How do you literal YECer's "defend" your position in light of such overwhelming evidence....

[gluadys]

Well put. The Genesis creation account is written like a psalm or a Biblical piece of poetry. What is literal and what is metaphor is far too flexible.

When Adam and Eve were cast out of the Garden, what type of world would have greeted them if there were hundreds of competing species of carnivorous giant amphibians, carnivorous therapods, crocodiles, megafauna, and pterosaurs.

Some were pursuit predators and others were ambush predators.

It wouldn't be safe in the open spaces, it wouldn't be safe in the woods, it wouldn't be safe in the caves, it wouldn't be safe near the water.

From walking in the cool of the day in the presence of God in the Garden to cast out into a wilderness represented by every predator found in the Paleozoic ages, Mesozoic ages, and Cenozoic ages respectfully.

Well, since we know that each of these creatures lived in their own age and not in the days of Adam and Eve, it's not something we have to consider, is it? Of course there were still bears and wolves and lions and snakes and a zillion other things that still make a wilderness dangerous.

 

[BobRyan]

QUOTE="BobRyan, post: 68198949, So then what "do you think" the Bible teaches in Gen 1:2-2:3 and Ex 20:11?? A literal 7 day creation week?

Clearly the subject is "origins"

Clearly the timeline is given "Six days you shall labor...for in SIX Days the LORD MADE the heavens and the earth the seas and all that is in them and rested the 7th day" Ex 20:8-11

QUOTE="BobRyan, post: 68192486"]Originally Posted by BobRyan ============================================
One leading Hebrew scholar is James Barr, Professor of Hebrew Bible at Vanderbilt University and former Regius Professor of Hebrew at Oxford University in England. Although he does not believe in the historicity of Genesis 1, Dr. Barr does agree that the writer's intent was to narrate the actual history of primeval creation. Others also agree with him.

Probably, so far as I know, there is no professor of Hebrew or Old Testament at any world-class university who does not believe that the writer(s) of Genesis 1-11 intended to convey to their readers the ideas that (a) creation took place in a series of six days which were the same as the days of 24 hours we now experience; . . . Or, to put it negatively, the apologetic arguments which suppose the "days" of creation to be long eras of time, the figures of years not to be chronological, and the flood to be a merely local Mesopotamian flood, are not taken seriously by any such professors, as far as I know.

James Barr, letter to David Watson, 1984.
================================

Well put. The Genesis creation account is written like a psalm or a Biblical piece of poetry. What is literal and what is metaphor is far too flexible.

An interesting opinion but you have to admit that is apparently not shared by any of the "professors of Hebrew or Old Testament at any world-class university "

 

[BobRyan]

QUOTE="BobRyan, post: 68216517, member: 235244"]QUOTE="BobRyan, post: 68198949, So then what "do you think" the Bible teaches in Gen 1:2-2:3 and Ex 20:11?? A literal 7 day creation week?

Clearly the subject is "origins"

Clearly the timeline is given "Six days you shall labor...for in SIX Days the LORD MADE the heavens and the earth the seas and all that is in them and rested the 7th day" Ex 20:8-11

QUOTE="BobRyan, post: 68192486"]Originally Posted by BobRyan ============================================
One leading Hebrew scholar is James Barr, Professor of Hebrew Bible at Vanderbilt University and former Regius Professor of Hebrew at Oxford University in England. Although he does not believe in the historicity of Genesis 1, Dr. Barr does agree that the writer's intent was to narrate the actual history of primeval creation. Others also agree with him.

Probably, so far as I know, there is no professor of Hebrew or Old Testament at any world-class university who does not believe that the writer(s) of Genesis 1-11 intended to convey to their readers the ideas that (a) creation took place in a series of six days which were the same as the days of 24 hours we now experience; . . . Or, to put it negatively, the apologetic arguments which suppose the "days" of creation to be long eras of time, the figures of years not to be chronological, and the flood to be a merely local Mesopotamian flood, are not taken seriously by any such professors, as far as I know.

James Barr, letter to David Watson, 1984.
================================

As do I. But it also means the author never intended to write an objective, scientific account to be understood as literally as a lab report.

Given the content of the post to which you are responding "As do I" is direct contradiction to the next sentence in your post.

The quoted text states that these professors admit that it was written in the form of factual historic narrative - to be taken literally -- and even you admit that Moses was not preaching Darwinism. They don't claim to agree with the POV expressed in the text of the Bible - but at least they are very direct in stating what that is.

If you are saying that the account given in the Bible is not trustworthy because the author is not informed enough to know the difference between 3 billion years and 7 days of the week - then that point should not be assumed in your argument - it needs to be proven that such a vast difference in facts would have been too subtle for an author who claims that life spans were 900 years before and after the flood and then shrunk down to 120 years over a period of a few centuries.

Nevertheless, all attempts to reconcile the biblical story with the scientific understanding are IMO strained and weak.

The "other choice" is that one of them is simply wrong if by "Scientific understanding" you mean - "the way atheists view the subject of origins given that they rule out God from a possible source of creation".

We should just accept that the biblical author was not writing science or even history

Which is not letting the text speak for itself - rather it is forcing eisegetical preference onto it.

The first question is "What does the text say" - and that seems to be beyond dispute given that quote above.

The second question is "what to do about it".

