Every day our kids are faces with choices.: Good or bad, right or wrong. How do we help them make the right choice?
There is a section in East of Eden in which John Steinbeck uses his epic story of multiple generations struggling with good versus evil to explore a very important philosophical concept. And even though East of Eden was published in 1952, that philosophical concept is more important to our kids now than ever.
The concept is TIMSHEL.
The philosophical anchor of the book centers around this Hebrew word “timshel,” which translates to “thou mayest.” In the book, three characters engage in a discussion about the biblical story of Cain and Abel. During the discussion, the characters realize that God’s response to Cain wasn’t a commandment that he would conquer sin, but rather a promise that he has the choice to conquer sin.
The characters are
Samuel Hamilton, a wise and aging Irish immigrant who settled his family in the Salinas Valley. Even though his ranch is failing, Hamilton keeps his family together and survives through his faith and good work.
Adam Trask is a recent transplant to the Salinas Valley. Trask’s father was a corrupt businessman and corrupt politician who amassed a fortune through unethical means. Trask is one of the beneficiaries of his father’s corruption. He eventually takes his inheritance and moves to the Salinas Valley, looking for a new start.
Lee, Adam’s Chinese American cook, who is perhaps the most quietly brilliant character in all American fiction.
The three are sitting together at Trask’s ranch with a copy of Genesis, wrestling with a single verse: Genesis 4:7. In this verse, the brothers Cain and Abel make an offering to God. For some unknown reason, God accepts Abel’s offering but rejects Cain’s. (Why? This has confused theologians for centuries). Cain becomes distraught and angry that his offering was rejected. God tells Cain to stand up, let go of his anger, and do the best that he can with this life he has been given.
“”If you do what is right, will you (thou shalt) not be accepted? But if you do not do what is right, sin is crouching at your door; it desires to have you, but thou shalt rule over it.”
It’s the interpretation of the Hebrew words Thou Shalt (Timshel) that ignites the discussion. Is Thou Shalt a commandment (You Will)? [You will rule over it] Is God saying this is a given? Or is God saying You May rule over sin? (You have the choice to rule over sin). [You May rule over it]. One is a prediction; one is a choice.
The concept of Timshel says that every one of us has the ability and power to make a choice. Later in Genesis, Cain made the choice to kill his brother Abel. Sin laid waiting at Cain’s door, and Cain made the choice to give in to sin’s murderous desires. At this point, East of Eden is giving in to the argument that our good or evil nature is predetermined and cannot be changed.
But it is the character of Lee, the Chinese religious outsider, who comes back with a perspective completely different from the one held by the men who grew up reading the Bible. This new perspective splits the difference between pre-determined destiny and the power of self-determination.
Timshel. Thou mayest.
Not “you will.”
Not “you must.”
You may.
Steinbeck tells us that this single interpretation carries the entire moral idea of what it means to be human. Lee says in the novel:
“That says the way is open. That throws it right back on a man. For if ‘Thou mayest’, it is also true that ‘Thou mayest not.’”
The choice is real. And because it is real, so is everything that follows from it. Our lives are the consequences of our choices.
So how does this apply to us raising our kids?
Our kids are being raised in the most sophisticated, most invasive, most manipulative, and most destructive algorithm-influenced machines ever created. Every single day through every single post, video, Tik Tok and X post our kids are forced to make a choice. They can give in to the lies and propaganda being spread (the sin that lies at the door). Or they may make a choice to reject it.
Social media algorithms are not neutral pipelines to our child’s brains. They are optimization engines designed to tell your teenager what to feel, what to want, who to be angry at, and what kind of person they should become. And who controls those pipes do not have your child’s best interest in mind. They have their own self-interest, monetizing your child’s personal life.
The message those platforms deliver, underneath all the content, is something very close to predestination. You are the product of what you consume, and we know what you’ll consume next. We will validate and reinforce your feelings by feeding you more similar content.
When Steinbeck wrote East of Eden in 1952, he couldn’t imagine opinion and society influencing platforms like TikTok or X. But he understood the idea that we perceive ourselves as not truly free. We perceive ourselves as our nature, our circumstances, our family history, our social class, our wounds have already decided the shape of our lives.
But Steinbeck is telling us that Timshel is the rebuttal to that. He’s telling us we may change our lives in any way that we choose at any time.
He is telling us that our path is not set. Our way is open. That we have the power of self-determination. If we chose it.
And there’s a darker side to timshel that we should not flinch from. If thou mayest choose well, thou mayest also choose badly. The freedom to choose is equal. Cain, after all, does not conquer sin. He kills his brother. The possibility of a good choice and the reality of a bad one exist in equal terms.
Let’s look at two modern day examples. As I write this, the platform X is a sewer of filth spreading lies that former first lady Michelle Obama is a transgender man. This was fueled by one of the fighters in the Freedom 250 cage match held on the White House lawn. Our children are being bombarded by this message. It’s being normalized on one of the world’s largest platforms. This is an example of them needing to make a choice. Thou mayest accept the hate and lies spread via social media. Or Thou mayest reject this behavior promoted by our government. The choice of who they become has been laid before them.
Today, the #1 documentary on Netflix is THE CRASH. The film explores the case of 17-year-old Mackenzie Shrilla who intentionally crashes her car into a building, killing her boyfriend and another friend. But the film explores a deeper issue beyond the criminal case.
One victim’s father poignantly tells us, “Show me your friends and I’ll show you your future.” Timshel. Two boys are dead because of the bad choices they made. Choices filled with the quest for social media clout, lack of accountability of one’s actions, substance abuse and lies. Thou mayest accept this lifestyle. Or thou mayest reject this lifestyle. Unfortunately, the consequences caught up to two boys ready to begin their life.
Teenagers being raised in an algorithm driven age, are being fed a steady diet of narrative tunnel vision: the idea that systems and algorithms shape their lives, so the only question is which tribe they belong to and which predetermined script they perform.
Timshel is a refusal of that story.
The way is open. The choice is ours. That is the most radical thing a parent can say to a child who has been told, a thousand times a day by a thousand different feeds, that the algorithm already knows who they are.
What timshel offers is the harder, truer thing: You may choose the right path. You may not. Either way, the outcome is not certain. And because it is uncertain, their choosing matters.
This is what we actually need to tell our kids, not certainty, not commands, but the weight and dignity of real choice.
Thou mayest. It’s the best thing we can pass on.
East of Eden by John Steinbeck (1952). The timshel discussion appears in Part Two, Chapter 24.
Curriculum of Dissent is a series within Dad Bod Weekly examining literature that challenges comfortable assumptions about the world our kids are growing up in. Because the books they’re not assigning in school might be the ones that matter most.
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