Update: Review of Tryggve N. D. Mettinger, The Eden Narrative: A Literary and Religio-historical Study of Genesis 2–3

Bibliographical details:
Mettinger, T. N. D. (2007). The Eden Narrative: A Literary and Religio-Historical Study of Genesis 2–3. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns.

Publisher’s information:
‘The arrival of a new monograph by Tryggve Mettinger is an occasion for scholarly delight. Mettinger is one of the finest biblical scholars in the world.’ – Ronald Hendel (University of California at Berkeley)

‘Mettinger “inverts our world,” and he does so with sustained and compelling erudition.’ – Brian B. Schmidt (University of Michigan

In a book marked by unusually readable yet academic style, Mettinger transforms our knowledge of the story of Eden in Genesis. He shows us a story focused on a divine test of human obedience, with human disobedience and its consequences as its main theme. Both of the special trees in Eden had a function: the tree of knowledge as the test case, and the tree of life as the potential reward for obedience. Mettinger adopts a two-tiered approach. In a synchronic move, he undertakes a literary analysis that yields striking observations on narratology, theme, and genre in the text studied. He defines the genre as myth and subjects the narrative to a functional analysis. He then applies a diachronic approach and presents a tradition-historical reconstruction of an Adamic myth in Ezekiel 28. The presence of both wisdom and immortality in this myth leads to a discussion of these divine prerogatives in Mesopotamian literature (remember Adapa and Gilgamesh). The two prerogatives demarcated an ontological boundary between the divine and human spheres. Nevertheless, the Eden Narrative does not evaluate the human desire to obtain knowledge or wisdom negatively.

A piece of fresh, original scholarship in accessible form, this book is ideal for courses on creation, primeval history, the Bible and literature, and the Bible and the ancient Near East.

Tryggve N. D. Mettinger is Professor Emeritus of Hebrew Bible at Lund University, Sweden. He is the author of a number of monographs on topics such as kingship, divine names, aniconism, and the dying god. He has served as visiting professor at a number of institutions in Europe, Israel, South Africa, and the U.S. He is a member of the Royal Academy of Letters, History and Antiquities, Stockholm, and an Honorary Member of the British Society of Old Testament Studies.

Table of contents:
Acknowledgments … ix
Preface … xi
Abbreviations … xv

1. Introduction … 1
1.1. The Agenda of the Present Study … 1
1.2. One or Two Trees? A Survey of Opinions … 5

2. A Narratological Analysis of the Eden Narrative … 12
2.1. Unifying Elements … 13
2.2. Time and Location … 14
2.3. Scenes and Plot … 16
2.4. Characters … 29
2.5. Focalization (Point of View) and Voice … 32
2.6. Narrator and Characters: Omniscience and Restricted Knowledge … 34
Summary and Conclusions … 41

3. The Theme of the Eden Narrative … 42
3.1. “Theme” in Literary Theory … 42
3.2. The Theme of the Eden Narrative … 47
Summary and Conclusions … 63

4. The Genre and Function of the Eden Narrative … 65
4.1. The Genre of the Eden Narrative … 66
4.2. Excursus: Structuralist Approaches … 74
4.3. The Nature of Genre and How Genre Works … 76
4.4. The Eden Narrative versus the Chaos Battle Drama of Creation … 80
Summary and Conclusions … 83

5. Traces of a Tradition: The Adamic Myth in Ezekiel 28 … 85
5.1. The Contents of the Adamic Myth … 87
5.2. Wisdom and Immortality in the Adamic Myth … 90
5.3. The Innovations of the Eden Poet (Genesis 2–3) … 94
Summary and Conclusions … 97

6. Wisdom and Immortality in Adapa and Gilgamesh … 99
6.1. The Myth of Adapa and the South Wind … 100
6.2. The Gilgamesh Epic … 109

7. Synthesis … 123
7.1. The Two Main Traditions Alloyed … 124
7.2. The Conceptual Framework … 126
7.3. Date and Literary Integrity … 134

References … 136

Indexes
Index of Authors … 156
Index of Scripture … 160
Index of Other Ancient Sources … 163
Index of Terms, Mainly Literary … 165

