Why did God tell Noah to build an Ark, as opposed to simply teleporting the animals and his family away?
The Ark served no purpose other than to tax Noah's time and money, just to see how devoted he was?Maybe, to test his faith?
The Ark served no purpose other than to tax Noah's time and money, just to see how devoted he was?
If God used the Ark as a method to separate the wheat from the chaff so to speak, to make sure that Noah was worthy of saving (ignoring the fact that God probably knew what Noah would do, the whole predestination thing), then after the completion of the Ark and the monumental task, why didn't God simply teleport Noah and his family and his animals from Earth? The test was over. Instead God leaves Noah and his family and a whole lot of animals hanging for 180 days. For what purpose?
Heck, why use the form of a global Flood that doesn't distinguish between animals and the evil people? A clean, targeted lightning bolt for all the evil people would save the animals of the Earth without the need for seven pairs of clean animals and a pair of unclean animals on the Ark.
Begs what question?Stop taking the story literally and see it for what it was intended ...the theological implications are what it is about not the actuality of what anyone could see would be impossible in fact. And please no "with God anything is possible" stuff.. That just begs the question.
If God wanted the Bible to be an instruction manual I think he would have done a better job. It's about the faith lessons our ancestors learned and wished to convey. It's about how they visioned God in their lives.
Why did God tell Noah to build an Ark, as opposed to simply teleporting the animals and his family away?
Begs what question?
Why not take the story literally? Jesus believed in Noah, the ark and a flood.
I am beginning to understand why Jesus told His disciples not to cast pearl before swine!Believing in something doesn't necessarily mean taking it literally. I know of no indication in the gospels that Jesus took the flood story literally.
Nooooooooo, Jesus REFERENCED the myths of Genesis. Nowhere does it says Jesus believed in them as literal truth. Nowhere are we given to understand such a thing. If I reference the Babylonian story of the world being created out of the body of a slain god, does it mean I believe it? So, if Jesus references the Hebrew story of God making human in two genders, or a worldwide Flood, does it mean He actually believed it happened?
If the answers to those two questions are different, something is seriously wrong with your logics. (yes, I misspelled that on purpose.)
So, why not take the story literally? Because the universe, which we are told we can know God by, tells us otherwise. Because nowhere does it says that the story is supposed to be literal infallible truth. Because there are two versions. Because there are so many things wrong with it, that cannot be fixed without invoking un-communicated miracles, and if there are un-communicated miracles, then who knows what else is uncommunicated? Maybe the line about "And yeah verily, each day spoken of in this story is a metaphorical day and this actually happened over ~14 billion years using naturalistic means"?
And so on.
Metherion
I am beginning to understand why Jesus told His disciples not to cast pearl before swine!
26 When the Son of Man returns, it will be like it was in Noahs day. 27 In those days, the people enjoyed banquets and parties and weddings right up to the time Noah entered his boat and the flood came and destroyed them all.
: Holy Bible : New Living Translation. Lk 7:26-27
Certainly sounds like Jesus believed the account of the flood in Noah's day.
Oh I agree, he believed it. I said so in the post you are so impolitely responding to. But there is nothing in that citation that says he believed it literally.
Do you believe Jesus' parables?Believing in the flood and not believing it literally is a oxy-moron.
That he said them, or that they are literal, are you really trying to compare the two? To the OP: Now, why don't you ask God? His ways are higher than our ways, I can't tell you why God did something the way he did it. I can only guess.Do you believe Jesus' parables?
What would be the point of this if it was merely a myth?
And through Genesis we then go to where it's mentioned in the New Testament. [bible]2 Peter 3:2-7[/bible]
Another thing (though not especially relevant), what do you all make of the sabbath? Why is it in place if you all say that Creation didn't happen? (Well, not in the way the bible says anyway.)
You answered it yourself:What would be the point of this if it was merely a myth? I could look in Chronicles, but that isn't the scripture i'm talking about, I just found it while looking back through Genesis.
To the OP: Now, why don't you ask God? His ways are higher than our ways, I can't tell you why God did something the way he did it. I can only guess.
Why did God tell Noah to build an Ark, as opposed to simply teleporting the animals and his family away?
Macca said that "Believing in the flood and not believing it literally is a oxy-moron." But clearly, this is not the case, given that we believe Jesus' parables despite the fact that they were not meant literally. In the same way, we can still believe the Creation or Flood accounts without ever believing they happened as described in the Bible. Why? Because we know God accomodates for our intellectual, cultural, and temporal limitations. The message God is trying to communicate in these accounts is a spiritual one (would you expect anything else?), delivered in the vessel of ancient Near Eastern mythology, as was the custom of their time. Imposing a 21st century attitude on the Scriptures by assuming they were written to be scientifically sound is not the way the original biblical audience would have understood the text, as such an approach was foreign to them.That he said them, or that they are literal, are you really trying to compare the two?