If as some have stated - their choice is to toss out the Bible in favor of what atheists would view as the right answer for the doctrine on origins -- fine ... belief in evolutionism may be the option they favor.

Not everyone will go down that road however.

in Christ,

Bob

 

[random person]

Well, since we know that each of these creatures lived in their own age and not in the days of Adam and Eve, it's not something we have to consider, is it? Of course there were still bears and wolves and lions and snakes and a zillion other things that still make a wilderness dangerous.

I agree, but what the literalists are doing is upping the ante, now these bears and wolves and lions and snakes and a zillion other things are cohabiting a world that also includes paleozoic, mesozoic (bipedal therapods such as raptors, allosaurus, spinosaurus, t rex, giganotosaurus, 40 foot crocodiles, 50 foot constrictors, etc), and cenozoic (giant bears, giant wolves, giant cats, giant terror birds, giant monitor lizards, giant meat eating pigs, etc).

We are talking a smorgesbord of teeth and claw survival of the fittest.

There are hundreds of species of carnivorous extinct animals in the fossil record.

 

[BobRyan]

Indeed the supposed mythical 100 mile geologic column due to supposed 600 million years of deposition exists nowhere - about a mile of it is all you have -- max and in other places much thinner. All those animals lived at the same time.. with humans ...

Which is one of a great many points I would make with atheists on this subject -- but with Christians - I would stick with
Yesterday at 10:42 PM #42

 

[gluadys]

I agree, but what the literalists are doing is upping the ante, now these bears and wolves and lions and snakes and a zillion other things are cohabiting a world that also includes paleozoic, mesozoic (bipedal therapods such as raptors, allosaurus, spinosaurus, t rex, giganotosaurus, 40 foot crocodiles, 50 foot constrictors, etc), and cenozoic (giant bears, giant wolves, giant cats, giant terror birds, giant monitor lizards, giant meat eating pigs, etc).

We are talking a smorgesbord of teeth and claw survival of the fittest.

There are hundreds of species of carnivorous extinct animals in the fossil record.

That's for sure. Likewise, (and I think mark kennedy is the only person I have seen to acknowledge this), the YEC view actually requires super-fast evolution after the flood to get the diversity we have now since Noah's time--something else there is not a shred of evidence for.

 

[gluadys]

Indeed the supposed mythical 100 mile geologic column due to supposed 600 million years of deposition exists nowhere - about a mile of it is all you have -- max and in other places much thinner. All those animals lived at the same time.. with humans ...

Which is one of a great many points I would make with atheists on this subject -- but with Christians - I would stick with
Yesterday at 10:42 PM #42

Of course geological strata are sometimes very thin. One of the effects of being compressed by a heavy weight pressing down on them is that they become very thin. No reason why the geological column in any one place should have a particular measurement from top to bottom. Both sedimentation and erosion occur at differing rates under different conditions, and pressure also varies to give different degrees of compression.

 

[gluadys]

QUOTE="BobRyan, post: 68216517, member: 235244"]QUOTE="BobRyan, post: 68198949, So then what "do you think" the Bible teaches in Gen 1:2-2:3 and Ex 20:11?? A literal 7 day creation week?

Clearly the subject is "origins"

Clearly the timeline is given "Six days you shall labor...for in SIX Days the LORD MADE the heavens and the earth the seas and all that is in them and rested the 7th day" Ex 20:8-11

QUOTE="BobRyan, post: 68192486"]Originally Posted by BobRyan ============================================
One leading Hebrew scholar is James Barr, Professor of Hebrew Bible at Vanderbilt University and former Regius Professor of Hebrew at Oxford University in England. Although he does not believe in the historicity of Genesis 1, Dr. Barr does agree that the writer's intent was to narrate the actual history of primeval creation. Others also agree with him.

Probably, so far as I know, there is no professor of Hebrew or Old Testament at any world-class university who does not believe that the writer(s) of Genesis 1-11 intended to convey to their readers the ideas that (a) creation took place in a series of six days which were the same as the days of 24 hours we now experience; . . . Or, to put it negatively, the apologetic arguments which suppose the "days" of creation to be long eras of time, the figures of years not to be chronological, and the flood to be a merely local Mesopotamian flood, are not taken seriously by any such professors, as far as I know.

James Barr, letter to David Watson, 1984.
================================



Given the content of the post to which you are responding "As do I" is direct contradiction to the next sentence in your post.

Not in the least. I agree entirely that apologetic arguments which suppose the days of creation to be long eras of time, the figures of years in the genealogies not to be chronological and the flood to be merely local are defective. They are methods well-meaning Christians have used in futile attempts to reconcile the biblical text with scientific knowledge. I agree such arguments should be scrapped. I also agree with Barr and his colleagues that the biblical text is not historical.

The quoted text states that these professors admit that it was written in the form of factual historic narrative - to be taken literally -- and even you admit that Moses was not preaching Darwinism. They don't claim to agree with the POV expressed in the text of the Bible - but at least they are very direct in stating what that is.

There is no such literary form as "factual historic narrative". There is narrative: period. And that is what the biblical authors produced: narrative.

Now whether the narrative is fact or intended to be understood as fact, is a different matter. Sometimes you have internal evidence that it is not intended to be completely factual in a scientific or objective descriptive sense (i.e. "if you had been personally present this is what you would have actually seen".) Sometimes it is only in the wider context of external evidence one can sort out objective fact from the truth intended in the text.

