Science (observations in nature) - supports creation not evolution. So does the Bible

[DamianWarS]

Amoebae do evolve. Recently, one species was found to have evolved an obligate endosymbiosis with bacteria; neither can now live apart from each other, and the bacteria evolved to become a sort of organelle within the cell of the amoeba.

This is the mechanism by which chloroplasts and mitochondria evolved in the evolution of eukaryotes.

my point is that theistic evolution may be viewed as accelerated or held back based on divine influence or ordered changes rather than merely from random changes.

The OP presents doubt based on what he perceives as lacking evidence over a period of time and I don't think your example is the missing link he's expecting.

So I'm spinning that logic back at the OP as the creative forces seen in Gen 1 have expliclty ceased so if the OP accepts this as a biblical model then why would the OP view a ceased evolution model as unbiblical? However flawed the evolution model the OP presents is, he is effectively saying evolution has stopped and concludes this means it's false. I'm pointing out the bible tells us God ceased his work so shouldn't we expect this?

 

[The Barbarian]

So I'm spinning that logic back at the OP as the creative forces seen in Gen 1 have expliclty ceased so if the OP accepts this as a biblical model then why would the OP view a ceased evolution model as unbiblical? However flawed the evolution model the OP presents is, he is effectively saying evolution has stopped and concludes this means it's false. I'm pointing out the bible tells us God ceased his work so shouldn't we expect this?

Ummm... yes. So he's kinda between a rock and a hard place here.

 

[The Barbarian]

Sadly for your argument - all that would show is "There is one exception" ... Barr's statement "so far as I know" does allow for things like "one exception".

And since he was unaware of that, his "as far as I know" is pretty much worthless. Particularly since ancient and medieval Hebrew scholars did not see the creation week as literal.

 

[The Barbarian]

The salient point in Barr's argument is that the facts in the text are so glaringly obvious that the professors in all world class universities accept the text as "intended" to be taken literally

Here you simply assumed what you failed to prove. And since you already have an exception...

You "Could" also have tried to rescue your assertion by addressing such as details as
1. How the newly freed slaves at Sinai were going to read darwinism "into the text"

They didn't read protons or plate tectonics into it, either. You seem to have wandered off into some kind of private argument with yourself.

2. How the narrative about no manna falling on the exact 7th day each week for 40 years argues against "the exact 7th day detail" in the text.

And here, you seem to think it would be impossible for God to observe the sabbath He prepared for the Israelites. I think you're wrong.

3. How the death sentence for one who ignored the exact 7th day detail in Ex 16 -- argues against "The exact 7th day detail" in the text

Why do you assume the word of God is less true or compelling if it's in a parable or other figurative language? That makes no sense at all.

4. How those "reading the text" could be so easily mislead into following those details

As you learned, they weren't Ancient and medieval Hebrew scholars knew that it wasn't a literal history, as I showed you.

 

[Roymond]

Yes, I know; ID was hijacked and debased by creationists, in spite of attempts by people like Michael Denton to keep a rational teleology clear of religious beliefs.

Have you read his forward to Nature's Destiny?

The book's on my list; if I had nothing else to do I might get to it by 2024 (one long six-month stretch of utterly free time, even between backpacking and canoeing and bicycling I read 2.25 books a week, which is a way of indicating just how long my list is).

Or I could re-arranged my list.

 

[Roymond]

No you did not. Instead of paying attention "to the details|" you skimmed past them and claimed to find "one exception".

To find a counter example you needed a professor in a world class university quoted as saying "all professors of Hebrew and OT studies reject the literal interpretation as the intended meaning of the author of Genesis -- as far as I know".

That's not how logic works: so long as he has even a handful of examples, the claim he is opposing is falsified.

I submit for consideration the ancient scholars who held that the first Genesis Creation account indicated a very, very ancient universe and a very ancient Earth, and that the six days cannot be literal -- positions they derived from the text.

 

[Roymond]

I don't know of any text of evolution that state "first horses came into being as on day 6 of Genesis 1 -- and then they began to evolve" ... do you??

