Serpents & Symbols

From the Garden of Eden to the staff of Asclepius, serpents have slithered their way through myths, ancient cultures, and even scripture as both deceivers and healers. 🐍 In this episode, we continue our insights from our Greece trip, uncovering the mysterious role of snakes in history, faith, and symbolism. 🇬🇷 Why are serpents feared in some traditions yet revered in others? 🌍 How do they embody both chaos and restoration? Join us as we untangle the paradox of the serpent across time and tradition on Navigating An Ancient Faith! 📜

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Chapters

• 0:00 The Serpent Symbolism in Ancient Sites
• 10:56 Modern Medicine and Ancient Symbols
• 18:49 Medusa and the Power of Perception
• 27:28 Biblical Serpents and Symbolism
• 48:47 Isaiah's Vision: Seraphim and Symbolism
• 1:07:44 Paul's Encounter with the Serpent
• 1:10:15 Revelation and the Great Dragon
• 1:13:56 Shrewd as Snakes, Innocent as Doves

Transcript

Serpents & Symbols

J.R.: [00:00:00] And so we took it to a pet store and the guy looked at it. And of course he immediately looked into it and he said, ma'am, this is a water moccasin. We, this is a poisonous snake. Take that thing out back and kill it 

David: All right. So let's talk about the Greece trip we took. 

J.R.: Okay. 

David: And we talked a little bit about it last episode, we kind of went through the sites we went to. But we're going to spend the next couple of episodes talking about some of the conversations that you and I typically have when we travel like this, which could either really be fascinating for people, or it could maybe be boring .

I can see people going, this is what you guys sit around and talk about? But you know, <Right.> we'd go to these sites. 

J.R.: Sadly, the answer is yes. 

David: Yes. Sadly, the answer is yes. But, you know, we'd go to these sites and oftentimes we'd go to dinner or we'd go back to the hotel at the end of the day and we would start talking about some of the things we would see and, you know, two [00:01:00] hours later, right, we're into this long conversation.

So that's a little bit what we're trying to capture with these next couple of episodes about some of the things we talked about in Greece, for better or for worse. You and I find it interesting. Hopefully, other people do as well, right? 

J.R.: Well, we get to talking about this stuff and it's like a spark and I don't know when it turns from a spark into a fire, but like at some point, a couple hours in, you know, we're neck deep into this deep conversations about, I think that's what this means, you know, of course these Eureka moments and I don't know.

Yeah. I don't know if anybody else finds it interesting, but, I don't know, there's something about going to these sites and putting some ideas together that, at least to us, it makes it seem like we've discovered something. And I, I think, we've got something that we sort of tied together today, interestingly enough.

David: Yeah, because all of the sites that we went to, and we noticed this early on, we saw carvings and images of snakes. And serpents. <Right.> And it was one of those things where once we saw it, [00:02:00] every time we went to another site, one of us pointed it said, look, there's a serpent, you know, in that carving right there.

There's a serpent wrapped around that guy's eye. There's a snake at that guy's feet. There's a person feeding a snake in this carving, right? And so we saw it everywhere and you couldn't unsee it once we started to see it. And that's what sparked this whole conversation of, okay, what's the deal with snakes and serpents?

And we saw it probably initially, the most clearly at Epidaurus, when we went to this ancient healing site of the cult of Asclepius in Epidaurus. 

J.R.: Right. And, just growing up in church like we did, you know, the image of the snake is a negative thing. You tie it to the Garden of Eden, right?

So, yeah. And so it is interesting that when we go to these sites, there seems to be a positive association, not always, but for the most part, they're positive. Some kind of positive association with the serpent that makes me think, well, okay, so they have a different understanding relationship with the idea of the serpent. 

And [00:03:00] even like when we went to Crete. Epidaurus is not on Crete. It's on the mainland Greece. But when we went to Crete there were images of snakes at several of the sites we went to. And one of the interesting things is as far as they can tell, there's never been snakes on Crete. <Yeah.> Like they've never been as far as they know, there's never been snakes that are native to that island. And so, where did that come from? You know, so they're obviously getting this image of the snake and carrying it to the Island of Crete. And so there's kind of a universal understanding about the serpent that we don't really understand, cause like I said, we associate it with the negative with Satan.

And there's a different association that the ancients had with the serpent. 

David: And I think you're right. If you grew up in church, your image of a snake is the devil, right? And the curse of the snake was that people are going to stomp on your head, right? That's literally it. 

J.R.: Well, that's why there's no such thing as a good snake.

Every once in a while you know, you'll meet the biologist that says, no, you don't want to get rid of that snake. He'll actually kill, rats and mice. It's like, yeah, they're all dead. [00:04:00] Yeah. If they're in my yard, they're gone. Sorry. I don't have, there's no distinction, right? The Bible tells me to stomp on their head.

David: So this is a biblical mandate. Yeah. It's a moral mandate that I'm carrying. Exactly. Get the shovel. No, but even after, even today's discussion, you might even rethink that, because I think that's typical that a lot of people are scared of snakes. Of course, that's a very primitive response.

I can remember, there's a forest preserve around here and it's a little bit a ways away, so I don't go there often, but I've been there two or three times. And I was walking the trails and it was one of these scrubby beach trails, but it's not really beach, it's just this pine trees and scrub that you see in Florida.

And I came right around the corner, and there was the biggest freaking rattlesnake I've ever seen. <Oh wow.> Right in the middle of the trail, curled up, I absolutely froze. And you know, they talk about how your brain tells you to freeze before you even process what you're seeing. 

J.R.: Oh, absolutely. Yeah.

David: And so there is something [00:05:00] very primitive. So, I slowly step back. gave him some space, he sat there and postured for a minute and then he slithered off. But that was a huge snake. And that was probably the best example I can think of personally of that primitive response of, man, when you see a snake, you don't think positive things, right? And so. 

J.R.: You don't have to reach very far to understand why we have the response to snakes. 

David: Yeah, exactly.

J.R.: Yeah. 

David: So then we go to a place like Epidaurus and all these places and everywhere, everywhere are images of snakes and serpents. And so Epidaurus is this healing center. We talked about this last episode, but it was this healing center.

The cult of Asclepius was there, and there were things like thermal baths, there was on site housing, but really it centered around this experience that people had at the temple there. <Right.> What you would do is you would, after you had gone through some baths, some changes [00:06:00] in diet, some exercise, you would go into the temple, and we talked about how you probably drank some hallucinogenic, but it says that people laid on the temple floor, and vision, a serpent, or the serpent woman?

Was it something like that? <Right.> So this vision of a serpent woman, or a serpent goddess, you may say, <Right.> would appear to you. 

J.R.: The meteor serpent they talked about, right. 

David: Yeah, and tell you how to heal what ails you? Right? <Mm hmm.> And there were several of these descriptions on the wall carved outside of this temple that they had uncovered. And what's really interesting about it is that it was the serpent spirit that told you what to do to get well. It wasn't the doctors there. That fascinated me. 

J.R.: Right. 

David: And the doctors would say, okay, what did the serpent priestess tell you? And they would say what the dream was, and they would say, Okay, that's what you're supposed to do.

Or they may modify it a little bit, but they would say, [00:07:00] Yeah, basically, this serpent priestess is the one who tells you how to get well. And that was this whole cult of Asclepius that we saw. 

J.R.: Right. And it was such a curve ball because leading up to it, it's like, you know, this was not an outpatient facility. You know, you went and you stayed there, the thermal baths, there's diet, there's exercise. So a lot of this stuff, you know, lends to our understanding of modern healing of let's reduce the stress. Let's start off with the basics. Let's change your diet. And all that makes perfect sense today, but yeah, then there was this wild curve ball about , you meet the serpent and the serpent will tell you, the serpent goddess will tell you what your ailment is.

And it's like, wow, I did not see that coming. <Yeah.> And so it sounds a little wild, but you know, the healing practices at Epidaurus, I think reflected like broader belief in divine intervention and sort of an interplay between religion and medicine that we look back at and say well, okay. So yeah, obviously if you're sick, it might be a demon. It might be the spirits. And so there [00:08:00] was an obvious interplay between religion and medicine at the time. But then I started thinking about you know, it really isn't that much different than sort of modern, we might call it holistic healing. Or even the the way many Christians view healing is, , you hear somebody's in the hospital. We're going to start praying for them, right?

We're asking for divine intervention. And so the ancients had this sort of, I guess it'd be a little bit more of a concrete, you meet the goddess and she'll tell you how to heal yourself. That was the real curve ball. It's like a little bit more than I would expect them to pray to the gods to heal. You know, a remedy similar to the way we might do it to God, you know? But yeah, when they explain that out to us, I was like, oh, wow, I didn't see that coming.

I mean, how does that work? So, yeah, it just kind of opened up this whole idea of what were they seeing? What would they come back and tell this person? And, it sort of takes, how should I say this? It sort of, if you think it's a little bit of a trick, it sort of takes the trick out of the magician's hands.

Does that make [00:09:00] sense? 

David: Yeah, yeah. So it's not the doctor's, that was the biggest takeaway, it's not the doctor sitting there directing the treatment. <Right.> It was the patient's experience in that temple with whatever happened through that vision. <Yeah.> That's what dictated the treatment. 

J.R.: Right, correct.

And again, it just takes it out of the physician's hands. Meaning that if you do look back at it and say, well, maybe they were giving them some sort of, you know, the psychoactive drug , or maybe they were giving him some herbs that caused this kind of experience in their own mind.

