Re: appendix

In a message dated 1/6/2005 2:53:10 AM Eastern Standard Time, "Don Winterstein" <dfwinterstein@msn.com> writes:

>Rich Faussette wrote:
>
>"My remarks are restricted to genesis...."
>
>OK.  Genesis (chapter 2) says the Lord God put the man in the garden "to work the ground."  This trumps the Cain story and your interpretation of it.  So God made man to be a gardener.  As a gardener (since retirement) I emphatically concur with the author of Genesis that such occupation is what man was made for.   So please stop denigrating agriculture.   :  )

Of course, you've seen my subsequent post with the link to the article stating Jews haven't farmed in 2 millenia, and you've seen my remark regarding England and the Jewish expulsion by the king after the Jews refused to farm and I do not understand why you link any other references to Jewish farming with the references in the Pentateuch which contains the Jewish partiarchal archetypes and their laws and I don't know why you would compare Adam before the fall when all things were given to him as opposed to the conditions for Adam and his progeny after the fall, (Cain and Abel came after the fall) the very conditions under which we live.
I don't denigrate agriculture :) but I'm pretty sure given the wording in the texts, of the absolute prevalence of the shepherd as a symbol throughout the Old and New Testaments.

>Actually I never said "the Israelites preferred agriculture over shepherding."  The Bible to my recollection never names Israelites' occupational preferences.  I was pointing out that agriculture was widely known and practiced among Israelites.  While Genesis certainly emphasizes herding among the patriarchs, apparently agriculture was known and practiced among them also:  Gen. 27:28 has Isaac wishing Jacob "an abundance of grain and new wine," and Gen. 30:14 has Reuben going out in the fields "during wheat harvest."
>
>Don
How does wishing someone an abundance of grain and wine make them a farmer? You have to ignore the subsequent move to Egypt when Jacob's sons clearly cling to nomadism. 27:28 does not make Jacob a farmer. He is a man of the tents and that is his worth over Esau, a man of the hunt. As for Reuben, he is the first-born of the dull-eyed Leah, he defiles his father’s concubine. His father says he will not excel.
When he goes into the field, he collects mandrakes, he does not farm.
He does not till the ground. You have not trumped my suggestion that Jews eschew agriculture, but you have seriously tried to and I am grateful.
rich
Received on Thu Jan 6 08:47:36 2005