The Beginning

We awake.

At first, We are darkness. In this state of not-being, We slowly develop a consciousness. At first, We are quiet. We listen, and We feel the darkness as being Us, infinite and in constant movement. A dot, still in hibernation. Our consciousness reaches a point that exceeds Our confinement. And we flex. Nudging the boundaries, We feel them give. With a cry of pure joy, We double in size, and with not much effort, We do it again. And again. With Our heightened consciousness, We expand, and with the volume, the understanding grows.

We watch as part of Us becomes substance. Lights and explosions happen when we stretch and bend in unfathomable directions. And We rejoice in Our unlimited power.

With time, serenity finds Us. And with it comes stillness, then wisdom. Out of the wisdom grows communities. Following the pull, We spin and circle, regarding one another, and maybe We fall into place, happy with our position, for now. We notice that We are developing differently and that We imprint on each other. Now separated, yet connected.

Suddenly, We are multiple consciousnesses in the consciousness. For the first time, We crave. Reproduction. Sustenance. Space. Necessities so strong that everything seems secondary. Species develop. We fight for the right to be – the most. We eat, strangle, and outmaneuver each other. And simultaneously, We learn how to cooperate. We live off and with each other. Like individuals and yet so interlaced as when We were still a dot.

We are single-celled, multi-celled unconscious consciousnesses who, over time, discover that we are naked.

”My name is Lilith. I was the first Woman – created in the image of God. As sovereigns, we were made, the Man and I, to rule over all living. On land, in the sky, and the oceans. As Gods on Earth, we were to multiply. This was God’s plan. As equals, we were to create humankind, but we could not agree on what equality was. We were so young and so full of life, and of ourselves, that it was difficult to contain anything else. Overshadowing powerfully, we felt everything that was happening inside us. The ideas shot out, like sprouts after rain, in our newly formed minds and hearts. Amazing, vibrant, pivotal ideas, but not necessarily compatible. With childish exhilaration, we held out our templates toward each other and took turns in not understanding and not being understood. We were equally bad at being constructive, and equally, we excelled at taking criticism as rejection. Quickly, it became toxic. Both of us in pain, we quarreled and belittled each other. We fought and languished.

We held all the right cards, but no one had taught us the rules of the game. As a couple, we were supreme, but we ended up battling each other. And instead of building up, we tore down. Each other and everything around us.

One day, I woke up and had had enough. I did not understand everything, but enough to know that the two of us would never fulfill the criteria that we had been given. Not together and not by ourselves. And I loved Us enough to know that I had to walk away and leave my space for someone else. So, with a heart that felt sorrow for the very first time, I whispered God’s name. God heard me and understood. And gave me the courage and strength to get up and leave Adam.

Naked and raw on body and soul, I went away. Not in anger or hate, but as a necessity and in great adoration for Us.

I went furthest away, yet I was always close by, not able to fully cut the ties that bound Us. And from my dwelling by the sea, I watched as Adam, in his grief, raised his fists toward the sky and cursed my name. I saw how he, consumed by his want to forget me, neglected all else around him. What had survived our battles now died, withered, and became dust. I observed this, and I observed how God did nothing. Not before Adam curled in on himself, like a desert seed, and fell into hibernation, did God intervene.

While Adam slept, Earth was rebuilt, fashioned to take care of itself. To develop into exactly whatever would happen. A constructive destructive, living, creative world constantly finding new ways to be.

And in a small corner, excluded from and raised above all else, it was decided that everything should be perfect. From blades of grass to fruit trees and from insects to mammals. From ocean to sky and through all seasons. This place would be, for all eternity, shielded from change. Here, everything would live in coherence. No fear. No hunger. No pain. No death. Here Adam was placed, and here God blew life into him once again.

While God was elsewhere, I kept an eye on Adam. I saw how his eyelids fluttered and his puzzled expression as he looked at his surroundings. No trace of his old life left in his face, all had been erased. My name was gone.

Adam embraced his kingdom. As beautiful in his nakedness as his golden cage, he took everything in with the candor of the exalted. The days weaved in and out of each other, none leaving traces and with no thoughts for tomorrow. It never rained more than he could keep dry, and the sun was never harsher than his skin could manage. Never more than the fish in the water or the monkey in the tree. Nonverbal and passive, and unchanging in his new life.

