Genesis 1 Again

[artybloke]

I'm incline to agree with this but it is interesting to note that Gen1 leaves room for so much more too.

Well, of course it does, it's symbolic language. There's always more interpretive possibility in symbolic literature than there is in baldly factual literature. But there's a danger in that too: in that you can easily write your own desires and beliefs onto a text without realising you're doing it. You can see that in the vain searches for the Anti-Christ over the centuries: is it the Pope or is it Luther? (My vote goes to Simon Cowell...)

 

[AV1611VET]

So you can either live in the la-la land of creationist nonsense, or live in the real world that God created through evolution. It's your choice.

Then I'll live in 'the la-la land of creationist nonsense', and science can take a hike.

 

[AV1611VET]

I'm incline to agree with this but it is interesting to note that Gen1 leaves room for so much more too.

When the lost stand before the Great White Throne Judgment Seat, Mother Nature, whom they worshipped all their lives, is going to abandon them and leave them high-and-dry.

Revelation 20:11 And I saw a great white throne, and him that sat on it, from whose face the earth and the heaven fled away; and there was found no place for them.

 

[artybloke]

When you have no rational argument, always resort to scare tactics; yeah, that'll work...

 

[AV1611VET]

When you have no rational argument, always resort to scare tactics; yeah, that'll work...

That scares you, does it?

 

[artybloke]

Why would it scare me? I don't think the judgemental dictator god you seem to delight in bears any resemblance to the Gospel of Christ.

 

[Jazer]

Either Genesis 1 is a symbolic, poetic text or it's just simply wrong.

No one has been about to show Genesis 1 as being wrong. Esp for people who believe in the GAP or OEC. Science helps us to understand our Bible and God's message for us today. New information comes along all the time in Science that confirms for us that the Bible is true. In the last 5 to 10 years there has been a lot of Y-DNA & Mt-DNA that has been discovered that confirms the genealogy in the Bible are true and accurate. People have said that DNA is strong evidence for Evolution. Well, DNA turns out to be strong evidence for the Bible and Creationism also.

 

[Jazer]

I don't think the judgemental dictator god

That is your god, or at least your concept of God, not ours. You maybe surprised to learn that Christians are truely free, it is people who do not follow God that end up in bondage. Even there are people who are not saved that are in bondage to drinking, drugs, sex and so on. Who live according to the flesh and not the spirit.

 

[AV1611VET]

Why would it scare me?

So you had no idea what you were talking about when you mentioned 'scare tactics'? or were you just parroting others who say that?

 

[Delphiki]

That is your god, or at least your concept of God, not ours. You maybe surprised to learn that Christians are truely free, it is people who do not follow God that end up in bondage. Even there are people who are not saved that are in bondage to drinking, drugs, sex and so on. Who live according to the flesh and not the spirit.

There are also Christians who are slaves to drinking, drugs, sex and so on.

Me? I enjoy drinking. I'm a bit of a beer snob, actually, and enjoy the aromas and flavors of a hoppy beer, but I'm not a slave to it. I'm free to do it.

I don't pay for drugs, unless they're prescription. I don't do drugs unless they're less harmful than the beer I enjoy. I also don't really care about other people doing drugs unless they are the kinds that really ruin lives.

I also enjoy sex. Great fun! Though I'd hardly consider myself a slave to it (unless that's part of the role play, of course). What's so horrible about the activity God invented that's used for our procreation? You ever bother to consider that it's relationship with procreation is why it's enjoyable?

I'll put rock and roll here for the "so on" so we can round out the "sex, drugs, and rock and roll" trifecta. I love rock and roll. I have a particular flavor for various brands of metal, classic rock, punk rock, and progressive rock. Rush is, by far, one of my favorite bands.

Am I in bondage to any of these things? Absolutely not. They are my preferences and I am free to enjoy them. You know some Jehovas witnesses aren't even allowed to dance? Most of you guys are against certain kinds of people being allowed to express their love for one another.

If anyone here is in bondage, Jazer, it's you guys. You're just not responsible enough to know what moderation or morality is, so you need religion to help you.

 

[Doveaman]

Except it isn't. The atmosphere of the earth was very different billions of years ago than it is now.

Who said anything about “billions of years ago”? Did you read the OP?

So if your god created the earth's atmosphere it wasn't created the way it is now, friendly to human life.

The way it is now is the way it was created, friendly to human life. Did you read the OP?

You may keep on trying to make Genesis be relevant but it's just a story.

So you didn't read the OP.

 

[Doveaman]

Genesis 1 was never meant to be historical.

I would agree with you if you were the author. You are not.

If it were it would be written as history not poetry.

It is written as history:

“In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth...Then God saw everything that He had made, and indeed it was very good.” (Gen 1:1).

There is no reason at all to believe Genesis wasn’t history except by those who fear their faith in science may be threatened.

But there is no need to fear; Genesis agrees with science when the science is done properly.

Symbolic truth is not just gained from histoical events,

But it can be gained from historical events. That’s the point.

but also from poetry, fiction, myth, drama - all of which have more in common with the genres of the early chapters of Genesis than does 'history' or 'science'.

I reject your opinion.

