archeological discovery of 10,000 BC temple

jamescarvin

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I will take a wait and see approach. Once all is unearthed we will have more to base decisions on. In the mean time we are free to speculate as longs as we don't get to far out on the limb.
I agree with this approach. The basis of my own opinion is on a documentary I found that is in German. I am not sure if this documentary is from Klaus Schmidt, or from other Germans. I do not speak German. All I can understand is the pictures. I may be making a mistake by assuming that the picture that is plainly of Calvary actually belongs to Gobekli Tepe. I have not been able to find this picture associated with Gobekli Tepe in any other source. And I do not know whether the documentary is actually saying that those pictures were from Gobekli Tepe. Possibly, the makers of this documentary were simply pointing out a similarity.

As for the similarity, even if there was not a wall painting, the fact remains that what has been found in this so called "Eden" are twelve foot high T crosses. No one sticks their neck out or paints themself into a corner by believing that an ancient culture may have predicted the cross. Read Tatian, Clement of Alexandria, Justin and Ireneus. All of these pointed out that the ancient cultures knew partial truths concerning the Gospel, and then through the work of the devil these were perverted. They were able to ascertain these truths through Moses, who was a prophet, and through the descendants of Noah, who also knew the truth.

If those who built this temple were not of the orthodox lineage of Adam through Noah, they may have been from among others, and may have had perverted concepts of the Truth. Such is apostasy. But that does not mean that there is no truth whatever. Just a twisted version of it. It is like a reflection of prophecy, though imperfect when it comes from any of these other cultures. What culture Gobekli Tepe will prove to have been, I don't know. As someone here mentioned, only 5% of the site has been excavated so far. We would all do well to wait and see what is unearthed. If that picture is part of the site, then I can say it seems like something closer to genuinely prophetic, and not necessarily on the apostate side of degeneration. And that would make it a very rare and significant find indeed.
 
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I believe that the Bible is true in its autographs, and I agree with Jesus, who said that the Scriptures cannot be broken and that every jot and tittle would be fulfilled. On the other hand, I don't think there are inconsistencies between what we find in the Bible and what we will find outside of the Bible. The heavens and the earth are declaring the glory of God.

That said, geologically, if the world was created formless, then it could not rotate, and if a day is defined as a full rotation of the earth, then it is possible that the first few days may have been longer than 24 hours, in fact millions of years each. So I am not opposed to an earth that is as much as a billion years old. And if the evidence showed otherwise, I would only have good reason to disbelieve it if it was inconsistent with the Scriptures, which I believe.

Even when the fish were created prior to landmasses, the formlessness may have continued so that up to the fourth "day" the period of a day may have been counted much longer than 24 hours. But once there were landmasses, the notion of formlessness disappears and the excuse for making a gap disappears along with it.

Beyond that, one might say the observability of the lights in the heavens that were for signs only became possible after the creation of man. But then why also count the first five days as days? And wasn't God there to observe these things? So I would discount observability as an excuse for continuing a gap theory, though it is still quite possible that the earth initially rotated much more slowly than it now does, even while plants were being formed on the land.

The idea of a gap helps explain old rocks and possibly some fossilized plants found in them, but the generations given from Adam are another matter. The whole race is thought to descend from Adam, who was created on the sixth day, whenever that was.Therefore there can be no "PreAdamic" temple building except by non-humans without running into Biblical errancy. So my opinion concerning any of these writers you mentioned is that they are not Biblcial literalists if they do not believe that the whole human race was descended from Adam.

Is a person a heretic if they are not a Biblical literalist? Depends on how one defines heresy. Those who espouse various gap theories do so in order to preserve the Bible as true, which they revere. So there is a tendency, at the least, for them to believe in the Bible throughout and with some clever input, while taking into account the findings of archeologists and paleontologists and geologists, etc., as well. And that is reasonable. But there are many who take the Bible seriously and even literally who are also heretics. We can read Ireneus' Against Heresies just for an initial dose. And the list will go on endlessly.

My own opinion is that it is possible that the dating given, especially for the patriarchs, may have error in the copy though not the autographs. There are definitely differences between the MT and the LXX. Augustine and others noticed them.

That means that "PreAdamic" may be a misnomer when it comes to looking at something dating back to the year 9000 BCE.

On the other hand, Luke recounts the genealogy from Jesus through Adam. So if we take an older date for the birth of Adam than the estimated approximately 6000 years we are looking at in available texts, then to stretch the dating back all the way to 10,000 BCE requires expanding the lifespans of some number of these patriarchs beyond the already very long ages our copies have retained.

Then again, Luke says "supposedly" and this is a legal term, which simply means that is how it was on the books of his day, which is the basis Africanus gives for the discrepancies between Matthew and Luke, showing that both accounts were true. In other words, Luke gives the legal genealogy, where Matthew gives the actual genealogy. And Matthew gives the genealogy only to Abraham. Therefore, if anyone is looking for "smudge room" between the findings of anthropologists and archeologists and Biblical accounts, I think the best place to find it is in the idea that the copy deteriorated with respect to the ages of the patriarchs up until Abraham. That way they won't be in conflict with Matthew or Luke. Either there were more generations than were recorded, or the patriarchs lived longer than was recorded. We can then attribute any problems to Genesis itself, especially Genesis 5, which we already know to have textual problems with respect to copy.

What any of these people you mentioned think doesn't matter to me. I am not associated with any of them. This is my opinion, though all that said, I remain unconvinced that the archeologists are basing their opinions on the right assumptions. I will unabashedly admit that I am more comfortable with basing my understanding of science on scripture, than my scripture on science. And even with respect to the ages of the patriarchs up to Abraham if asked to decide on longer or shorter dates, or more patriarchs just omitted, in order to allow for an older date for the birth of Adam, I'd guess that the Masoretic Text is probably reliable. (In other cases I might prefer the Greek - just not here).

As for modern science, I am inclined to think that this is one of the culprits of the spirit of antichrist that changes times and law. The effect of it is to force people into very creative thinking in order to continue to maintain that the Bible is true, whether that be by gap theories or any of what I mentioned above. The result is that very few people believe in the Bible any more. And that is certainly consistent with the devil's agenda.

I also think that Jesus Himself, being the Truth and the Word made flesh, could easily have addressed this type of discrepancy if it had existed. At the least He could have said, "by the way, there are errors in this copy that were created by the devil." Or He may have said "and I only mentioned to Moses those patriarchs whose names are written in the book of life." And this may actually have been something He said, but we have no record of Him having said that through the apostles. Yet He, being God, is omniscient. And the result is, that He foresaw we would be having this discussion today.

Apparently then, Jesus was entirely comfortable with our being left with these questions. What should we do about them? For me, the best solution is to get comfortable with the fact that there is smudge room in all that I've mentioned above. It may well be that only those patriarchs whose names are written in the book of life were mentioned in the original autographs of Scripture. Maybe there were seven generations of faithful believers between Adam and Enoch, but seventy generations of non believers between them, as well. The Bible asks us not to lean on our own understanding but to trust and acknowledge the Lord in all our ways. So my answer is that I don't know.

But as for dates and places, these are portrayed in Scripture not as allegory and poetry, but as inventories of reality. Just read Numbers and Leviticus/ The style suggests a literal interpretation is appropriate. And the apostles and early fathers of the church, as well as the Jews who lived before them all accepted literal interpretations of the Bible for that reason. It wasn't until geology and archeology started to show contradictions that Christians began forming these gap theories, not excluding Christian Darwinism.

In Christian Darwinism an unidentified period is given for each of the days. And the order followed in the Genesis creation account follows the same order given by Darwin in the theory of evolution. It would then make sense to accept a "PreAdamic" temple because no one would claim that Adam was the first born human being, or we could perhaps agree with those who maintain that prior to Adam the others were of another species. And this would not be inconsistent with the theory that the Bible only counted those who were believers whose names were to be written in the book of life. And that God created Adam from the dust of the earth could be understood as a summary of Darwinian evolution.

Well fine. Maybe that is possible. But I have no record of Jesus ever saying anything about it. So either it just doesn't matter, which is what those who espouse this theory say, or it does. I think that it matters because not only does it effect our hermeneutics, but it effects our theology. If we believe that man ascended from animals over many millions of years then we get a very different picture of who God is. We may conclude from such a picture that the resurrection is actually not like a new creation that happens all of a sudden ex nihilo, but will take another gazillion years to recycle naturally. We may even reject all that is supernatural and the entirety of the power of God.

Belief in evolution seems to seriously effect theology, and soteriology as well. The resurrection of Christ did not happen over millions of years, did it? No, it happened quite supernaturally on the third day, in a way that demonstrated the already understood power of God (for those who believed), because it was a sign of the new creation. If the new creation recapitulates the old creation, not only does it arise from the power of God, it takes place on the first day of the week, as a deliberate anti-type of Genesis 1 so that Christ fulfills the Sabbath Law, showing that the Law is perfect.

A smudged creation account results in a smudged resurrection account and a smudged future restoration of all things. And that pretty much sums up why I am more comfortable just accepting the MT as is on Genesis 5 and rejecting various gap and smudge theories. Does this make those who disagree with me heretics? Hmmmm. Yes and no. Yes, if heresy is defined as being in error in any way shape or form. And if that is the case, we are all heretics except God. No, if heresy is defined as relating only to Christology. Soteriology is akin to Christology and is somewhat effected by old earth creation beliefs. But it is not utterly destroyed by it when it gets smudged. The types and anti-types remain the same. However, there are dangers. If we do not take the types literally, then we may not wish to take the anti-types literally.

This may lead to people accepting the mark of the beast, rationalizing that such warnings were not meant to be accepted literally. It may also result, as it so often has, in disbelief in the resurrection, on the one hand, and a belief in deism, on the other. A rejection of the incarnation of Christ, and spiritualizing of Christ is also a possibility. Once one thing is rejected in Scripture, the principle is injected that allows the whole thing to be sliced and diced according to preference. Ultimately, each man does what is right in his own eyes. Smudge an inch and they take a mile. But dangers and heresies are still two different things.
Thank you for your explanation. Since we don't know each other, I'll just say a few things so you know where I was coming from. I am both an engineer (practical scientist) and a Fundamentalist Christian. I take the Bible literally and do not believe in the ever-changing pseudoscience of evolution. I believe Adam was the first man and was created by God. I pretty much accept the 6 days of creation + 1 day of rest as written. I believe there is much that happened to this world between Genesis 1:1 and 1:2, commonly called the Gap Theory or Ruin-Reconstruction. But none of this speculation is necessary for salvation, and if we fragment into a discussion of Genesis, I believe it would tend to hijack your original posting, which I don't want to do.
 
