Creationists False on Key Point

[Dale]

I'm going to make some observations about Creationism before explaining the thread title. The point falsified by Creationists will be explained in my fourth post.



Creationists have clearly picked a fight with the wrong enemy. Why is science is the enemy. At a time when Christianity seems to be under attack from every direction, Creationists have picked a fight that Christians don't need.

After discussing Creationism for years, I've come to certain conclusions. Creationists assume that at some time in the not so distant past, Christianity was all-powerful in society. Then Charles Darwin dethroned it.

There never really was a time in the past when Christianity was as powerful and unquestioned as Creationists assume. There has never been a period when there was complete agreement about what Christianity is. Religion has always been a powerful force but it has never been the only force in society.

Religious conservatives have sometimes assumed that Marxism came in the aftermath of Darwin. Darwin weakened religion, and in the resulting chaos Marxism arose. I once did a thread where I pointed out that Karl Marx issued the Communist Manifesto years before the Origin of the Species was published. The Creationists got it backwards.



See this thread:

http://www.christianforums.com/threads/adventists-on-evolution-marxism.6653678/



Should Christians blame any single person for weakening Christianity in the 18th&19th centuries? If so, it would make more sense to blame someone who attacked Christianity, like Voltaire.

 

[Dale]

Here's another assumption Creationists tend to make. Since Genesis is the first book of the Bible, they assume that it is the foundation of all that follows. Genesis, and the Eden story, is foundational. They fear that if you remove the first chapter or two of Genesis, the whole structure falls.

This isn't necessarily true. For one thing, it isn't a question of believing or not believing the Eden story, it's how you interpret it, what it means for us today.

I have a book tape on the Old Testament by Dr. Robert Odin, a scholar of ancient languages. He says that in the Jewish mind, Exodus is the core of the OT. This sounded odd the first time I heard it but the more you think about it the more sense it makes.

The first five books of the OT, the Torah, had a special status for Jews. Of the five, Deuteronomy is clearly from a later period. Leviticus, as the name suggests, is largely rules for the Aaronic priests.

The Ten Commandments are first given in Exodus and repeated in Deuteronomy. It is in Exodus where Moses is introduced, is commissioned by God and becomes a great leader.

In Acts, when Stephen is brought before the Roman Governor, he has to explain Judaism to explain Christianity. He starts with Abraham but spends more time on Moses bringing the people out of Egypt. Stephen doesn't go back to Adam and Eve. Exodus is the core of the Old Testament in the Jewish mind.

The Eden story in Genesis may not be the foundation of Judaism and Christianity, in the sense that Creationists imagine.

 

[Hieronymus]

I'm going to make some observations about Creationism before explaining the thread title. The point falsified by Creationists will be explained in my fourth post.



Creationists have clearly picked a fight with the wrong enemy.

True, the enemy lies, they're not fair.

Why is science is the enemy.

It isn't, atheism and naturalism (beliefs) are self proclaimed enemies of Theism.

At a time when Christianity seems to be under attack from every direction, Creationists have picked a fight that Christians don't need.

it's not the Christians that started it.
Maybe you should have a look at history.
It's theosphical / luciferian ideology that teaches evolution, especially in the spiritual sense, but with the idea of mind over matter, the physical will follow suit.
And thus Darwin in that same period was inspired by evolutionary thinking, and he made his famous conjecture, that was (and is) lapped up eagerly.

After discussing Creationism for years, I've come to certain conclusions. Creationists assume that at some time in the not so distant past, Christianity was all-powerful in society. Then Charles Darwin dethroned it.

That has nothing to do with creationism.
First of all it is the written Word that teaches creation, throughout the Bible, even our Lord Jesus Christ, who is the Word incarnate that created everything, confirmed Genesis and (thus) Creation.

There never really was a time in the past when Christianity was as powerful and unquestioned as Creationists assume.

Not relevant.

There has never been a period when there was complete agreement about what Christianity is. Religion has always been a powerful force but it has never been the only force in society.

Still not relevant.

Religious conservatives have sometimes assumed that Marxism came in the aftermath of Darwin. Darwin weakened religion, and in the resulting chaos Marxism arose.

Indeed, the world changed its views mid 19th century.

I once did a thread where I pointed out that Karl Marx issued the Communist Manifesto years before the Origin of the Species was published. The Creationists got it backwards.

Who cares?
It has nothing to do with creationism.

After Darwin science has discovered most of what we know about living nature.
The main problem for naturalists is the lack of a mechanism that writes the code that makes organisms what they are.
And what all organisms are, is an enormously complex system of interactive interdependent systems.
It can even withstand random mutations (data corruption) without too many problems.
Correction of corrupt data is also an incorporated system within the organism.