That statement has absolutely nothing logically to do with my post. In fact it shows a failure to grasp the point.

 

[Roymond]

This just speaks to the who, not the how. Is God not powerful enough to work through all mechanisms of life regardless what they are?

It's interesting that he fails to see that the elegance of the theory of evolution indicates some vast intelligence behind it all.

 

[Roymond]

Is not belief in the unseen intrinsic to the faith? Some things in the bible are for time and place and are not actively happening yet if applied to theistic evolution you demand the evidence. Maybe amoeba don't evolve because God has stopped his creation process through amoeba.

Why doesn't God continue to create as he did in Genesis? Simple, because he ceased. So why is this counter biblical again?

Agreed, science has unanswer questions yet with a creator who is in control the unexplained becomes ordered. Why doesn't it happen? Because God is in control of the processes and he determines what advances and what doesn't. he also determines the when.

Given God as described in the Old Testament we should expect that any evidence for theistic evolution will be thin at best.

BTW, if your assertion about amoeba not evolving any more were true, then God would not be faithful. Either He stopped innovative creating at the end of the six days or He keeps on such creating; there is no possible middle ground.

 

[Roymond]

The Bible addresses "How" in two areas -
1. The time frame - 7 literal day
2. The initiating event - God speaks.

The text does not indicate that the seven days are literal, nor for that matter does it indicate that they are consecutive; the grammar only requires that they are sequential, that each was later in time than the previous one.

Indeed - we could have had a text that said "for in 4 billion years God created all life on Earth in a very slow innefficient and death -centric way..somehow".

He did not choose that option according to His text.

No ancient writer thought in terms of billions of years so no, we couldn't have had such a text. You're falling into the trap of thinking that ancient people thought the same way you do -- study some ancient literature in depth and you'll discover that some of the ways thy thought were very alien to ours.

Going with His actual text - we have "the other option" as the one selected -- which is a problem for trying to jam belief in evolutionism into it.

Stop with your misrepresentation of things by using "evolutionism" -- the term is deliberately deceptive.

As for actual evolution and the first Genesis Creation account, there's no need to "jam belief" in, there's nothing to exclude it.

 

[Roymond]

BobRyan said:

To find a counter example you needed a professor in a world class university quoted as saying "all professors of Hebrew and OT studies reject the literal interpretation as the intended meaning of the author of Genesis -- as far as I know".

Bar made no assumption. His observation was that he knows of no professor in Hebrew or OT studies in any world class university that takes the "jam billions of years into each day" path. He states that as far as he knows there is no such professor which at the very least informs us that his own peers have a very strong tendency to view the text in its obvious literal form.

You find not one single professor saying " as far as he knows there is no professor of Hebrew or OT studies in any world class university that views the text as teaching a literal 7 day timeline for creation... or failing that -- "most or al professors of Hebrew or OT studies in all world class universities assume the text of Genesis is figuratively and allows for billions of years in each day."

We seem to both agree you did not show that at all.

What you DID claim to show is "There is at least ONE professor" that does view it that way -- who makes NO statement at all about how his peers at all world class universities view it.

Details matter.

Yes, details matter, starting with basic logic -- at which you fail miserably in a way that demonstrates that you're mostly clueless about how science even works. All that's necessary to falsify a universal claim such as Barr made is one sole example.

Besides which, you then present a false dichotomy between bad science and crappy understanding of literature: calling the text "figurative" as though that's the only other option is just an uneducated hasty conclusion.

It seems at this point is that you share with radical atheists a failure to grasp that scripture is actually ancient literature written in literary types totally different from what we have.

 

[Roymond]

And since he was unaware of that, his "as far as I know" is pretty much worthless. Particularly since ancient and medieval Hebrew scholars did not see the creation week as literal.

You should put the word "many" in front of "ancient"; since the Exile in Babylon there has always been a school of thought regarding the creation week as actual history, i.e. as literal. Sometimes they dominated, other times not, and in what would seem bizarre to us there were periods when literal, allegorical, and other ways of looking at the text all prospered at once, occasionally in a single individual!