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jamescarvin

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Thank you for your explanation. Since we don't know each other, I'll just say a few things so you know where I was coming from. I am both an engineer (practical scientist) and a Fundamentalist Christian. I take the Bible literally and do not believe in the ever-changing pseudoscience of evolution. I believe Adam was the first man and was created by God. I pretty much accept the 6 days of creation + 1 day of rest as written. I believe there is much that happened to this world between Genesis 1:1 and 1:2, commonly called the Gap Theory or Ruin-Reconstruction. But none of this speculation is necessary for salvation, and if we fragment into a discussion of Genesis, I believe it would tend to hijack your original posting, which I don't want to do.

As the OP I don't mind some amount of thread drift so long as it can somehow come back to the topic. Discussion of old vs. new earth seem relevant because it is based on these that various assumptions are made that feed into how we interpret geological, paleological and archeological evidence. And in this particular forum, it has a bearing on the defense of Biblical literalism so it is also relevant to the forum, not just to the thread.

I already went into some lengthy discussion about the possibility of the first days extending beyond 24 hours. Many say Genesis 1:1 is possibly a title. Others, that the heavens were created first and then the earth. For those who prefer the latter, there is the problem that the light does not appear until verse three. Were the heavens without light?


1In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.
2The earth was formless and void, and darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was moving over the surface of the waters.
3Then God said, "Let there be light"; and there was light.

Perhaps, the light that belonged to the heavens was spiritual uncreated light. But here we are speaking of creation. God in Himself is uncreated light. But the common presumption is that the angels were created at Genesis 1:1 prior to the creation of the earth and that the whole heavenly host has been worshiping the Lord in the heavens ever since. This works fine but indicates that there was no created light, but rather only uncreated light in their worship - which for incorporeal beings might make sense. The light then that they eternally share in the heavens is uncreated. It is God Himself. He is the light.

The other option is to consider the creation of the angels along with the creation of the animals and man, or simply not as a part of the creation account given in Genesis 1 at all. The whole Genesis account is primarily anthropocentric.

In the formlessness of the earth in verse 2, the light is created also on the first day. The story says nothing about the form of the heavens. Being incorporeal, it would not be necessary to mentions this because the subject is here about formation. The angels in the heavens did not need to be formed since they are incorporeal. They are created spiritual beings. As spiritual beings they have free will and they can fall or choose to abide in the life giving Spirit of God. Only they may not do so corporeally as mankind can. There is thus no reference to time as to when they were created, but we do see one of them in the Garden of Eden.

We see then the visitation of the serpent in the Garden of Eden after the creation has been completed. We don't know what time the temptation takes place, but we rightly associate the serpent with the devil and satan because the Scriptures later tell us this ...


Revelation 12:9
"And the great dragon was thrown down, the serpent of old who is called the devil and satan, who deceives the whole world; he was thrown down to the earth, and his angels were thrown down with him."

Revelation 20:2
"And he laid hold of the dragon, the serpent of old, who is the devil and satan, and bound him for a thousand years."

In the Apocalypse John does not give the timing of the fall of the angels. But in Genesis we see that the Sons of God came into the daughters of men, and this was the main reason the world had to be destroyed. This is a hard statement to understand. The apostolic fathers interpreted this as referring to the angels. The angels are thus, in the state to which they are called, properly termed Sons of God, but having free will are able to fall from grace.

Thus in two places in Genesis, first the serpent, and then with these Sons of God, there is a a falling of angels that results in a race of men called the nephilim. These nephilim, the early fathers point out, were demons. And so we see that there was a tendency from the beginning to have demonic manifestations on the earth and for people to become demon possessed, the demons choosing corporeality, against the will of God, through possession, and human beings, being referred to here as the "daughters of men," allowing such possession through their own perversion of will.

The amalekites were descendants of the nephilim. So here I should add that the command that they should be destroyed was not a reference to their physical destruction so much as their spiritual destruction - in other words a command to exorcise them. If the flood could not wipe them out then neither could genocide. That is why even the cattle had to be destroyed, rather than serving as booty, the cattle also being possessed by demons just as were the pigs at Gederea. The sin of the Israelites in their failure to utterly destroy the amalekites was thus the sin of failure to serve as exorcists, which is the will of God for every man, as demonstrated in Christ, in whom such power exists.

So again when we see animals depicted on these crosses at Gobekli Tepe, that is what we are talking about. All unclean things become clean in Christ. Whatever is corporal is subject to God as given in the death and resurrection of man and the cross, in which the flesh is crucified.

Several possibilities then exist and I will present them as scenarios ...

Scenario #1: Gobekli Tepe was created by people who were not from the clan of Noah and his ancestors but these had some amount of the truth because Adam was still the ancestor of all mankind and because the earth was not very old, so also was there some common amount of information shared among men concerning the things of God. This explains why there are no upper portions on the crosses.

Scenario #2: Gobekli Tepe was created by Noah and his ancestors and then deliberately buried by Noah prior to the flood.

Scenario #3: Biblical literalism is a false presumption and the assumptions of archeologists concerning the dating of the site are fair and roughly accurate.

Of all of these Scenarios #2 is the one that makes most sense to me because I am very comfortable with Biblical literalism and because everything I have seen so far in this archeological site is consistent with what would make sense to me concerning what Noah probably knew. I will allow for a Scenario #1, pointing out that even the unorthodox prophesy accurately at times. Read Clement of Alexandria's Stromota and Justin's Apologies for examples. However, I don't think that the unorthodox would have had the foresight to bury and preserve the temple as was done. And those who will advocate for Scenario #3 lack an explanation, as well. But in Scenario #2 that explanation is quite apparent.

In defense of their position advocates of Scenario #3 have already been asking some very good questions of me. For instance, what Christian message can be found in a relief of a man with a large phallus?

My response was that there is no evidence that this was a fertility cult, but that in the mindset of Noah, which predated any fertility cults associated with human sacrifice, there had been a simple command - be fruitful and multiply. And Christ came to give life abundantly. This pertains not only to physical but also to spiritual abundance. The purpose of Noah bringing animals, (including unclean animals such as scorpions and snakes) on the Ark was directly associated with the physical as well as spiritual fulfillment of this command. Why did he bring bed bugs and mosquitos and fire ants? I think it was to declare the great mercy and deliverance of the Lord which is to come when all things are restored in Christ. We groan and await His coming like a woman in travail.

Having no negative associations in his day, I don't see how Noah would have had any reason to exclude such an image. On the other hand, he demonstrated the need to cover his nakedness. (See Genesis 9:21-25). Here is a distinction that I really like. The physical anatomy is good because God has made it so. And even animals such as scorpions are good. Everything created by God is good. What is not good is sin. The uncovering of Noah's nakedness was a display not just of his body, but of the fact that he had become drunk, a sin. Canaan refused to cover his sin and was thus cursed. But Christ covers sin and delivers us from the curse of sin and death, whereby Canaan becomes a servant to Shem (the father of Israel - who possessed the land of Canaan) and Japeth (the father of the Gentiles, who share in the vine of Israel as the church, the Sons of God).

Of course, modesty, purity and continence were indeed valued, as well. That is why the sons refused to look on their fathers' nakedness. But it was the personal nature of it in as much as it pertained to dishonor and a failure to think on what is good and holy that made it sinful to look on. There is nothing wrong with the human anatomy any more than there is anything wrong with wine. In itself it is very good. But when we drink it to excess it becomes a sin. Rather than covering his father's nakedness, lest anyone begin to stare at it, Ham not only looked at his father, sharing in the sin of excess, but also sought to compel his brothers to do the same thing.

It is not as though a relief of a human figure with a phallus is a inappropriate contentographic image. Rather, it is a symbol of the human seed that is directed towards abundance. Fertility cults were later condemned on two counts. One, they promoted promiscuity and licentiousness. Two, they promoted human sacrifice. They were thus abhorrent to God. This type of abuse happened after the flood, not prior to it. In and of itself a fertility symbol, whether male or female, ought to carry very positive meaning for Christians and Jews when viewed from an antediluvian perspective.

Since none of the symbols found at the site are inconsistent with what Noah probably would have wished to preserve for a generation like ours, which is struggling with belief in the Christian faith, the strength of Scenario #3 then rests precisely on old earth arguments. And on that front, creationists have been eschewed from the scientific community for the most part, and the ICR and other organizations advocating a young earth are engaged in selling, rather than providing their information gratis except in sound bites. As a result, very few people are espousing the young earth position. And this is having the damaging effects I described in my previous post.

I think it was precisely in anticipation of this kind of wearing down of Christian orthodoxy that Gobekli Tepe was given. Much in the way that the Jews provided the very books that proved Christ, though they rejected Him, so also the archeologists are now uncovering the very archeological data that proves Christ, and likewise we will see Him be rejected. And I think this may well have been through Noah, which adds some touching irony to my theory.
 
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As the OP I don't mind some amount of thread drift so long as it can somehow come back to the topic. Discussion of old vs. new earth seem relevant because it is based on these that various assumptions are made that feed into how we interpret geological, paleological and archeological evidence. And in this particular forum, it has a bearing on the defense of Biblical literalism so it is also relevant to the forum, not just to the thread.

I already went into some lengthy discussion about the possibility of the first days extending beyond 24 hours. Many say Genesis 1:1 is possibly a title. Others, that the heavens were created first and then the earth. For those who prefer the latter, there is the problem that the light does not appear until verse three. Were the heavens without light?

My scientific mind reads Genesis and sees a big problem -- light. So let's say God created the universe with a word and a big bang. Since we worship an infinite God, the universe He created is still expanding. By looking at the stars and the heavens, we can actually look back in time. For example, we know the universe is much older than the earth, but is not infinitely old as some Darwinists would like to believe.


1In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.
2The earth was formless and void, and darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was moving over the surface of the waters.
3Then God said, "Let there be light"; and there was light.

Why would an infinite God create earth as formless and void? I do not believe He did. The earth was under some form of judgment. Rather the go into a long discussion of the Gap Theory here, I'm going to point you to a website that explains it.

Landmark Missionary Baptist Church - The Gap Theory of Creation

I'll make an observation here. Verse 1:2 states that darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was moving over the surface of the waters. Where did the darkness come from? If the deep is the oceans and God was hovering over the surface of the oceans, why couldn't His light penetrate the deep?

What does this have to do with the archaeological find? Well I believe it comes from a time before Noah and before Adam, as do the dinosaurs and all sorts of other creatures.

Perhaps, the light that belonged to the heavens was spiritual uncreated light. But here we are speaking of creation. God in Himself is uncreated light. But the common presumption is that the angels were created at Genesis 1:1 prior to the creation of the earth and that the whole heavenly host has been worshiping the Lord in the heavens ever since. This works fine but indicates that there was no created light, but rather only uncreated light in their worship - which for incorporeal beings might make sense. The light then that they eternally share in the heavens is uncreated. It is God Himself. He is the light.

The other option is to consider the creation of the angels along with the creation of the animals and man, or simply not as a part of the creation account given in Genesis 1 at all. The whole Genesis account is primarily anthropocentric.

