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Ishmael then provides some historical context to help the narrator identify the story's authors as the Semites, who were ancestors to the Hebrews. Takers can never admit that their way of life is problematic, since such an admission would require them to “relinquish their pretensions to godhood” (168). Leavers, on the other hand, might practice agriculture, but only in moderation and never as an imperative to others. Takers have always believed their way of life to be superior and essential, and hence forced everyone else in the world to conform to it.
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The story would be of man's ascent, not his fall. Ishmael reasons that the Takers would never have forbidden Adam the knowledge of good and evil, but would have had the gods grant it to him. The narrator then asks why Ishmael believes this story was devised by the Leavers. The disaster came when Takers decided 8,000 years ago that they were "as wise as the gods and can rule the world as well as they" (164). Since they believe such knowledge is of great benefit to man, allowing him to rule the world, it seemed natural and expected that they would granted it. Ishmael notes that Takers have always been confused as to why the tree of knowledge was forbidden to Adam. Realizing all of this, the gods chose to prohibit Adam from eating of the tree of knowledge. Considering himself equal to the gods, Adam would exempt himself from the law that governs all other species, believing that any suffering he caused must have been ordained by the gods. They worry that such a predicament would cause destruction, since he would see any limitations as evil and thus expand until he devours the world. Operating under that delusion, he would be able to justify anything that pleased him as "good" and anything that impeded him as "evil" (162). Though the tree would never give him the same knowledge it gave them (since he was just a man), it would dangerously create the delusion that he did have that knowledge. However, they worry that he might grow impatient in his quest and choose to eat from the Tree of Knowledge. When the gods realize Adam - the first man - is awaking, they recognize his specialness and decide to give him a goal for life: to find the Tree of Life. They eat the fruit, and thereby gain the knowledge they need to “tend the garden without becoming criminals and without earning the curses of all who live in our hands.” In essence, this knowledge is “the knowledge of who shall live and who shall die” (160). They then remember that they had created a tree whose fruit brings the knowledge of good and evil. Their final recognition is that they "are criminals who send good and evil by turns," even if they do not ever know what they ought to do (158). Eventually, the gods realize that any decision they might make would upset some species, while pleasing others.
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One god points out that the locusts would strip the land bare, depriving deer and gazelles of food, and in turn lions and wolves and foxes of food.
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He then tells a story about a debate between the gods, over whether to send a flock of locusts to the savannah to sustain the birds and lizards. Pleased, Ishmael defines the story he is about to tell as the story of “how the gods acquired the knowledge they needed to rule the world” (156). Ishmael asks the narrator who else might possess this knowledge, besides the Takers, and the narrator guesses “the gods would have it” (156). Accordingly, the Takers believe that the Leavers lack this “knowledge” (155). Ironically, the Takers took this story as their own even though it was the Leavers who initially told it, in order to explain the appearance and danger of the Takers.īefore identifying the story, Ishmael notes that Takers believe they they possess the most fundamental knowledge of all, knowledge indispensable to those who want to rule the world. (It is the Biblical origin story, though Ishmael does not identify it yet). Ishmael then draws the narrator's attention to a story that the Takers adopted 2000 years before, believing it was “pregnant with meaning and mystery” (154). The agricultural revolution provided the foundation of the vast Takers civilizations that spread throughout the world - its manifesto is that “revolution was necessary” for progress, and hence must continue at all costs (154). The Takers, on the other hand, came into being around 8000 B.C., starting with the agricultural revolution, which continues to the present day. Ishmael first shows the narrator a chart that indicates the timeline of the Leavers and the Takers. The narrator is naturally a bit uncomfortable, but prepares to continue. When the narrator returns the next day, Ishmael has moved from behind the glass and is sprawled out next to the narrator’s chair.