See this thread:

http://www.christianforums.com/threads/adventists-on-evolution-marxism.6653678/



Should Christians blame any single person for weakening Christianity in the 18th&19th centuries? If so, it would make more sense to blame someone who attacked Christianity, like Voltaire.

The enlightenment and its ideologies is not the result of one person.
It is actually as old as the devil himself.
And again, it has nothing to do with creationism.

 

[Hieronymus]

Here's another assumption Creationists tend to make. Since Genesis is the first book of the Bible, they assume that it is the foundation of all that follows.

It's also the first story in the Biblical chronology, starting with: "In the beginning...."

Genesis, and the Eden story, is foundational. They fear that if you remove the first chapter or two of Genesis, the whole structure falls.

And that's true too.
Jesus confirmed it too, so if it is not true, Jesus is a liar.

None the less, i wasn't a creationist when i came to believe in Christ.
But what did i know?
Not much, i just assumed evolution was science, like they claim it is.
So i took Genesis 1 to 3 as allegorical, symbolical, yet with literal implications.
But at a certain point in my quest for truth i stumbled upon the arguments against evolution and for creationism.
So i pursued this topic further.

But this still has little to do with creationism.
Creationism is about how things came to be.
So it's about evidence.
The question being: Is Genesis 1 to 3 historical or allegorical?

I.D. is also creationism, but it's not Biblical creationism.
And as time and knowledge progressed, more and more is discovered that naturalism has no answer to.
I alluded to DNA in my previous reply.
But also the eco system(s) are a problem, because of irreducible complexity.
Everyone knows a system will stop functioning when you remove essential parts.
(i'm sure you don't need examples).

This isn't necessarily true. For one thing, it isn't a question of believing or not believing the Eden story, it's how you interpret it, what it means for us today.

Why would a theist look through atheistic glasses?

I have a book tape on the Old Testament by Dr. Robert Odin, a scholar of ancient languages. He says that in the Jewish mind, Exodus is the core of the OT. This sounded odd the first time I heard it but the more you think about it the more sense it makes.

The first five books of the OT, the Torah, had a special status for Jews. Of the five, Deuteronomy is clearly from a later period. Leviticus, as the name suggests, is largely rules for the Aaronic priests.

The Ten Commandments are first given in Exodus and repeated in Deuteronomy. It is in Exodus where Moses is introduced, is commissioned by God and becomes a great leader.

In Acts, when Stephen is brought before the Roman Governor, he has to explain Judaism to explain Christianity. He starts with Abraham but spends more time on Moses bringing the people out of Egypt. Stephen doesn't go back to Adam and Eve. Exodus is the core of the Old Testament in the Jewish mind.

The Eden story in Genesis may not be the foundation of Judaism and Christianity, in the sense that Creationists imagine.

So where are your arguments against creation?
I didn't see one, to be honest.

Let me give you some argument FOR creation though.
We exist in a fine tuned universe.
You can forget about chance and accidental coincidences of the laws of dead nature to bring forth what we have today.
Even more so regarding living nature.
That's even more complex, genius, purposeful (like organs in an organism, organisms in an eco-system), even inspiring and teaching us humans how to create things.
DNA, the data-carrier, renders evolution a silly ignorant conjecture.

but let me share this documentary with you in stead of attempting to make a case myself:

You see, Darwinism is not science, it's naturalism, a belief, force fed to us by the world under the guise of science.

God bless.

 

[Dale]

From experience I know that Creationists are not aware that there are two creation stories in Genesis, if we are talking about the creation of people. The first is briefer and more general than the second, which is Adam and Eve, and is often overlooked.



24 And God said, “Let the land produce living creatures according to their kinds: the livestock, the creatures that move along the ground, and the wild animals, each according to its kind.” And it was so. 25 God made the wild animals according to their kinds, the livestock according to their kinds, and all the creatures that move along the ground according to their kinds. And God saw that it was good.

26 Then God said, “Let us make mankind in our image, in our likeness, so that they may rule over the fish in the sea and the birds in the sky, over the livestock and all the wild animals, and over all the creatures that move along the ground.”

27 So God created mankind in his own image,
in the image of God he created them;
male and female he created them.

28 God blessed them and said to them, “Be fruitful and increase in number; fill the earth and subdue it. Rule over the fish in the sea and the birds in the sky and over every living creature that moves on the ground.”

29 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 in the sky and all the creatures that move along the ground—everything that has the breath of life in it—I give every green plant for food.” And it was so.

31 God saw all that he had made, and it was very good. And there was evening, and there was morning—the sixth day.

--Genesis 1:24-31 NIV




In this passage God creates mankind “in his own image,” and commands people to “fill” and “subdue” the earth, and to rule over it. Yet Adam and Eve are not mentioned here and have not been introduced yet.

If Genesis is in chronological order, Adam isn't created until after God rests on the seventh day. So maybe Adam was created on the eighth day, and Eve either on the same day, or maybe later? We don't know. Either Genesis backtracks and inserts more material into the account of the sixth day, or Adam and Eve aren't part of the six day creation.

