What was shameful about Adam and Eve's nakedness?

[Tree of Life]

...I am suggesting that we shouldn't be so concerned with nakedness as to make exposure (accidental or not) an inherent immoral act...

Your thoughts?

My thoughts are that this is a lot of theological hemming and hawing to get to such a vanilla thesis. Do you have anything more interesting or consequential to say about the subject?

 

[Kenny'sID]

Is is known that clothing actually increases sexual arousal. Groups of people

Is is known that clothing actually increases sexual arousal. Groups of people
in warmer climates do not wear clothes. It doesn't foster constant sex.

A show on TV , Naked and Afraid, brings together two naked strangers
in a remote location. There is no evidence of arousal on the show.
Like Adam and Eve they are focused on survival, not sex.

None of that refutes a thing I said. Why do people insists on bringing in not normal circumstances, and touting them as the norm.

As far as clothing increasing arousal, sure it can under the right circumstances, then again, so do feet, or knocking the living daylights out of their partners to some people. Bit that doesn't mean the lack thereof does not.

What I clam is a fact, and not even sure why someone would pretend it's not, unless it's some justification for what someone might want to do, something there may, or may not be some truth to here.

 

[Halbhh]

I've noticed some troubling Christian theological positions on nudity (such as this one), so I wanted to investigate the most cited passage when this topic comes up.

We read in Genesis 2:25 after Eve is created and becomes "one flesh" with Adam:

And the man and his wife were both naked and were not ashamed.

Later, in Genesis 3:7 and immediately after the couple sins, we read:

Then the eyes of both were opened, and they knew that they were naked. And they sewed fig leaves together and made themselves loincloths.

After they made coverings out of the fig leaves, we read:

And they heard the sound of the LORD God walking in the garden in the cool of the day, and the man and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the LORD God among the trees of the garden. But the LORD God called to the man and said to him, "Where are you?" And he said, "I heard the sound of you in the garden, and I was afraid, because I was naked, and I hid myself."

____________________________________________

My thoughts:

1. Adam and Eve were never ashamed to see themselves naked. Shame here comes from God discovering them naked.

2. Even though Adam and Eve covered themselves with fig leaves, they still hid from God when they heard Him coming. They claimed they did not want God to find them naked. It appears they thought their makeshift fig leaf coverings were inadequate. The fig leaves did not fully satiate their need.

Note: Shame in the OT world was connected to public reputation. Shame is the public exposure of guilt. In Genesis, Adam and Eve were attempting to prevent God from shaming them by fulfilling their own needs themselves. They were guilty, not of being naked openly (no one was there to see them besides God!), but of violating God's command and fracturing themselves from his gracious provisions.

3. Nakedness is seen throughout Scripture as neediness and/or weakness. This new awareness of their nakedness on the part of Adam and Eve suggests their boarder awareness of their total dependence on God - who had provided for them in the garden for all their needs.

4. In this sense, nudity is being communicated as nonmoral. It is soley being used to communicate what they were lacking. As Job states eloquently, "Naked I came from my mother’s womb, and naked shall I return."

5. For clarity, I'm not suggesting we should walk around naked. I believing clothing has an important purpose; however, I am suggesting that we shouldn't be so concerned with nakedness as to make exposure (accidental or not) an inherent immoral act. Context and intentions matter. We live under the New Covenant of Grace.

Your thoughts?

Interesting.

Another key part -- the fruit of the knowledge of good and evil means becoming aware of the consequences of more and more of your actions, instead of blissfully unconscious of them.

Suddenly (for example), they realized that their sexual bodies were potent to affect others, even possibly at times in a wrongful way.

So...(hard to get a good analogy from another thing), it's somewhat (only somewhat!) like how we would not walk around with a loaded gun and casually just wave it around with other people without any care of where it is pointing, because of that potential in it to affect them.
So, our understanding/awareness of the effect of things changes how we use them. We lose blissful unawareness, and instead have fraught awareness.