If you are saying that the account given in the Bible is not trustworthy because the author is not informed enough to know the difference between 3 billion years and 7 days of the week

No, that is not at all what I am saying. Of course he knew the difference between those numbers (though he may not have had any comprehension of the term "billion" he would still know that a thousand thousand of thousands was a lot more than seven.)

What I am saying is that he did not know the earth had existed for 3 billion years. He had no idea of the age of the earth. And the Genesis creation stories and genealogies are not intended to give us that information. He had a different reason for situating the creation in a framework of seven days.

- then that point should not be assumed in your argument - it needs to be proven that such a vast difference in facts would have been too subtle for an author who claims that life spans were 900 years before and after the flood and then shrunk down to 120 years over a period of a few centuries.

We don't know what the significance of the long ages attributed by ancient writers to still more ancient ancestors. We do know that it was not only the Hebrews who made use of such numbers; so did the Babylonians, the Assyrians and the Egyptians. It is not likely they were intended, even at the time, to convey the literal age of the person when he died. Rather there is probably a cultural significance which has been lost.

The "other choice" is that one of them is simply wrong if by "Scientific understanding" you mean - "the way atheists view the subject of origins given that they rule out God from a possible source of creation".

No, that is not what I mean either. By scientific understanding I mean the understanding that is the fruit of examining the natural world by the scientific method and which, on the basis of tested evidence, is accepted by scientists in the relevant field, both believers and unbelievers alike. Science does to rule out God in any way.

We should just accept that the biblical author was not writing science or even history

Which is not letting the text speak for itself - rather it is forcing eisegetical preference onto it.

On the contrary, this frees us from the eisegetical dogma of literalism. (See the second quote in my signature.) Literalism as a dogmatic imperative in reading and interpreting scripture is a forced eisegetical preference. Especially when it is assumed that in order to be "literally" true a passage must pass the scientific measure of objective description.

The first question is "What does the text say" - and that seems to be beyond dispute given that quote above.

The second question is "what to do about it".

Agreed as to the first question. But you go prematurely to the last. Your question should be third, or even later. The second should be "what does the text mean in the author's intention?" And we can follow that up with "what did the text mean to those receiving it originally?" and then "What meaning does this text have for us today?" Only then are we ready to ask "what to do about it."

If as some have stated - their choice is to toss out the Bible in favor of what atheists would view as the right answer for the doctrine on origins -- fine ... belief in evolutionism may be the option they favor.

Not everyone will go down that road however.

I don't believe in tossing out the Bible. The Bible is as important to me as it is to you. Nor do I accept an atheist view on any doctrine. Nor on science either. I do accept a scientific view of nature, as many other Christians do. It may be that atheists agree with us on that point, but that doesn't make them Christians and it doesn't make us atheists, nor does it make our view an atheist view.

 

[BobRyan]

QUOTE="BobRyan, post: 68216517, member: 235244"]QUOTE="BobRyan, post: 68198949, So then what "do you think" the Bible teaches in Gen 1:2-2:3 and Ex 20:11?? A literal 7 day creation week?

Clearly the subject is "origins"

Clearly the timeline is given "Six days you shall labor...for in SIX Days the LORD MADE the heavens and the earth the seas and all that is in them and rested the 7th day" Ex 20:8-11

QUOTE="BobRyan, post: 68192486"]Originally Posted by BobRyan ============================================
One leading Hebrew scholar is James Barr, Professor of Hebrew Bible at Vanderbilt University and former Regius Professor of Hebrew at Oxford University in England. Although he does not believe in the historicity of Genesis 1, Dr. Barr does agree that the writer's intent was to narrate the actual history of primeval creation. Others also agree with him.

Probably, so far as I know, there is no professor of Hebrew or Old Testament at any world-class university who does not believe that the writer(s) of Genesis 1-11 intended to convey to their readers the ideas that (a) creation took place in a series of six days which were the same as the days of 24 hours we now experience; . . . Or, to put it negatively, the apologetic arguments which suppose the "days" of creation to be long eras of time, the figures of years not to be chronological, and the flood to be a merely local Mesopotamian flood, are not taken seriously by any such professors, as far as I know.

James Barr, letter to David Watson, 1984.
================================

As do I. But it also means the author never intended to write an objective, scientific account to be understood as literally as a lab report.

Given the content of the post to which you are responding "As do I" is direct contradiction to the next sentence in your post.

The quoted text states that these professors admit that it was written in the form of factual historic narrative - to be taken literally -- and even you admit that Moses was not preaching Darwinism. They don't claim to agree with the POV expressed in the text of the Bible - but at least they are very direct in stating what that is.

If you are saying that the account given in the Bible is not trustworthy because the author is not informed enough to know the difference between 3 billion years and 7 days of the week - then that point should not be assumed in your argument - it needs to be proven that such a vast difference in facts would have been too subtle for an author who claims that life spans were 900 years before and after the flood and then shrunk down to 120 years over a period of a few centuries.

Not in the least. I agree entirely that apologetic arguments which suppose the days of creation to be long eras of time, the figures of years in the genealogies not to be chronological and the flood to be merely local are defective. They are methods well-meaning Christians have used in futile attempts to reconcile the biblical text with scientific knowledge. I agree such arguments should be scrapped.

