August 18, 2026
Dear Leland and Everett,
This morning overwhelmed me a bit. I mostly stuck to my typical routine: drop you off at school before heading to the gym where I exercise, stretch, and sauna and then stop by the grocery store to pick up a few staples on the way home to eat lunch, meditate, and write. The primary change to my morning routine today was that I didn’t listen to a podcast. I typically listen to podcasts on any number of topics while I work out. Today I decided to do something I’ve wanted to do for a long time, but not had the guts: to exercise without additional stimulus. Partly I did this because I was excited to write today, and wanted to think about what I might write. What I found was that ideas came flooding through faster than I could process or hold them. I seem to be genuinely excited about this project, to a degree where I am worried I might not be up to the task of honoring it. Alas, so it is with the things we care about. Onward.
Today I want to talk about Adam and Eve. This is a topic I’ve touched on several times before, so part of me is loathe to retread old ground. I’m tempted to say this will be the last time I will cover the topic; truth be told, I don’t think I can make that commitment: I’ve been fascinated by the tale of Adam and Eve for a few years now, and find myself revisiting its themes often. What I do hope is for this letter to serve my deepest dive into the topic, covering all the themes I notice (including several I’ve not mentioned to date), such that in future letters I can point you back to this one, and merely underscore (or add to) previous observations.
The story of Adam and Eve has been told for thousands of years; that alone seems worthy of interest. For one thing, people seem to have a deep seated need to understand “how it all began”. Even today, while we no longer look to Adam and Eve (and the book of Genesis more broadly) to define how humanity came to exist, we do have a modern genesis story: The Big Bang Theory. The Big Bang, so we believe, explains how the universe came into being, how the earth formed, and how humans evolved in that timeline. Without taking a side in the veracity of either of these genesis stories, it’s important to understand how badly humans seem to need a story that explains how the world, and humanity, came into being.
I wanted to be a little more precise in terms of defining how many years humans have been telling the story of Adam and Eve, but that is tricky to nail down with precision. There is a Creationist view that believes one can literally follow the timeline of events outlined in the the bible and calculate that Adam and Eve date back 6,000-7,000 years old. Personally I never felt the need to assume the events of the Old Testament are meant to be understood literally, so don’t think it safe to assume the story dates back that far. The first evidence of the story of Adam and Eve being written down dates back nearly three thousand years. But we broadly understand that humans are a storytelling species, and that there likely existed an oral tradition that predates any written records, though by how much we really don’t have any way to know. The story of Adam and Eve has significant overlaps and echoes in The Epic of Gligamesh, a Babylonian story first written close to four thousand years ago with an oral history that would likely extend centuries earlier. Whether the story of Adam and Eve was adapted from The Epic of Gilgamesh, influence by it, or somehow derived independently, it’s not crazy to suggest the story of Adam and Eve has roots extending back more than four thousand years.
Consider the evolutionary pressure the story must have faced. Oral storytellers need to captivate their audience, so would have refined the story over time. Extraneous detail would have been discarded, leaving only the truly captivating elements to survive over time. And while the story almost certainly isn’t meant to be taken literally, it’s worth considering what deep truths must have been encapsulated in order for the story to have survived over the millennia, such that it not only survived the oral storytelling era, but also that we still tell the story to this day.
Genesis 2 mostly talks about how Adam and Eve came to be. Perhaps because we now assume humans evolved into being, this is not the portion of the story I find interesting. I’ll gloss over this portion of the story for today, and merely reserve the right to find inspiration and dimensionality in this part of the story later. I often find deeper meaning in biblical stories after a discovery in my personal spiritual journey. So it may be with Genesis 2, or maybe not.
The one element of Genesis 2 that sets up Genesis 3 (the focus of today’s letter) is that God supposedly put Adam in the Garden of Eden to work and take care of it, telling Adam he was welcome to eat fruit from any tree in the Garden except for the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. First off, it’s worth observing how deeply our belief that humans hold an obligation to look after the natural world runs: we’ve been telling ourselves we were given that mission by God for thousands of years. For me, it’s crazy to think that modern environmentalists, conservationists, and climate activists – though typically quite secular in professed beliefs – share a sense of mission with humans who have professed it was ordained by God for millennia.