That all may be true, but I just think it's interesting that the physicians were willing to step back and say, you tell us what's wrong and then we'll treat that. You know, so it is a little bit strange take on, certainly the way we view modern medicine. 

David: Yeah, and I think you were saying that actually to see a serpent guide is common in accounts of hallucinogenic use. 

J.R.: Right. Yes. Yeah. In general, I forget where I read this or why I [00:10:00] was even reading it, but yes, , there was all these common themes, you know, that people would meet the serpent or would meet. I think we talked about this when we were talking about Delphi last visit we went is that yeah, there's all these sort of, I guess you'd call them LSD hallucinogenic experiences, experiments where people come back saying that they met a serpent.

And , I think that's kind of a strange coincidence, you know, maybe like, cause that maybe it goes back to the subconscious, like you said. Our fear of serpents is deeply, deeply ingrained in our primitive brain, so maybe that's not such a stretch that it's a common occurrence, but there is a connection between that. Yes. 

David: Yeah, kind of facing what you fear most or something along those lines. Yeah. 

J.R.: Yeah. Sure. 

David: Yeah. So that was one aspect of what we saw. Of course, at the site of Epidaurus, another thing you saw was the staff with the snakes wrapped around it. <Right.> Because that was a symbol of Asclepius. And of course, that symbol is still used today in medicine.

It's [00:11:00] the caduceus staff. 

J.R.: Okay. So it's funny that I just had a conversation with our nephew Titus. <Okay.> And he said, That's Apollo, and I said, no, it's Asclepius, the rod of Asclepius. So we actually googled it, and there is a, distinction between the rod of Asclepius and Caduceus, or Hermes staff, and one has one snake, one has two snakes. And so the Caduceus has two snakes intertwined, and if you look on the back of an ambulance or something like that, it's one snake wrapped around a staff, so there is a distinction between the two, and they're commonly, you know, kind of mistaken for each other.

David: So which one was the one at Asclepius? 

J.R.: That was the single snake wrapped around the staff. 

David: Okay. 

J.R.: Okay. And the other one is tied to Hermes staff or the God Apollo. 

David: Okay. Well, regardless then still, you had this images of staffs with snakes wrapped around them. 

J.R.: Right. Sure. 

David: And so you and I started talking about, you know, okay, what the heck does that mean? If you think about that modern image that you see on [00:12:00] hospitals and ambulances, you're like, what's with the snakes? Why, you know? 

J.R.: Well as a kid, I saw that you'd see an ambulance. You're like, what is that all about? The staff with a snake around it? That doesn't seem like a reassuring symbol to be pulling up when you're having a heart attack, right? 

David: Yeah. 

J.R.: Hear these guys, here come the snake people, that's exactly what you want to hear when you're having a panic attack, right? 

David: Yeah, but the point is this goes back thousands of years, this idea of a staff and a snake, or multiple snakes. 

J.R.: Right. And it comes from Asclepius. It comes from, basically, it comes from Epidaurus. That's where it originated. 

David: Yeah. Some of the earliest pictures have to do with that being associated with the cult of Asclepius. And so, I don't know, I was doing some more reading when we got back. We had this conversation throughout the trip.

But it's interesting because I think we can kind of settle on the idea that the staff represents, you might say, order or facts, right? Something solid and tangible. And in larger symbolism, a staff would represent what the axis between [00:13:00] the earth and the heavenly realm also. <Right, right.> So what does the snake mean when you add the snake on there?

Well the snake represents maybe something like the opposite. So the snake might represent meaning, right? The snake represents a little bit of chaos, and that's not necessarily a bad thing. Yeah. So I did some reading, I think I sent you an article, I don't know if you read it, on the Caduceus staff, but I think that's what people really are landing on, is that it's this intersection between both medicine as established fact, but also this idea of meaning, like the snakes give meaning to it.

The snakes bring a little bit of chaos. And of course the snakes also represent, we think of snakes as well, if it bites you, , you're a goner, right? But then snake venom represents healing. 

J.R.: Yeah, there's a lot of that understanding in the ancient world is that a little bit of the venom can actually heal you.

So you have this weird juxtaposition for the very thing that can kill you. is also the, in smaller quantities, is the same thing that can [00:14:00] heal you. , because there were medicinal properties out of snake venom. 

David: And I remember us having this conversation. Okay, so who was the first person who said, Look, I think, Joe got bit by a snake and he's dead now.

But I have a theory that if you take a little bit of that poison and put it in someone, it'll help them. Like, who's the first person who would say, yeah, give me a shot at that. 

J.R.: Yeah, I think about this with all kinds of plants. You know, strange plants or mushrooms that kill you versus mushrooms that you know. Then I'm thinking, who runs around and tastes these things?

Who's the Mikey of the ancient Mikey, that's, sorry, I'm dragging that out of - that dates us right there. <Oh, sure.> Who's the Mikey of the ancient world that, you know, he'll try anything? Just give it to him, see if he makes it through the night, right? 

David: That's right. And how many people died? And so, you know, the ancient with their stone tablet was like, okay, cross that mushroom off the list. That's 

J.R.: Right, write that down. 

David: Do not eat this one, you know. 

J.R.: And then the next person up is like, [00:15:00] killed the last guy, but we're only going to give you half as much. 

David: Yeah, that's right. 

J.R.: We think this is actually going to have a benefit to you. So I don't know how this worked, the trial and error of it, but yeah. They clearly figured out the balance of it in the ancient world, and they wrote a lot of these things down. 

David: Yeah. And so they recognized that snake venom given in the right dose, could actually promote healing or work as an antibody against maybe snake bites and other things. There's one more thing that was interesting is you know, snakes will shed their skin. <Mm-hmm.>

And we have a snake around in our yard. And every spring, you know, I'll find a snakeskin somewhere and it freaks me out. So, to the ancients, that actually represented transformation and renewal. 

J.R.: Yeah, death and rebirth. 

David: Yeah, death and rebirth. So, they're like, okay, this is a creature that can renew itself, which taps into the side of healing, right?

And so, I think these are all things that we've lost a little bit. You know, the snake venom, we know that scientifically, but none of us have to deal with that on a day to day basis. That starts to kind [00:16:00] of shape why the ancients saw snakes as this dangerous creature and yet also an agent of transformation and an agent of healing, right?

J.R.: Yeah, right. Well, it helps explain why a snake is not just a random animal. Like, how come a snake and not a lion? Right, but right to your point about the shedding of the skin, the venom, then you start to kind of get an understanding of the snake represents a little bit more than just something like, oh, here's a dangerous predator or here's a dangerous animal that we want to avoid, you know. Why not a spider, right?

But there is those qualities of the snake that kind of give you those images and you can kind of see where the snake landed into that role as both sort of predator and healer. You know, it obviously has the ability to hurt you, but it has the ability to heal you as well. 

David: Right, yeah. 

J.R.: And to go back to your point about the staff, why is the snake juxtaposed to the staff?

And the staff sort of represents, to your point, the center. So we would plant a flag. The modern idea of planting a flag. This is now the [00:17:00] territory of JR. Here's my flag. I'm planting it. And so the staff represents the center of things. The new established order. The new established center. And then the snake is that chaos agent, so in a way it's sort of the yin and the yang, the chaos and order type of symbol, that it ties together as well, right? 

David: Right, and I think even the yin and the yang are representations of serpents, if I'm not mistaken. 

J.R.: Yeah, I've heard that before, which never made sense because they don't look like serpents. But I have heard the snake eating its tail. Yeah, kind of abstract. 

David: Yeah. And so you have that's another one. You have a snake eating its tail. I just got a book for Christmas and on the spine is a snake eating its tail. So I was like, Oh, there you go. 

J.R.: There it is. 

David: So point we're trying to make is there's all these ideas out there about the snake that I think In the modern world, we by and large miss. So I remember we went to the temple of Apollo on the edge of that cliff. Remember that? And I remember we were walking around. It was a [00:18:00] nice day and we had been having conversations about the serpent.

And I think we sat down. We said, I think this is it. This is what it means. Actually, that's when we recorded a video. So I'll put a link because in the video, we actually record this conversation that we had. But this idea that, okay, so if we had to summarize it then, the snake is seen as a dangerous animal. Obviously, if it bites you, you know, you're a goner, right? But then there's this idea that if you can tame it, or somehow use it as a tool, it becomes beneficial. <Right.> And then ultimately, there is this idea that the snake can actually become a protector, right? If you truly master the serpent, then it becomes your protector.

And so that's the progression we made in that conversation. 

J.R.: Well, the lightbulb moment for me was, didn't we pivot that into Medusa? 

David: Yeah, so we talked about the whole story of Medusa. 

J.R.: Yeah, because obviously the snake's for the hair. And so we were trying to figure [00:19:00] out, well, you know, is that just a scary image? Or is there something to that? So yeah, the single snake as an enemy. But then also a protector, but there was something about Medusa with the multiplicity of snakes that makes you freeze to your point about when you saw the snake on the trail, you automatically froze.

David: Yeah, exactly. So if you looked at Medusa, you turned to stone, right? And so that's exactly what that means like the snake makes you freeze if you look at it, right? And so that's exactly what that Medusa head. So yeah, we had this conversation, but let's you know, we can unpack this again, right? So that's this whole idea of the Medusa head is it's not just one snake. Which might be weird enough if that snake is on her head, but it's a multiplicity of snakes, right?

