The story at the heart of this chapter is gruesome and disturbing. Like many traditions enshrined in folktales, it may not be suitable for children and for those of a particularly sensitive disposition. The rest of us will have to try to face up to its dark implications. It involves a re-telling of the Garden of Eden tale, with important differences. This chapter offers a sustained reading of this one source, which provides an opportunity to consider the human propensity to cover up any sense of wrongdoing by attempting to swallow the evidence. While optimistic adherents of Reform Judaism were once convinced that all the demons of pre-modern life would be vanquished, this chapter attempts to face up to the darker side of human existence. Torah is presented here as a kind of salve to the human condition, although it also strikes a note of caution, since Torah study is no guarantor of moral rectitude.