 

[AnticipateHisComing]

I'm confused about your position.

That would be because you always look for ways for what I say to be confirmed with what the world says. What I say is based on what scripture says.

In one sense, it seems that you are supporting Utilitarianism. "Utilitarianism is a version of consequentialism, which states that the consequences of any action are the only standard of right and wrong." Source

And in another sense, you seemed to have argued for Natural Law Theory. "Natural law theory is a theory about the relationship between morality and human nature, the theory that who we are determines how we ought to act. There is way of living that is in accordance with human nature, this kind of natural law theory holds, and morality prescribes that we live such a life." Source

However, each of these theories are contradictory to one another. Can you please explain which philosophical position you subscribe to? It will help with this discussion.

I have explained my position with few words and more words. You have ignored half my post in my initial argument. Your arguments do not address why Adam and Eve clothed themselves immediately after sinning. Mine, that you ignore, does yet you claim no one can show how nudity is intrinsically immoral.

Most of what you believe has secular foundations, you just don't know it because Christians in the past have utilized these foundations and gave them a decidedly Christian flavor. For example, you'd be surprised just how much Christian theology and theological language was influenced by Plato and Aristotle.

So you opine. I disagree. Who was the wisest man to live? Did he say there is nothing new under the sun? Learn that the Holy Spirit led the writers of scripture what to record.

I take the same position as Augustine on these issues:

Moreover, if those who are called philosophers, and especially the Platonists, have said anything that is true and in harmony with our faith, we are not only not to shrink from it, but to claim it for our own use from those who have unlawful possession of it.

I take the same position as scripture.

1 Corinthians 1:20
Where is the wise person? Where is the teacher of the law? Where is the philosopher of this age? Has not God made foolish the wisdom of the world?

 

[Apex]

What I am doing is explaining why it was that Adam and Eve felt shame in the wake of the Fall.

Adam and Eve felt shame, but that shame was not due to their nakedness. Their shame came from disobeying God.

If you study the various passages that couple nakedness with shame, you'll realize the context is almost always judgement for disobedience or wickedness. This is because nakedness was a sign of total loss of provisions. If you were stripped naked, you literally have lost everything, like the man the Good Samaritan saved (Luke 10:30).

When Israel practiced idolatry and broke their covenant with God, He took away all their provisions that He had provided - including their clothes! Their shame was found in WHY they were naked and lacking everything.

Deuteronomy 8:47-48
Because you did not serve the LORD your God with joyfulness and gladness of heart, because of the abundance of all things, therefore you shall serve your enemies whom the LORD will send against you, in hunger and thirst, in nakedness, and lacking everything.

Why would God take away their clothes if being naked was intrinsically immoral?

 

[Apex]

These questions still have not been answered:

If the purpose of clothing was to lessen sexual arousal, why did God make clothes for Adam and Eve before there was anyone else around to see them?

If the purpose of clothing was to lessen sexual arousal, why are we clothed on the New Earth? If we are freed from our sin nature, why would we need to implement measures to lessen potential sin?

 

[bugkiller]

Interesting thread. This will be my only post in it.

I think the con argument is provided by those bringing their unexamined and uncontested social conditioning to the Bible looking to support it. I just can not grasp something God said was good suddenly becomes evil. There is a difference between nude and naked. Naked means more like deprived to me. I saw some good posts covering this aspect. I also believe the issue is hiding. Even my dogs hide when they do wrong. Adam and Eve both knew they were nude prior to sin. Adam had enough knowledge to name the animals. They were told to be fruitful and multiply (have sex thus children) prior to sin.

Also find it interesting so many posters with so few posts in this thread.

bugkiller

 

[AnticipateHisComing]

These questions still have not been answered:

If the purpose of clothing was to lessen sexual arousal, why did God make clothes for Adam and Eve before there was anyone else around to see them?

I have answered what you haven't. You just don't like my answer.