Her whole right head is covered with snakes <Right.> And so if you stare directly at it, this multiplicity of danger will just overwhelm you and you freeze, right? You turn to stone. 

J.R.: Right. And then I [00:20:00] think we were on to something. Who's the one who killed Medusa? 

David: Perseus. 

J.R.: Perseus. Okay. So, the myth goes, Perseus found a way around it and he would look into his shield <Right.> and saw a reflection of Medusa, and then he was able to cut off her head. I'm certain there's something to that. First of all, when you talk about the reflection of something in the ancient world, you're not talking about a nice mirror, like, that's hanging on your bathroom wall. Right? You're talking about polished bronze, in fact, I think he looked into his shield, right? The polished shield? 

David: Yeah, the shield was polished. The shield, I think, was given to him by one of the gods, who said, this is how you are to kill Medusa. And so you're right, if you're looking at a shield of Medusa's reflection, you're seeing a very low resolution image. <Exactly.> You're seeing that's probably blurry even if it's a highly polished metal. 

J.R.: Right. And so I think the image, or I think the message of that was when you look directly at Medusa, you see a hundred snakes on her head and you freeze. But if you lower the resolution, [00:21:00] you begin to see Medusa as a singular, maybe a singular snake or a singular enemy, but you don't see the resolution of all the snakes. All you see is the single head. And of course, that's how he knew how to swing the sword and decapitate her, right? <Right, right.> He actually aimed for the head of the snake. He didn't attack the individual snakes. He attacked the head of Medusa, the head of Medusa. And the only way you can do that is through a low resolution view. And so when you look at your problems with too much, what would it be? I guess we're going to keep using this word resolution. When you look at your problems at too high of a resolution, it will freeze you because all you see is the multiplicity of snakes, right?

And instead we need to kind of dial it back, see it as one particular problem and attack that one particular problem. And that's how you can move forward. And what beat Medusa. Beat the, 

David: Yeah. 

J.R.: Defeat the enemy, right? 

David: Yeah. I think that's right. So Medusa represents this duplicity that is overwhelming.

And you've, [00:22:00] you know, you've heard people talk about that. You may even feel this way sometimes. You go, I just have so much to do today. I don't even know where to start, right? <Right.> Well, in a way, you're looking at a Medusa head, right? You're looking at this multiplicity of snakes, of problems, and you are so frozen you don't even know where to start.

Well, the moral of that image of using the shield to look at a lower resolution is just to say, Alright, where can you start, right? Just do the next thing. Attack that one. <Right.> And once you've done that, what's next? And suddenly they all start to fall in line and you, you know, lop the whole head off Medusa.

J.R.: Yeah. I can't tell you how many times I've done this. I've woken up on a Saturday with in my mind, a hundred things to do. And you're like, you know, somebody will call and say, Hey, do you want to, whatever you want to meet up for coffee? And the answer is absolutely not. I've got a million things to do. I just don't have time to do it. 

And then you start picking away at it. It's like, okay, this is checked off. This is [00:23:00] checked off. And it always surprises me by whatever one o'clock I'm like, wow, I'm done. I thought I had three days worth of work to get done today. And I just tackled it one at a time. And, you know, it turns out by the afternoon, I could have met that person for coffee, right?

<Yeah, yeah.> But when you get overwhelmed by everything at one time, that's not the way to look at anything. That's the definition of anxiety. It's like there's too many things coming at you that you freeze and you can't do any of them, right?

<Right.> And so yes, the message of Medusa is tackle them one at a time. But there does seem to be that connection. Medusa represents the multiplicity of adversaries versus the single controlled serpent of Asclepius. The single snake wrapped around the staff, the center point, right? <Right.> And now that image starts to make a little bit more sense of why we see it in the medicinal fields.

David: Yeah, that's right. And okay, so here's another interesting thing, and this is going to be a little sneak peek into our next series on [00:24:00] fairy tales. So in preparation for this, we've, I've said this before, we've been reading through some of the Grimm's fairy tales. Okay, so the one I read just yesterday, it's a really short one, so I'll just say it real quick.

Alright, so the one I read yesterday was called, like The Girl and the Snake. And it says, this mother would feed, and of course Grimm's fairy tales go back hundreds of years. So these aren't modern things, neither are they ancient myths. So, the myth goes that the mother feeds this child her lunch every day, and she gives her a bowl of milk and some bread.

Well, when the mother goes off to do chores, the snake comes out of a hole. And so I'm immediately paying attention. I'm like, okay, where's this going now, right? 

J.R.: Yeah, here we go. 

David: So the snake comes out of the hole and drinks the milk, and the child tries to feed it some bread, and it doesn't want bread, but it likes the milk.

So, every day, the snake comes out of the hole, and the child lets the snake drink the milk. Well, then one day, the mother comes back early or [00:25:00] something, so she gives her child the bread and the milk. And she turns around, and she sees the snake at the milk bowl. Well, in her panic, she grabs something heavy and smashes the snake.

Kind of like what you would do if you saw one in your yard, right? 

J.R.: Yeah. So far, I'm tracking with the mom. 

David: Yeah. Okay. So, here's where the fairytale gets interesting. So the mom kills the snake, and the child was sad, but then it said the child after the snake was dead, grew weaker and weaker until her daughter died.

And that was the end. 

J.R.: Oh wow, that's interesting. 

David: And I was like, oh yeah, that was my reaction. I was like, oh wow, that's really interesting. 

J.R.: Yeah, that's an image of the devouring mother, right? The image of the parent, we'll just say the parent that tries to protect their children from every possible calamity in life actually weakens the child.

Wait, is that what you get out of that? 

David: Yeah, well, that's part of it. The other one is that the snake had actually become the protector of the child. And the mother failed to realize that. [00:26:00] <Right.> So when the mother killed the protector, the child actually died. 

J.R.: Yeah, I think that's exactly right. 

David: And you're right, because I was thinking about this as I took the dog for a walk. You know, that, yeah, the mother, there was something the mother didn't recognize was happening. And maybe it was trying to overly protect her child from danger. You know, maybe it was not recognizing, I don't know, some gift that her child had.

But the message is that the mother squashed that. And when she squashed that, she basically killed her child as well. 

J.R.: Well, it's funny because when I heard the story immediately, I still see the snake as a negative thing. <Sure.> Right, you know, not, I realize it's a fairy tale, so I didn't see it as a typical poisonous snake.

But I still said, yeah, the mother is trying to protect the child from all the problems. But you're exactly right. I think the snake itself was the protector. And that goes back to my negative view of all serpents, that any time I see a serpent symbolized in a story, it's always going to be immediately negative.

David: Yeah. 

J.R.: Yeah. [00:27:00]

David: I had the same reaction because there was another short story right after that about another snake and I won't tell it, but yeah, I first, as soon as I see, okay, the snake comes out of the hole and goes to the bowl of milk. My first reaction is, you know, someone get a shovel kill that thing, you know? 

J.R.: Yeah, here we go This isn't good. 

David: But it's interesting because the more I read about this the more we talk about it I'm not sure the ancients would have seen it that way. 

J.R.: No, I don't think they did. And so at least saw the dual nature of it. 

David: Yeah, they saw the dual nature of it.

So this led us then into: okay well, let's think about all the times that you see snakes in the Bible. Because you see a snake in the Bible, and like we said at the beginning, your first reaction is, okay, well that represents the devil, and so nothing good ever happens, right, when a snake enters the picture.

J.R.: Sure. Well, our first introduction is the Garden of Eden, so, you know, that's where we launch our negative view of snakes. But the interesting thing is, the more we talked about it, moving forward, snakes don't seem to have this completely evil persona throughout the rest of the Bible. 

David: [00:28:00] No, it's kind of a mixed bag. It's that dual nature. It's that dual nature. Yeah. 

J.R.: Yeah, exactly. 

David: And so yeah. So we start in the Garden of Eden and the common image is that the snake or the serpent tempted Eve, right? And it doesn't say that the snake is the devil, but it came to be associated with the devil. 

J.R.: Yeah, we don't get that information until Revelation.

David: Yeah, it kind of puts it all together. I was just reading a book that tried to, I don't know, point out the obvious, which is like, well, it never says that was the devil. And I'm like, yeah, that's why you've got to look at all of scripture, right? 

J.R.: Right. Exactly. It does pretty clearly say that in the New Testament. But the strange thing is, before the New Testament came along, to that person's point, in the Old Testament, it really doesn't spell it out for you. 

David: Right. But I believe there was still that tradition though, that people said, yes, this is obviously, you know, Satan, the devil. Whether those are multiple beings or one being, like, that's what was recognized there as the tempter, right?

J.R.: Yes, that's right. 

David: So, one of the first things you have to [00:29:00] understand when the Bible talks about a snake or a serpent is, it's not, well, sometimes it's clear what it means, but other times it's not actually clear what it's saying. And especially in this story in Genesis, because one of the things that happens is when God curses the serpent, right, it is cursed to crawl upon the ground, which kind of gives you the image that before it may have stood upright. 

J.R.: Yeah, I've even heard commentaries that imply that who knows, it may have had wings. It may have been able to fly. 

David: Right, yeah. Yeah. And we'll kind of tie all this together. We won't get into this right now, but that's just to say that when the Bible talks about a serpent, it's maybe not necessarily talking about just, you know, the garden snake out in your yard.

J.R.: Right. Our common understanding of snakes. 

