Current Events > Come on Eileen

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I knew her in the biblical sense said the ribaldrous fellow with a wink and a nudge.

Many are aware that knowing in the biblical sense is shorthand for sex. But few know what it is thats biblical about that biblical sense.

Well it all goes back to Genesis 4:1:

And Adam knew Eve his wife; and she conceived, and bare Cain.

To know in the biblical sense means a lot more than remembering her birthday. There is a deeply relational aspect to knowing. So, in the context of marriage, this kind of knowing means making babies.

This reflects the intimate nature of all knowing in the bible. It doesnt have to be sexual. Lots of knowing in the bible isnt sexual. But it is relational. The bibles idea of knowing is not just a cerebral excercise.

Perhaps its the effects of the Enlightenment, but we tend to consider knowledge as a matter of accumulating information. Someone who knows is simply a person whos had buckets of data poured into their head.

We think of knowledge quite impersonally. Not so in the bible. In the bible, knowing involves relationship and heart-commitments.

So Adam and Eve were tempted to know good and evil (Genesis 3:5). This was more than an addition of information. It was a taking of good and evil to themselves to possess those terms.