In the Gap Theory, angels would be created between Genesis 1:1 and 1:2. Genesis 1:2 speaks of a state of chaos, not a normal condition I would associate with God's creative work.

In the formlessness of the earth in verse 2, the light is created also on the first day. The story says nothing about the form of the heavens. Being incorporeal, it would not be necessary to mentions this because the subject is here about formation. The angels in the heavens did not need to be formed since they are incorporeal. They are created spiritual beings. As spiritual beings they have free will and they can fall or choose to abide in the life giving Spirit of God. Only they may not do so corporeally as mankind can. There is thus no reference to time as to when they were created, but we do see one of them in the Garden of Eden.

There are numerous examples throughout the Bible where angelic beings take on human form and interact with humans. Consider Lot. Also consider Jacob.

We see then the visitation of the serpent in the Garden of Eden after the creation has been completed. We don't know what time the temptation takes place, but we rightly associate the serpent with the devil and satan because the Scriptures later tell us this ...

Revelation 12:9
"And the great dragon was thrown down, the serpent of old who is called the devil and satan, who deceives the whole world; he was thrown down to the earth, and his angels were thrown down with him."

Revelation 20:2
"And he laid hold of the dragon, the serpent of old, who is the devil and satan, and bound him for a thousand years."

In the Apocalypse John does not give the timing of the fall of the angels.

This is all prophetic, it hasn't happened yet. (I believe in the Rapture and adhere to a Pre-Tribulation view of prophecy.)


But in Genesis we see that the Sons of God came into the daughters of men, and this was the main reason the world had to be destroyed. This is a hard statement to understand. The apostolic fathers interpreted this as referring to the angels. The angels are thus, in the state to which they are called, properly termed Sons of God, but having free will are able to fall from grace.

Thus in two places in Genesis, first the serpent, and then with these Sons of God, there is a a falling of angels that results in a race of men called the nephilim. These nephilim, the early fathers point out, were demons.

Which early church fathers are you talking about?

And so we see that there was a tendency from the beginning to have demonic manifestations on the earth and for people to become demon possessed, the demons choosing corporeality, against the will of God, through possession, and human beings, being referred to here as the "daughters of men," allowing such possession through their own perversion of will.

I disagree with your analysis here.

The amalekites were descendants of the nephilim. So here I should add that the command that they should be destroyed was not a reference to their physical destruction so much as their spiritual destruction - in other words a command to exorcise them. If the flood could not wipe them out then neither could genocide. That is why even the cattle had to be destroyed, rather than serving as booty, the cattle also being possessed by demons just as were the pigs at Gederea. The sin of the Israelites in their failure to utterly destroy the amalekites was thus the sin of failure to serve as exorcists, which is the will of God for every man, as demonstrated in Christ, in whom such power exists.

I disagree with your analysis here too. God had the Israelites destroy people when their seed was corrupted, and He wanted the coming Messiah to be a perfect sacrifice. How could the seed be corrupted? Only if it was mixed with something not human, e.g. Nephilim.

So again when we see animals depicted on these crosses at Gobekli Tepe, that is what we are talking about. All unclean things become clean in Christ. Whatever is corporal is subject to God as given in the death and resurrection of man and the cross, in which the flesh is crucified.

Noah's flood, whether local or global, was about 4000 years ago according to scripture. If the carbon-dating of this archaeological site can be believed, Noah's flood predates this archaeological site by 7000-8000 years.

Several possibilities then exist and I will present them as scenarios ...

Scenario #1: Gobekli Tepe was created by people who were not from the clan of Noah and his ancestors but these had some amount of the truth because Adam was still the ancestor of all mankind and because the earth was not very old, so also was there some common amount of information shared among men concerning the things of God. This explains why there are no upper portions on the crosses.

Scenario #2: Gobekli Tepe was created by Noah and his ancestors and then deliberately buried by Noah prior to the flood.

Scenario #3: Biblical literalism is a false presumption and the assumptions of archeologists concerning the dating of the site are fair and roughly accurate.

Of all of these Scenarios #2 is the one that makes most sense to me because I am very comfortable with Biblical literalism and because everything I have seen so far in this archeological site is consistent with what would make sense to me concerning what Noah probably knew. I will allow for a Scenario #1, pointing out that even the unorthodox prophesy accurately at times. Read Clement of Alexandria's Stromota and Justin's Apologies for examples. However, I don't think that the unorthodox would have had the foresight to bury and preserve the temple as was done. And those who will advocate for Scenario #3 lack an explanation, as well. But in Scenario #2 that explanation is quite apparent.

In defense of their position advocates of Scenario #3 have already been asking some very good questions of me. For instance, what Christian message can be found in a relief of a man with a large phallus?

My response was that there is no evidence that this was a fertility cult, but that in the mindset of Noah, which predated any fertility cults associated with human sacrifice, there had been a simple command - be fruitful and multiply. And Christ came to give life abundantly. This pertains not only to physical but also to spiritual abundance. The purpose of Noah bringing animals, (including unclean animals such as scorpions and snakes) on the Ark was directly associated with the physical as well as spiritual fulfillment of this command. Why did he bring bed bugs and mosquitos and fire ants? I think it was to declare the great mercy and deliverance of the Lord which is to come when all things are restored in Christ. We groan and await His coming like a woman in travail.

Having no negative associations in his day, I don't see how Noah would have had any reason to exclude such an image. On the other hand, he demonstrated the need to cover his nakedness. (See Genesis 9:21-25). Here is a distinction that I really like. The physical anatomy is good because God has made it so. And even animals such as scorpions are good. Everything created by God is good. What is not good is sin. The uncovering of Noah's nakedness was a display not just of his body, but of the fact that he had become drunk, a sin. Canaan refused to cover his sin and was thus cursed. But Christ covers sin and delivers us from the curse of sin and death, whereby Canaan becomes a servant to Shem (the father of Israel - who possessed the land of Canaan) and Japeth (the father of the Gentiles, who share in the vine of Israel as the church, the Sons of God).

Of course, modesty, purity and continence were indeed valued, as well. That is why the sons refused to look on their fathers' nakedness. But it was the personal nature of it in as much as it pertained to dishonor and a failure to think on what is good and holy that made it sinful to look on. There is nothing wrong with the human anatomy any more than there is anything wrong with wine. In itself it is very good. But when we drink it to excess it becomes a sin. Rather than covering his father's nakedness, lest anyone begin to stare at it, Ham not only looked at his father, sharing in the sin of excess, but also sought to compel his brothers to do the same thing.

It is not as though a relief of a human figure with a phallus is a inappropriate contentographic image. Rather, it is a symbol of the human seed that is directed towards abundance. Fertility cults were later condemned on two counts. One, they promoted promiscuity and licentiousness. Two, they promoted human sacrifice. They were thus abhorrent to God. This type of abuse happened after the flood, not prior to it. In and of itself a fertility symbol, whether male or female, ought to carry very positive meaning for Christians and Jews when viewed from an antediluvian perspective.

Since none of the symbols found at the site are inconsistent with what Noah probably would have wished to preserve for a generation like ours, which is struggling with belief in the Christian faith, the strength of Scenario #3 then rests precisely on old earth arguments. And on that front, creationists have been eschewed from the scientific community for the most part, and the ICR and other organizations advocating a young earth are engaged in selling, rather than providing their information gratis except in sound bites. As a result, very few people are espousing the young earth position. And this is having the damaging effects I described in my previous post.

I think it was precisely in anticipation of this kind of wearing down of Christian orthodoxy that Gobekli Tepe was given. Much in the way that the Jews provided the very books that proved Christ, though they rejected Him, so also the archeologists are now uncovering the very archeological data that proves Christ, and likewise we will see Him be rejected. And I think this may well have been through Noah, which adds some touching irony to my theory.

The fourth scenario is this site has nothing to do with Noah because it predates Noah. It also predates Adam, when the Gap Theory is considered.
 
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My scientific mind reads Genesis and sees a big problem -- light. So let's say God created the universe with a word and a big bang. Since we worship an infinite God, the universe He created is still expanding. By looking at the stars and the heavens, we can actually look back in time. For example, we know the universe is much older than the earth, but is not infinitely old as some Darwinists would like to believe.
I have contemplated this issue. Here is a spin most people have probably not heard. It starts with God's unlimited power. And it mingles with God's demonstration of His great love. He demonstrates both at the same time by removing time at the creation of man, and rather than placing man within cosmic dust as one lost particle, he centers the entire universe around man, pointing at him with aeons of light.

As a result, man does not have to wait either billions of years or an eternity to have perception. The Lord provides an anthropoecentric time warp entirely of His own doing.

As a result, light does in fact travel at 186,000 miles per second and we can measure distance and history with light and make our estimations of the universe by looking at the stars and galaxies without any conflict with cosmological science, yet at the same time understand that on another level - God's level with man's - time didn't start until man was created.

The evidence for this theory is not just from first causes. It is from the probability of simultaneous perception with a moving target. If perception has a limited time span. And the time we call now is a moving target, the odds of the time we call now coinciding with the limited time span we call our perception are as great as the division between our limited time span and the whole length of time itself. So say if the whole length of time is 40 billion years and the length of a human perception is 70 years, then the odds of a man having human perception right now are 70 in 40 billion. Whereas, if time is infinite then the odds of a man having perception at this time are infinity to one.

Proof of the theory is thus given in this simple fact.

We thus have in the evidence of the cosmos everything that is important in God's Word to man. We are saved by His grace so that we don't have to wait through eternity past in order to be born. If the universe is not eternally long in the past, God still is. Therefore, we have no basis for perception unless we also somehow have an eternal past and were born at the first moment of time along with God, which the cosmos declare we were not.

Rather, God reaches through time and gives us life without having to wait for it. And he gives us an expansive Universe full of light that travels relatively slowly in order to prove that the Universe is very old, yet while giving us no explanation for how matter was created ex-nihilo, or what the first cause was.

In all of His infiniteness, God doesn't neglect us, but rather bends the heavens toward us via the grace of his own time portal power. And Genesis begins from there.
 
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I have contemplated this issue. Here is a spin most people have probably not heard. It starts with God's unlimited power. And it mingles with God's demonstration of His great love. He demonstrates both at the same time by removing time at the creation of man, and rather than placing man within cosmic dust as one lost particle, he centers the entire universe around man, pointing at him with aeons of light.

I tend to believe God existed before time, in a timeless past before the Big Bang. At the moment of the Big Bang, time began. God's interaction with us is then temporal. Can God's nature permit Him to both remain in the temporal world and the timelessness of His prior state? I believe the answer is yes, although some would say that God now works only in the temporal realm. The reason I say is that it explains how the free will versus predestination controversy without linguistic gymnastics through the Bible. It also explains why the Son does not know the day and hour, but only the Father knows in Matthew 24:36.

Matthew 24:36 "But of that day and hour no one knows, not even the angels of heaven, nor the Son, but the Father alone.