I am thinking that God saw the same as I did, that Adam wasn’t sad, but neither was he happy. That he searched amongst shrubs and animals, but never found what he was looking for. That he was lonely, without knowing what loneliness was. Because one night, when Adam slept, God created another human in Adam’s likeness, thus making sure that they would recognize each other.

With mixed emotions, I watched as the day broke and Adam stirred. In the place between sleep and wakefulness, his body patiently waited for his mind to return – his subconscious already aware. He rolled over on his side and opened his eyes. The woman, for that was what she was, waited less than an arm’s length away. Her gaze was open and fixed on his.

He never startled nor showed surprise, he just reached for her and pulled her in. With their hands, and eyes, and mouths, they got to know each other, and his body remembered what his mind had forgotten. Together, they found all the places that fitted.

I will not lie, it hurt to watch. Not that I have been chaste, I have had thousands of lovers and have hundreds of children. My life is how I have chosen it, and I have lived it after my own design, but Adam was supposed to be my partner, my human, and we failed. So, how do you know that you have won in your choice, but still feel a touch of failure? And how do you wish the very best for someone, and at the same time, in the dark pits of your mind, still want to see him suffer? I shall not make myself wise on the ways of the human soul, I am but human myself. Instead, I turned my attention outward again and observed the two who now formed a pair. And it was truly moving to watch.

Adam was like he had been awakened from a slumber. Alive and present, he showed the Woman, We called Eve, every nook and cranny of his paradise.  Through her eyes, he saw – or re-saw, every tree and shrub and all the animals. They were like children, in their newfound rush of happiness, wrapped in each other’s arms, they rejoiced in even the most inconsequential things. They fed each other. Pinched, tickled, and laughed. They swam and splashed water, and they made love lying, standing, hanging, and every other way they could come up with. And they talked to God.

When the sun painted the sky in countless colors, and the insects sounded the loudest, they sat down, with their eyes closed, holding each other’s hands, then God would fill the garden with presence.

To begin with, Adam and Eve had no language. They communicated like the animals with gestures and sounds, but as time went on, they developed a language that was theirs alone. And every evening, when God filled the garden, they would repeat all the things they had given names that day.

Instead of running around, they now often sat down. Mouths that had mostly been used to eat, kiss, and laugh now talked about what the eyes had discovered, and what the soul had felt. Hands that had been pinching and tickling were now used to emphasize the importance of a specific word. They still laughed, but now mostly because someone had said something funny, and less because water had been splashed.

If God had intended it thus, I cannot say. Was it predicted that nothing can be stationary, not even in the confinement of the garden? Was it by design? With God, you never can say for certain, but my guess is that God, in some remote corner of Our might, felt the stinging pettiness of jealousy. You see, it was evident that the two people now regarded each other with far greater esteem than they did for their creator. Where God had become a part of All, as common as the air they breathed, they had recognized each other as necessities.

It was at this point that God changed everything – did he do so knowingly? Again, my guess is as good as anyone’s. He let them know that there was a certain tree in the garden whose fruit they were forbidden to eat. Not that they had done it before, because even though the tree was beautiful, and the fruits with it, they did not look very accessible, with their deep red color and hard skin. They understood that these fruits were poisonous and that they would perish if they ate them. And thus, a tree that had been less interesting than a date-palm or an orange tree and more interesting than crabgrass suddenly became the center of the garden. Especially Eva, I noticed, was drawn to it. It amused me to watch her casual strolls around the garden, seemingly without purpose, that somehow always ended up under the forbidden tree. Here she sat down, with her back to its trunk, pretending she had no idea in which shadow she rested. After a time, she became bolder. She would sit facing the tree, staring up into its branches. But the tree kept its secret. Or did it?

Eve saw that the songbirds build their nest there. That they hacked holes in the hard peel, ate of the fruit, and fed it to their young. And then she saw that not only did they not die, they thrived.

My next question must be this: How many coincidences does it take before it is no longer a coincidence? If God is all-knowing, then the following events must have been a part of the design? Or at least tacit acceptance?

At this point in the story, I found Eve sitting under the three more days than not, and Adam grouchy over her sudden lack of interest. Though she spent hours under the tree every day, she never disobeyed. She observed it, and the birds. She walked around the trunk. She stroked the bark and crumbled leaves between her fingertips. She even talked to it, but the fruits she never touched.

Never have I witnessed such procrastination. I almost lost patience and entertained the idea of sending one of my children, just to stir things up. But I didn’t need to. Nature took its course.