If the purpose of clothing was to lessen sexual arousal, why are we clothed on the New Earth? If we are freed from our sin nature, why would we need to implement measures to lessen potential sin?

At creation, clothes hid "perfection", in flesh.
In heaven, clothes show our new perfection, in spirit.

Revelation 7:14 I answered, “Sir, you know.” And he said, “These are they who have come out of the great tribulation; they have washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb.

 

[Apex]

My thoughts are that this is a lot of theological hemming and hawing to get to such a vanilla thesis. Do you have anything more interesting or consequential to say about the subject?

Of course my thesis is vanilla. It is a straightforward understanding of only what the text provides us. It is the legalistic position on nudity that is convoluted and contrived. Part of the reason I started this thread was to bring clarity to this mess. I believe legalism is damaging to the church.

 

[Tree of Life]

Of course my thesis is vanilla. It is a straightforward understanding of only what the text provides us. It is the legalistic position on nudity that is convoluted and contrived. Part of the reason I started this thread was to bring clarity to this mess. I believe legalism is damaging to the church.

What species of legalism are you opposing?

 

[DamianWarS]

Not in Canada --- depending on the season we contend with cold, black flies and mosquitoes. Thank God just one at a time.

women may also go topless in Canada

 

[DamianWarS]

Of course my thesis is vanilla. It is a straightforward understanding of only what the text provides us. It is the legalistic position on nudity that is convoluted and contrived. Part of the reason I started this thread was to bring clarity to this mess. I believe legalism is damaging to the church.

a lot of these things are culturally driven and we must gauge our position on nudity by how our culture perceives it and if said perception can still give glory to God. If not, then although we are not bound by the law (torah) we are bound by our mission to approach nudity how they approach it and then give glory to God through that lense.

Probably in a North American context public nudity should be abstained but there may be contexts where it could be less frowned upon, certainly breast feeding should be a non-issue but there is also a growing acceptance on women going topless (in Canada it's not illegal). It's the blurring with sexuality that's the issue and often it is inseparable which is why it should be abstain.

 

[SolomonVII]

women may also go topless in Canada

But they don't.

 

[prodromos]

But they don't.

It' way too cold most of the time

 

[SolomonVII]

It' way too cold most of the time

Oh, we have central heating in Canada. The colder it is on the outside, the warmer it is on the inside.
It is not the law that keeps women clothed in Canada; it is their own integrity and inner sense of dignity. I imagine that women in Canada are very much like women everywhere else in that regard.

 

[Apex]

But they don't.

The reasons behind this are multifaceted. It is difficult to strip away cultural programming, even liberated Muslim women who escape to Western countries have trouble adjusting to not wearing traditional "modest" Islamic garb. Sadly, even if a woman was comfortable not wearing a top in public, they would be treated poorly and without love. Not to mention we body shame females in various forms of media. Many women have body image issues from the ridiculous plumbline of womanly perfection we advertise as most desirable on billboards and in magazines. I can understand why they wouldn't want to, even if they could legally.

Also, it still has not been shown in this thread that exposing bare breasts is included in the biblical concept of "nakedness". With breastfeeding being so commonplace in ancient society, if God didn't want female nipples to be exposed in public, you'd think God would issue an explicit command to cover up breasts. I see no such command.

 

[SolomonVII]

Most Christians that take a legalistic stance on nudity aren't doing it because of American (or any other) culture.



The reasons behind this are multifaceted. It is difficult to strip away cultural programming, e.. With breastfeeding being so commonplace in ancient society, if God didn't want female nipples to be exposed in public, you'd think God would issue an explicit command to cover up breasts. I see no such command.

It should be difficult to strip away cultural programming. Our cultures have taken thousands of years to develop, and they are what define us as a people. It is the presence of a culture that makes us human, and helps separate us from animals.

It is very common for women in Canada to breastfeed in public. Most are very comfortable in doing so, and tend to be discreet, as most women are wont to do.