The timeline given in the text does not agree with the timeline that evolutionists would prefer for origins - I also agree

There is no such literary form as "factual historic narrative". There is narrative: period.

There is the "intent of the author" - Moses is giving this text to newly freed slaves from Egypt and it is clearly historic narrative and not poetic fiction -- so much so that legal code is based on it "For in six days the Lord MADE the heavens and the earth the seas and all that is in them" Ex 20:11

One may not wish to agree with the facts as stated in the text - but the facts remain as they are in the text.

Now whether the narrative is fact or intended to be understood as fact, is a different matter.

No it is not. The intent is clear.

But whether or not one chooses to accept the narrative as fact -- is a different matter.

Sometimes you have internal evidence that it is not intended to be completely factual in a scientific or objective descriptive sense

It is given as a matter of fact description - the author gives no indication that he does not believe what he is writing or that the reader should not believe it. In fact the "details" are included in legal code - also without the "but of course this is not actually true" added.

i think we all see that.

No, that is not at all what I am saying. Of course he knew the difference between those numbers

Indeed - 4 billion years is very different from 7 days.. and the author already claims there are 900 life spans that shrink down to about 120 years in the book as written.

What I am saying is that he did not know the earth had existed for 3 billion years.

indeed - given his lineage timeline with names, ages for each -- he would have known a very different timeline from 300,000, 3 million, 3 billion ... and given that even in your model he would not know to tell people about such a long timeline he could not possibly have intended that the newly freed slaves "imagine it anyway".

Here again - i think we all agree.

It is not likely they were intended, even at the time, to convey the literal age of the person when he died. Rather there is probably a cultural significance which has been lost.

A very 'hopeful' conclusion -- you appear to hope the text does not mean what it actually says - while still admitting you have no better explanation for it.

Agreed as to the first question. But you go prematurely to the last. Your question should be third, or even later. The second should be "what does the text mean in the author's intention?"

That was the first question - the author intended to give a direct obvious historic account - a narrative intended to be taken at face value. whether one chooses to reject it as being true - is a different matter altogether.

in Christ,

Bob

 

[gluadys]

BobRyan said: ↑

Not in the least. I agree entirely that apologetic arguments which suppose the days of creation to be long eras of time, the figures of years in the genealogies not to be chronological and the flood to be merely local are defective. They are methods well-meaning Christians have used in futile attempts to reconcile the biblical text with scientific knowledge. I agree such arguments should be scrapped. I also agree with Barr and his colleagues that the biblical text is not historical.

The timeline given in the text does not agree with the timeline that evolutionists would prefer for origins - I also agree

You mean the timeframe in the text does not agree with the actual timeframe discovered by geologists and physicists. Evolutionary biologists had nothing to do with establishing the age of the earth, nor did science present them with several options so that they could prefer one over another. That the earth was at least hundreds of millions, rather than just a few thousand, years old was established by 18th century geologists, most of them Christian, and was accepted by the majority of Christians a century before Darwin proposed the theory of evolution by natural selection. More recent studies have pushed the 18th century estimate to more than 4 billion years.


Scripture does not actually give a time frame for the age of the earth, but the time frame of creation in a literal six days clearly does not fit the witness of the actual created world either. Nor does the sequence of things created.

There is no such literary form as "factual historic narrative". There is narrative: period. And that is what the biblical authors produced: narrative.

There is the "intent of the author" - Moses is giving this text to newly freed slaves from Egypt and it is clearly historic narrative and not poetic fiction -- so much so that legal code is based on it "For in six days the Lord MADE the heavens and the earth the seas and all that is in them" Ex 20:11

Intent is not a literary form. There is no way to tell from the narrative text alone whether the author intends it to be read as an objective description of historic events, as a poetic narrative description of historic events, as a mystical history or as imaginative fiction: the form of the narrative would be the same in all these cases.


As for Genesis and Exodus both referring to six days of creation, that is to be expected when both are written by the same author. Even if he intended it to be fiction (and that would not be my assessment) he would write it that way for consistency.


Even assuming Mosaic authorship (and few scholars do these days) we do not know in which order they were written. Genesis could have been intentionally written as a prequel to Exodus, and so the creation story given a framework of six days to support the law & practice of sabbath-keeping already in existence.

One may not wish to agree with the facts as stated in the text - but the facts remain as they are in the text.

It looks like you mean to say that one may not wish to agree that the statements in the text are fact — but the text remains what it is.


And to that I say “Amen!”

We can study the text, analyze it, try to understand it, but one thing we don’t do is mess around with it. The text says what it says—whether or not one accepts what it says as fact. We don’t rewrite it to suit ourselves.

What I am saying is that he did not know the earth had existed for 3 billion years.

indeed - given his lineage timeline with names, ages for each -- he would have known a very different timeline from 300,000, 3 million, 3 billion ... and given that even in your model he would not know to tell people about such a long timeline he could not possibly have intended that the newly freed slaves "imagine it anyway".


Here again - i think we all agree.

Affirmative. He did not intend his people to imagine into the text what he himself could not know or imagine. In fact, I’ll go a step further and say that we should not imagine the actual age of the earth into the biblical text. It is simply not there.