 

[DamianWarS]

Given God as described in the Old Testament we should expect that any evidence for theistic evolution will be thin at best.

BTW, if your assertion about amoeba not evolving any more were true, then God would not be faithful. Either He stopped innovative creating at the end of the six days or He keeps on such creating; there is no possible middle ground.

Amoeba not evolving is the OPs assertion not mine, I entered that space to show that in the model of evolution that the OP presents, however flawed, can still be under the control of God.

What God actually is doing or not doing is his business not mine. Certainly a biblical model shows God in creative action then explictly shows him as ceasing that action. In a literal vacuum that happens in 7 days however outside that vacuum the literalness of the creation account is probably the most insignificant. What the ceasing does show us is God has a work that is triggered by light being spoken into darkness and when that work was complet it ushers in rest. Indeed a salvation metaphor that foreshadows Christ.

If we accept God is in control of every process then he determines the when and to what extent something changes. The creation account may be non-literal but Christ death and resurrection is not. Christ comes as a human and dies as a human to save humanity. Christ does not come to save another species and implicitly I think this shows us a state of evolution that is in control so that another sentient life form parallel with humans doesn't immerge simple because that's not the plan.

 

[Roymond]

Amoeba not evolving is the OPs assertion not mine, I entered that space to show that in the model of evolution that the OP presents, however flawed, can still be under the control of God.

What God actually is doing or not doing is his business not mine. Certainly a biblical model shows God in creative action then explictly shows him as ceasing that action. In a literal vacuum that happens in 7 days however outside that vacuum the literalness of the creation account is probably the most insignificant. What the ceasing does show us is God has a work that is triggered by light being spoken into darkness and when that work was complet it ushers in rest. Indeed a salvation metaphor that foreshadows Christ.

If we accept God is in control of every process then he determines the when and to what extent something changes. The creation account may be non-literal but Christ death and resurrection is not. Christ comes as a human and dies as a human to save humanity. Christ does not come to save another species and implicitly I think this shows us a state of evolution that is in control so that another sentient life form parallel with humans doesn't immerge simple because that's not the plan.

Don't forget that there are two different creation accounts! The first is a strange but impressive weaving of multiple different sorts of literature where taking it literally is 'allowed' but only serves a limited function, the second is a completely different literary type that could well be meant literally -- it's just not connected to the first account much at all.

 

[DamianWarS]

Don't forget that there are two different creation accounts! The first is a strange but impressive weaving of multiple different sorts of literature where taking it literally is 'allowed' but only serves a limited function, the second is a completely different literary type that could well be meant literally -- it's just not connected to the first account much at all.

The accounts are goal driven where the goal is the focus and the details are more fluid and support the goal. Gen 1 creation account is more about God echoing his plan of redemption. Gen 2 account is more about the creation of man and his subsequent need and pairing with Eve.

The accounts also have different sources, Gen 1 is a P source (preistly) where accounts typically build or define ritual and priestly practice (such as the Sabbath or 7 day week), these are often more propheticd have deeper meaning. The Gen 2 account has a J/Y source, uniquely using the name YHWH for God. Gen 1 uses Elohim were Gen 2 uses YHWH Elohim which reveals a different source.

Pre Abrahimic accounts are more of a collection of accounts chronological ordered than it is a continuous stream and have various sources. The genealogy helps to bind the accounts as well as focused on showing a golden line from Adam to Abraham. in this sense they are xenocentric as it's focused is on the hebrew line leaving the rest behind.

 

[BobRyan]

Don't forget that there are two different creation accounts! The first is a strange but impressive weaving of multiple different sorts of literature where taking it literally is 'allowed' but only serves a limited function, the second is a completely different literary type that could well be meant literally -- it's just not connected to the first account much at all.

Not really.

The Gen 1 - Gen 2:3 account of the 7 day creation week is a timeboxed chronological sequence. But in Gen 2:4-end we have "more details" added to it.

some folks like to "delete chapter 1 and pretend that the Bible starts in Gen 2" to get a "second account".

