Naked Deception, Part 1:
Smooth Criminal.

You don’t need a theological degree to understand the Bible. If you have ears to hear what the text is saying, the message can be quite clear. That’s why, in the Gospels, Jesus teaches in parables - to make the message so straightforward that the only excuse people could have for not getting it is their own unwillingness to hear and to submit: “He who has ears to hear, let him hear.” The problem is that the Bible wasn’t written in our language. What we read and hear are translations. Yet even the King James English can’t convey what the authors of the Bible are saying in their language, which is Hebrew. Even if we can’t or don’t want to study ancient languages, we should at least acknowledge the fact that the Bible wasn’t written in English. Then we might be willing to learn from people who do know Biblical Hebrew how the language works so that we could better understand the text so we could do what it commands.

In part 1 of this special episode, we take a look at some wordplay in Genesis 2:25-3:1 that really sheds light on the meaning of the text, but that can only be captured in the original Hebrew.

Notes:
עֲרוּמִּ֔ים - a-rũm-mîm (naked)
עָר֔וּם - a-rūm (subtle/cunning)
הָֽאֲדָמָ֗ה - hā-ǎ-dā-māh (ground)
Genesis 2:4-6
Isaiah 47:2-3
Job 5:8-13; 15:4-5

Brand New Orleans performed by Prince.