 

[Dale]

Creationists are quick to claim that the Bible is on their side. In practice, experience shows that they don't know the Bible as well as they think they do.

Here is an example of how Creationists have misled everyone. We know that in the Biblical conception, a garden was a walled area. This is still typically true in the Middle East today. Genesis doesn't give a size for the Garden of Eden but it was clearly defined by an impassible barrier. It was probably square.



“After he [God] drove the man out, he placed on the east side of the Garden of Eden cherubim and a flaming sword flashing back and forth to guard the way to the tree of life.”

--Genesis 3:24 NIV



As a child, I was taught that God removed the Garden of Eden from the earth. The walls surrounding this extraordinary Garden and the cherubim with flaming swords must have been removed as well.

There is a problem here. No verse anywhere in the Bible, from beginning to end, says anything about God removing the Garden of Eden. If God destroyed the Tree of Life and the Garden around it, the Bible doesn't mention it. If God moved it to heaven, the Bible doesn't mention that either.

It isn't clear when Creationists think that God destroyed or removed the Garden of Eden from the earth. Apparently it was shortly before the Flood.

This problem in the Creationist narrative proves that Creationists add to the Bible. For years I have heard religious conservatives complain that liberals add to the Bible. Here is strong evidence that Creationists have done the same.

If every word of the Bible is literally true, and that implies a physical Garden of Eden, it is still here on earth. Nothing in the Bible tells us otherwise. All the Creationists have to do is find it.

What do I think? There is another possibility. The Garden of Eden story is a parable, a teaching story. It was never intended to be literally true but to offer spiritual truths.

 

[Dale]

Hieronymus in post #3:


<< First of all it is the written Word that teaches creation, throughout the Bible, even our Lord Jesus Christ, who is the Word incarnate that created everything, confirmed Genesis and (thus) Creation. >>


I don't believe that Jesus ever confirmed a literalist interpretation of the six days of Creation or of the Eden story. One of the things that I've noticed from discussions on other subjects is that there doesn't seem to be any mention of Original Sin in the four Gospels. Yet Creationists do believe in Original Sin, with rare exceptions.


<< The enlightenment and its ideologies is not the result of one person.
It is actually as old as the devil himself. >>


If you're saying that the enlightenment is of the devil, that is a most extreme view. The enlightenment opposed superstition and took a hard look at social organization.


Here is what one source has to say about the enlightenment from an American point of view.

“In the American context, thinkers such as Thomas Paine, James Madison, Thomas Jefferson, John Adams and Benjamin Franklin invented and adopted revolutionary ideas about scientific rationality, religious toleration and experimental political organization—ideas that would have far-reaching effects on the development of the fledgling nation.”


Link:

http://www.iep.utm.edu/amer-enl/#SH1c

 

[Dale]

Hieronymus in post #4:

<< You see, Darwinism is not science, it's naturalism, a belief, force fed to us by the world under the guise of science. >>



“Darwinism” is a term used by Creationists. Darwin was a biologist. There have been many biologists since then.



Do you accept species change? The fact of species change was known from the fossil record before Darwin. What Darwin did was propose a theory to understand it. If you deny species change, you aren't just arguing with Charles Darwin.

 

[Hieronymus]

From experience I know that Creationists are not aware that there are two creation stories in Genesis,

There are 3 chapters.
1 creation week
2 summary
3 focus on day 6 (particularly the Garden)

27 So God created mankind in his own image,
in the image of God he created them;
male and female he created them.

You're not quoting it properly.
Genesis 1:27
...in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them.

 

[Hieronymus]

Creationists are quick to claim that the Bible is on their side.

Creationists are on the side of the Bible.
The Bible and Genesis has been there for thousands of years.
Few people ever doubted it until the 19th century.
Not doubts because of science, but because of evolutionary thinking, the 'new age'.

In practice, experience shows that they don't know the Bible as well as they think they do.

I think you don't know how well they do know the Bible.
They probably know it better than you.

Here is an example of how Creationists have misled everyone.

They just believe God's written Word, so your beef is with God's written Word.

We know that in the Biblical conception, a garden was a walled area. This is still typically true in the Middle East today. Genesis doesn't give a size for the Garden of Eden but it was clearly defined by an impassible barrier. It was probably square.

Who knows?

“After he [God] drove the man out, he placed on the east side of the Garden of Eden cherubim and a flaming sword flashing back and forth to guard the way to the tree of life.”

--Genesis 3:24 NIV



As a child, I was taught that God removed the Garden of Eden from the earth. The walls surrounding this extraordinary Garden and the cherubim with flaming swords must have been removed as well.

The Tree of Life reappears in Revelation (iirc)
But the Garden itself was probably washed away with the Flood.

