Genesis 1–11 introduces not only Genesis but the Bible as a whole. With remarkable realism, these chapters present manifold challenges to ethical living. They suggest that humanity does not operate in an overwhelmingly positive moral space. Instead, human beings face a variety of challenges. Humanity is not necessarily damned to lives of immorality, but praiseworthy people are rare, and temptations are great. While creating a thirst for upright behavior, the text explains the difficulty of doing the right thing. This emphasis on moral difficulty has important resonances with both its earliest and its most recent readers.