David: Yeah, which is what we picture. But maybe there's something more going on and we're gonna unpack that as we continue to talk about serpents in the Bible. So that's the first instance. Well, the second one, or the next [00:30:00] couple ones are pretty easy to come up with because Moses interacts with serpents.

J.R.: Right. Well, we talked about this, you know, obviously you have the, staff that he throws down in front of Pharaoh, and it turns into a serpent, and he picks the staff back up. And so immediately we're like, okay, so here's another image of a snake, not really wrapped around a staff, but a snake turning into a staff and vice versa. But you have that snake staff duality.

One is a, what I don't know, a tool. to help you walk to, you know, to use as a shepherd's hook, however you want to use it, is this straight, solid flag that could be planted as the center. And then you cast it on the ground, and it turns into this, well, again, our contemporary reading is that it turns into a dangerous serpent.

David: Right. And so what's interesting about that story is when God tells Moses, You're to throw the staff down and in front of Pharaoh, it'll turn into serpent, right? So when [00:31:00] it's actually Aaron's staff, I went back and reread this, Exodus 7, if you're interested in the story. So Aaron throws his staff down when Moses commands him to do so and it turns into a serpent.

Well, then what's interesting is that Pharaoh calls his magicians and they're actually able to replicate this. <Right.> Now, if someone threw their staff down, and it turned into a snake, that'd be pretty impressive to me, right? I remember this walking, I love this walking stick that I got in North Carolina at one of my trips up at the cabin.

But, you know, if I was like, Jay, watch this. And I threw that stick down and it turned into a serpent, you'd probably be pretty impressed, right? 

J.R.: Yeah, absolutely. 

David: Yeah, so what's funny about this story is, it's like Pharaoh says, yeah, my magicians can do that. And then next thing you know, well, Exodus 7:12 says "Each one of them threw their staff down and it became a snake. But Aaron's staff then swallowed up their staffs." Now that's where kind of this comes to the [00:32:00] next level, right? And so what does that mean? 

J.R.: Yeah, well, I mean, so we were talking about this, you know, especially the dual nature of the serpent. Well, it's almost like it's saying Aaron or Aaron and Moses's understanding of the serpent is superior to the pharaoh or the Egyptians understanding and dual use of the serpent. Right? Does that make any sense? 

David: Yeah. Yeah. 

J.R.: I mean, I could be wrong on that, but.

David: Yeah, so the staff, you see this duality between the staff and the snake, and it's kind of that same thing. It's kind of like that image of Asclepius wrapped into one thing, right? <Right.> It can morph into the other. And so, yeah, there was this, well, we talk about the ability to utilize the snake as a tool, so I think that's one thing that's going on, right? And apparently this was something that Pharaoh's magicians had the ability to do, is to use the snake as a tool.

J.R.: Right. Well, again, it's this mythic language that, when you have a better understanding [00:33:00] of the mythic language and the way that this is spoken, this story actually makes sense. Cause I remember as a kid hearing, well, okay, Moses can throw down the staff and it turned into a snake because , that's a miracle, right? That's God's on his side. 

But when the Egyptians can do it, you're like, well, what in the world is that? Right? 

David: Right. That always threw me for a loop. 

J.R.: Demonic? Right. Yeah. But I think when you understand it as a mythic expression of we have a tool and it can either be used as a tool or it can be seen as something dangerous, right, I think you're right. It's almost like it's saying, yeah, the Egyptians understood the proper way to use a snake either as a tool or as an instrument of, or something dangerous, right? 

David: Yeah, and of course, I think the cobra is sacred in Egypt, and that's another place we went a while ago, and you see the cobra image everywhere.

And so they had clearly had this, what we might say, the mastery over this dual nature of the serpent. <Right. Right.> The other thing I think that, that [00:34:00] story is saying is, you know, so Aaron's staff eats. And it's interesting because the Bible actually said Aaron's staff swallowed up their staffs. It doesn't call it a snake. But the staff, again, is a symbol of authority. 

J.R.: Well, yeah, that's interesting. 

David: Right? So it's like Moses authority just trumped Pharaoh's, and I think that's exactly how Pharaoh would have seen that. It's like, hey, my magicians can do that, and they do it. They throw their staffs down, it becomes a snake. And then Aaron's staff swallows the others.

I think Pharaoh would go, Oh crap, I'm not dealing with a lightweight here. I'm dealing with someone who's also had mastery over this dual nature, right? But also whose authority, at least on the surface, appears greater than mine. 

J.R.: Yeah, it's almost like an image, yes, the image of the higher authority. <Yeah, yeah.>

 Well, we've said this before. It's that idea of we just get hung up on the, again, the literal interpretation, the literal understanding of the literal staff thrown on the ground and a literal [00:35:00]snake, right?

Right. And so we get hung up on the idea of just like I said, well, how did the Egyptians magicians do that? Right. And, again, I think you're missing the symbolism of it. And when you talk about authority and you talk about the staff being a tool and the serpent having a dual nature, we miss all that symbolism because we're hung up on, well, wait a second, how did they turn it into snakes? And I never even realized how do staffs eat each other, right? That's the first time you've said that, or that I've understood that the Bible says Aaron's staff ate the other staffs. It's like, well, how did that happen, right? <Right.> But when it's described as a staff, you're right, you see it as authority. One person's authority trumps all the other Egyptians authorities.

David: Yeah, I think that's right. And, you know, I've heard people, I heard this one guy, one time said, well, there is a type of snake that gets really stiff if you grab its tail and it might be possible. Right. And, you know, we've all gone down these trails of, in our modern mindset, [00:36:00] try to rationalize how this could happen.

But I think one of the things, well, one of the things we try and do on this podcast and say, if you go too far down that trail, you're missing the point of what they're actually trying to tell you. 

J.R.: Yes, exactly. 

David: You know, may have happened. It may be symbolic. Look, God can do anything but I think one of the things we keep coming back to is if you get too hung up on those things, you miss the point of what it's trying to say, why the Bible talked about this incident the way it does.

J.R.: Right. Yeah. Either way, if it was literal, then I can promise you that the Egyptians weren't thinking, well, how'd they turn into a snake and how'd that step? They, they recognized the symbolism of what was happening right in front of them. 

David: Yes. Yes. And certainly it got Pharaoh's attention.

And look, the rest of the plagues of Egypt are all about Moses God triumphing over Pharaoh's gods, little g's, multiplicity.

J.R.: Right, the Egyptian gods, right, that's right. 

David: Yeah, and so this is just a precursor to all that. [00:37:00] And it's almost a way to say, introduce them all to say, look, at the very beginning, Moses's authority trumps your authority, Pharaoh. But if you're gonna go down this road, then okay, so be it, right?

J.R.: Right, exactly. So we have this image of, this is not the first image of the serpent, but certainly the first image of the serpent and the staff. <Right.> And then we move on to, what, Moses in the wilderness, and we have another weird image of the serpent and the staff. 

David: That image becomes materialized in a literal staff with a bronze serpent in the wilderness. <Right.> Right? And so there's all kinds of symbolism there. 

 So when Moses leads the children of Israel out of Egypt, they get bit by snakes. And one of the things that God tells Moses to do in order to stop this plague of snakes, of course, again, here's the snakes, right? <Right.> Is he says, put your staff in the ground and make a bronze serpent and put it on the staff and people are to come up and look at the staff and they will be healed.

J.R.: [00:38:00] Right. 

David: Now, I've heard other people talk about this too, but, you know, man, you read that and you go, Okay, what the heck's going on here? But there's a couple of images right off the bat and then I'll get your thoughts. The image of a staff and a serpent is actually Pharaoh's authority. So I've read this idea that, okay, somehow Moses, it's almost like Moses has taken Pharaoh's authority from him and it's now in the hands of Yahweh.

J.R.: Okay. Yeah.

David: Might be one way to read that, right? 

J.R.: Right. 

David: And of course, the other way to read that is the serpent on the staff. We go back to the caduceus, right? We go back to the healing, symbol, <Right.> that a serpent and a staff represents. 

J.R.: Right. Well, the snakes that entered the camp were obviously a threat. It was killing people. And then the interesting thing about that story is, well, first of all, again, As someone who grew up in the church, I see the bronze serpent and I'm thinking, well, that looks a lot like an idol. So that's the image that pops in my head right away. So this is usually a problem, right?

You know, you [00:39:00] don't fashion images and now it doesn't say worship it in fairness, it does say to look on it. But it is this strange idea of, okay, it feels a little bit like an idol and you're going to lift it up. 

But then the strange thing is not that if you look on the bronze serpent, suddenly the snakes stop biting you. It's that the snakes won't kill you. <Right.> That's an interesting distinction. <Yeah.> Right, that when they bite you, you won't die. And so you're thinking you know, again, as a kid, I would read this or I would hear this story and I'm thinking, well, I would rather the snake not bite me at all, right? I would rather have protection from the snakes completely or make the snakes disappear out of the camp. Right, but that's not what it is, because that's not the image that it's trying to communicate. It was that when the snakes bite you, they wouldn't kill you.

And so, again, we go back to this dual understanding of, you do have the snakes, they're dangerous, but if you look on the bronze serpent, then they become what, they don't become dangerous anymore, or at least they don't become mortal. 

David: Well, just as you were saying that, this is [00:40:00] interesting. I was thinking, this sounds an awful lot like The Medusa problem, right? You have a multiplicity of snakes and it's overwhelming, right? People are dying. <Yeah. Yeah.> And Moses puts this object, God tells Moses to put this object, that suddenly becomes the singular focus. And it's almost, there's a hint of that. I'm not saying, you know, okay, this is the right interpretation. But there is a hint of that idea of, take your eyes off the multiplicity of snakes in the camp and focus on this. And somehow that will bring about healing. 

