THE BOOK OF GENESIS ILLUSTRATED BY R. CRUMB

Illustration by R. Crumb - The Book of Genesis Illustrated

R. Crumb is no bonafide ‘believer’ which (ironically) makes his illustrations of Genesis surprisingly faithful. We church-people, brought up singing love songs to Jesus and his Dad and taught to embrace the horrifying narrative of the destruction of the world as a children’s story about a floating zoo would do well to immerse ourselves in this graphical literal interpretation that (according to Crumb) seeks simply to be a straight illustration job.

It’s probably safe to say that no one is without their own peculiar biases. R. Crumb, more than many, may be geared toward skeptical inquiry and cynicism, but he approaches the collected stories in Genesis with respect and evidently a great deal of scholarship and attempts to be true to the words he finds there.

This approach seems well suited to the action packed stories that deal with a fledgling nation and its covenantal relationship with a jealous God. Crumb doesn’t censor or omit the uncomfortable scenes in Genesis which seldom get play time during regular Sunday sermons. The founding patriarchs don’t wear halos nor do they seem particularly righteous or holy. So, when you read this version, what you don’t get is a dose of inerrant dogma. You do get complex stories filled with moral ambiguity that invite you to do your own research – your own soul-searching.

Illustration by R. Crumb - The Book of Genesis Illustrated

Would you sacrifice your own son as a burnt offering? Would you do it if God told you to? Scenes like Abraham’s near sacrifice of Isaac take on just a hint of Crumb’s restrained visual commentary. As a grim but determined Abraham binds his son like a sheep, a single tear falls from the eye of a bewildered but subdued Isaac. Is this kind of scary faith and obedience what God expects of all of us?

In his introduction, Crumb says about the Bible, “It seems indeed to be an inspired work, but I believe that its power derives from having been a collective endeavor that evolved and condensed over many generations before reaching its final, fixed form as we know it…”

Crumb’s understanding of scripture seems light years ahead of some fundamentalists who boast that if the King James Version was good enough for Jesus, it’s also good enough for them. His everyman response to the Genesis narratives provides an important perspective to those of us whose Bibles have been filtered through the apologetic veneer of orthodoxy.

REVIEW BY S. DIETZ copyright 2011