The simplest recourse is to acknowledge that the author of Genesis was writing according to the limit of his own knowledge—and for a different reason than telling people thousands of years later that they had to limit their knowledge to his. Get away from fruitless debates about trivia like the age of the earth, and get into studying what the Genesis creation accounts are really about. What is their doctrinal, not their scientific, importance?

We do know that it was not only the Hebrews who made use of such numbers; so did the Babylonians, the Assyrians and the Egyptians. It is not likely they were intended, even at the time, to convey the literal age of the person when he died. Rather there is probably a cultural significance which has been lost.

A very 'hopeful' conclusion -- you appear to hope the text does not mean what it actually says - while still admitting you have no better explanation for it.

I think the text means what it says, but that we may not know exactly what it means. I don’t know a lot about this theory that the ages in many ancient records were “honorary”, but I do know that numbers were approached much more mystically in ancient cultures than in ours; they were not used simply to count quantities.

Agreed as to the first question. But you go prematurely to the last. Your question should be third, or even later. The second should be "what does the text mean in the author's intention?

That was the first question - the author intended to give a direct obvious historic account - a narrative intended to be taken at face value. whether one chooses to reject it as being true - is a different matter altogether.

No, the first question, as you stated correctly, is “What does the text say?” And by that I mean the actual words of the text.


Meaning is a different question and the author’s intended meaning a different question still. What it means for us is still a different question.


We can start with the face value, the literal meaning of the text as it appears before us. Then we can ask if this is the meaning the author intends. And even if it is, we can also ask if it is the only meaning the author intends. When Jesus told parables, he often intended two meanings: one (literal) for the crowd, and a deeper meaning (mystical) for the disciples. Why would the same not be true for many other narratives in scripture?


It is also sometimes the case that the primary meaning of the story at the time it was written is not very pertinent to us today, yet there may be other levels of meaning that are important for us. Only when we get to that point can we ask “What are we to do?”

 

[BobRyan]

BobRyan said: ↑

You mean the timeframe in the text does not agree with the actual timeframe discovered by geologists and physicists.

I mean the time frame given in the text is pretty obvious. All can read it.

The time frame some atheists imagine/speculate/prefer differs from that Bible time frame - and so... they differ.

Scripture does not actually give a time frame for the age of the earth,

It does give a time frame for all live on earth, dry land, the sun, the moon, our atmosphere... that sort of thing.

Intent is not a literary form.

Understanding of intent has everything to do with context and literary form

"Mary had a little lamb..' very different from "Legal code".

"Mary had a little lamb..." very different from the account of the resurrection of Christ.

This is just stating the obvious.

When people say "The Bible says - A.... but I believe B instead" I don't argue much with that unless of course the Bible does not say "A" at all.

in Christ,

Bob

 

[gluadys]

I mean the time frame given in the text is pretty obvious. All can read it.

Granted. Now the question remains as to whether or not the author intended that time frame to be literal, symbolic or both.

The time frame some atheists imagine/speculate/prefer differs from that Bible time frame - and so... they differ.

And what about all the believers who also accept the scientific timeframe--which, btw, is not imaginary, nor symbolic--but verified by tested evidence.

It does give a time frame for all live on earth, dry land, the sun, the moon, our atmosphere... that sort of thing.

That is not unique to any theorized time frame. And insofar as they give us information about time frame, it is the scientific time frame, since that is where geologists and physicists got their numbers from.

Understanding of intent has everything to do with context and literary form

Absolutely, it has a lot to do with understanding the meaning the author is investing into the text, but it doesn't determine what the literary form is.

"Mary had a little lamb..' very different from "Legal code".

Right. "Mary had a little lamb" is a narrative. Legal code is not.

"Mary had a little lamb..." very different from the account of the resurrection of Christ.

Not as different. Both of these are narratives. "Mary had a little lamb" is a narrative in verse. The resurrection accounts are narratives in prose.

Both could be intended to be taken literally, though "Mary had a little lamb" may actually have a symbolic meaning that has been forgotten. Many of the verses we call "nursery rhymes" actually started out as adult political satire, but I haven't heard if that is the case with this verse.

Both could be intended to refer to actual history.

But the literary form in itself doesn't give enough information to establish that,

When people say "The Bible says - A.... but I believe B instead" I don't argue much with that unless of course the Bible does not say "A" at all.

Fair enough. I agree. Where we differ is in whether the bible says "A". It seems to me that a lot of what you think the bible says, it actually doesn't. It certainly does not tell us whether any passage is a simple description of historical events. In fact, when you look at how the NT interprets the OT, it almost never uses a simple literal interpretation of "this is what happened". Even passages which seem to be simple history are interpreted allegorically in the NT. The church continued to follow that interpretive example for about 1600 years. Only people who wanted to give the bible a cachet of being "scientific" began to insist it be taken as history and as accurate science when interpreted literally.

That leads to the false dichotomy that if the biblical text, understood literally, does not agree with known history and validated science, either the bible or science is wrong. Well, on that basis, a lot of the bible is wrong. But I don't think the fault is in the bible. I think it is in this false insistence that it be something it is not.

 

[miamited]

That leads to the false dichotomy that if the biblical text, understood literally, does not agree with known history and validated science, either the bible or science is wrong. Well, on that basis, a lot of the bible is wrong. But I don't think the fault is in the bible. I think it is in this false insistence that it be something it is not.

