If the Bible isn't a rulebook, then what is it? And how does it actually shape the way we live?

I'm Nate Hansen, and this is Faith Lab. This is part two of our conversation with Tim Mackie,

co-founder of the Bible Project. If you haven't heard part one, you can go back and listen to that.

We broke down how the Bible uses design patterns to communicate on multiple levels.

Today, we're going to dig deeper. We picked back up with Tim walking through

one of the most disturbing and most misunderstood stories in Genesis. The sin of ham and what it means

for him to look upon the nakedness of his father is such a great example. That whole scene,

Noah getting off the boat and planting a vineyard, that's a new

Adam and Eve scene. And God commissions him, be fruitful and multiply and fill the land. And it's

exactly what happened in Genesis 1. So that itself is a good example of narrative patterning. Noah is

like a new atom. And he gets off, he plants a vineyard, and in the vineyard, some great sin is committed

because of the fruit of the vineyard. And you're like, oh, no, it's Genesis 3 all over again,

except even more weird now. So he gets drunk, and he exposes himself in the tent, and then Ham looks

upon the nakedness of his father. So if you're just reading, you actually, that could mean many things.

It's also what Noah wakes up, and he says, he knew what his son had done to him.

So the narrative is worded in this highly suggestive way,

but it just leaves you, it leaves you without the core information you need

to actually make sense of what happened.

And I am now convinced that it's exactly on purpose. There are many narratives like this in the Hebrew Bible. You have to fit

this into how the Bible works. There are narratives that are actually crafted super dense with

intentional gaps and ambiguities. What they are is their narrative riddles.

And Proverbs chapter one actually tells you that one of the things that you'll learn from reading

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