J.R.: No, I think you're onto something. Well, at the very least, the multiplicity of snakes are not gone. Your problems aren't gone, but they don't inflict the mortal wound that they used to inflict, right? <Right.> No, I think you're onto something. Well, look, a lot of these things have dual meanings, or layered meanings, right?

David: Yeah, sure, layers of meanings, yeah. 

J.R.: There's more than one way to understand it, so I think you've peeled back a pretty deep layer. That's interesting. I haven't thought about that one. 

David: And then, of course, you have the interpretation that we've [00:41:00] heard others talk about, is this idea of, you know, looking upon a snake means that you are having to face your problem head on, right?

And maybe you even layer that into the whole idea of the Medusa problem it's like, no quit looking man I like that quit looking at the multiplicity of problems and being overwhelmed by it and focus in on one; focus in on the key thing you can do right now It's something like that. Yeah. 

J.R.: Oh, yeah. Listen, we know people that treat all the problems in their lives like whack a mole. You know, they're trying to tackle this problem in that problem. And if you can step away from it sometimes, you know that guy or that girl that when you step away from the chaos of their lives you can see it as, look man.

 You don't have a problem with the third and fourth and fifth DUI. You don't have a problem with, you don't have a multiplicity of problems. You have one simple problem. You don't know how to treat alcohol properly. You don't know how to, you know what I mean? you see what I'm [00:42:00]saying?

It's like, I see this a lot of times where somebody will say, oh man, this is going wrong in my life and this is going wrong in my life. And when you hear them all tied together, a lot of times I look at it and say, well, yeah, you just need to get your act together. There's a couple simple things that you could do that would erase a dozen of the problems that you just explained to me. 

David: Yeah, that's right. Yeah, and you're not getting to the root of the problem, and that's why it continues to be. 

J.R.: That's what I'm trying to say, yes. 

David: Okay, so this is interesting because Mark Manson, I think you and I both read a couple of his books. Mark Manson calls this the VCR problem. Which is this idea that the VCR looks very complicated. For those of you who are younger, that's how we used to stream movies. 

J.R.: I know. Yeah, you lost half our audience. 

David: Yeah, they're like, what? So anyway, a VCR looks like a complicated piece of equipment, right? And he talks about this story about how one day his parents VCR was broken and they're like, well, it's been broken. I don't know. We'll have to buy a new one. So he takes it apart. So when he takes it apart, he actually sees [00:43:00] that it's a very simple mechanism. And I don't know, you're more like this than I am. And so he fixes it, right? And so, he calls issues like this the VCR problem, because he's like, it looks like a very complicated problem, and people just throw their hands up.

And he's like, if you can help people see, like, no, here's the issue right here. Fix this, and everything else works. Like, that's the singularity of focus, right? That's, look at the serpent on the staff. And quit looking at the duplicity of problems all in the periphery, right? 

J.R.: Right, yeah, I think you're right.

Well, it's sort of like a vehicle, a vehicle like has a million moving parts and, you know, all kinds of things can go wrong with a car, but many times, you know, you pop the hood and you do a little poking around and you're like, Hey, why is this hose not connected? Or why is this wire just hanging loose?

This looks like a problem, right? And you're right. It's kind of a comparison to the VCR problem? <Yeah. Yeah.> But yeah, you're focusing on the wrong thing because you're looking at all the things on a car that could go wrong. You're [00:44:00] like, oh, I'll never figure this out. Yeah. But if you actually look under the hood a little bit, you can say, oh, here's something that certainly doesn't look right, and I may not be in a mechanic, but it's certainly gonna at least point me in the right direction.

David: Right. You can be overwhelmed by that, but with just a little bit of knowledge, you can actually narrow something down to only a handful of things. 

J.R.: Yeah. Right. Yeah, I think, that's probably right. 

David: And so it's something like that that's trying to be communicated in the ancient way. Anyway, there's a lot of different ways to interpret this idea of the bronze serpent on the staff.

But it is interesting that, A, it's the same thing as the staff of Ascelpius, and B, it's the same thing as the symbol of Pharaoh's authority. <Yeah.> Pharaoh literally carried around a staff with a cobra head on it. <Right.> A bronze cobra head, right? And so, I don't know, there's a lot going on in that image of the serpent in the wilderness.

J.R.: Okay. So also in the New Testament, it refers back to this verse, right? Something about the <Yeah, that's right.> Yeah, Moses lifting up the serpent in [00:45:00] the wilderness, even, what is it, even so the Son of Man should be lifted up. So it's a reference to Jesus on the cross, maybe. How do we make that connection then?

David: Yeah, well, given what we just said, I think you could say, well, a simplistic view would just be to say that, look, if you put your focus on Christ, then this duplicity of problems in your life will not necessarily go away, but will subside. It's that singularity of focus again. <Right.> And of course you have, you know, Christ's sacrifice on the cross.

There's definitely that meaning as well. But it's that idea of the symbol of, so that's really interesting. So they compare Christ on the cross to the bronze, serpent, the wilderness on the staff. 

J.R.: Right. Which right away it makes you say, okay, the serpent is clearly not all evil throughout the Bible, right?

David: Yeah, that's right. . So it kind of squashes that idea of, that the serpent everywhere in the Bible is evil and the devil. They're actually comparing Christ to the bronze serpent. And that brings in this idea of healing. Christ [00:46:00] on the cross, is that a veiled symbol of the staff that heals, right?

J.R.: Yeah, sure. Well, I also like the idea of, sort of like what we said, Jesus is the answer. Like, if you focus on Christ on the cross, that answers a multiplicity of other problems. Right, I mean, as opposed to, like you said, focusing on the individual snakes that are biting the people in the camp, focus on Christ on the cross.

So yeah, it goes back to the whole Sunday School answer. If you don't know the answer, you just say Jesus. And so this story kind of solidifies that idea. That's where it comes from, right? That's right. The answer is always Jesus. 

David: Well, and of course, that's the whole thing about the Sermon on the Mount, where Jesus says, Seek first the kingdom of God, right? That's the singularity of focus. <Yeah.> And all these other issues that you're having will be taken care of as well. 

J.R.: Yeah, I know. I think you're right. And like we said earlier, there are layers to this analogy. So I'm not saying that this is the be all end all of what this represents. <Yeah.> Certainly, I think an aspect [00:47:00] of it is exactly what you said. Jesus is the singular focus that we should be putting our eyes on instead of worrying with, well, let's compare this to the problems that the Pharisees had.

They're pointing out all these, what, hundreds and hundreds of laws. Don't do this on the Sabbath. And, you know, you can't do this. You know, all the Levitical laws that kind of expanded out and now you have this group of Pharisees that all they do is keep up and codify all the multiplicity of laws that mean you're a holy person, right?

<Yeah.> And it's almost like they're saying, yep, stop worrying about that, focus on the bronze serpent lifted up, focus on Christ on the cross, and that answers all those other issues the multiplicity of issues that we actually, ironically, that we create in our own life in traditional religion. 

David: Yeah, well, I like that idea of focus on Christ on the cross. And you might say, well, practically what does that mean? And I think that's where the Sermon on the Mount helps to say, seek first the [00:48:00] kingdom of God. And you could, again, say, well, what does that mean? And well, to use your example, you know, you said you were overwhelmed one day, and what would it mean to seek first the kingdom of God on that day? It probably would have meant having coffee with that person who wanted to have coffee with you. Right? 

J.R.: That's exactly right. Yes, you're right. 

David: And so it's that, it's things like that to get really, really practical. 

J.R.: Yeah, and let all these other things shake out, and when you have time, tackle them. But don't exclude personal relationships at the exclusion of all that your little to do list that you have for today.

David: Right, yeah. 

J.R.: Right, that's certainly one aspect of seeking first the kingdom of God. 

David: Wow. There's a lot packed into that image. 

J.R.: I know. Well, we're already off the reservation a little bit. 

David: Yeah, we are .

J.R.: So how do we bring the, unless we wanna do a four hour episode how do we bring this back? 

David: Yeah, well, let's, let's move on to Isaiah then, because Isaiah chapter six <Okay.> is Isaiah's commissioning, and in fact, let's just listen to this. Let's just listen to verses one through seven and then [00:49:00] we'll talk about it. 

AI Winston: " In the year that King Uzziah died, I saw the Lord, high and exalted, seated on a throne, and the train of his robe filled the temple. Above him were seraphim, each with six wings, with two wings they covered their faces, with two they covered their feet. And with two they were flying. And they were calling to one another.

Holy, holy, holy is the lord almighty. The whole earth is full of his glory. At the sound of their voices the doorposts and thresholds shook and the temple was filled with smoke. Woe to me. I cried, I am ruined, for I am a man of unclean lips, and I live among a people of unclean lips, and my eyes have seen the King, the Lord Almighty.

Then one of the seraphim flew to me with a live coal in his hand, which he had taken with tongs from the altar. With it he touched my mouth and said, See, [00:50:00] this has touched your lips, your guilt is taken away and your sin atoned for."

J.R.: Yeah. Don't you love AI? 

David: Yeah. Right. We talk about it in other episodes. 

J.R.: That's the second time we've used this guy. And of course, you know, yeah. 

David: And I got to say, for some reason, everything sounds better in a British accent.

