John Y’s Musings from the Middle: Bible Studies

Great moments in Biblical interpretation.

When my daughter was young–around age 5–I read to her a children’s Bible.

It was great. The stories were condensed and easy to understand and discuss after reading.

Our first reading (and discussion) was a memorable one.

Adam and Eve. Maggie was intrigued by the story and got the “big picture” lesson….but she got hung up on something that really bothered her.

The nakedness part.

“Dad, do you mean they wore no clothes? As in no clothes at all? Weren’t they embarrassed?”

I explained that wasn’t quite the case. There were fig leaves, albeit not terribly fashionable by themselves, but they did do the trick of covering up important parts.

I said, “Well, remember, this is right at the beginning of things so maybe clothes hadn’t been invented yet.” I was trying to get Maggie to think for herself and asked, “What to you think may explain it?”

A light bulb went off with Maggie and she offered up her own explanation for why it was OK to run around naked back in the day.

“Maybe, Dad, they just hadn’t invented looking down yet.”

We decided to go with that explanation. It was simple, clear and made perfect sense to both of us.

So, if you–like Maggie and me–have ever wondered about this question, now you have a possible explanation.

And as a rule, I prefer the clear perception of a 5 year old on issues like these.