As a result, man does not have to wait either billions of years or an eternity to have perception. The Lord provides an anthropoecentric time warp entirely of His own doing.

Man's perception of time is irrelevant, only God's viewpoint is important.

Psalms 90:4 For a thousand years in Your sight Are like yesterday when it passes by, Or as a watch in the night.

As a result, light does in fact travel at 186,000 miles per second and we can measure distance and history with light and make our estimations of the universe by looking at the stars and galaxies without any conflict with cosmological science, yet at the same time understand that on another level - God's level with man's - time didn't start until man was created.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geologic_time_scale

In the various geological stratas, we find fossils indicating prior life. We see a plethora of new species during the Cambrian explosion. This would tend to discount your Genesis interpretation.

The evidence for this theory is not just from first causes. It is from the probability of simultaneous perception with a moving target. If perception has a limited time span. And the time we call now is a moving target, the odds of the time we call now coinciding with the limited time span we call our perception are as great as the division between our limited time span and the whole length of time itself. So say if the whole length of time is 40 billion years and the length of a human perception is 70 years, then the odds of a man having human perception right now are 70 in 40 billion. Whereas, if time is infinite then the odds of a man having perception at this time are infinity to one.

Evidence? What evidence? You've lost me with this perception philosophical argument.

Proof of the theory is thus given in this simple fact.

We thus have in the evidence of the cosmos everything that is important in God's Word to man. We are saved by His grace so that we don't have to wait through eternity past in order to be born. If the universe is not eternally long in the past, God still is. Therefore, we have no basis for perception unless we also somehow have an eternal past and were born at the first moment of time along with God, which the cosmos declare we were not.

We are not waiting if we haven't been created yet, by that I mean, procreated in the womb.


Rather, God reaches through time and gives us life without having to wait for it. And he gives us an expansive Universe full of light that travels relatively slowly in order to prove that the Universe is very old, yet while giving us no explanation for how matter was created ex-nihilo, or what the first cause was.

In all of His infiniteness, God doesn't neglect us, but rather bends the heavens toward us via the grace of his own time portal power. And Genesis begins from there.

I do not believe you've shown a sufficient reason to introduce a time portal to suspend the physics of the universe, of which earth is a part. Beyond suspension of Prima Causa, you must now introduce a secondary cause, or a restart. I do not see enough basis to suggest this is the case, but I admit I'm lost by some of your reasoning. This looks like trying to force a square peg into a round hole.
 
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I do not believe you've shown a sufficient reason to introduce a time portal to suspend the physics of the universe, of which earth is a part. Beyond suspension of Prima Causa, you must now introduce a secondary cause, or a restart. I do not see enough basis to suggest this is the case, but I admit I'm lost by some of your reasoning. This looks like trying to force a square peg into a round hole.
I do not believe you have comprehended what I have said. But your last statement about fitting a square peg into a round hole may be an idea I can take up on that would help explain it. And that is to say that what is impossible for man is not impossible for God.

You say that "before" time God existed in a timeless state. Perhaps this is because in the round hole we imagine that there is a time space continuum. But God, being outside the creation box, doesn't fit into that category. So we can say something that doesn't make sense like the phrase "before time." Obviously, the adjective "before" is a reference to time itself. Therefore, there is no such thing as "before time." Yet because God is not the circle of the time space continuum, but something other, He can, in fact be "before time." And since we have a relation with Him despite our outer limits, His unlimitedness can comingle with our limitedness. And this is the mystery both of the incarnation and of the new creation we are becoming in Him as we are born again from "above."

Man, not being created, has no perception of ever having "waited" to be created, but nevertheless, if time is infinite then the odds of the concurrence of perception (x) with the point of time called now (y) is x:y. And where y is infinity, creating impossible odds.

If time is infinite, then our perception of now is thus proof that the imfinite odds are being played out right at this moment and being won by those who have perception. And I do have perception. And so do you.

It does not require an experience of waiting, since perception does not begin prior to the creation of the perceiver, but the reality of waiting that makes our perception at this point in time infinitely unlikely. Yet we do perceive that we are alive right now.

Many people on hearing me say this have said that really the odds of such perception are 1:1, not 1:infinity because the probability is being analyzed after the fact. Now already coexists with the time aloted for the human perception. And by such reasoning they discount what I am saying.

However, that is not the case. The probability existed before creation for however long God has existed and then time started rolling forth when creation began relative to creation's time and space, mass and energy. The probability from the perspective of God, rather than man, who existed for eternity past and will exist toward eternity future in whatever time continuum exists outside of creation was infinity to one that our perception would be right now at this point along the time continuum when the God time continuum, not the creation time continuum began. That is God's perspective. And then the odds of us existing at any point in time where that time appointed should coincide with now within the set of possible portions of time in a limited time-space continuum that began with creation, say some umpteen gazillion years ago with a big bang is maybe not infinity to one but umpteen gazillion to seventy or so.

This makes our existence right now highly improbable to say the least from the perspective of God, who being greater than creation is the one who would wait for our existence, but by His power doesn't have to.

Rather, he is able to bend the heavens, along with time, towards us. Thus the entire history of creation has taken place, but at the same time, along with Him, He is able to (and does) advance time on our behalf so that our lives may begin. In saying this I am not saying that the Universe only appears to be gazillions of years old but that it actually is that old - only that we as human beings did not have to wait for it to be born. Had we been forced to wait for our appointed time to be born we would not be having perception right now at this time, because either there would be umpteen gazillion years to wait for in the best case scenario, or infinity years to wait for, in the event that time, because of God, not because of creation, does extend infinitely into the past.

The age of the universe does nothing to dismantle this logic. Light is thus exactly what it seems, showing that the Universe is very old and very large, containing tremendous energy and mostly space, but also tremendous mass, just as the cosmologists suppose. I have no disagreement with them.

The formation of the world is another matter. Cosmologically, it seems to me that the earth starts out as a blob of lava at some point late in the history of this old Universe. The creation of the "heavens" thus occurs prior to the creation of the earth in two different ways. First, spiritually it exists incorporeally as part of creation. It is thus not subject to the time/matter/space system that has its limits. There is no reference to what happens and when in terms of the creation of the heavens in Genesis 1:1, only that "in the beginning" "they were created." The rest of the story pertains to the creation of the earth. And on the very first day that the earth was created so also did God create light.

Here, then is what happened - the earth spun off as a fireball from some other system, either a planet, or a meteorite, or the sun or some such thing and the earth began rotating around the sun, though it is well possible that even the earths rotation around the sun took a very long time. That is it may have floated in from outside of our own solar system and then got caught in the Sun's gravitational field and started to orbit much later.

The result is that it started out as formless. And the first thing that was created was the light - darkness having been hovering over the deep with the Spirit of God brooding there, where there was water. What this gives me the picture of is a mass of water that is on fire on one side and full of water on the other side and over the water is the Spirit of God getting ready to do something with this watery fire ball. The water, being in that portion of the ball that has no light gradually cools the surface of the whole ball so that the fire is put out, and over time there would have been a great deal of steam coming up creating a firmament in the heavens.

The fire does not produce life in the creation, which is very interesting because the fire winds up being swallowed up by the water and becoming the center of the earth, not only hot by birth, but continually hot on account of gravity's pressure. The symbol of the pull towards what is earthly, rather than heavenly is thus depicted in this beginning of earth's creation. And in all of this a day has not yet occurred because the earth has not yet been able to rotate because it is formless and void. A great deal of time thus passes while the earth cools. And to me that seems consistent with what geologists say. Thus not only is the Universe old, but also the earth is old. However, in the measure of days, these don't begin until the earth rotates because it is the Sun and the moon that are given for time and for seasons.

Right around Genesis 1:5-6 then the water covers the earth and the steam creates an expanse between the earth and the heavens and we wind up with a huge canopy of water in a very hot greenhouse environment with mists coming up wherever there is water. It is steam. The expanse was the "sky" or "firmament" and this steam canopy continued until at some point the earth was beginning to take some sort of shape because somewhere between day one and day two there was some rotation going on. As a Biblical literalist I would think this must mean that God would then count the rotation of the ocean floor which would eventually become the promised land. Now the timing of the planting of the Garden of Eden is never given because it doesn't come until Genesis 2. But the fact that the earth was rotation shows that there was a point of reference that mattered in the sight of God so that days could be measured. And that place would be where God dwelt upon the earth - that is over the waters of the deep. So a second day was completed while there was as yet no land above the waters. And again, this may have lasted a very long time, not just 24 hours, yet have been counted as a single day.

It is on the third day, Gen 1:9 that He separates the land from the sea. He does not say that He creates the land, but that He separates it from the sea. The vegetation that had been under the water also may have begun long before this in the mixture of earth and sea. And then once the land is separated, on the same day it is separated so also does the land produce vegetation of its own accord. He does not create vegetation, but lets the land produce it. See verse 11. All this happens on the third day, which again may have lasted fro millions of years and yet have been counted as a single day because the earth had not yet begun to rotate rapidly.

It is not until the fourth day (Gen 1:14) that the lights are given for signs. It is thus beginning with the fourth day that the earth seems to gain a faster rotation. The rhythm of the seasons thus marks the first stabalization of a formerly formless world whose elements were first put in place so that the world could sustain every variety of life in a very short period of time thereafter.

The fifth day the waters begin to teem with living creatures. This does not mean that there were no living creatures with life prior to the fifth day, but merely that the oceans were not teaming with them prior to that time. The birds also begin to fly and teem at that time, as well. These also may have had much older origins but did not begin to teem until the fifth day. Hence there may be found skeletal remains of both birds and fish that are much older than sixth thousand years by a constant scale, but not necessarily in terms of counting days by rotation, which the lights of day four were given for. God created the sea cratures and the birds and also says for them to multiply on that day, which again may have still yet been very long. But on this day the earth is normalizing its orbit with the Sun and its rotation may be picking up speed

The sixth day then comes and the beasts are created on the land and everything that crawls and these also multiply. The only other thing I should point out here that people usually fail to notice is that not just man, but also every beast was given not animals to eat, but the plants, as per Gen 1:29-30 ...

Then God said, "I give you every seed-bearing plant on the face of the whole earth and every tree that has fruit with seed in it. They will be yours for food. 30 And to all the beasts of the earth and all the birds of the air and all the creatures that move on the ground—everything that has the breath of life in it—I give every green plant for food." And it was so.

Notice he says this about the beasts of the earth and of the birds but not of the fish. The land beasts and birds were thus created as herbavors, as was man. After the fall, satan messed up the chromosomes of many creatures because he was given some authority over man, which included the ability to cause him to die through disease and decay in the multiplication of sin. When the earth became very barren and devoid of proper nutrition outside fo the Garden of Eden some dinosaurs, through disease and lack of nutrition became meat eaters and developed sharp teeth. The world became very dry in certain places. Agriculture became toilsome. And the dinosaurs and other beasts roamed the earth looking for meat because man was not ruling over them and was unable to provide Eden's good nutrition to them.