Picking up in Genesis 3, a snake appears, and takes up the “bad guy” role in the story. The snake informs Eve that the cost of eating the forbidden fruit is not death (as God supposedly warned), but merely knowing good and evil “like God”. They eat the fruit, realize they are naked, and sew fig leaves together to cover themselves. God proceeds to find out that they have eaten the forbidden fruit, and assigns punishments. The snake is condemned to crawl on its belly and be cursed to live in a state of deadly enmity with humans. Eve is condemned to experience pain in childbirth and be ruled by her husband. And Adam is condemned to never-ending toil in order to secure food. Lest Adam and Eve live forever, God expelled them from the Garden and placed a cherubim and flaming sword to guard the tree of life.
The punishments attempt to explain why humans still struggle in ways that still ring true to this day (I don’t know why, but I find this fascinating):
- Humans feel shame being seen in our natural (naked) state.
- Humans evolved a deep seated and visceral fear of snakes.
- Women, seemingly uniquely in the animal world, suffer during childbirth.
- Agriculture is hard work, and a seemingly constant battle to survive (more on this thought in a moment).
- Men have (or until very recently had) power over women.
- Man continues to suffer in separation from God and an inability to live in harmony with the natural world.
Of these supposed punishments, only a fear of snakes seems to make much sense once you really stop to think about them. Why would humans feel shame being seen naked? Why would women suffer during childbirth? Why should humanity seem to suffer more anguish than other species in the struggle for survival? (To be clear, plenty of other species appear to have more difficult battles for survival than humankind, but humans seem to suffer mental and emotional anguish in ways that are uniquely human, despite our relatively secure lot in life). And why should men have historically held so much power over women?
My next point will retread some prior observations, so I want to take a little detour.
A year or so ago I learned about a recent academic study. The author was exploring the reasoning behind a phenomenon with which I was unfamiliar: that humans invented agriculture in at least seven different parts of the world independently. Five of these locations (the Fertile Crescent, northern and southern China, modern day Mexico, and in the northern Andes region of South America) invented agriculture within a couple thousand years of each other, which hardly seems like it could be entirely coincidental given human history extends back 300,000 years or so. The paper hypothesized that agriculture might have developed in response to relatively sudden changes in weather patterns, creating an incentive for humans to get more proactive about cultivating (and storing) food. The author identified changes in the earth’s orbital patterns (like axis tilt) that apparently led to increased temperature extremes across seasons (e.g. summer vs winter in the northern hemisphere) and precipitation extremes in areas with wet and dry seasons. The theory goes that humans, no longer able to rely on predictable food availability in the cold winter season (or dry season), learned to cultivate and store an excess of food in the hot/wet season.
As I read about the study the thought hit me: “this is the story of Adam and Eve”. For 300,000 years humans lived in relative harmony with their environment. They developed tools to obtain and secure food, but they relied on their environment to provide the nutrients they needed. As seasonal weather patterns became more extreme and unpredictable, peaking around 12,000 years ago, people decided to take a more proactive approach to food security.
To me, the crux of the story of Adam and Eve is man’s elevation of his own image to that of god. We decided we no longer needed to live subservient to God, nor in harmony with our natural surroundings. We felt (and continue to feel) a responsibility toward the natural world, but we came to believe the world was ours to manipulate and control as needed to ensure our survival. We stopped trusting that God or nature would ensure our survival, and decided we needed to take proactive control of ensuring our needs were met. In the process of deciding we would grant our evolved brains primacy, we elevated ourselves – and our egos – to god status, no longer living in harmony with nature. Within our beings, we put our brains in charge, pushing our emotions and spiritual selves into subservience. These actions inherently put some separation between us, nature, and God. Ever since, we’ve felt a dull ache, a desire to return “home” to some unknown and undefined location or state.
This desire to return home is so eternal that it’s captured in the monomyth, also known as the hero’s journey. We tell stories where the hero starts at home, gets called to adventure, is guided by a (sometimes magical) mentor before venturing into the unknown on a series of adventures. In at least one of these adventures, the hero must go alone to face some manifestation of his deepest fear. In another of the adventures, the hero must face the deepest of temptations. Eventually, these adventures transform the hero into a fully realized version of himself, and (partly thanks to the transformation) the hero is able to secure victory in whatever the objective of the original quest. Finally, the hero returns home, bringing his newly transformed self into integration with the life he previously left behind.
