Module 12 Personal Reflection: The first family fights

There are probably as many creation stories as there are ancient cultures. The stories often contain similar features, themes, and characters (supreme beings, humans, animals, etc.). The Greek story began with chaos. Norse mythology began with a chasm. And the Biblical creation story also begins with darkness and emptiness. In all of the stories, the presence of nothing is soon filled with lots of somethings and someones.

In the creation story recounted in the book of Genesis, after a productive but exhausting first week of creating stuff, God instituted the first weekend so he could rest before dealing with humans. For a while it was like a happy nudist garden party for Adam and Eve, but then they broke a major rule that was clearly covered in the rental agreement, and they had to leave. After a while, the not-quite-as-happy couple decided to have a couple of sons, Cain and Abel (because everyone knows that the best way to deal with couple stress is to add children to the mix).

As a student of the family, I am particularly interested in the story of this first family, and I am specifically intrigued by their early interactions. If you are familiar with original Mom and Dad’s first argument, you recall that they each ranked low on taking personal responsibility and ranked high on shifting blame. One night Adam and Eve invented hide-and-seek in the garden with God, likely due to body shame issues and scratchy fig leaves. When God said, “Umm, I created you. Do you really think I can’t see you? Now tell me what happened.”. Adam immediately blamed Eve and Eve just as quickly blamed the family pet reptile. (This pattern of blame-casting on partners and family pets has persisted through the generations. Just ask poor innocent Fido or Kitty or Basilisk.) Anyway, though we don’t know if the couple continued their finger-pointing blame and shame game, it was a rough start for healthy conflict resolution.

The second fight starts with sibling rivalry and ends with the first family member murder (thus the term home-icide). Cain grew up to be a farmer and Abel grew up to be a rancher. They both gave the offerings of their efforts to God, but God wasn’t wild about Cain’s present of produce. Cain felt rejected and bad. Abel probably felt accepted and good until Cain invited him for a walk and killed him. Once again, God has a brief interrogation with the beings that are giving him the most trouble in the new world. He asks, “Hey Cain, have you seen your brother?” Cain says, “Nope”, but then goes further, using the frustrating communication ploy of answering a question with a question: “Am I my brother’s keeper?”

Evidently that was a rhetorical question because God doesn’t answer it. I wish there had been an answer. I wish God would have said, “No, you are not your brother’s keeper. You are your brother’s brother and that is a much more meaningful and significant relationship.” I wish the theistic family therapist would have said, “It’s not about keeping or controlling, it’s about being a family member. It’s about taking responsibility instead of assigning blame. It’s about forgiving instead of fighting, or at least forgiving after the fighting. It’s about giving a piece of your heart rather than a piece of your mind.”

In our individual families and in the extended family of humankind, let us remember that we have a higher calling than just “keeping”--keeping the peace, keeping things in check, keeping things the way we want them to be, keeping the upper hand. Let us not strive to control or coerce or kill each other. We are family. We have each other’s backs; we don’t stab them in it. Keepers keep. Families keep focused on loving and helping and supporting each other, especially when life is far from a garden party, nudist or not.