Archeologists have not ever found Eden. But the redemption of the animal kingdom is depicted both in the Noah's Ark and in the clinging of the animals to the crosses at Gobekli Tepe - a sign that Paradise may one be restored through Christ when He returns and when man comes to obtain dominion over the earth as he was intended.

I do not necessarily call this a gap theory. My beef is with evolution, not cosmology. In a sense this may make me a Gap supporter as I've described it above. But I don't just see extra time being placed between Genesis 1:1 and 1:2, but in these other verses as well. In my opinion, this leaves much more room for a consistency with the findings of geologists, which include fossilized plants and animals that are very old inside of rocks.

A slowly rotating earth that increases in speed is something that wabbles and then reaches an equilibrium followed by some gradual decrease. The text does not provide the timing of this but recorded history, I've been told, is showing a gradual slowing down of the earth's rotation which shows it to be very young if extrapolated. But in what I am telling you here, there is not an endlessly increasing speed to look for just because the earth's rate of rotation is now decreasing, but an initial increase as the form of the earth stabilized, followed by a decrease after an equalization point of sorts.

The slowing of the earth's rotation may thus show that the earth is young, but the formula is not so easy to determine, and must instead be calibrated by other factors, not excluding the Word of God itself.

In all of this science lives in harmony with the Word of God and does not conflict with it in a single word, particularly when the anthropomorphisms are accounted for. That is, the sun does not rotate around the earth, but the earth itself rotates. But from man's perspective, (and the Bible is written for man, so why not write it often from man's perspective?), the sun rotates around the earth. And indeed, all things being relative, if something rotates, then in relation to it everything is rotating around it.

That the earth is surrounded by the universe is thus the very image God wants to reveal. It speaks of God's great love towards us that creation itself should appear this way, because in God's eyes, no matter how vast and good the heavens are, the whole Universe rotates around us. It is an expression of His great love that He condescends this way.
 
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I do not believe you have comprehended what I have said. But your last statement about fitting a square peg into a round hole may be an idea I can take up on that would help explain it. And that is to say that what is impossible for man is not impossible for God.

You say that "before" time God existed in a timeless state. Perhaps this is because in the round hole we imagine that there is a time space continuum. But God, being outside the creation box, doesn't fit into that category. So we can say something that doesn't make sense like the phrase "before time." Obviously, the adjective "before" is a reference to time itself. Therefore, there is no such thing as "before time." Yet because God is not the circle of the time space continuum, but something other, He can, in fact be "before time." And since we have a relation with Him despite our outer limits, His unlimitedness can comingle with our limitedness. And this is the mystery both of the incarnation and of the new creation we are becoming in Him as we are born again from "above."

I was hoping we could start off by agreeing on something.:)

If you study or read about the Big Bang, astronomers and physicists do talk about the state of things before the Big Bang, before time, in their attempt to provide a mathematical model reconciling quantum mechanics with general relativity. This is where String Theory, Superstrings, M-theory and others are postulated. This is where 11 dimensions of space and time make sense.


Man, not being created, has no perception of ever having "waited" to be created, but nevertheless, if time is infinite then the odds of the concurrence of perception (x) with the point of time called now (y) is x:y. And where y is infinity, creating impossible odds.

If time is infinite, then our perception of now is thus proof that the imfinite odds are being played out right at this moment and being won by those who have perception. And I do have perception. And so do you.

It does not require an experience of waiting, since perception does not begin prior to the creation of the perceiver, but the reality of waiting that makes our perception at this point in time infinitely unlikely. Yet we do perceive that we are alive right now.

Many people on hearing me say this have said that really the odds of such perception are 1:1, not 1:infinity because the probability is being analyzed after the fact. Now already coexists with the time aloted for the human perception. And by such reasoning they discount what I am saying.

I never said time was infinite. What I've been saying is time started with the Big Bang. I do not understand what your saying here about "waiting". This does not make sense to me.

However, that is not the case. The probability existed before creation for however long God has existed and then time started rolling forth when creation began relative to creation's time and space, mass and energy. The probability from the perspective of God, rather than man, who existed for eternity past and will exist toward eternity future in whatever time continuum exists outside of creation was infinity to one that our perception would be right now at this point along the time continuum when the God time continuum, not the creation time continuum began. That is God's perspective. And then the odds of us existing at any point in time where that time appointed should coincide with now within the set of possible portions of time in a limited time-space continuum that began with creation, say some umpteen gazillion years ago with a big bang is maybe not infinity to one but umpteen gazillion to seventy or so.

Whoa there. What do you mean "for however long God has existed"? What's this "God time continuum"? I do not believe this is a valid concept.

This makes our existence right now highly improbable to say the least from the perspective of God, who being greater than creation is the one who would wait for our existence, but by His power doesn't have to.

Rather, he is able to bend the heavens, along with time, towards us. Thus the entire history of creation has taken place, but at the same time, along with Him, He is able to (and does) advance time on our behalf so that our lives may begin. In saying this I am not saying that the Universe only appears to be gazillions of years old but that it actually is that old - only that we as human beings did not have to wait for it to be born. Had we been forced to wait for our appointed time to be born we would not be having perception right now at this time, because either there would be umpteen gazillion years to wait for in the best case scenario, or infinity years to wait for, in the event that time, because of God, not because of creation, does extend infinitely into the past.

The age of the universe does nothing to dismantle this logic. Light is thus exactly what it seems, showing that the Universe is very old and very large, containing tremendous energy and mostly space, but also tremendous mass, just as the cosmologists suppose. I have no disagreement with them.

One thing we know about God, He does not violate His perfect will. I like to think of God as the ultimate engineer, scientist and mathematician. The world, the universe is ruled by laws we have been trying to figure out for the totality of man's existence. By God does not violate the rules He sets in place. Light is going to act the way God originally intended. We may not have always known why it is affected by gravity, but it always was
whether we observed it or not.


The formation of the world is another matter. Cosmologically, it seems to me that the earth starts out as a blob of lava at some point late in the history of this old Universe. The creation of the "heavens" thus occurs prior to the creation of the earth in two different ways. First, spiritually it exists incorporeally as part of creation. It is thus not subject to the time/matter/space system that has its limits. There is no reference to what happens and when in terms of the creation of the heavens in Genesis 1:1, only that "in the beginning" "they were created." The rest of the story pertains to the creation of the earth. And on the very first day that the earth was created so also did God create light.

Here, then is what happened - the earth spun off as a fireball from some other system, either a planet, or a meteorite, or the sun or some such thing and the earth began rotating around the sun, though it is well possible that even the earths rotation around the sun took a very long time. That is it may have floated in from outside of our own solar system and then got caught in the Sun's gravitational field and started to orbit much later.

The result is that it started out as formless. And the first thing that was created was the light - darkness having been hovering over the deep with the Spirit of God brooding there, where there was water. What this gives me the picture of is a mass of water that is on fire on one side and full of water on the other side and over the water is the Spirit of God getting ready to do something with this watery fire ball. The water, being in that portion of the ball that has no light gradually cools the surface of the whole ball so that the fire is put out, and over time there would have been a great deal of steam coming up creating a firmament in the heavens.

The fire does not produce life in the creation, which is very interesting because the fire winds up being swallowed up by the water and becoming the center of the earth, not only hot by birth, but continually hot on account of gravity's pressure. The symbol of the pull towards what is earthly, rather than heavenly is thus depicted in this beginning of earth's creation. And in all of this a day has not yet occurred because the earth has not yet been able to rotate because it is formless and void. A great deal of time thus passes while the earth cools. And to me that seems consistent with what geologists say. Thus not only is the Universe old, but also the earth is old. However, in the measure of days, these don't begin until the earth rotates because it is the Sun and the moon that are given for time and for seasons.

Right around Genesis 1:5-6 then the water covers the earth and the steam creates an expanse between the earth and the heavens and we wind up with a huge canopy of water in a very hot greenhouse environment with mists coming up wherever there is water. It is steam. The expanse was the "sky" or "firmament" and this steam canopy continued until at some point the earth was beginning to take some sort of shape because somewhere between day one and day two there was some rotation going on. As a Biblical literalist I would think this must mean that God would then count the rotation of the ocean floor which would eventually become the promised land. Now the timing of the planting of the Garden of Eden is never given because it doesn't come until Genesis 2. But the fact that the earth was rotation shows that there was a point of reference that mattered in the sight of God so that days could be measured. And that place would be where God dwelt upon the earth - that is over the waters of the deep. So a second day was completed while there was as yet no land above the waters. And again, this may have lasted a very long time, not just 24 hours, yet have been counted as a single day.

It is on the third day, Gen 1:9 that He separates the land from the sea. He does not say that He creates the land, but that He separates it from the sea. The vegetation that had been under the water also may have begun long before this in the mixture of earth and sea. And then once the land is separated, on the same day it is separated so also does the land produce vegetation of its own accord. He does not create vegetation, but lets the land produce it. See verse 11. All this happens on the third day, which again may have lasted fro millions of years and yet have been counted as a single day because the earth had not yet begun to rotate rapidly.

It is not until the fourth day (Gen 1:14) that the lights are given for signs. It is thus beginning with the fourth day that the earth seems to gain a faster rotation. The rhythm of the seasons thus marks the first stabalization of a formerly formless world whose elements were first put in place so that the world could sustain every variety of life in a very short period of time thereafter.

The fifth day the waters begin to teem with living creatures. This does not mean that there were no living creatures with life prior to the fifth day, but merely that the oceans were not teaming with them prior to that time. The birds also begin to fly and teem at that time, as well. These also may have had much older origins but did not begin to teem until the fifth day. Hence there may be found skeletal remains of both birds and fish that are much older than sixth thousand years by a constant scale, but not necessarily in terms of counting days by rotation, which the lights of day four were given for. God created the sea cratures and the birds and also says for them to multiply on that day, which again may have still yet been very long. But on this day the earth is normalizing its orbit with the Sun and its rotation may be picking up speed

The sixth day then comes and the beasts are created on the land and everything that crawls and these also multiply. The only other thing I should point out here that people usually fail to notice is that not just man, but also every beast was given not animals to eat, but the plants, as per Gen 1:29-30 ...

Then God said, "I give you every seed-bearing plant on the face of the whole earth and every tree that has fruit with seed in it. They will be yours for food. 30 And to all the beasts of the earth and all the birds of the air and all the creatures that move on the ground—everything that has the breath of life in it—I give every green plant for food." And it was so.