	Review
	In Chapter 1, Mettinger outlines the main aims of his study of the Eden narrative in Genesis 2–3 as identifying the theme of the narrative and determining whether the author used an earlier story that was then turned into something new. He goes on to review some earlier views about the central idea of the passage, including those of: Hermann Gunkel: expulsion from the garden, Claus Westermann: why are humans, though created by God, limited by, suffering and sin? Gordon Wenham: a paradigm of sin, of what happens whenever man disobeys God, Gerhard von Rad: human hubris and its consequences, Odil Hannes Steck: the root of evil is the human endeavour to form their own existence autonomously, James Barr: how human immortality was almost gained but was in fact lost, Terje Stordalen: a story about the impossibility of having both knowledge and life, Ellen van Wolde, Lyn M. Bechtel: a story about human maturation, and Phyllis Trible: life and death. This is followed by a survey of scholarly views on the trees in the garden, i.e. the question of whether the story originally contained one tree or two. Scholars who have concluded, on the basis of perceived inconsistencies in the narrative, that the tree of life is a secondary addition include Karl Budde, Hermann Gunkel, Claus Westermann, Howard N. Wallace, Christoph Dohmen and David Carr. Those who have argued, albeit for various reasons and on the basis of different perceptions of the development and theme of the narrative, that the tree of life does have an essential place in the text include Paul Humbert, Odil Hannes Steck, James Barr, Terje Stordalen and Konrad Schmid. A minority of scholars (e.g. Eduard Nielsen and Jutta Krispenz) have argued for the tree of life as the original tree, regarding the tree of knowledge as a later addition.
	In the second chapter, Mettinger then turns his attention to a narratological analysis of the Eden narrative. As part of this he looks at unifying elements such as recurrent motifs and inclusios (which suggest that Genesis 2–3 is a meaningful whole), at time and location (which indicate a cosmic ‘world apart’, i.e. outside the ordinary realm), scenes and plot (with the latter being understood as being focused on a divine test concerning the issue of obedience to the commandment), characters, and focalization/point of view (noting that the Eden story is told from an objective, detached, outside point of view) and voice (which is described as ‘extradiegetic’ because events are narrated from ‘above’). Special attention is devoted to the question of the knowledge of the narrator vis-à-vis that of the characters, with Mettinger concluding that the narrator is omniscient but not necessarily ‘omnicommunicative’, whereas the human characters come across as ignorant (for instance, they do not appear to have had any knowledge about the tree of life or the fact that they were passing a test). His narratological analysis leads Mettinger to conclude that: the Eden narrative is a well-structured, unified whole, the plot focuses on a divine test of obedience to God, which is about the demarcation of the human world from the divine, with knowledge being understood as a divine prerogative, both trees are required in that one is the test, with the other being the reward, the narrator, God and the reader know about both trees, whereas the human characters are ignorant with respect to the tree of life.
	The theme of the Eden narrative then becomes the focus of chapter 3. Mettinger here begins with some general considerations on the notion of theme in literary theory, focusing on the work of theorists like Monroe Beardsley, Gerald Prince and others, before analyzing the theme of the Eden narrative itself. The possibilities he discusses include: Death versus immortality Mettinger notes that ‘the two inclusios …, the tree of life and creation out of dust, strike a note of human transitoriness and the possibility of immortality that was never realized’ (p. 47), only to conclude, however, that although the issue of death versus immortality is an essential part of the narrative, it is not its central theme. The test of obedience: disobedience and its consequences Following the lead of Gerhard Lohfink, John Van Seters and Eckart Otto, Mettinger here points to the Yahwist’s indebtedness to the Deuteronomistic covenant theology, which is exemplified in the motifs of the divine commandment and the divine test. He concludes that ‘the Deuteronomistic notion of law is here repristinated to the divine commandment, addressed in illo tempore to the first human couple in the garden of Eden’ (p. 57, italics removed). Theodicy Employing the Deuteronomistic emphasis on the connection between acts and their consequences, the text indicates that the state of affairs in the real world is a perversion of what it was intended to be. ‘While the [Deuteronomistic History] supplies an etiology for the loss of the land, the Eden Narrative serves as an etiology for the loss of the Garden of Bliss’ (p. 59, italics removed). Mettinger then moves on to present some conclusions concerning the trees, which are both required, the tree of knowledge as the test case and the tree of life as the potential reward in case the human couple had passed the test. And he offers some brief comments on the kind of knowledge the tree was supposed to provide, such as (1) the acquisition of human qualities (e.g. adult maturity, human independence and self-determination), (2) sexual consciousness, (3) ethical knowledge, or (4) universal knowledge.
	Mettinger concludes the chapter by defining the subject of the Eden narrative as ‘the divine test of obedience to the commandment’; the theme is understood as ‘disobedience and its consequences’, and the thesis of the passage is said to be ‘obedience to the commandment leads to life, disobedience to death’ (p. 64).
	Chapter 4, in turn, is devoted to the genre and function of the narrative.
	.… to be continued …

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