Hi gluadys,

I'm curious why, if you allow for an 'or' outcome, the conclusion must be that the bible is wrong? I suppose this is where most of us differ. You allow that if we understand the Scriptures, specifically this issue of the creation, as being a true and literal explanation of just exactly 'how' and 'when' God created this realm, that the Scriptures must be wrong. I, on the other hand, allow that if we understand the Scriptures, specifically this issue of the creation, as being a true and literal explanation of just exactly 'how' and 'when' God created this realm, that the methodology of the science must be wrong.

God bless you.
In Christ, Ted

 

[gluadys]

Hi gluadys,

I'm curious why, if you allow for an 'or' outcome, the conclusion must be that the bible is wrong? I suppose this is where most of us differ. You allow that if we understand the Scriptures, specifically this issue of the creation, as being a true and literal explanation of just exactly 'how' and 'when' God created this realm, that the Scriptures must be wrong. I, on the other hand, allow that if we understand the Scriptures, specifically this issue of the creation, as being a true and literal explanation of just exactly 'how' and 'when' God created this realm, that the methodology of the science must be wrong.

God bless you.
In Christ, Ted

That is an excellent and thoughtful question, Ted. Thank you.

Let's review a few things the bible tells us:
God created the universe and all things in it.
All created things give glory to God and declare him Creator
Humanity was made to be God's image on earth, to exercise authority (dominion) in the domain of earth's creatures (Gen. 1), to till the earth and care for the garden (Gen. 2)

Now we add a little logic:
In order for the created universe to be the witness the bible tells us it is, it has to be perceived and known by humanity.
In order for human beings to fulfill their responsibilities in this world, humans need to be able to see and understand the world and its creatures, to understand how things fit together and how they work, so that we can avoid harming it and be good caretakers of the creation.
So, God gave us senses to perceive the world, and rational minds to think about what we see.

Now we know that neither of these modes of knowing is perfect, especially since our nature has been corrupted by sin. Our senses can be fooled at times. In the absence of complete information, we sometimes come to erroneous conclusions. And sometimes we use our minds to get to conclusions that agree with our desires rather than the observed facts. However, as Abraham Lincoln once said: "You can fool some of the people all the time, and all of the people some of the time, but you can't fool all of the people all of the time."

Science is the best tool we know of for correcting incorrect perceptions and conclusions based on them. You can fool even scientists some of the time, and some scientists you can fool all the time, and some scientists will even avoid observed evidence in favour of their preferred conclusions. But there are always other scientists who will question the pioneers and suggest different understanding. In the long run, you get to a place where only one conclusion is possible given the evidence we have. At that point, it seems to me, we are no longer merely hearing human scientists. We are hearing the witness of the created world itself telling us "Here is what God created. So give God glory for what God has done."

In short, when our perceptions have been tested and verified every which way, we have to trust what they tell us, because God made them to be trustworthy so that we could see his glory in creation and fulfil our role within it. And when we have examined every rational line of thought, rooted out every logical fallacy, acknowledged the limits of our knowledge and what it may leave uncertain, then what remains has to be trusted to be true because God made us to know the truth with our minds. Time and time again we rely on this ability in every other sphere: a coroner's investigation into the cause of death, a doctor's determination of the cause of illness and its proper treatment; a detective's investigation into how and by whom money was embezzled; in all such cases, provided the work is done well, we trust the conclusions reached through hypotheses which are tested against data.

Why deny it only in regard to science, and even then only when we are uncomfortable with what science has determined to be the case?

So, I have to ask, what is this world science has been telling us of, if it is not the world God created? If the world scientists explore is the world God created, then it is as old as the scientists tell us, because this conclusion fits the observed evidence, successfully predicts evidence not discovered yet, and fits things together in a sensibly satisfying way that nothing else does.

That is what I would expect from an accurate assessment of the world God created.

So, I ask again, just what world do you think scientists are seeing again and again and again in every fossil dig, ever geological investigation, in every astronomical observation, in every probe of species genomes. Do you think they are not real? If the world was actually created in the space of one week a few thousand years ago, why doesn't it look like that? Oh, I know you have an answer, but your answers are all about why it doesn't look like that, about why several billion years of earth's history is an illusion--something God did not actually create.

Science is grounded in observed factual data. Scripture, however, is not grounded in a literal understanding of its text. In particular, the creation accounts have had symbolic,mystical interpretations proposed for them for over 2 millennia--either instead of or in addition to any literal understanding--by Christian theologians who are as expert on the meaning of scripture as geologists are on the meaning of rocks. We are not bound to a literal understanding the way science is bound to observed data. Why then erect a barrier between understanding and accepting science and scripture both when that barrier is completely unnecessary?

I am not saying scripture is wrong; I am saying an unnecessary insistence on understanding it literally is wrong when it flies in the face of what we are learning through the direct study of what God created.

I believe scripture is right when it tells us the created world testifies of its Creator and of God's majesty and power so there is no excuse for unbelief. But in light of that, we need to accept the creation as it is, not reject what we have come to know of the created world because we have erroneously committed ourselves to an incorrect dogma of literalism.

 

[miamited]

Please open quote to read response:

Now we add a little logic:
In order for human beings to fulfill their responsibilities in this world, humans need to be able to see and understand the world and its creatures, to understand how things fit together and how they work, so that we can avoid harming it and be good caretakers of the creation.