The hero’s journey provides the framework for the original Star Wars trilogy. One can find the outline of represented in The Lord of the Rings, Harry Potter, The Odyssey, and many (most?) of our favorite epic tales. We keep telling the same story over and over again. Why?
I submit the monomyth holds so much power over us precisely because it outlines what we most want: transformation and reintegration. We want to be transformed, and we want to integrate the transformed self into the life we temporarily left behind in order to secure the transformation. The monomyth is ultimately describing a spiritual journey. Fascinatingly, it provides something of a roadmap. Following an invitation away from the confines of the familiar in order to grow and develop new tools, before facing a series of adventures and crossing into the unknown to face fears and temptations, in order to achieve a transformation…describes my spiritual journey to date. I would place myself at some point in the return home and integration portion of the journey as of today. Via spiritual stew, I’ve had the good fortunate to hear about many spiritual journeys, and find while the specific adventures vary wildly from story to story (much like the adventures vary wildly between Star Wars and Harry Potter), the underlying themes and patterns show remarkable overlap.
The hero’s journey, I submit, offers individuals something of a solution to the problems presented in Adam and Eve. We separated from God and we yearn for a return. Our original path is closed off (as symbolized by the cherubim and flaming sword), so we must find a new way home. The hero’s journey provides clues for how to find our way home (as do the world’s religions; potentially more on this topic another time), suggesting our paths are unique to each of us (which is consistent with my personal observations). Unfortunately, while the hero’s journey serves as an inherently resonant guide for each of us individually, humanity continues to struggle with our collective separation from God, in a manner that takes on a pattern. The Old Testament documents the pattern I’m describing: people sin and so are allowed by God to be conquered and oppressed by their enemies, at which point they cry out for God’s help and are rescued. Personally, I think this pattern continues to play out in modern times, though I would frame the pattern slightly differently.
Every 80 years or so America enters a new epoch. We enter the new epoch with a clear understanding of mission: we know the purpose of the new epoch, and are motivated to set about building this new world (and preventing the calamity marked by the end of the old epoch). Eventually, we overextend the building mission of the epoch, and shift focus toward utilizing (vs building) the tools we’ve developed. Eventually, we start to abuse the tools we’ve built. Finally, we start to realize the tools no longer seem to solve our problems, and because no one alive remembers a time without these tools we face an identity crisis. Eventually, we set about deconstructing the old epoch and then, eventually, begin building anew.
In spiritual terms, I believe the transitions between epochs are divinely inspired. We move into the new epoch joyful for the seemingly endless opportunities we see in front of us (God’s gifts). Eventually, we begin to take God’s gifts for granted, and begin to assume the we ourselves built this new epoch (increased separation from God). Separation from God inevitably leads to a world of decay (a world where our tools dominate us instead of us utilizing them), at which point we undertake to deconstruct. In the chaos of deconstruction, we begin to search for a connection with God again. Enough of us establish connection with God to navigate a (previously unseen) path out of the chaos and destruction and into the hope and promise of a new era. And then the cycle repeats.
Distilled all the way down, man oscillates back and forth between connection with God and separation from God, eternally tempted to elevate man back into the role of God but always willing to cry out for God’s help in our darkest hours.
The story of religion, too, is the story of oscillation between connection to God and separation from God. Our religions convince themselves they understand the will of God, attempting to force God to shrink to fit our capacity to comprehend. Our leaders convince themselves they need to assert increasing authority over their flock…and perhaps their spiritual enemies as well. These small-minded behaviors, born of an attempt to stuff God in a box whose dimensions we understand (and can thus manipulate), in effect elevates man back to the status of god and leads to tremendous suffering. Eventually some devoted and inspired folks attempt to reestablish a more genuine relationship with God. By opening themselves up, these individuals receive inspiration that leads the religious body into a new era.
I also wonder if the story of Adam and Eve plays some misdirection on humanity. The story clearly tells us that Adam and Eve, by eating the forbidden fruit, came to know good and evil. I increasingly wonder whether humans genuinely do possess the ability to discern good from evil. Recent evidence suggests to me that evil (or what we have traditionally considered evil) increasingly hides in plain sight while folks struggle to notice. Actually, that’s not entirely true: folks are quite adept at observing the evil emerging over there (in our spouses or parents or kids or siblings or, especially these days, in the other political party), but shockingly blinded to the evil overtaking us in here (in my own being, tribe, or political party).