 

[Apex]

It should be difficult to strip away cultural programming. Our cultures have taken thousands of years to develop, and they are what define us as a people. It is the presence of a culture that makes us human, and helps separate us from animals.

You seem to think this is a good thing. Let me remind you that culture is subjective and not the arbitrator of truth. Most people live in a culture that is molded by idol worship, such as in China, Japan, Indonesia, Africa, and India. I think you'd agree that Hinduism and Buddhism are real concerns. Statistics show that the majority of the people born in these cultures stay faithful to their ancestral faith. This is due to cultural programming and pressures. We must be willing to change if we want to be open to the truth, even if this means bucking cultural norms.

It is very common for women in Canada to breastfeed in public. Most are very comfortable in doing so, and tend to be discreet, as most women are wont to do.

Sure, exceptions exist, but my point still stands.

 

[fhansen]

You don't need a Bible verse to prove it is immoral for everyone to run around naked all the time. Why because it is a natural law. Just like it takes a man and woman to make babies. Just like it is a natural law that God exists.

Natural law would actually say the opposite IMO. God made everything and everything He made was good-including the human body in its natural state. Only our "falleness" has twisted that good into an evil. And, working with man to save him, ultimately to restore him to innocence and something even greater yet, perhaps, God acknowledges and accommodates that fallen state for now, that shame, by fashioning clothes for them Himself. In the end truth will reign again, man will be transparent, fully himself as God created him to be. For now He and we deal with the reality of human life on this earth, as it is, for better or worse.

 

[redleghunter]

I've noticed some troubling Christian theological positions on nudity (such as this one), so I wanted to investigate the most cited passage when this topic comes up.

We read in Genesis 2:25 after Eve is created and becomes "one flesh" with Adam:

And the man and his wife were both naked and were not ashamed.

Later, in Genesis 3:7 and immediately after the couple sins, we read:

Then the eyes of both were opened, and they knew that they were naked. And they sewed fig leaves together and made themselves loincloths.

After they made coverings out of the fig leaves, we read:

And they heard the sound of the LORD God walking in the garden in the cool of the day, and the man and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the LORD God among the trees of the garden. But the LORD God called to the man and said to him, "Where are you?" And he said, "I heard the sound of you in the garden, and I was afraid, because I was naked, and I hid myself."

____________________________________________

My thoughts:

1. Adam and Eve were never ashamed to see themselves naked. Shame here comes from God discovering them naked.

2. Even though Adam and Eve covered themselves with fig leaves, they still hid from God when they heard Him coming. They claimed they did not want God to find them naked. It appears they thought their makeshift fig leaf coverings were inadequate. The fig leaves did not fully satiate their need.

Note: Shame in the OT world was connected to public reputation. Shame is the public exposure of guilt. In Genesis, Adam and Eve were attempting to prevent God from shaming them by fulfilling their own needs themselves. They were guilty, not of being naked openly (no one was there to see them besides God!), but of violating God's command and fracturing themselves from his gracious provisions.

3. Nakedness is seen throughout Scripture as neediness and/or weakness. This new awareness of their nakedness on the part of Adam and Eve suggests their boarder awareness of their total dependence on God - who had provided for them in the garden for all their needs.

4. In this sense, nudity is being communicated as nonmoral. It is soley being used to communicate what they were lacking. As Job states eloquently, "Naked I came from my mother’s womb, and naked shall I return."

5. For clarity, I'm not suggesting we should walk around naked. I believing clothing has an important purpose; however, I am suggesting that we shouldn't be so concerned with nakedness as to make exposure (accidental or not) an inherent immoral act. Context and intentions matter. We live under the New Covenant of Grace.

Your thoughts?

The shame was a result of obtaining the knowledge of good and evil which was a result of their disobedience. We don't know why this was but we know the cause.

What's interesting is the fig leaves were inadequate as they fashioned their own. God then provides them animal skins. Thus giving us an image of God being sovereign in covering our sins. The Gospel on every page.