J.R.: Oh, yeah. I sent you a few samples of what this would sound like, and you were immediately, no, go with the English guy. 

David: Go with the English guy. 

J.R.: It just adds a whole new level of validity than if you or I were saying it. 

David: Yeah, that's right. Yeah, no one wants to hear me in my southern accent read Isaiah chapter 6. 

J.R.: You don't have a southern accent. 

David: Ah, it's, yeah, I lost a little bit of it in the Midwest, but yeah, you're right. 

J.R.: Yeah. Anyway. Well, trust me. I live in Tennessee. I hear the southern accents. You don't have it. 

David: Okay. 

J.R.: We probably have a touch of it. I don't know. But, in any case. Yes. Right. 

David: Isaiah chapter 6. Yeah, so what's interesting in this is Isaiah has this vision and it's the calling of Isaiah. Probably familiar with it. But I want to point out a couple of things in here. You say, what has this got to do with [00:51:00] snakes, right?

 I didn't see one snake in this. Well, in verse 2 it says, "Above him were seraphim, each with six wings, two wings covered their face, two covered their feet, and two were flying." Now what is a seraphim? So a seraphim is, first of all, seraphim is the plural of just a seraph. And a seraph is apparently, according to the Bible, this angelic creature, right?

And it's the same thing as a cherubim. In Revelation you see the seraphim and the cherubim. <Mm hmm.> And we think of a cherub on the Hallmark card, you know, the fat little baby with wings. 

J.R.: Yeah, fat baby angel, right. 

David: That's not at all what a cherub was, right? So, cherubim and seraphim. Well, it's kind of this type of spiritual being, let's say.

But people aren't quite sure what it is, except for the descriptions given of it. What's interesting is the root word, seraph, could either mean something like a flaming being. But it could also refer to a serpent being.

J.R.: Oh, okay. So that's interesting. 

David: [00:52:00] Okay, so what I want to pull out here is this idea. So we have this idea of a seraphim, and it's a flying seraphim, right? So it's something like a serpent with wings, and then it grabs a coal. So it's this idea of fire. It's also embedded in that word seraph. He grabs a coal and he touches it to Isaiah's lips, right? And so it's this idea of a, flying serpent that works with fire, right? Now, I think that's really interesting.

J.R.: Yeah, well, it goes back to the serpent being cursed to crawl on the ground. And I think I mentioned that one of the possibilities was that they used to be able to fly. <Right.> Again, you know, don't get too hung up on the literal here. <Right.> But, yes, that a flying serpent used to be the proper, What the proper understanding of the serpent, perhaps in the spiritual realm or something.

David: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. 

J.R.: In the garden, right? 

David: Yeah. So there's an interesting connection there because a seraph also is a throne guardian. Okay, [00:53:00] there's all kinds of connections here. So that's what a seraph is, a throne guardian, and that's what the seraph here is doing. It's guarding the throne of God, right?

So you have this idea of a serpent acting as a guardian, okay? So we've just talked, we've already talked about that. <Sure, okay.> So it's the serpent as the guardian, and then you have this idea of Satan, who in some traditions was a throne guardian. <Right.> Right? Who fell from heaven because he led a rebellion.

And so you have this idea of what if the serpent in the garden was actually a seraph? <Okay, yeah.> So it's this serpent with wings, right? Again, we don't know what exactly that looks like. <Right, right.> And so I think there's an interesting connection there. 

J.R.: And that's tying together a lot of the loose threads that we've been talking about. 

David: Yeah, that's right. That's right. It's getting beyond just our image of you know, the garden snake, right? 

J.R.: Sure. Sure. 

David: And maybe the serpent the garden is much more than we realize in our literal readings of things. 

J.R.: Well [00:54:00] certainly more complex than simply being a symbol of Satan, right? If Satan, you know, we all kind of understand that Satan was once an angel and cast out of heaven.

But if we recognize that perhaps Satan was one of these seraph or throne guardians, or what? Fiery flying serpent, angelic being, right? Now we can understand why the image of the actual snake being cursed to crawl on its belly why that image actually has meaning beyond. 

David: Why that's, yeah, almost why that's so demeaning to a creature like that, right?

J.R.: Right. Well, and this may be a little bit of a rabbit trail. I have always wondered why the serpent got cursed at all. Now I understand why you would curse Satan, but what about all snakes? You know what I mean? Like we're supposed to look to Adam and say, Oh, it would have been this perfect world had not Adam not eaten, right? You know, and all women look to Eve, you know, and I guess all snakes are supposed to look [00:55:00] to Satan and say, why did you mess it with you? We used to fly, man. We used to have wings dog and you messed it all up. Now we got to crawl around and yeah, deal with shovels and yeah, that's right.

But you're right. It kind of never made sense of why curse the serpent as some sort of symbol of what Satan did. But it does help tie together some, like I said, some loose threads about, okay, now if Satan was a angelic being and not just an angelic being, but this kind of fiery serpent image, then the cursing of the serpent in the garden now kind of at least has some symbolic meaning behind it.

David: Yeah. And the idea may be that, a literal snake is maybe a low resolution image of something much greater. Like we've already talked about that, you know, there's all this imagery tied together with just a snake. And so here's another layer of, you know, I think you asked an interesting question.

It's like, well, why did God curse snakes? Like snakes didn't do anything. Well, but this idea that the [00:56:00] snake represents something much greater than just the snake, right? <Right.> And this is one of them, right? It represents kind of this, maybe, let's say this material manifestation of this kind of spiritual being that is a throne guardian right?

That, the snake is supposed to evoke that, if you know all the imagery associated with it. 

J.R.: Yeah, yeah. Well, it just disconnects this complete negativity that we have with the snakes, and you understand now, okay, if that, pattern holds true, then you can start to see at least the snake as sort of this dual nature.

In one sense, it's a guardian of the throne of heaven, and then in another sense, it's also, embodied by Satan as, evil incarnate, right? <Right.> But yeah, so we do have a little bit better understanding of the dual nature. 

David: Yeah. 

J.R.: Of the serpent in the Bible, right? 

David: And the last thing I'd point out is when I read these images of Okay, you have a serpent with wings and fire, like, what image does that evoke? It evokes the image of a dragon. [00:57:00]

J.R.: Oh, yeah, I was just about to say, yeah, I was on the tip of my tongue, I was about to say, well, a fire breathing serpent is definitely a dragon. 

David: That's right. That's exactly what that is, right? And so it's interesting that you have, why is the dragon such a pervasive image? 

J.R.: Right, all through history. 

David: All through history, right? You have this image of the dragon, and it's like, well, Maybe it's a pattern of something that exists in the spiritual realm, right? <Sure.> And so that's another layer to this usage of the serpent throughout the Bible, is because snake, serpent, dragon, it's all kind of describing something similar, right?

J.R.: Yeah. I'd say that's right. Well, the dragon even in storytelling is not all bad because it's always protecting the treasure. 

David: Right. The dragon is usually acting as a protector. Yeah. 

J.R.: Right. Yeah. There's that protector imagery again. <Yeah, that's right.> But a protector of the treasure and if you want to get to the treasure you have to figure out how to overcome the dragon.

<Right.> Okay. Well, lots of things. You're right. It's hard to tie everything together perfectly and I don't think we're meant to. You [00:58:00] know, again, because this layered understanding of images. It definitely is helping me understand clearer that the snake in the Bible it should not always be seen as evil or Satan or, you know what I mean? There's definitely a dual nature to it. 

David: There's a lot more going on. Yeah. <Yeah. Okay.> I think last fall, I want to say, I hate to even bring it up, but I want to say Joy Behar was making fun of Joe Rogan because Joe Rogan said he believed in dragons. 

J.R.: Yeah. Yeah, memes out there about that. 

David: Yeah, yeah, she was like mocking him, you know, How silly can you be?

And my first thought was man, you don't understand symbolism and imagery at all you know, if you're taking that the way you're taking it and making fun of someone because they say, Oh, you know, he believes in dragons. I'm like, well, I believe in dragons, so. 

J.R.: Yeah, I was about to say the fool is the one who doesn't understand what the dragon represents.

David: Right. Exactly. Yeah. 

J.R.: Yeah. No, I think you're exactly right. 

David: All right. So let's move on to the New Testament then. And we have a couple here. [00:59:00]So this one that occurred to me on one of my runs, right? So Mark 16, here's what you need to know about Mark's chapter 16 is the last part, I think Mark 16 is the last chapter of Mark, and the last part of that chapter has some weird stuff in it, right? And so in your Bible, a lot of times it will say Mark 16, through like 9 through 20 is a later edition, right?

I don't know if you've seen that? But a lot of Bibles will have it.

J.R.: What's it speak about yeah, it's not familiar. I'm not familiar with the passage. 

David: Okay Well, we'll get to that in a minute. But 

J.R.: okay 

David: in the earliest copies of Mark, these verses aren't in there and then later they are in there to a point where even academics are like, yeah, I don't know if this is original to Mark. Besides there's some weird things going on in here, so, you know.

J.R.: Right, might have been added later. 

David: Might have been added later. So anyway, I was thinking about that because I was looking up references of serpents. So, Mark chapter 16 says this, "And these signs will accompany those who [01:00:00] believe. In my name, they will drive out demons. They will speak in new tongues. And they will pick up snakes with their hands. And when they drink deadly poison, it will not hurt them at all. They will place their hands on sick people, and they will get well." Okay, so you can kind of see why people are like, Ah, that's some weird stuff going on, right? They drink poison, they can handle snakes. 