This problem in the Creationist narrative proves that Creationists add to the Bible. For years I have heard religious conservatives complain that liberals add to the Bible. Here is strong evidence that Creationists have done the same.

Example?

If every word of the Bible is literally true, and that implies a physical Garden of Eden, it is still here on earth. Nothing in the Bible tells us otherwise. All the Creationists have to do is find it.

Again, the Flood.

What do I think? There is another possibility. The Garden of Eden story is a parable, a teaching story. It was never intended to be literally true but to offer spiritual truths.

Nowhere in the Bible is it suggested or inferred to be allegory.
For example, look at the 4th Commandment in Exodus 20:8-11
Again, Jesus Christ confirmed it Himself.
he is the Word that created everything Himself.

 

[Hieronymus]

I don't believe that Jesus ever confirmed a literalist interpretation of the six days of Creation or of the Eden story.

You don't believe it, that much is clear.
Please provide some evidence.

If you're saying that the enlightenment is of the devil, that is a most extreme view.

It's true though.
Yes, it's extreme perhaps when you hear this for the first time, or when it doesn't fit your paradigm.

The enlightenment opposed superstition and took a hard look at social organization.

That depends on what you're referring to.
Theosophy and evolution go hand in hand.
It's luciferian ideology.
Lucifer being the one that enlightens.
It's just the opposite religion re-emerging in the world, supported by the elite, who consider themselves enlightened.
Human arrogance.

 

[Hieronymus]

Hieronymus in post #4:

<< You see, Darwinism is not science, it's naturalism, a belief, force fed to us by the world under the guise of science. >>



“Darwinism” is a term used by Creationists.

Not only by Creationists.
It refers to the ToE or 'special evolution'.
It's naturalism, which is a belief.

Darwin was a biologist. There have been many biologists since then.

Indeed.
And they have discovered many many things that the ToE has no answer for.
And still mankind discovers more complexity in living nature.
As you have seen in the documentary, the evidence they boast and bluff about is weak, even false.

 

[Hieronymus]

@Dale

The problem that arises is when theists are convinced by naturalistic models, because they force feed this to us as science.
There is no God in naturalism.
So when you look through naturalistic glasses, you won't see God or his Handiwork.

 

[Hieronymus]

The enlightenment and its ideologies is not the result of one person.
It is actually as old as the devil himself.

I'm of course referring to Genesis 3.

 

[Hieronymus]

So, can things create themselves?
No, because then it would have had to exist prior to its existence. (logical fallacy)
Therefore the Original Cause of everything that exists can not be caused.
Note that "Original" already implies it is not caused.
So God is not caused, but everything other than God is caused.
This is why God = Creator.
John 1:1-3

 

[Dale]

Another problem with Creationists is that they interpret the Bible but they don't realize that they are interpreting it. They read the Bible thinking that their interpretation is the Bible itself.

This partly explains how the Creationists blundered into claiming that Eden was removed by God. Their interpretation is that Eden was either destroyed or removed from the earth. Creationists assume that their interpretation is what the Bible says. It doesn't occur to them to check the text.

When we read something written thousands of years ago in an ancient language, there is no such thing as reading without interpretation, if there ever is.

The Creationist notion that Eden was removed does fit with the fact that we hear no more about it later in the Old Testament. On the other hand, hearing no more about it also fits with the possibility that it was never a physical reality at all.

 

[Dale]

Answers in Genesis, a Creationist website, says that the Garden of Eden was destroyed in the Flood. This is an inadequate answer. The Tree of Life was in Eden, probably at the center. Did God allow the Tree of Life to be destroyed? The Bible doesn't explain this point. If God allowed the Garden to be destroyed, did He recall the Seraphim guarding the gates with flaming swords? If these things were physical realities, it is surprising that Genesis doesn't give us some idea of how God handled this. It is hard to picture Seraphim standing at the gates until the rising water puts out the fire on their flaming swords. Surely God would do better than that.

The Creationist website Answers in Genesis leaves us with no other picture than this soaking mess.



For the claim that Eden was destroyed in the Flood, see the last paragraph in the following link.

Link:

https://answersingenesis.org/genesis/garden-of-eden/was-the-garden-of-eden-located-in-iraq/

 

[miamited]

Hi dale,

Just passing through, but I read in your OP that you would be making your point about what christians have wrong about creationism in your fourth post, (which by my count is post #6). That post says that we got it all wrong because a garden has a wall. That's it? We're all wrong because a garden has to have a wall?

God bless you.
In Christ, Ted

 

[Speedwell]

<

I don't believe that Jesus ever confirmed a literalist interpretation of the six days of Creation or of the Eden story.

If he did it certainly has not been demonstrated in this forum.

 

[Speedwell]

What the creationists should be looking for is not the garden, but the literal cornerstone of the Earth (Job 38:6).