I'm not convinced that your corollaries are correct. For example: Exactly why, in order for human beings to fulfill their responsibilities in this world, do humans 'need' to be able to see and understand the world and its creatures, to understand how things fit together and how they work?

God told man that he would have dominion over the earth and that he was to go out and increase and multiply. Now, you don't believe that man can do that without 'knowing' all these things that we know, but...

Haven't we already done it for a few thousand years before we knew all the things that we need to know in order to do it, as you seem to presume? Is it honestly your understanding that Adam did not do what God asked of him, nor Seth or Abraham or any of the other thousands of humans who have lived on the earth before Jesus came because they didn't know what we know? No, friend, you are incorrect that man somehow needs to understand all these things that you think we need to understand in order to accomplish God's plan for mankind.

So, God gave us senses to perceive the world, and rational minds to think about what we see.

Then again it could be that God gave us senses so that we could see, hear and feel. His reason for giving us brains may have been more for our preservation in order to figure out how to build housing and grow food and the various other things that we do need to be able to figure out in order to live. He may also have given us brains that are different from every other creature so that we would be able to praise Him. Yes, I imagine that there are a lot of things about the creation that God did want us to be able to think about. First would be whether we were going to praise and honor Him for who He is. I'm not sure that your corollary that God giving us the ability to think and understand things should then mean that He wants us to waste our time figuring out 'everything' is sound. Your statement needs some 'proof' regarding everything that follows each of the two 'to's. Personally, I'm not sure that I trust that you're telling me the truth about the 'why' God gave mankind senses and rational minds. It would seem that you have assumed that you know why God gave us senses and rational minds, and then you illogically 'assume' that because you are correct about 'why' God gave us these things, then you also assume that you are correct about what He wanted us to do with them.

Now we know that neither of these modes of knowing is perfect, especially since our nature has been corrupted by sin. Our senses can be fooled at times. In the absence of complete information, we sometimes come to erroneous conclusions. And sometimes we use our minds to get to conclusions that agree with our desires rather than the observed facts. However, as Abraham Lincoln once said: "You can fool some of the people all the time, and all of the people some of the time, but you can't fool all of the people all of the time."

How do we know when we have 'complete' information? Is there like a bell that rings or a light that shines when we have all the evidence and information that we need?

Science is the best tool we know of for correcting incorrect perceptions and conclusions based on them. You can fool even scientists some of the time, and some scientists you can fool all the time, and some scientists will even avoid observed evidence in favour of their preferred conclusions. But there are always other scientists who will question the pioneers and suggest different understanding. In the long run, you get to a place where only one conclusion is possible given the evidence we have. At that point, it seems to me, we are no longer merely hearing human scientists. We are hearing the witness of the created world itself telling us "Here is what God created. So give God glory for what God has done."

You may well be correct that science is the best tool that man can devise to correct incorrect perceptions and conclusions based on them. That's why I choose to believe God's truth. I understand fully the fallibility of man's wisdom. No, I believe that you are hearing human scientists tell you what they have determined based on the evidence that they have studied and the conclusions they have derived from such and then say to yourself, "OK, now how can I incorporate this into what the Scriptures say?"

In short, when our perceptions have been tested and verified every which way, we have to trust what they tell us, because God made them to be trustworthy so that we could see his glory in creation and fulfil our role within it. And when we have examined every rational line of thought, rooted out every logical fallacy, acknowledged the limits of our knowledge and what it may leave uncertain, then what remains has to be trusted to be true because God made us to know the truth with our minds. Time and time again we rely on this ability in every other sphere: a coroner's investigation into the cause of death, a doctor's determination of the cause of illness and its proper treatment; a detective's investigation into how and by whom money was embezzled; in all such cases, provided the work is done well, we trust the conclusions reached through hypotheses which are tested against data.

No, again. God is clear to us that man's heart is wicked and we are not to lean on our own understanding. That our wisdom is foolishness.

Why deny it only in regard to science, and even then only when we are uncomfortable with what science has determined to be the case?

So, I have to ask, what is this world science has been telling us of, if it is not the world God created? If the world scientists explore is the world God created, then it is as old as the scientists tell us, because this conclusion fits the observed evidence, successfully predicts evidence not discovered yet, and fits things together in a sensibly satisfying way that nothing else does.

Well, here you have lost sight of the issues. The question has never been, "What is this world science has been telling us of, if it is not the world God created?" The question is much, much simpler, "Are we correct in our understanding, methodology, and conclusions that we draw from science?" Sure it's the same world! It's not like we live in a different plane of existence than the earth on which we live and the universe in which we live.

That is what I would expect from an accurate assessment of the world God created.

So, I ask again, just what world do you think scientists are seeing again and again and again in every fossil dig, ever geological investigation, in every astronomical observation, in every probe of species genomes. Do you think they are not real? If the world was actually created in the space of one week a few thousand years ago, why doesn't it look like that? Oh, I know you have an answer, but your answers are all about why it doesn't look like that, about why several billion years of earth's history is an illusion--something God did not actually create.

