History Literature / BookOfGenesis

* TruthInTelevision: Many of the characters and events were found to have historical basis, such as Abraham's life. The first 11 chapters are harder to say, but many think they were at least inspired from real events, such as the Flood being one or more large regional floods, centering around the Middle East during the late Stone Age, and the Neolithic Revolution, where many people around the world began to farm and metallurgy and city building was being experimented during the later Pleistocene. There are oodles of interpretations however, depending on who you ask.

* JaywalkingWillRuinYourLife: The first two people decide to have a bit of fruit, resulting in [[spoiler: the fall of man and eternal punishment]].

* ForbiddenFruit: {{God}} gives free reign to the first two humans over everything in the paradisal Garden of Eden, except for one tree, because eating of its fruits will cause them to die. Unfortunately, a wily serpent manages to tempt the two into eating the fruit out of their desire to be god-like, leading them to be expelled from the Garden and introduce humanity to pain and death. The exact species of fruit wasn't mentioned, and alternatives as pomegranate, fig, or grape have been suggested. Much like FourIsDeath, it's portrayed as an apple because the Latin word for apple, malus, [[StealthPun also means "evil".]]

** As crazy as this may sound to some, Eden ''may'' have been a (semi-)real place. A site called "Gobekli Tepe" was unearthed in what is today Turkey (very close to the border it shares with modern-day Syria). The site features stone henges that predate Stonehenge (and similar structures), and, indeed, farming. The henges feature carvings of animals, which may represent which clan each one (and its associated sitting place) was associated with, or totemic animals. Gobekli Tepe was a site where groups of people gathered to celebrate...something, or to remember their ancestors, as evidenced by wild animal bones (that showed signs of butchering and cooking), and containers that seem to have been used for the production of beer. Now, what does all this have to do with Eden? Well, besides the clan sigils or totemic animals on the henges, it's located in about the right spot. (Right between the Tigris and Euphrates rivers, with some tributaries.) Additionally, the story (being a JustSoStory) may reflect the hardship of transitioning from a ''relatively'' easy hunter-gatherer lifestyle to a farming lifestyle (to produce enough food and drink for a growing population) with all of ''its'' challenges. (Living in closer quarters, the uncertainty of the rains, more wear and tear on the body, social stratification, etc.)

* BuryMeNotOnTheLonePrairie: Joseph makes the Israelites swear that they would take his body with them when they left Egypt. He was eventually reburied in Israel, meaning that they must have carried his coffin through the desert for forty years. [[FantasticReligiousWeirdness This causes complications along the way]], because the people carrying his coffin are therefore ritually impure and can't offer the Passover sacrifice. A "make-up" date for the sacrifice one month later is instituted due to this and other reasons, which means that complications as a result of a will are OlderThanFeudalism.
** Averted with Rachel, whose body Jacob is forced to leave behind despite her status as his OneTrueLove.

* AbsurdlyElderlyMother: Sarah, who was in her nineties and way past menopause, is told by God's visiting angels that she's going to have the promised child from her husband Abraham. Sarah laughs at this, thinking the whole thing to be impossible, but God gets the last laugh when He fulfills this promise and she bears her first and only son Isaac.

* BigLippedAlligatorMoment: Sent to check on his brothers, Joseph fails to find them immediately and is advised by a stranger who overheard them discussing where they were headed. Significant effort (including a full dialogue) is devoted to describing the scene although the brief delay makes no difference to the plot and the episode is never referenced again.

** Both of Jacob's wives eventually are unable to conceive and require Jacob to sleep with their servants in order to have more children.

* DepravedHomosexual: Quite possibly the men of Sodom who ganged around Lot's house to desire "knowing" the two men who came into his house to sojourn with them. Lot offers his two virgin daughters to the men in exchange for keeping the visitors safe under his roof, but the men persisted, even going so far as to do harm to Lot himself for "acting as a judge". The two angels bring Lot into the house and struck the men with blindness so that they wearied themselves to trying to find the door.

* ItsTheOnlyWayToBeSure: God glasses Sodom and Gomorrah when He can't find even ten people in their entire populations who are not an absolute monster.

* DepravedHomosexual: Quite possibly the men of Sodom who ganged around Lot's house to desire "knowing" the two men who came into his house to sojourn with them. Lot offers his two virgin daughters to the men in exchange for keeping the visitors safe under his roof, but the men persisted, even going so far as to do harm to Lot himself for "acting as a judge". The two angels bring Lot into the house and struck the men with blindness so that they wearied themselves to try finding the door.

* DiningInTheBuff: Probably the most famous example of this trope. Eve eats the forbidden fruit (possibly an apple, Scripture doesn't say exactly) while she and Adam are living naked in the Garden of Eden.

JustForFun/{{The one w|ith}}here it '''''[[CreationMyth all]]''''' began. Also, the one with CainAndAbel, Noah's Ark, and the TowerOfBabel.

-->..."Come, let us build ourselves a city, and a tower with its top in the heavens, and let us make a name for ourselves; otherwise we shall be scattered abroad upon the face of the whole earth." The LORD came down to see the city and the tower, which mortals had built. And the LORD said, "Look, they are one people, and they have all one language; and this is only the beginning of what they will o; nothing that they propose to do now will be impossible for them. Come, let us go down, and confused their language there, so that they will not understand one another's speech."

* TheUnderworld: All characters expect to "go down to Sheol" after death. The words "go ''down''" suggests that Sheol is conceived of as a somewhat depressing afterlife[[note]]Either that or simply "the grave", suggesting [[CessationOfExistence there's no afterlife[[/note]] and there's no difference mentioned concerning the fate of righteous and wicked people. Only gradually does the Old Testament go on to suggest there's more sorting to follow.

* TheUnderworld: All characters expect to "go down to Sheol" after death. The words "go ''down''" suggests that Sheol is conceived of as a somewhat depressing afterlife, and there's no difference mentioned concerning the fate of righteous and wicked people. Only gradually does the Old Testament go on to suggest there's more sorting to follow.

* DeathByDespair: When Jacob's son Judah saw that his brother Benjamin was implicated in a theft he didn't commit (the whole thing being a frame-up by Joseph to test his brothers) and was subject to becoming Joseph's slave in Egypt, he feared that if he and his brothers didn't return to their home with Benjamin, their father would die of despair, and so he offered himself in the place of Benjamin so that he wouldn't have to see his father suffer that fate.

* OutWithABang: Onan in chapter 38, by deciding to cheat his brother's wife out of her inheritance by denying her to have a child from him that would not inherit anything from him by performing ''coitus interruptus'', was killed by God for his actions.

* DeathBySex: Onan in chapter 38, by deciding to cheat his brother's wife out of her inheritance by denying her to have a child from him that would not inherit anything from him by performing ''coitus interruptus'', was killed by God for his actions.

* GoneHorriblyWrong: God saw just how wicked antediluvian-era mankind became, and was horrified by what he had made. Every inclination of the human heart's thoughts [[EvilFeelsGood were evil perpetually]]. He grieved and regretted ever making them, before opting to destroy everything in TheGreatFlood.

* SadisticChoice: One interpretation of Lot offering his two daughters to the mob to be raped is that he had to choose between honoring SacredHospitality or [[PapaWolf protecting his family]], and he went with the former.