Where there are egg-filled nests, there are snakes. And this tree was no different. On the right day, at the perfect time, a snake slithered toward its next meal. She was magnificent. Shiny scales in emerald-green and pearl-white, winding around a branch, scenting the air with her tongue. In her embrace, she pushed an overripe fruit from its perch. It fell and landed right in front of where Eve was sitting. She didn’t even have to turn her head to see it. As the fruit hit the ground, it split open and revealed its insides. The small ruby kernels, so succulent and radiant, catching the sun like precious stones, were impossible for her not to touch.

Holding my breath, I watched her glide her fingertips across the kernel’s slick surface. Transfixed, like a bird in a snake’s gaze, she followed the beckoning of the fruit. For a long time, she sat with the fruit in her lap, stroking the kernels with her thumb. And best as I thought that this was all she needed, she squeezed her thumb into the flesh, broke the skin, and released juices that stained her hands and thighs. I was holding my breath, because surely now God had to intervene? But nothing happened. Not when she, mesmerized, put her thumb in her mouth. And not when she licked her hand clean. And after she had eaten half the fruit, there still was no God. She wasn't stopped, and she didn’t die, so what did this mean?

I cannot speak for God, but I saw a thousand thoughts racing through Eve’s mind. She looked at the two halves in her hands, the one almost eaten and the one untouched. Then she looked up and stared into nothing. I also saw that when she finally stood up, she had changed. Her gaze had sharpened, and her walk had purpose. What I saw was no longer a girl in a woman’s body, but a grown woman with the knowledge and the worries that follow.

The first thing she did was to seek out Adam. She had gathered the two halves of the fruit so it looked whole and recognizable in his eyes. After having seen the fruit, he looked puzzled at her. She then opened her hands, making the two halves come apart. Then I heard her say:

“It was not the truth, what we were told. I ate, and I live. But more importantly, I understand.”

Adam still didn’t understand. He looked intently at the two halves. The one that was full of kernels and the one that was almost empty. His eyes trailed Eve’s juice-stained hands, toward her chest, and chin. Then he realized what she had done and started to move backward in horror. But she followed.

“They are not poisonous. Not the way we were told. Not the way we understood. They are sweet and juicy, and it has made me think. You try, and you will see.”

She held the uneaten half toward him.

Adam took the fruit. He scrutinized it. weighed it in his hand. Then he flipped the peel around, exposing the kernels.

I applauded his courage when he ate. He wasn't greedy like Eve, he only had a few kernels. Then he plucked some out and rolled them around in the palm of his hand. And ate those too.

“Do you see? Do you understand?” Eve said, but Adam still didn’t quite understand, at least not in the way she did, and he looked so lost that I wanted to poke Eve with a stick.

Adam lay awake all night. I could see the moonlight reflected in his open eyes, and I felt the burden weighing him down as if it were my own body. The next morning, shortly after he finally fell asleep, Eve woke up and found the first grey hair in his beard.

Curious to see what would happen now, I waited impatiently with Eve for Adam to wake up. When he opened his eyes, something completely unexpected happened. They looked at each other for a while, then Eve closed her legs, and Adam crossed an arm over the lower part of his torso. Like this, they sat for a while, not talking, trying to deny that most things were different. Then they left in their separate direction. Next time I saw them, both of them wore skirts made out of flax.

They were still naked when they bathed, but it was a polite nakedness that made room for self-consciousness. They were naked when they made love. Their lovemaking, which used to be as natural as eating and sleeping, became a fumbling necessity. While making love, they were still as one, and forgot, for a short while, that they were not. But as soon as they rolled off each other, the feeling of absence reappeared. Their souls used to be naked, or appeared unshrouded from each other, now it was hidden behind individuality.

As the days passed, more grey appeared in Adams’ beard, and Eve’s belly grew. I felt in them a growing frustration of not knowing. What to believe and their purpose. Every evening, as they had always done, they sat down, holding hands and listening. But God was silent. There was no longer a Us. There was a we and a me, and the growing realization.

When winter set in, they killed their first animal. They had never known hunger, being cold, or death, now it was the battle to avoid those three things that kept them going. When Eve almost lost her life, giving birth to their first son, they understood that they needed more like themselves. They understood that in a group, the chances for survival of the individual would be greatest. So, they packed their few belongings and left the garden.

Behind them, the garden closed around itself, and in front of them, humans and two new understandings awaited; us and them.

me

us

them and Us.”