Notice he says this about the beasts of the earth and of the birds but not of the fish. The land beasts and birds were thus created as herbavors, as was man. After the fall, satan messed up the chromosomes of many creatures because he was given some authority over man, which included the ability to cause him to die through disease and decay in the multiplication of sin. When the earth became very barren and devoid of proper nutrition outside fo the Garden of Eden some dinosaurs, through disease and lack of nutrition became meat eaters and developed sharp teeth. The world became very dry in certain places. Agriculture became toilsome. And the dinosaurs and other beasts roamed the earth looking for meat because man was not ruling over them and was unable to provide Eden's good nutrition to them.

It do not believe Adam coexisted with dinosaurs. You'd have a difficult time getting a geologist to agree with your speculative creation account.

Archeologists have not ever found Eden. But the redemption of the animal kingdom is depicted both in the Noah's Ark and in the clinging of the animals to the crosses at Gobekli Tepe - a sign that Paradise may one be restored through Christ when He returns and when man comes to obtain dominion over the earth as he was intended.

That the earth is surrounded by the universe is thus the very image God wants to reveal. It speaks of God's great love towards us that creation itself should appear this way, because in God's eyes, no matter how vast and good the heavens are, the whole Universe rotates around us. It is an expression of His great love that He condescends this way.

I did not see crosses at Gobekli Tepe. Tees maybe, crosses no. You seem to want to force harmony between Noah's Flood and Gobekli Tepe. Fine, but I'm not convinced. I think we're going to have to agree to disagree, but I've enjoyed the discussion. Some of your original posting had to be cut because it and my reply were too long.
 
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jamescarvin

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I was hoping we could start off by agreeing on something.:)

If you study or read about the Big Bang, astronomers and physicists do talk about the state of things before the Big Bang, before time, in their attempt to provide a mathematical model reconciling quantum mechanics with general relativity. This is where String Theory, Superstrings, M-theory and others are postulated. This is where 11 dimensions of space and time make sense.
I am aware of the 11 dimension string theory. It is way beyond my ability to comprehend. What I can comprehend is how to caculate odds. I have awareness against all odds. I am alive. Sweet!


I never said time was infinite. What I've been saying is time started with the Big Bang. I do not understand what your saying here about "waiting". This does not make sense to me.

Yes, well whether you or others agree or not, I believe that time is infinite, and did not begin with the Bib Bang, whereas the portions of the Universe that contain mass are not infinite. I do not know whether the Universe is expanding or contracting or whether there is equilibrium with portions of both. But time and space, as concepts, have no limits. And I believe that God has awareness of mass-free places in the Universe infinitely far away from any locations of mass or energy in the Universe. Anyone else's agreement is not required. I base my faith on what Scripture reveals. Further, it cannot be said that the Universe is expanding or contracting without consideration of these outer limits as spacial coordinates. There seems to me to be a failure among cosmologists to make the distinction between the limits of the Universe as to time, mass and energy and the spacial and time coordinates extending beyond them which are not limited by those things. Therefore I believe that time existed before the Big Bang. How the 11 dimensional string theory fits in with that statement I don't know. As I said, I can't comprehend what those cosmologists have been saying.



Whoa there. What do you mean "for however long God has existed"? What's this "God time continuum"? I do not believe this is a valid concept.
"for however long God has existed" is to the infinite past. The statement was a passing dig. The "God time continuum" poses a distinction between the "Universe time continuum" - God existing before the Universe in time and as other being than the Universe as to space since He is uncreated Spirit. In short the "God time continuum" extends from eternity past, to now, to eternity future. Because of it, "now" must be infinity years from the beginning of God. God has no beginning. Therefore our existence is impossible. But God also has no limits to His power. Therefore, He creates us not in a time warp of the Universe, as these are known through astrophysical theories, but in a time warp of the God time continuum, which is known through theology.



One thing we know about God, He does not violate His perfect will. I like to think of God as the ultimate engineer, scientist and mathematician. The world, the universe is ruled by laws we have been trying to figure out for the totality of man's existence. By God does not violate the rules He sets in place. Light is going to act the way God originally intended. We may not have always known why it is affected by gravity, but it always was
whether we observed it or not.

This would be generally true but the "laws" of the Universe are a description of generally observable phenomena, or theories and are not the same as Divine Law. There is nothing prohibiting God from intervening in creation to do things that belong to His power and produce exceptions in the realm of the laws of the Universe. That is why there is such a thing as miracles, including the resurrection of the dead.



It do not believe Adam coexisted with dinosaurs. You'd have a difficult time getting a geologist to agree with your speculative creation account.
Maybe so. But I do not assume that geologists are right any more than I assume modern Creationists are right. I have seen people huddling up and publishing what looks like group think on both sides. I am not capable of following all of the arguments of either side, partly because of the limits of my apprehension, and partly because I don't have time to consider it all. But I am open to the possibility that man did coexist with dinosaurs, and indeed, that is the way the Genesis account appears. I do not see that the Gap Theory makes this any less so. I have not seen any creationists attempt to examine my rotation-theory as it stands against the geological and fossil record. I am suggesting an entirely unexamined paradigm so far as I know - one that may actually prove true in the long run. As I said before, my belief in the Bible stems from my examination of prophecy and my personal experience. This is given in faith. So no doubt I bring a great deal of prejudice to questions concerning creation. My bias is that every word of the Bible was true in its original authorship until it was completely compiled. That includes Genesis 1 and 2. Geologists will not approach that question with the same bias. They will no doubt continue to support their already existing contrary presuppositions.


Philo of Alexandria, a pharisee living in the time of Jesus, did not believe that the Garden of Eden was literal. Many Christians have taken an allegorical approach to Genesis as he did. The problem I have with allegory is that once we say something wasn't literal then we open up a hermeneutic for saying that everything should be taken allegorically and that none of it is literal - even the incarnation and the resurrection of Christ. I therefore take the account of the flood literally. And I take it at face value that the dinosaurs lived up until the flood.

The creationists have made some good arguments and their critics have refuted them. My position has been to stand to the side as a casual observer who is admittedly biased on this question. The reports of the Dinosaur and Human Co-existence: FOOTPRINTS dinosaur tracks at the Paluxy River in Texas with human footprints in them may have other explanations, as proposed by Glen Kuban and others, who refute creationist claims. The primary evidence I find is the Bible itself, which I take at face value. So I have not engaged in those debates, nor followed them steadfastly.

One thing that I have heard you say that maybe will help me understand you, is that you say that this temple predated Adam by 6000 years. My response that I did not believe that there was any such thing as a "PreAdamic Temple" was what started this diversional dialog. Hopefully, I have clarified that here I am referring to man, not fossils of other sorts in saying this. The Bible repeatedly says that Adam was the first man. I do not see how the Gap Theory fixes that. Apparently you do not hold that Adam was the first man? If you believe that Adam was the first man, then how did there appear other men who built Gobekli Tepe 6000 years earlier?
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I am aware of the 11 dimension string theory. It is way beyond my ability to comprehend. What I can comprehend is how to caculate odds. I have awareness against all odds. I am alive. Sweet!

The Lord gave me a logical, mathematical and scientific mind. But the way God saved me is totally unbelievable. At least it was unbelievable to those I shared my testimony with on another forum fifteen years ago. It was met with complete silence. I may someday try again, but not now.

Yes, well whether you or others agree or not, I believe that time is infinite, and did not begin with the Bib Bang, whereas the portions of the Universe that contain mass are not infinite. I do not know whether the Universe is expanding or contracting or whether there is equilibrium with portions of both. But time and space, as concepts, have no limits. And I believe that God has awareness of mass-free places in the Universe infinitely far away from any locations of mass or energy in the Universe. Anyone else's agreement is not required. I base my faith on what Scripture reveals. Further, it cannot be said that the Universe is expanding or contracting without consideration of these outer limits as spacial coordinates. There seems to me to be a failure among cosmologists to make the distinction between the limits of the Universe as to time, mass and energy and the spacial and time coordinates extending beyond them which are not limited by those things. Therefore I believe that time existed before the Big Bang. How the 11 dimensional string theory fits in with that statement I don't know. As I said, I can't comprehend what those cosmologists have been saying.

When I speak of 11 dimensions of space, time is the fourth dimension. The time dimension did not exist prior to the Big Bang. Or to put it another way, all 11 dimensions were collapsed to the point of a singularity. Hard to grasp, I know, and it is still just a theory. The universe is not just expanding, it's still accelerating!

"for however long God has existed" is to the infinite past. The statement was a passing dig. The "God time continuum" poses a distinction between the "Universe time continuum" - God existing before the Universe in time and as other being than the Universe as to space since He is uncreated Spirit. In short the "God time continuum" extends from eternity past, to now, to eternity future. Because of it, "now" must be infinity years from the beginning of God. God has no beginning. Therefore our existence is impossible. But God also has no limits to His power. Therefore, He creates us not in a time warp of the Universe, as these are known through astrophysical theories, but in a time warp of the God time continuum, which is known through theology.


I don't see the logical leap you make from God has no beginning to therefore our existence is impossible.

This would be generally true but the "laws" of the Universe are a description of generally observable phenomena, or theories and are not the same as Divine Law. There is nothing prohibiting God from intervening in creation to do things that belong to His power and produce exceptions in the realm of the laws of the Universe. That is why there is such a thing as miracles, including the resurrection of the dead.


I agree.

Maybe so. But I do not assume that geologists are right any more than I assume modern Creationists are right. I have seen people huddling up and publishing what looks like group think on both sides. I am not capable of following all of the arguments of either side, partly because of the limits of my apprehension, and partly because I don't have time to consider it all. But I am open to the possibility that man did coexist with dinosaurs, and indeed, that is the way the Genesis account appears. I do not see that the Gap Theory makes this any less so. I have not seen any creationists attempt to examine my rotation-theory as it stands against the geological and fossil record. I am suggesting an entirely unexamined paradigm so far as I know - one that may actually prove true in the long run. As I said before, my belief in the Bible stems from my examination of prophecy and my personal experience. This is given in faith. So no doubt I bring a great deal of prejudice to questions concerning creation. My bias is that every word of the Bible was true in its original authorship until it was completely compiled. That includes Genesis 1 and 2. Geologists will not approach that question with the same bias. They will no doubt continue to support their already existing contrary presuppositions.


I also take the Bible literally. I've read some unscientific Creation theories proposed to reconcile the discrepancy of years but I'm not yet moved by their arguments.

Philo of Alexandria, a pharisee living in the time of Jesus, did not believe that the Garden of Eden was literal. Many Christians have taken an allegorical approach to Genesis as he did. The problem I have with allegory is that once we say something wasn't literal then we open up a hermeneutic for saying that everything should be taken allegorically and that none of it is literal - even the incarnation and the resurrection of Christ. I therefore take the account of the flood literally. And I take it at face value that the dinosaurs lived up until the flood.

The creationists have made some good arguments and their critics have refuted them. My position has been to stand to the side as a casual observer who is admittedly biased on this question. The reports of the Dinosaur and Human Co-existence: FOOTPRINTS dinosaur tracks at the Paluxy River in Texas with human footprints in them may have other explanations, as proposed by Glen Kuban and others, who refute creationist claims. The primary evidence I find is the Bible itself, which I take at face value. So I have not engaged in those debates, nor followed them steadfastly.