J.R.: This is Jesus speaking, right?

David: Yeah, supposedly, yeah. Yeah . This is supposedly Jesus to send off to his disciples, right? 

J.R.: Right, yeah. This is one of those really weird verses for those of us who grew up in traditional evangelical households, right? Yeah. What, the speaking in tongues, the handling snakes, right? Yeah. I'm assuming this is where we get the kind of modern snake handling of, charismatic denominations, right?

David: Yeah, so this launched, especially in the 70s, I think, there were literal break offs, cults, you could say, that they focused on snake handling. And I remember even stories of, like, people would get bit and have to go to a hospital. 

J.R.: Yeah, yeah, that's right. 

David: And they're like, well, it's said in the Bible.

J.R.: Yeah, it is [01:01:00] kind of interesting, I didn't realize this verse was such a clear implication of the connection with tongues and healing and snake handling and all of those things sort of tie into the more charismatic denominations, you're right. 

David: Yeah, so I was thinking about this because it crossed my mind and I was like, okay.

What's going on here? Whether it's a later edition or not, right? So what's going on here? So it's like, okay, you'll drive out demons. Okay, you'll handle snakes with their hands. Okay? Think how we've been talking about snakes then. What does it mean to handle a snake? It means you're getting mastery over something that could have been harmful, right?

J.R.: Okay? Yeah. 

David: Okay. And then this idea of drink poison. So there's again something that could harm you, right? But if taken in the right dose, it actually heals you. So I don't know. I was just thinking about I wonder if this actually makes more sense, you know again, don't take it literally.

That's how people got bit by snakes, right? But what if it's more of this idea of [01:02:00] I am going to give you mastery over what over a spiritual realm? Over things in the world that can hurt you, but I'm going to give them to you as tools to use to further the kingdom? <Yeah.> I don't know. What do you think of that?

J.R.: Well, I also kind of think it's sort of Jesus calling us back to the wilderness in Exodus, right? I think there's something a little bit more to it. But it's also sort of, yeah, it's calling back to that wilderness experience, which obviously we've talked about that and kind of, I don't know, calling us back to that, to what focusing your eyes on the bronze serpent and the snakes will bite you and we won't get hurt.

Well, that's kind of what Mark is saying, or what this addition to Mark is clearly saying. But you're, you are right, but understanding that mastery or understanding the duality of the snake, a duality of the serpent and understanding mastering it is actually part of mastering it is, what, handling them and even drinking a portion of the poison for [01:03:00] benefit as opposed to obviously yeah dying from it, right?

David: Yeah, I think that's interesting. I think it's a good point.

J.R.: I think there's something there too. 

David: I think there's almost a link between the imagery of: you will drive demons out. You will handle snakes, you'll drink poison. All that is almost saying the same thing, right? And it's this idea of mastering a spiritual realm that is initially dangerous towards you but if you know how to handle things, it won't harm you, right? 

J.R.: No, I think, I don't know. Yeah, I really do kind of think you're onto something with that. The drive out demons, again, it's hard to not read this in a traditional, let's just say, evangelical reading of driving out demons and speaking in tongues.

But if you kind of parse it a little bit, driving out demons, you'll speak in new tongues. In other words, you'll speak in unknown language or speak in a new language. Right? You'll pick up that which can harm you with your bare hands. You'll even drink the deadly poison and it won't hurt you. And then placing your hands on sick [01:04:00] people, you know, you tie that into Epidaurus and you tie that into the healing center and tie that into Asclepius. And yeah, you've got a really strange connection where all those elements we saw all those elements in antiquity, right. And it is kind of tying together an idea of facing the demon. Facing the, what did you call it?

The serpent goddess? Yeah. Facing the demon. Speaking to it.

David: Somehow developing authority over it. <Right.> Right. So you can actually handle the serpent now. 

J.R.: Yeah, and that leads to healing. 

David: Right, yeah. 

J.R.: Well, I mean, that's what they claimed in, Epidaurus. 

David: I mean, I look at this and I wonder if that's, and we talked about this, okay, last episode, how the cult of Asclepius was seen for a couple hundred years as a rival to Christianity because they were claiming a lot of the same stuff when it came to healing.

<Right.> Right, and so it's like, I read this part in Mark that [01:05:00] no one really knows what to do with, and I'm like, well, I think it's actually saying something similar.

J.R.: Well, it's like the serpent and the staff. You can't look at the serpent and staff and not automatically go, well, that sounds like Moses and the staff. That sounds like the serpent being lifted up on the staff in the wilderness. So, you know, that there's a connection, but you just can't quite put your finger on it. And I think we're onto something. I don't know. We may not be able to figure out in this episode, but there is something, man, all those elements of Epidaurus is right here in this verse. if you understand, if you kind of understand what to look for and understand a way to view it, right? <Right.> yeah, that's kind of wild. I don't know. I'm going to have to think about that. I need to go on a run and think about that.

David: That's right. That's where my ideas come to me. <Uh, yeah.> And you know, this gets around the whole idea , of, again, those practices in the seventies where people were literally trying to handle snakes and getting bit, it's like Yeah, maybe try and understand what's really going on here a little bit more, you know? 

J.R.: Yeah, instead of just taking a literal reading and then heading [01:06:00] to the pet store. That's probably not the best, best idea. Hey, sidebar. When I was a kid, you know, we lived on a lake, obviously. And I found a snake one day and so I trapped it with a stick, me and some buddies. And I ran and got a pillowcase and I stuck the snake in the pillowcase. And I had heard about other people doing this.

So I ran to mom. I said, Hey, if you take this snake to a pet store, they'll buy it, you know? And she's like, really? You know, of course, mom, she's so great. And you know, she rolled her eyes and, but she entertained it. She's like, well, you know, it's in the pillowcase. I'll take it up there.

And so we took it to a pet store and the guy looked at it. And of course he immediately looked into it and he said, ma'am, this is a water moccasin. We, this is a poisonous snake. Take that thing out back and kill it or whatever. Right. You know, he says, I don't want to touch, but he did confirm. Yeah. I mean, there are certain snakes that they buy, you know, but what a great story.

I forgot all about that, but yeah, mom just, of course, you know, I'm the youngest of four boys, [01:07:00] so by this point she's just rolling her eyes. And then you thinking, yep, here we go again. 

David: Yeah, that's hilarious. 

J.R.: Tried to sell a water moccasin into a pet store. Yeah. In any case, see, I got off course there. So where are we at? 

David: Well, we should probably move on. All right. So yeah, there's a lot more we can talk about. That passage is loaded with imagery that we'll have to think on more, but there's a couple more places in the New Testament that I want to hit on and then we'll wrap this up.

J.R.: I'm starting to wonder if this should have been an entire series. It could have been, instead of trying to tackle, this is about the third time that we've said, okay, we can't go any further. And look, this is not one, right? 

David: Yeah. This is not an exhaustive list of all the times snakes are mentioned in the Bible either. Like we're just hitting on a handful of them, so. 

J.R.: All right. Well, yeah, let's keep on the path. 

David: All right. The one, another one, Paul on Malta, right? So Paul gets shipwrecked on his way to Rome, Acts 28, and he gets bit by a snake. In fact, I'll just read these real quick. "The people expected him to swell up or suddenly fall dead [01:08:00] because he was bitten by a snake. After waiting a long time and seeing nothing unusual happened to him, they changed their minds and said, 'he must be a god.'" Okay. So, I mean, it just ties into a lot of what we've been talking about here, but Paul gets bit by a snake. Yeah, go ahead. 

J.R.: Well, I was going to say, well, right off the bat, you recognize the ancient locals. saw, well, they saw the snake like hanging from Paul's hand, right?

David: Yeah, that's right. 

J.R.: Assume that it was divine justice. Because I mean, look, he just survived a shipwreck, which would imply that, okay, you've got God's hand upon you that you survived this shipwreck, but then you get bit by a snake, right? So now they're starting to see the fates, you know, fates and the punishment. <Yeah, right.> Right. Yeah. But it just is interesting, and it points to the understanding, the ancient understanding of tying serpents to, 

David: Well, in this case, the interesting tie in is, their initial response is they're tying a serpent to judgement, right? 

J.R.: Right, to justice, yes. 

David: You must be guilty of something. [01:09:00] <Right.> Like, you're shipwrecked, you got bit by a snake gathering wood, like, dude, I don't know what you did, but you know, you might want to be in church on Sunday, something like that. 

J.R.: Right, there's an immediate connection to the spiritual, which I think is interesting right off the bat. But then when nothing happened, their perception of Paul completely changes. Not from thinking, okay, we maybe got this wrong, right? But thinking he was a criminal to declaring that he has to be a god, right? 

David: Yeah, so they completely flip. Because once they realize, and again, it's this, okay, so what does that mean? It's this idea of the mastery over the serpent, right? It's like you must be some kind of god.

It's almost, in some ways, it's the same thing as Moses casting his staff down. It's like, okay, he's got mastery over a serpent, like something bigger is going on here that we realize. 

J.R.: Yes. And, again, the ancients worldview rooted in superstition, where the bite of a snake is divine retribution immediately to overcoming that bite means that you are now a divine being. <Right. Yeah.> You're right. [01:10:00] That extreme is kind of wild. 

David: Yeah, it is. if a serpent bite is judgment. Then surviving a serpent bite means that, you know, you've transcended kind of this divine judgment thing, and so you must be a god yourself. 

