
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© James Barr 1992
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This book is based on five lectures given in the University of Bristol in
1990, when the author was invited to be the Read-Tuckwell lecturer
for that year. The Read-Tuckwell lectureship was established by a
residual bequest to the University of Bristol made by Alice Read-
Tuckwell, who directed in her will that income deriving from the
trust funds should be used to establish and maintain the lectureship
and that the lecturer should deliver a course of lectures on Human
Immortality and related matters, the course of lectures to be printed
and published.
Contents
Preface ix
Abbreviations xiii
1 Adam and Eve, and the Chance of Immortality 1
2 The Naturalness of Death, and the Path to
Immortality 21
3 Knowledge, Sexuality and Immortality 57
4 Noah’s Ark: Time, Chronology and the Fall 74
5 Immortality and Resurrection: Conflict or
Complementarity? 94
Bibliography 117
Notes 128
Index of Biblical References 141
Index of Names and Subjects 144
Preface
This book is an expanded version of the fifth series of Read-Tuckwell
Lectures, delivered at Bristol University in May 1990. The Lectures
are specifically endowed for the study of the subject of human
immortality. I was honoured by the invitation from Bristol Univer
sity to deliver these lectures, and was pleased and stimulated by the
opportunity they offered, an opportunity to explore certain connec
tions which run through the entire Bible and have ramifications in
numerous aspects of theology and ethics.
Central to the presentation offered here is a reading of the story of
the Garden of Eden, not as a tale of the origins of sin and death, but
as a tale of a chance of immortality, briefly accessible to humanity
but quickly lost. Old Testament scholars have long known that the
reading of the story as the ‘Fall of Man’ in the traditional sense,
though hallowed by St Paul’s use of it, cannot stand up to examina
tion through a close reading of the Genesis text. But though this has
long been evident, scholars have not, on the whole, succeeded in
formulating a general picture of the purpose and impact of the story
which could rival the traditional one and could carry an equal force
or similar relevance over so wide a range of biblical materials and
theological considerations. My suggestion is that the perception of
the place of immortality in the narrative can do much to fulfil that
need.
The subject is one that well illustrates the question of the relation
between the Old Testament and the New. It has been, above all,
Paul’s own reading of the story that has led people, all down the
centuries, to read it in a certain way. Paul’s reading itself, however,
depends heavily on a particular tradition of interpretation which is
not always evident to the ordinary reader. If one is to reconsider the
ways in which the Old and New Testaments may mutually illumi
nate each other within Christianity, no example is more profound or
more far-reaching than the story of Adam and Eve.
IX
The Garden of Eden and the Hope of Immortality
The Read-Tuckwell endowment, by fixing interest on the subject
of human immortality, rightly made central an aspect which down
the ages has always or normally been regarded as central and
essential to religion. The twentieth century, however, has left people
confused in this regard, for powerful voices have been heard to
declare that the focus of Christianity is entirely directed upon the
resurrection of the body, and that the immortality of the soul, which
is the commonest formulation of human immortality, is a quite alien
idea, based upon Greek philosophy and foreign to the Hebrew
heritage of ideas upon which Christian faith rests. The study here
presented may, by indicating a path through which Hebrew thinking
also was concerned with immortality, help to overcome some of this
uncertainty.
Our study may also have something to say about the relation
between biblical texts and studies in other areas: particularly three,
namely (1) philosophy, (2) anthropology, and (3) the general history
of religions. (1) A large part of the traditional argumentation con
cerning immortality was always philosophical: more modern trends
in religion tended to push aside philosophical involvement for the
sake of an approach believed to be more biblical. We may hope
that our study will lead us to some fresh thinking about this question.
(2) As mentioned above, recent studies laid much weight upon the
ideas of the nature of humanity held, or supposed to have been held,
by the Hebrews and the Greeks (or, naturally, by other groups: but
these two have been taken as the classic contrasting pair). Heavy
theological weight was thus made to rest on judgments which had
linguistic, sociological or anthropological character and over which
theology itself scarcely had the necessary means for evaluation.