One thing that I have heard you say that maybe will help me understand you, is that you say that this temple predated Adam by 6000 years. My response that I did not believe that there was any such thing as a "PreAdamic Temple" was what started this diversional dialog. Hopefully, I have clarified that here I am referring to man, not fossils of other sorts in saying this. The Bible repeatedly says that Adam was the first man. I do not see how the Gap Theory fixes that. Apparently you do not hold that Adam was the first man? If you believe that Adam was the first man, then how did there appear other men who built Gobekli Tepe 6000 years earlier?

No, I do recognize Adam as the first man. But I also believe there was a judgment placed on the earth -- something that Scripture only alludes to. But there are Scriptures in Genesis, Psalms, Peter and elsewhere that give us clues. But let me reiterate, that what did or did not happen before Adam is not necessary to fully understand for salvation. I've studied the Gap Theory for years, and have also more recently studied the Day-Age Theory of Genesis. I am not persuaded by the YEC arguments, and not really persuaded by the Day-Age Theories either. The Gap Theory is too involved with many side roads and too much Scripture to consider to go into here. Origins theology is probably the best place to have a detailed discussion.
 
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jamescarvin

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When I speak of 11 dimensions of space, time is the fourth dimension. The time dimension did not exist prior to the Big Bang. Or to put it another way, all 11 dimensions were collapsed to the point of a singularity. Hard to grasp, I know, and it is still just a theory. The universe is not just expanding, it's still accelerating!
To me it just sounds like smart people bending over backwards to deny creation ex nihilo by an uncreated creator. They stuffed time into space in order to accomplish it.

I don't see the logical leap you make from God has no beginning to therefore our existence is impossible.
The only reason God has no beginning is that His existence extends into the forever past. He always was. And He always was independently of the creation of the Universe. However, whether it is God or anyone else, in order to arrive at the point that is now, that has an eternity past, it is necessary that God should do the impossible, and that is to transcend time itself so that an infinite amount of time has passed. He is not only everywhere, but at all times.

For man it is impossible to exist without God, who sustains man by many forms of grace. The "beginning" of this grace is exemplified in our perceiving existence right now. An infinity past has taken place, which from our relationship with time is impossible, lest an infinity of time had been accomplished, which by definition, it cannot ever be accomplished. We exist then in logical contradiction. The string theorists provide a Universe with a limited amount of time so that this contradiction is lessened. But their theory is wholly speculative, just as the God theory is wholly speculative. But it has one thing on its side - it is easier to understand and has been understood fro millennia.

So this is it, time is either limited or it is not. If it is not, and it extends forever into the past, then our present existence has passed through an infinite amount of time. Nothing can pass through an infinite amount of time. Therefore (a) time must be limited or (b) something has passed us through an infinite amount of time miraculously. or (c) unmiraculously.

I don't have a satisfactory explanation for either (a) or (c). And even if the string theory for the Universe was correct, (and how would anybody prove that?) if God is wholly other then the string theory doesn't apply to God. God is El Olam. He is by revelation eternal, everlasting. He is the Alpha and the Omega and before Abraham was He is.

Man, by contrast, is made from dust even in the evolutionary model. For God to transcend eternity is not impossible because God is God. But for man to do so requires the grace of God. God thus does the impossible for man and brings him forth not just out of dust, which was itself brought forth from nothing, but passes by eternity on his behalf both in His own realm of time, and in the realm of time that belongs to the Universe. As a result man has perception and experiences life right now.

If the string theory can explain somehow, (well beyond my understanding), that the Universe and time are connected so that a Big Bang happened gazillions of years ago, it still doesn't explain the improbability of man's existence right now, which is one in a gazillion. I have already explained this. But perhaps not very well. As I said, some people say that since we do exist, therefore the probability of our existence is 1:1.

That is like saying regarding the lottery that since I won, the odds of my winning were 1:1. After the fact that is true, but prior to the lottery date that is not true. And what we are speaking of is a paradigm that says chance is the cause of us rather than God in which the Universe is supposedly gazillions of years old and that with no special intervention we would come to be through chance, or maybe not, but that we just happened to wind up existing at some point, and not just as "some" point, but right now. And that is something that is against all odds, whether by God's infinite timeline, or by some limited timeline given according to string theory.

You say you don't see the logical leap I make from God has no beginning to therefore our existence is impossible. "Impossible" turns into "highly improbable" when the set of odds defeated is finite. So if time is finite, then it is not impossible, just highly improbable - ridiculously highly improbable given the size and scope of the Universe, along with time proposed by string theorists. And it is impossible given the eternity past and future paradigm revealed in God. But by His power this impossibility is overcome. He thus reveals Himself as a Savior from the start.

I also take the Bible literally. ...No, I do recognize Adam as the first man...
So are you an evolutionist? If Adam is the first man, and you take the Bible literally, how do other civilizations appear prior to Adam? Are these not men? Are you saying that Gobekli Tepe was not built up by men?

I am willing to admit that it is possible that Gobekli Tepe was not created by Noah and Methuselah. Perhaps it was created by the "men of renown." Taking dozens of 30 ton rocks up that hill would have required some incredible strength. There is also the possibility that the site was shared by both good and evil. After all, it appears to have layers of use, and that would explain the painting on the wall of Calvary. It is not just a one time deal. Archeologists are saying it was built and rebuilt over a thousand years. It remains to see what else they find as 95% of it is still uncovered. And again, I still have not found any other source for that wall painting. The German Documentary makes it appear that it is part of the Gobekli Tepe inventory. But no other source has confirmed that. The possibility exists that the German documentary was using footage from another site in order to make a comparison. I don't speak German. I can only understand the pictures in that documentary.
 
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To me it just sounds like smart people bending over backwards to deny creation ex nihilo by an uncreated creator. They stuffed time into space in order to accomplish it.

We're going around in circles here. We probably should agree to disagree.

So are you an evolutionist?

No.

If Adam is the first man, and you take the Bible literally, how do other civilizations appear prior to Adam? Are these not men? Are you saying that Gobekli Tepe was not built up by men?

I am saying that there were beings and/or creatures who lived before Adam, beings and/or creatures who were judged by God, as was this prior creative work. Hence, the reason for the earth to be in a state of chaos, i.e., judgment, at the beginning day of our creation. It is not necessary for me to know the details regarding this for it is immaterial to my salvation. It is obvious that the earth was in a state of chaos at the time before creation, and some of the fallen angels were imprisoned for their part in what happened. This is actually less speculative than what you've been trying to force with your interpretation of Gobekli Tepe. Just my opinion.
 
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I agree with this approach. The basis of my own opinion is on a documentary I found that is in German. I am not sure if this documentary is from Klaus Schmidt, or from other Germans. I do not speak German. All I can understand is the pictures. I may be making a mistake by assuming that the picture that is plainly of Calvary actually belongs to Gobekli Tepe. I have not been able to find this picture associated with Gobekli Tepe in any other source. And I do not know whether the documentary is actually saying that those pictures were from Gobekli Tepe. Possibly, the makers of this documentary were simply pointing out a similarity.

As for the similarity, even if there was not a wall painting, the fact remains that what has been found in this so called "Eden" are twelve foot high T crosses. No one sticks their neck out or paints themself into a corner by believing that an ancient culture may have predicted the cross. Read Tatian, Clement of Alexandria, Justin and Ireneus. All of these pointed out that the ancient cultures knew partial truths concerning the Gospel, and then through the work of the devil these were perverted. They were able to ascertain these truths through Moses, who was a prophet, and through the descendants of Noah, who also knew the truth.

If those who built this temple were not of the orthodox lineage of Adam through Noah, they may have been from among others, and may have had perverted concepts of the Truth. Such is apostasy. But that does not mean that there is no truth whatever. Just a twisted version of it. It is like a reflection of prophecy, though imperfect when it comes from any of these other cultures. What culture Gobekli Tepe will prove to have been, I don't know. As someone here mentioned, only 5% of the site has been excavated so far. We would all do well to wait and see what is unearthed. If that picture is part of the site, then I can say it seems like something closer to genuinely prophetic, and not necessarily on the apostate side of degeneration. And that would make it a very rare and significant find indeed.

Archeology is fascinating and we can only learn more as the 5% eventually become a complete excavation. I believe all discoveries point to God one way or the other. The data learned from this excavation pro or con in the present regard can only glorify God if it is understood in its proper context.
 
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Archeology is fascinating and we can only learn more as the 5% eventually become a complete excavation. I believe all discoveries point to God one way or the other. The data learned from this excavation pro or con in the present regard can only glorify God if it is understood in its proper context.
That is a good summary of this. I do see God's hand everywhere I turn. It is my faith disposition. Others will no doubt interpret the data differently. None of us has all the data. However, I do find that wall painting from the German Documentary particularly compelling. If that is, indeed, a painting from Gobekli Tepe then there can be no question in my mind that those shapes are not just Ts, but crosses.

Other discussion here has centered on the question of dating. Archeologists assign a very old date to this site even with only 5% of it excavated - 6000 years not just before Stonehenge, but before Adam. It is fascinating but stands in contradiction to the Scriptures. The Lord said that the Scriptures could not be broken. The archeologists would disagree with Jesus.

So here in this Fundamentalist Forum the discussion has revolved appropriately around whether or not an old dating like that does, in fact, break the Scriptures. So far two theories have been proposed that would allow it - a Gap theory and a Slow Day theory. In the first, there doesn't seem to be any accounting for Genesis 1:2-25. A judgment call makes man man at Genesis 1:26 where man is made in God's image. Prior to that there is no argument with consensus archeology. And that is the advantage - whether one believes in evolution or not - man is created specially when God breathes the spirit into Him and makes Him in His own image.

The Slow Day theory poses many unanswered questions and gets rejected along with the Scriptures by consensus archeology. I should expect as much. I simply pose it, not as an archeologist, but as an exegete, so as to consider the question we have before us.

A third theory is that various verses in Genesis 1 were not part of the original autograph of the Scriptures. It was added on by a copyist at some point. In that event, we would have a Bible that was unbroken in its original autograph. Pretty much that could be said about any supposed contradiction in the entire Bible.

The problem I have with that is that I understand the Bible to be a document that was compiled over many centuries. The Jahwist, Elohist, Priestly and Deuteronomist streams that are woven into Genesis and later books produce a fabric that becomes canon. It isn't until the 3rd Century BC that I can start to get any picture at all of the vorlage of that age. To go back all the way to Moses and Joshua is impossible. Are these later streams uncanonical just because they were woven together? Is the weaving itself not inspired? This is the problem with the autograph theory. There are different approaches to answering that question.