J.R.: Yeah, mastery over the serpent. I like that. 

David: Yeah. Alright, so one more and then we'll wrap this up. Revelation, of course, you can't talk about the serpent without Revelation, the images of, again, Seraphs, we already talked about that. But the great dragon, right? <Sure.> And I don't know that we need to go into this, only just to say that Revelation 12 and 13 you have the image of the great dragon and the great dragon again represents what Satan, right? It's the final battle against Satan. And so it's just interesting that it brings in this imagery of you tie it all together back to the garden. You know, what is it describing? Well, it's describing a dragon, right? This beast with wings. Fire, right? And chaos. Yeah. Chaos. 

J.R.: Yeah. Sure. 

David: All the imagery that we've been talking about. 

J.R.: Yeah, there's an understanding [01:11:00] of Leviathan being Satan, but also just a broader understanding of it representing chaos. And if you go back to, you know, again, to tie it back to Medusa, that's what the creature Medusa understanding that, you know, the chaos of all the snakes of the multiplicity of snakes.

<Okay.> Now you got Leviathan that is obviously the fire breathing dragon. It's sort of a unification of chaos, a singular unification understanding of chaos, of Satan. So it's just kind of this one dragon maybe it can be seen as maybe that we've unified all the chaos and a Christian would say sin in the world into this one being.

David: Yeah. Yeah. 

J.R.: But in any case, it's the unification of all this chaos. And of course, Who throws the dragon into the lake of fire, right?

 It's God, it's Jesus. Yeah. Again, to go back to where you focus your attention. Where should your attention be focused. It should be focused. Christ on the cross, and that's what overcomes the chaos. That's what ultimately [01:12:00] overcomes even the grand unification of sin, chaos, Satan. Jesus is the one who throws it into the lake of fire. That's why we focus on him, on the staff. 

David: That's right, and you could actually say your focus even in Revelation, your focus could be on, I mean, because it talks about these - actually, there are two beasts. It talks about the beast of the sea, which would be the Leviathan, and then the beast of the earth. You could talk about how terrifying that is, or your focus could be on Jesus. 

J.R.: Right. <Right?> And of course, yeah, and when Jesus does that, that ushers in what? The new heaven and the new earth. <Right.> Where there is no sea. Right? We talked about that in previous episodes. 

David: Yeah, that's right. 

J.R.: There is no sea. It doesn't mean there's no ocean, if you're an ocean fan. Right? It just means that there's no chaos, because the sea represents chaos. 

David: Yeah. So, there's probably a lot more. We've talked about this before, too. There's probably a lot more going on in these two chapters. 

J.R.: This is why we're never going to tackle Revelation. You keep bringing this up. You want to do Revelation? No, no, I don't. 

David: But one of the final things I want to [01:13:00] point out of this is just this idea of the way serpents are talked about in the Bible. And, look, in the Old and New Testament, also, sometimes a serpent is a snake, is a dragon, is a Leviathan, like, sometimes it's all the same thing, and that's why it becomes hard to read just everything as a snake, right?

J.R.: Right, one myopic way of viewing it. 

David: Right, because sometimes it's talking about a serpent, sometimes it's a snake. Well, what does a serpent mean? Well, it's kind of like a dragon, or it could be a snake, right? So, there's a lot going on in this imagery of the serpent in the Bible. And we see the same thing as we saw on our Greece trip, everywhere we went, we saw the image of the serpent, right?

J.R.: Right. Is this good or bad? 

David: Yeah. 

J.R.: Right? And the answer is clearly both. 

David: It's both, yeah. When you understand it, there's a lot more going on on any one of those images than just, oh man, that guy has a snake. Why would he do that, right? 

J.R.: Right. Yeah, yeah, exactly. 

David: Yeah, there's one more passage, we can end on this, get your [01:14:00] thoughts, because this, I've been thinking about this, like, what does this mean?

Okay, so Matthew 10:16, where Jesus tells his followers, "Therefore be as shrewd as snakes and innocent as doves." Okay. Okay, in light of everything we just talked about, what does it mean to be shrewd as a serpent? 

J.R.: Well, I'm not sure, I'd have to know what the original Greek or Hebrew of the word shrewd. But it is something we do talk about, snakes represent to some degree, one of the layers of the representations of the serpent is knowledge, right?

<Okay.> To circle all the way back to Eden, that's why the serpent was trying to talk Adam and Eve into eating from the tree of knowledge of good and evil. Right? So in a sense, you could see the serpent as the protector of the tree of knowledge of good and evil. Now he wasn't protecting it. He actually talked them into eating from it. But there's a understanding of the serpents as being protectors of knowledge.

David: Yeah, I could see that. Yeah. 

J.R.: Right. that's why it was portrayed that [01:15:00] way in Greece. There's a dual nature to it. Obviously they can hurt you, but there's also a knowledge behind it. You could even kind of tie into, there's a little bit of a scientific knowledge behind it when we talk about the poison, there's a medicinal understanding that we can gather from the serpent. <Right.> So to go back to the verse, 'be as shrewd as snakes and as innocence as doves', it's almost like the way I've always read that is to be kind of crafty like a snake, be, maybe even tap into that dual nature. I don't know. I may be going off the reservation a little bit, but kind of have the potential for danger, but ultimately have the, dual nature and the understanding of the healing nature also.

David: Yeah, I could see that. 

J.R.: I mean, that's where my mind's at, at least at the end of this episode. 

David: Well, it's interesting because, it says be as shrewd or crafty as a snake. I don't know. I don't necessarily think of snakes as crafty, but I think of more of like, sly like a fox or, you know, something like that. It's interesting because I wonder then if the snake represents, yeah, kind of this, [01:16:00]everything we've been talking about, there's a better way to say this, but almost like a worldly knowledge of how to handle things that are dangerous. 

J.R.: Yeah, a potential for danger as well as a potential for healing.

David: Yeah, yeah. 

J.R.: Yeah, if you can embody that aspect of the snake, of the serpent. 

David: Yeah, so do that, like take that from the world you live in, because he's sending his disciples out, right? <Right.> And look, he's talked in some parables about this very thing, where, you know, he commends the shrewd manager, right?

And where he actually ends up commending people who act shrewdly in the world. And I was saying, like, don't be unethical like they are, but actually, look, understand what they're doing and why they're doing it. And so there is, I think, this interesting idea, and maybe it's wrapped up in this idea of being shrewd as a snake.

There's this interesting idea of, understand how the world works, and understand when you can use that to your advantage. Right? <Yeah.> But the whole idea of then innocent as doves, but don't be [01:17:00] naive. 

J.R.: There's, there's an aspect of innocence that is being naive. In other words, just don't have any knowledge at all. You can see innocent as not guilty, or you can see innocent as has never experienced anything, right? And the innocence of a child is not because they're not guilty of committing a crime or things like that, it's that they haven't had any life experiences, so there's a naive approach to the world.

And so I think he's saying, maybe be innocent as doves, but I don't want you to be the naive type of innocence. 

David: Right, yeah. 

J.R.: You know, I don't want you to have the naive type of innocence, I want you to have the what? 

David: I don't know, it's just this understanding of the world around you, without being corrupted by it, you might say, something like that.

J.R.: Right, yeah. 

David: I just think it's interesting, the more I thought about this last one, is, there is this aspect where Jesus, the Bible calls us, man, be smart about what you're doing, right? Don't be naive. Don't be like the naive religious person who is totally caught off guard or has sucker written on their [01:18:00]forehead, you know? Like, right, like, don't be that person, but , don't get your hands too dirty either, right? We could talk for 30 minutes about what this might mean, but it's something like that. And I think it's an interesting way to kind of wrap up this idea of the imagery of the serpent. 

J.R.: Yeah, I got about 50 things I'm thinking right now, but I, I go back to that idea of when you think of the Bible as do this and don't do that, you're getting a wrong understanding. Instead, embrace the idea of tension between two ideas. And so I think that's what this verse is a good example of. 

David: Yeah, yeah. 

J.R.: You know, hold the tension between the shrewdness, the craftiness the dual nature of the snake. And the tension between being innocent as doves, but don't be naive. I don't want you to run any too far in one direction or the other. I want you to hold the tension between those two concepts. 

David: Yeah. It's something like that. I like that. 

J.R.: Yeah. Yeah. I can go with that. 

David: Well, we could have talked another hour about this. 

J.R.: We're going to have to have a follow up. I got a feeling that when you hit stop hitting [01:19:00]record, me and you were going to keep yakking for another hour. 

David: Yeah, we should have just kept recording or something like that. 

J.R.: That's right. Yep, it's going to be one of those moments. 

David: So this is the kind of conversation so that you and I have all throughout the trips we take. 

J.R.: Yeah If you wonder what our trip to Greece is like, yeah, there you go. You just had an experience of it of what our dinners are like after we go to these ancient sites, right?

David: That's right. And let's see next episode, we are going to talk about okay, this is gonna be interesting Abraham and Agamemnon 

J.R.: Oh, yeah, that was a fun conversation. 

David: Yeah, so we're gonna have that conversation next time. 

J.R.: Okay, yeah fascinating connection there. Okay, perfect. 

David: Well, so thanks for listening. If you did like these kind of conversations, bizarre as they may be, we enjoy it. You know, be sure to subscribe. We have a Facebook page. You might throw some comments out on the Facebook page, start a conversation. And we will talk to you next episode. 

J.R.: We'll see y'all.