(3) The first few chapters of Genesis form one of the biblical areas
where there is an unusual degree of contact with myths and ideas
known from peoples outside Israel. On the other hand, much
modern biblical theology has striven to emphasize the separate
identity and peculiar character of the Bible and to take these qualities
as the very basis for claims about its authority within Christianity.
Our study of the Garden of Eden will perhaps illuminate some part
of this area also.
In addition, much scholarly research has been devoted in the last
decades to the Jewish background of the New Testament texts,
especially through the Dead Sea Scrolls but also on the basis of other
documents. Much of this work, however, has been academic and
Preface
fairly technical, and there has not been time for its effect to filter into
general theological and popular discussion. This book also will
remain outside the technical levels, but it will seek to let the influence
of recent studies in Judaism have some effect on the more general
understanding of immortality.
This book is not intended to be a thorough or systematic discus
sion of either immortality or resurrection. It follows out a certain
group of biblical themes which I believe to be meaningfully related
and linked to immortality. I have not attempted to engage with all
the vast discussion in the scholarly literature or to cite every biblical
passage that might be relevant; rather, I have preferred to restrict
myself to a limited number of writers who seemed to form a creative
circle. Most of my argument I worked out myself, without any large
scholarly apparatus. In a few cases, after the lectures were delivered,
I came upon writings that I had not known but that had taken similar
paths: such was the valuable article of Ulrich Kellermann, and in
particular it was a great pleasure to find opinions of similar tone
expressed in Harold Bloom’s comments in The Book of], published
in the same year in which the lectures were delivered. As commonly
happens, the material tended to swell in volume after the lectures
were delivered, and this will be particularly visible to the reader in
ch. 2.
I owe particular thanks to Bristol University for honouring me
with the invitation to deliver the lectures, and for its kindness and
hospitality during my visit there. I am grateful especially to the Revd
Simon Tugwell, OP, who assisted me by letting me see in advance a
proof copy of his own earlier series of Read-Tuckwell Lectures, now
published as Human Immortality and the Redemption of Death
(Darton, Longman and Todd 1990); to Professor George Nick-
elsburg, who kindly made me a gift of the last available copy of his
invaluable Resurrection, Immortality and Eternal Life in Intertes-
tamental Judaism (Harvard 1972); and to Dr Robert Hanhart of
Gottingen, who kindly obtained for me copies of the correspondence
published in the Kirchenblatt fur die Reformierte Schweiz of 1926,
which is referred to on pp. 87ff.
While in Bristol, during the period of the lectures, my wife and I
greatly enjoyed the friendship and hospitality of the University, and
the Departments of Theology and of Philosophy provided excel
lently for all the needs involved in the delivery of them. The five
lectures were interspersed with seminars conducted on related topics
xi
The Garden of Eden and the Hope of Immortality
by scholars of Bristol University, and these enlivened the series with
variety and interest. I as lecturer gained and learned much from the
five seminars conducted by Professor Ursula King on immortality in
world religions, by Dr Lyndon Reynolds on aspects of mediaeval
theology, by Dr David Milligan on the philosophy of belief in
immortality, by Drs David Hopkins and T. A. Mason of the English
Department on Milton’s Paradise Lost9 and by Professor C.J.F.
Williams with a general response to the lecture series. Dr Margaret
Davies took care of our everyday needs and was extremely kind and
friendly. For us it was a wonderful occasion, and we wish all future
prosperity and world-wide renown to the Read-Tuckwell Lectures.
In biblical passages, where the Hebrew numbering differs from the
English, the Hebrew numbers are given first, the English in brackets
afterwards.
xu
Abbreviations
HTR Harvard Theological Review
JBL Journal of Biblical Literature
KBRS Kirchenblatt fur die Reformierte Schweiz
NEB New English Bible
REB Revised English Bible
seA Svensk Exegetisk Arsbok
SJT Scottish Journal of Theology
THAT Theologisches Handworterbuch zum Alten Testament
VT Vetus Testamentum
VTS Vetus Testamentum Supplements
