Revisiting Adam and Eve: Understanding Ourselves, each other, and God, through a relational lens

Abstract

The narrative about Adam and Eve in Genesis 3 has been highly influential in its shaping of Western culture. Creative interpretations through poetry, stone, paint and wood have brought varying perspectives to the text, while Western theology has been powerful in its representation of the guilt of human beings and its consequences. An exploration of the narrative in its context of the creation stories invites us to bring fresh eyes and ears to this familiar story and to wonder, again, what it might have to say to us. The question to be addressed in this afternoon together asks “How does examining the behaviour of Adam and Eve and of God, as each is portrayed in Genesis 3, contribute to a fuller understanding of our human experience and our relationships with ourselves, each other and with God?”

Speaker and Bio

Dr Helen Blake has been a counsellor, psychotherapist and supervisor in private practice for the past 25 years. She has worked with individuals and couples and continues to be an educator in a higher education context. She teaches in the Master of Pastoral Counselling programme at St Mark’s National Theological Centre, the School of Theology for Charles Sturt University.

Helen’s passion for counselling, teaching and a growing interest in theology at St Mark’s were combined in her Doctor of Ministry studies for which her observations of the impact of shame in the couple relationships with whom she worked led her to explore this topic.