Whether humanity possesses the ability to discern good vs evil or not, I increasingly wonder whether that’s even the right paradigm. I’m deeply torn on this one. On the one hand, warning against evil (and the evil one, or Satan) is a theme that runs through both the Old Testament and the New (including in Jesus’ teachings), and permeates our modern stories and belief systems. On the other hand, I find little evidence of either good or evil in my own spiritual pursuit. I find evidence of light and shadows, love and fear, truth and lies…but not good and evil. I’m open to the possibility I’ve just been blocked to evidence of good and evil. In the meantime, I find myself drawn toward what I perceive to be the polarities of love and fear. What we traditionally label good and evil I am coming to think of as “actions born of love” and “actions born of fear”. The polarity of love and fear I do in fact think we have the capacity to discern. I submit two people could take the apparently exact same actions, yet we could instinctively, viscerally understand which person was acting from a place of love and which was acting from a place of fear.
I submit that the two of you already have shown this capacity for discernment. Being children, you make mistakes often. As your parents, part of our job is to guide and correct your wayward behavior. You can tell the difference between when your mom and I set loving boundaries versus when we attempt to correct your behavior from a place of fear. Our words might differ only slightly, but you can feel and sense the shift in tone and energy. In my experience, you both respond positively to boundaries set with love (even when those boundaries sting), but respond negatively to corrections relayed from fear. You are even developing the capacity to articulate your observations, in order to give your mom and me feedback when you believe we’ve crossed into fear (and thus no longer providing constructive boundaries or direction).
[You two are not wholly unique in your ability to discern love and fear, and your positive reactions to love and negative reactions to fear. But I will say that a person’s ability to sense the difference, and respond appropriately, is impacted by the degree to which that person is trapped in fear. Whether temporarily or more deeply possessed, the degree to which we are trapped appears to dictate our capacity to discern fear and love, and to respond appropriately. Metaphorically, I think of fear as represented by shadows. As such, fear is deeply resistant to light, and will do whatever possible to avoid the light; that includes hijacking our actions in order to frighten the source of light or, failing that, running away. So, we have the capacity to respond positively to actions born of love, but only to the degree we have not been hijacked by fear.]
I said I would return to God’s punishment of man, specifically consigning man to the toil of agriculture in order to secure food. I mean only to point out here how humanity often seems to be trapped in a mindset that no longer seems relevant. Thankfully, humanity seems to have mostly solved the problem of how to feed the planet. While a large number of us work toward that food security, and while those farmers presumably continue to toil painfully, the percentage of us who continue to cultivate food is small and shrinking. And yet, from what I can tell we generally continue to worry about our security in ways that no longer seem relevant. To some degree, humanity seems to be adapting slower than the world is changing. On another level, I wonder how much painful toil was ever required: Jesus chided his followers on more than one occasion, suggesting God would provide for their needs. I’ll admit: I myself struggle to internalize what these passages mean, because I cannot comprehend a world where we do not concern ourselves with from where our next meal will come; I suspect internalizing these messages will correspond with my next spiritual breakthrough.
To that point, there are those who wish humanity would return to our hunter gatherer state, presumably assuming we might return to a state of harmony with nature. I am deeply skeptical. For one thing, the story of Adam and Eve itself implies that a return to the garden is impossible. The deep resonance of the hero’s journey implies that we must find our own, individualized paths. On a more practical level, while the world proves quite capable of supporting eight billion people, I sincerely doubt it could support so many without the cultivation of food. And I think, evolutionarily, the battle between agriculture and the hunter gatherer lifestyle occurred long ago, and agriculture won comfortably.
In sum, the story of Adam and Eve seems to resonate across the millennia precisely because we 1) intuitively recognize something deeply true about the story (that humans elevated ourselves to god status, creating a separation between ourselves and God), and 2) instinctively comprehend how elevating ourselves to god status leads to our suffering.
In terms of solutions, I have many to offer the individual. I’ve offered a few within this letter, and offer them throughout these letters. I have fewer solutions to offer humanity as a whole. Perhaps we are relegated to each finding our way back individually; in fact, my experience strongly suggests this is so. On the other hand, I do sense a shift occurring that will likely enable more people to find their paths, even if those paths remain individualized.
Okay, it’s getting late. I enjoy writing these TOE letters, but find them more difficult to write than the others. And so, I need my rest.
I love you,
Dad
Letters to Leland 