Science is grounded in observed factual data. Scripture, however, is not grounded in a literal understanding of its text. In particular, the creation accounts have had symbolic,mystical interpretations proposed for them for over 2 millennia--either instead of or in addition to any literal understanding--by Christian theologians who are as expert on the meaning of scripture as geologists are on the meaning of rocks. We are not bound to a literal understanding the way science is bound to observed data. Why then erect a barrier between understanding and accepting science and scripture both when that barrier is completely unnecessary?

I am not saying scripture is wrong; I am saying an unnecessary insistence on understanding it literally is wrong when it flies in the face of what we are learning through the direct study of what God created.

I believe scripture is right when it tells us the created world testifies of its Creator and of God's majesty and power so there is no excuse for unbelief. But in light of that, we need to accept the creation as it is, not reject what we have come to know of the created world because we have erroneously committed ourselves to an incorrect dogma of literalism.

I can see that you have obviously given this great thought and study. We will ultimately, each one, believe what we have convinced our self is the truth. We will trust those who we believe to be trustworthy.

God bless you.
In Christ, Ted

 

[Smidlee]

Indeed the supposed mythical 100 mile geologic column due to supposed 600 million years of deposition exists nowhere - about a mile of it is all you have -- max and in other places much thinner. All those animals lived at the same time.. with humans ...

Which is one of a great many points I would make with atheists on this subject -- but with Christians - I would stick with
Yesterday at 10:42 PM #42

What about all those examples where the columns is in the wrong order?

Evolutionist will of course dismiss this just because he is a creationist as evolutionist no doubt do they best to explain this away.
I'm amazed on just how many miracles evolutionist rely on to support their creation myth.

 

[BobRyan]

Evolutionism's by faith alone doctrine on origins is very different from what we find in the Bible

 

[BobRyan]

Hi gluadys,

I'm curious why, if you allow for an 'or' outcome, the conclusion must be that the bible is wrong? I suppose this is where most of us differ.

Granted. Now the question remains as to whether or not the author intended that time frame to be literal, symbolic or both.

Which is where this irrefutable fact comes in --

QUOTE="BobRyan, post: 68192486"]Originally Posted by BobRyan ============================================
One leading Hebrew scholar is James Barr, Professor of Hebrew Bible at Vanderbilt University and former Regius Professor of Hebrew at Oxford University in England. Although he does not believe in the historicity of Genesis 1, Dr. Barr does agree that the writer's intent was to narrate the actual history of primeval creation. Others also agree with him.

Probably, so far as I know, there is no professor of Hebrew or Old Testament at any world-class university who does not believe that the writer(s) of Genesis 1-11 intended to convey to their readers the ideas that (a) creation took place in a series of six days which were the same as the days of 24 hours we now experience; . . . Or, to put it negatively, the apologetic arguments which suppose the "days" of creation to be long eras of time, the figures of years not to be chronological, and the flood to be a merely local Mesopotamian flood, are not taken seriously by any such professors, as far as I know.

James Barr, letter to David Watson, 1984.
================================

So then we have the Bible flatly refuting the by-faith-alone doctrine in evolutionism on the subject of origins.

It is then a simple choice as to which one - you may prefer to place your faith in. Dawkins, Provine, Meyer and almost every other atheist evolutionist freely agrees that this is an "either-or" issue - as do many Christians that accept the Bible account of origins in Gen 1:2-2:3

in Christ,
Bob

 

[gluadys]

Dr. Barr's opinion of the author's intent is noted. But his opinion, though reasonable, does not rule out other opinions from other well-qualified scholars.

My not-so-well qualified opinion is that the author certainly intended the reader to understand "day" in the normal common sense and not as far-ahead-of-their-time representations of geological ages of which the author could know nothing.

I am not so certain that the author intended that the days be understood as days of history or more like the days of the "dreamtime" of Australian aborigines. I don't think ancient people had the same sort of concept of history that we do, and we ought not to impose our notions on them. So I don't think one can draw from the literal understanding of "day" an equally literal understanding of history. In the overall scheme of things, the "history" encompassed in this account may be literary rather than literal.

Finally, even if we grant the author intended the account to be understood as history, this does not rule out symbolic understanding the account. It is quite possible that the author intended both literal and symbolic meanings, just as Jesus intended people to hear both a literal story and a symbolic teaching in the parable of the Sower.

 

[BobRyan]

Dr. Barr's opinion of the author's intent is noted. But his opinion, though reasonable, does not rule out other opinions from other well-qualified scholars.

in this case
Wednesday at 11:08 AM #58
We are talking about two things
1. His opinions of the "kind of literature" that it is.
2. His opinion of what his own peers view as the "kind of literature that it is " in all world-class universities.

My not-so-well qualified opinion is that the author certainly intended the reader to understand "day" in the normal common sense and not as far-ahead-of-their-time representations of geological ages of which the author could know nothing.

And at that point - you don't appear to be at variance with Barr's own evaluation of the "kind of literature that it is" - and the intent of the author... and the way the primary intended readers would have taken the document. Which is essential to proper exegesis

I am not so certain that the author intended that the days be understood as days of history or more like the days of the "dreamtime" of Australian aborigines.

hopefully it does not take long to figure out if Moses was aborigine. or if the author is relating a 'dreamtime parable'

I don't think ancient people had the same sort of concept of history that we do,

That is hard to believe given that the story of Genesis is one long history -- and so also Exodus. The Bible reader will not have to read too very long before they begin to get the idea.

in Christ,

Bob