Which makes no sense -- since in Gen 2 - there is no air, no sun and moon, no water, no stars, no fish, no plants other than trees...etc And there is no timeline in it either. It is a great chapter for adding on more details to the time boxed chronological sequence that preceeds it since it adds the details for marriage, for the fall of man related to the forbidden tree, for the origin of Eve in more detail etc.

 

[The Barbarian]

The Gen 1 - Gen 2:3 account of the 7 day creation week is a timeboxed chronological sequence. But in Gen 2:4-end we have "more details" added to it.

Different stuff in different sequence. A different story.

 

[The Barbarian]

It is a great chapter for adding on more details to the time boxed chronological sequence that preceeds it since it adds the details for marriage, for the fall of man related to the forbidden tree, for the origin of Eve in more detail etc.

Actually, the fall is in Genesis 3. And in Genesis 2, God says to Adam:

Genesis 2:17 But of the tree of knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat. For in what day soever thou shalt eat of it, thou shalt die the death.

Adam does eat it, but he lives on physically for many years thereafter. This is another way we know it's figurative, not a literal account.

 

[Roymond]

The accounts are goal driven where the goal is the focus and the details are more fluid and support the goal. Gen 1 creation account is more about God echoing his plan of redemption. Gen 2 account is more about the creation of man and his subsequent need and pairing with Eve.

The accounts also have different sources, Gen 1 is a P source (preistly) where accounts typically build or define ritual and priestly practice (such as the Sabbath or 7 day week), these are often more propheticd have deeper meaning. The Gen 2 account has a J/Y source, uniquely using the name YHWH for God. Gen 1 uses Elohim were Gen 2 uses YHWH Elohim which reveals a different source.

Pre Abrahimic accounts are more of a collection of accounts chronological ordered than it is a continuous stream and have various sources. The genealogy helps to bind the accounts as well as focused on showing a golden line from Adam to Abraham. in this sense they are xenocentric as it's focused is on the hebrew line leaving the rest behind.

The major function of the first Genesis Creation account is polemical: it follows the order of the Egyptian creation account but alters it in a way that these days could be summed up as "All your gods are belong to YHWH": it takes all the Egyptian gods involved in creation in their story and declares that none of them is anything more than something that YHWH-Elohim made, with the starkest put-down being for the sun and moon; the writer doesn't even mention their names, just lists them by their function! In form it is both what I learned to call "royal chronicle", an account in poetic prose setting forth a great accomplishment of a mighty king, plus a "temple dedication" account where the deity shapes a temple, then fills it, then takes up his/her position and 'rests' from that activity (where "rest" does not indicate inactivity but rather relaxed supervision and enjoyment of what was achieved).

In grad school I encountered a Jewish rabbi and a Jesuit priest who both said that the second Creation account was about the creation of a particular man and the nature of his relationship with God, distinct from the 'generic' creation of humans in the first account. Off and on I'm uncomfortable with that, though more and more it seems to make sense to me.

 

[Roymond]

Not really.

The Gen 1 - Gen 2:3 account of the 7 day creation week is a timeboxed chronological sequence. But in Gen 2:4-end we have "more details" added to it.

some folks like to "delete chapter 1 and pretend that the Bible starts in Gen 2" to get a "second account".

Which makes no sense -- since in Gen 2 - there is no air, no sun and moon, no water, no stars, no fish, no plants other than trees...etc And there is no timeline in it either. It is a great chapter for adding on more details to the time boxed chronological sequence that preceeds it since it adds the details for marriage, for the fall of man related to the forbidden tree, for the origin of Eve in more detail etc.

The second account has a very different order of events in it that is not compatible with the first account -- it is a different story. And it does make sense; it doesn't have to tell about "air... sun... moon... water... stars... fish..." etc. because it assumes the prior account. It isn't "more details" for the frst account since the details are incompatible with that account, it's a follow-on to the first account.