Creation & EvolutionForum for the discussion of this important topic. This forum is open to non-believers. There is a Christians-only forum in the Christians-only section too.
perfect of course is an ideal that cannot be achieved unless there is a god to do it.
very good is so far from the same thing that only someone who was just determined to play word games would spend any time on it.
It would be kinda nice tho if i made a very good effort, or what seemed to ME a very good effort, or what i could define as a good effort, and it would always result in a perfect souffle.
It just depends what kind of souffle He wants to make , and how He wants to go about making it
Thing is of course, we dont have ALL the ansers
But this is the very thing that points to a literal interpretation of Genesis being absurd. Genesis is full of instances of God's recipe not turning out as he seems to have wanted it to - Adam lonely, so needing a partner, snakes in the garden, fruit trees only intended for God's previous creations (one assumes) yet fully available to the innocent and ignorant creature who isn't allowed to have such fruit, people not behaving as he wanted, necessitating an entire redo via flood, and so on.
Free will does not explain all these instances of God not being happy with creation. Genesis paints a picture of an almighty being who can't predict what his creation will do and is blindsided by the stuff both humans and lurking snakes come up with.
Basically I think im kind of agreeing with you. It's just hard to explain to a nonChristian how God might view "very good" and "perfection"
There's possibly even another sense of viewing perfection - when a mother goves birth to what to everybody else looks like an ugly little thing, the mother usually looks upon her bsby as being perfect - even if it has some physical defect.
Basically I think im kind of agreeing with you. It's just hard to explain to a nonChristian how God might view "very good" and "perfection"
There's possibly even another sense of viewing perfection - when a mother goves birth to what to everybody else looks like an ugly little thing, the mother usually looks upon her bsby as being perfect - even if it has some physical defect.
Well, I tried explaining it scientifically by showing that six times in Genesis 1, God calls it "good" --- then steps back and calls it all "very good" --- thus making it a gestalt --- that is, the whole is greater than the sum of its parts.
But that didn't seem to work, so I showed from Ezekiel where Lucifer was created "perfect" ---
Originally Posted by Ezekiel 28:15
Thou wast perfect in thy ways from the day that thou wast created, till iniquity was found in thee.
--- but that didn't seem to work either --- so I concluded they were just denying it on principle.
But this is the very thing that points to a literal interpretation of Genesis being absurd. Genesis is full of instances of God's recipe not turning out as he seems to have wanted it to - Adam lonely, so needing a partner, snakes in the garden, fruit trees only intended for God's previous creations (one assumes) yet fully available to the innocent and ignorant creature who isn't allowed to have such fruit, people not behaving as he wanted, necessitating an entire redo via flood, and so on.
Free will does not explain all these instances of God not being happy with creation. Genesis paints a picture of an almighty being who can't predict what his creation will do and is blindsided by the stuff both humans and lurking snakes come up with.
Well, possibly you could get that impression from Genesis (though even there, there are certain promises of a future puting things to rights). But if one reads the rest of Scripture, one sees that God must have known what would happen (or at least what might happen), and He had already made provision for it before the creation of the world.
He certainly wasnt blind-sided.
We dont' have ALL the ins and outs in Genesis..if we did, there would be no differing opinions.
I'm not coming down on either side of the cre/ev debate....I certainly dont know enough to argue either side - I just try to understand what i can.
And I try and understand and ask questions on both sides.
Personally, I believe that God DID create everything in the beginning, and I dont see why God couldnt have brought everything into being without evolution (im not denying natural selection between groups of creatures BTW). I think though that quite probably 6000 years is not right..id have to look into a lot of things to figure that one out.
Personally, I believe that God DID create everything in the beginning, and I dont see why God couldnt have brought everything into being without evolution (im not denying natural selection between groups of creatures BTW).
Well, I tried explaining it scientifically by showing that six times in Genesis 1, God calls it "good" --- then steps back and calls it all "very good" --- thus making it a gestalt --- that is, the whole is greater than the sum of its parts.
But that didn't seem to work, so I showed from Ezekiel where Lucifer was created "perfect" ------ but that didn't seem to work either --- so I concluded they were just denying it on principle.
Yes, well I think its that there's theological stuff they dont understand...but then to explain all that would probably take forever, and maybe doesnt necessarily come under the haeding of cretaion and evolution (oops typos)
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