I think the best solution to that problem is to recognize that God knows what the true Scriptures are even if we can't. They are His word. So when He says that every jot and tittle must be fulfilled and that the Scriptures can't be broken, the Scriptures He is referring to are the ones He spoke Himself. Everything else is tares sewn/sown among wheat. But if I say that I can't speak of an inspired fabric. I need to speak of inspired pearls of Wisdom instead. The fabric idea doesn't work. We are back to autographs, though it is not the autograph of the prophet, but the autograph of God that counts. And if that happens, inerrancy really takes a back seat.

Yet, there are many very scientific ways to approach text criticism and archeology is a fascinating helper there too. As well, there is papyrology. In terms of age of the paper, the Samaritan Pentateuch is only as old as the Codex Leningradicus - both 11th Century copies. For an earlier version of the Hebrew we have the Dead Sea Scrolls. And then for redundancy we have a number of versions of the Septuagint - Codex Sinaiticus and Vaticanus and other Greek copy that dates to the 4th Century. And there are isolated fragments that are much older. But we still don't have any copy that dates to Moses.

The variety of models of inspiration does not seem to have figured much into the canon. Inerrancy and national assignment have been the two hallmark claims of the Reformers in rejecting "deuterocanonical" books, which they call "apocrypha." If we are going to reject portions of Genesis then it certainly flies in the face of the presuppositions made by the Reformers with respect to canon theory. We may as well revert to a replacement model and accept the church's original 72+ books which gave them the right to add in the NT, (as the new prophets), as well as make the judgment call on the deuterocanonicals.

The original assumption was that the Jews carried forth prophecy, and that that prophecy was given to the whole world when it was miraculously translated into Greek without error. The apostolic church then quoted mostly from the Greek translation of the Scriptures and accepted the version of the OT they had in front of them as the very words of God. And there is no evidence that Jesus did otherwise, claims of Muslims not withstanding.

If there is one thing the Dead Sea Scrolls discovery did for us it was to show that the Scriptures had not been changed substantially either in the copy that remained in Hebrew or in the copy that was distributed in Greek. If we extrapolated for another two thousand years we could get back to the time of Abraham and explore the original tradition that eventually brought us the Book of Genesis.

How cool it would be if on this same Gobekli Tepe site, archeologists found jars with scrolls in them. A number of speculative ideas enter my mind here. If the site was indeed the work of Noah, and Noah lived up until the birth, or thereabouts of Abraham, and the site was near Haran. It may have been that Noah asked Abraham to go up to that site and check on those jars of scrolls - and to translate them into a modern tongue, then rebury them. He left with his father Terah, who settled in and died in Haran. Here is the account ...

10These are the records of the generations of Shem. Shem was one hundred years old, and became the father of Arpachshad two years after the flood [= Noah's 602nd year];
11and Shem lived five hundred years after he became the father of Arpachshad, and he had other sons and daughters.

12Arpachshad lived thirty-five years, and became the father of Shelah [= Noah's 637th year];

13and Arpachshad lived four hundred and three years after he became the father of Shelah, and he had other sons and daughters.

14Shelah lived thirty years, and became the father of Eber [= Noah's 667th year];

15and Shelah lived four hundred and three years after he became the father of Eber, and he had other sons and daughters.

16Eber lived thirty-four years, and became the father of Peleg [= Noah's 701st year];

17and Eber lived four hundred and thirty years after he became the father of Peleg, and he had other sons and daughters.

18Peleg lived thirty years, and became the father of Reu [= Noah's 731st year];

19and Peleg lived two hundred and nine years after he became the father of Reu, and he had other sons and daughters.

20Reu lived thirty-two years, and became the father of Serug [= Noah's 763rd year];

21and Reu lived two hundred and seven years after he became the father of Serug, and he had other sons and daughters.

22Serug lived thirty years, and became the father of Nahor [= Noah's 793rd year];

23and Serug lived two hundred years after he became the father of Nahor, and he had other sons and daughters.

24Nahor lived twenty-nine years, and became the father of Terah [= Noah's 822nd year];

25and Nahor lived one hundred and nineteen years after he became the father of Terah, and he had other sons and daughters.

26Terah lived seventy years, and became the father of Abram [= Noah's 892nd year], Nahor and Haran.

27Now these are the records of the generations of Terah. Terah became the father of Abram, Nahor and Haran; and Haran became the father of Lot.

28Haran died in the presence of his father Terah in the land of his birth, in Ur of the Chaldeans.

29Abram and Nahor took wives for themselves The name of Abram's wife was Sarai; and the name of Nahor's wife was Milcah, the daughter of Haran, the father of Milcah and Iscah.

30Sarai was barren; she had no child.

31Terah took Abram his son, and Lot the son of Haran, his grandson, and Sarai his daughter-in-law, his son Abram's wife; and they went out together from Ur of the Chaldeans in order to enter the land of Canaan; and they went as far as Haran, and settled there.

32The days of Terah were two hundred and five years; and Terah died in Haran.

The Bible says that all the days of Noah were 950 years (Gen 7:6 has him at 600 years at the time of the flood and this lines up with the totals given here and then in Gen 9:28-29, where his living 350 years after the flood to the age of 950 is plainly stated). So from this passage it would seem that Terah left for Haran and the land of Canaan with his children possibly immediately following the death of his father ancestor, Noah, whom he probably knew personally for the first 128 years of his life. And Abram would have known Noah personally for the first 58 years of his life - quite long enough to get to know the great patriarch of all mankind personally and to have the foresight of this great prophet - and the confidence - to do some pretty incredible things, not excluding sacrificing his own son on Mount Moriah, where God said "I have provided the lamb."

God provides. That is where Calvary was. And so we see here that Haran plays some role in prophecy, as no text of the Scriptures is devoid of meaning. Here I should also mention that not all of the ancestors of Abram were faithful. Terah, Abram's father, is specifically identified as one who "served other Gods" (Joshua 24:2). It seems to me that Abram was called out of Ur, as Steven says, with his father Terah, but that Terah got caught up in the local god-worship in Haran. With Terah he was "brought out" but according to Stephen he was "called out." So apparently leaving Ur of the Chaldees was not easy. It required the hand of the Lord. And quite possibly Terah had been reluctant. Maybe, along with being equally called with Abram, he was forced to go to Haran on pressing business. Or maybe he was in trouble with the Law or for some reason about to be killed in Ur. So he fled. Terah then forgot his spiritual calling when he was caught up in the affairs of Haran. But Abram did not forget. And, in fact, he saw the hand of the Lord in Terah's dilemma in Ur. So Terah lived on another 60 years in Haran while Abram left for Canaan at the age of 75. There is no indication as to when they arrived in Haran. It was after the death of Haran, and Haran had a son, Lot, so it was probably a move that took place after the children were grown up. Sarai seems to have been born in Ur, as well. All this is to say that Abram was not a child when he left Ur.

Anything that can be said, then about Gobekli Tepe, to the effect of being a storehouse of prophecy, did not come from Terah. But the fact that Abram could have known Noah is still fascinating. The book of Jasher suggests he lived with Noah in his youth. But I take that with a grain of salt. There is evidence that the two or three versions of the Book of Jasher are forgeries. There is nothing indicating they are authentic originals.


I should also mention that the dates given in the passage above, conflict in certain codices covering the same genealogy. Here I am quoting from the New American Standard Version, that uses the Masoretic Hebrew Text (MT). But anyone can see how the dates line up. And I think it is very important to recognize that Abram and his father knew Noah personally for such a long time. And if not Abram, certainly Terah, who lived quite close to Gobekli Tepe - if we can trust the MT in this passage.

Certainly I am using my imagination as I describe Terah or Abram, separately or together, translating scrolls at Gobekli Tepe and then burying them again. But it would not surprise me if any such things were found. And if that happened, there would be evidences at the site of newer finds. If it is as I have speculated, that Noah and his ancestors took the great trouble to roll those 30 ton stones up the hill, then it would follow that he might have asked his grandchildren to provide more specific information, as well, once the floodwaters had subsided. And it would also make sense that he would ask that the truths pertaining to the years before the flood be conveyed to his great grandchildren at a time when his death was approaching, so that the message of wisdom he carried in his memory could be passed on with as little change as possible to future generations. And the total picture of Gobekli Tepe then fits into that general idea, of preserving the truth for future generations.

Archeologists also deny there was a world-wide flood. But they don't deny that there may have been local floods. The Black Sea may have created a huge flood in that region, accompanied by huge Tsunamis if there was an earthquake or meteorite - that is about as far as I've heard any of them admit. Natural explanations are always required with them. Anything else is always dismissed. But not with me.

So I don't expect any of my theories to ever be accepted no matter what is ultimately found at Gobekli Tepe. And like everyone else, I am waiting on new data to come out. As you said, God's hand is everywhere. There is no question that there will be a variety of interpretations of the evidence. But I would hate to see the Christian interpretation get watered down into a restatement of archeologists that forces us to accept the theory of evolution, or as one poster here seems to have suggested, that before Adam there was another race of creatures that were not "men", per se, but who built such things. That, to me, seems to be as far out on a limb in defending the Scriptures as anything else I've seen.
 
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Cloudwatcher

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I kind of doubt that Noah is responsible for this temple. The Smithsonian website says there are thousands of bones with obvious butcher markings on them. Yet it is my understanding that during Noah's time, man was not yet eating meat. Meat was not given to man to eat until after the flood. Am I misunderstanding?
 
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Wirraway

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In 1994 a place of worship was uncovered about 50 miles north of a place between the Tigris and the Euphrates river once called Beth Eden. ....

I'm curious, can you give a source for the 10k date? because I've always understood this region to have been an independent kingdom from around the 10th to 9th centuries BC when it fell to the Assyrians.
 
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I kind of doubt that Noah is responsible for this temple. The Smithsonian website says there are thousands of bones with obvious butcher markings on them. Yet it is my understanding that during Noah's time, man was not yet eating meat. Meat was not given to man to eat until after the flood. Am I misunderstanding?

My understanding of Holy Scripture is that at the time of Adam's fall, animals had not been killed for food or clothing. God covered up the nakedness of Adam and Eve with animal skins that would have necessitated the death of these animals, not by Adam's hands, but by God's. If you know something to indicate otherwise, I sincerely welcome being set straight.
 
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I'm curious, can you give a source for the 10k date? because I've always understood this region to have been an independent kingdom from around the 10th to 9th centuries BC when it fell to the Assyrians.

My understand is that the date was determined by carbon-dating methods. Most of us Fundamentalists feel uncomfortable with this date determination method, but it stands until something better comes along.
 
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Your post regarding the killing of animals by God's hands at the time of Adam's fall is in relation to it being necessary to implement a sacrificial blood covenant at that time as a "type" of the atoning sacrifice of Jesus later. But I don't understand how you relate the deaths of those animals at that time to the actual eating of meat by men before the flood. Am I wrong in understanding that men were not permitted to eat meat before the flood? Perhaps ungodly men practiced meat-eating before the flood...?
 
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