 

[Hentenza]

Well, of course it does, it's symbolic language. <snip>

Please provide grammatical and textual evidence that the language used in Gen 1&2 is symbolic and/or poetic language. Thanks.

 

[Jazer]

so you need religion to help you.

I do not see any problem with needing help from the God who created us.

 

[Greg1234]

That the book of Genesis would be meaningless until some 20/21st century literalist comes along and reinterprets it, or that it actually had real symbolic meaning to its first hearers?

Actually you find Darwinism nowhere. In the New Testament you have "All flesh is not the same flesh: but there is one kind of flesh of men, another flesh of beasts, another of fish, and another of birds. There are also celestial bodies, and bodies terrestrial: but the glory of the celestial is one, and the glory of the terrestrial is another."

In the [url="http://www.horuscentre.org/library/Kabbalah/The_Kabbalah_Unveiled.pdf] Kabbalah,[/url] a Jewish division "[By an exegetical rule of numbers, not so often employed as the others. simple numbers or units signify divine things; numbers of ten, celestial things; numbers of a hundred, terrestrial things; and thousands"

"(Numbers are called days, and numbers of the inferior world short days; among which tens are attributed to the factive, on account of their decimal numeration; hundreds to the formative, since they are numbers of the light of their author, and draw their existence from the tens; but thousands to the creative, for the same reason.

Plato explains the reflective nature of reality in his allegory of the cave.

Literally, it is an historical text on Creationism. Interpretively, it would be an historical text on Even More Creationism.

 

[Delphiki]

I do not see any problem with needing help from the God who created us.

If the doctrine of said God includes injustice and atrocities, or ways to interpret the doctrine in such a manner, then there is great risk. The book tells you who to love, which is fine, except that it also tells you who to hate.

Then there's the risk of people who rely on religion losing their faith. Too often, I get asked the question "If you don't believe in God, then where do you get your morals from?" This implies that the person asking wouldn't have any morals if they stopped believing.

Lastly, needing help from a deity that you believe exists (and has killed millions of people, according to his biography) is simply unnecessary. I, and most atheists, are a good example of this. Even if our good moral behavior didn't come naturally, it's still within our capacity to reason good moral behavior.

 

[Jazer]

needing help from a deity that you believe exists is simply unnecessary. I, and most atheists, are a good example of this.

If you do not need God then what are you doing here? If others believe they need God then what business is that of yours? Why are atheists so concerned about prayer in schools and christians putting 10 commandments up on a plaque on public property and all the other infringements on our freedom as Christians.

 

[Delphiki]

If you do not need God then what are you doing here? If others believe they need God then what business is that of yours? Why are atheists so concerned about prayer in schools and christians putting 10 commandments up on a plaque on public property and all the other infringements on our freedom as Christians.

I don't care if you believe in God, but what I do care about is teaching kids a religion as if it was scientific fact. Save religion for church, and keep science in the classroom. Christianity isn't the only religion out there, after all. My kids aren't Christians so why should I let someone force their creation myths on them as if they were true.

I don't care if you pray in schools, but I do care about whether or not prayer is enforced. As it is now, students can pray and read the bible all they want in school, it's just that teachers aren't allowed to instruct students to do so -- that's a violation of the 1st amendment.

The 10 commandments only pertain to your religion and Judaism. Not everyone agrees with them -- the first five are specific to those religions and aren't even laws, nor should they be. In fact, there laws that reflect the sentiment of only 4 of the 10 commandments, and those laws are pretty much universal (and regardless of the 10 commandments).

Putting the 10 commandments outside a government building sends the message that we are a Christian nation (which we're not) and a theocracy (which we also aren't). It's a Christian majority population with a (supposed to be) secular government,

You can believe anything you want, pray when you want, and to whoever you want, but it's not a violation of your rights to keep you from forcing others to do the same as you. Keeping Christians from infringing on the rights of others is not a violation of your rights.

Freedom of religion means you have your personal freedom to practice your religion. It doesn't mean the freedom to make everybody else practice your religion.

Matt 6:6 - But thou, when thou prayest, enter into thy closet, and when thou hast shut thy door, pray to thy Father which is in secret; and thy Father which seeth in secret shall reward thee openly.

 

[dad]

Genesis 1:

[FONT=&quot](1) [/FONT]In the beginning God created the Heaven and the earth...

(6) And God said, Let there be a firmament...

(7) And God made the firmament...

(8) And God called the firmament Heaven.


It is interesting to know that the Hebrew word for "Heaven" in verse 1 is the same Hebrew word for "Heaven" in verse 8, and that this Hebrew word for "Heaven" &#8211; &#8220;Shamayim&#8221; &#8211; can also mean &#8220;Atmosphere&#8221;.

This means that Genesis 1, verse 1, can be read:

&#8220;In the beginning God created the Atmosphere and the earth.&#8221;

We may consider that verse 1 is a summary statement stating who did the creating and what was created, and the verses that follow, verses 2 through 31, goes into details on how this creation was accomplished.

It is also interesting to know that in verse 2 planet earth was already in existence, but in a chaotic state:

&#8220;Now the earth was formless and empty, and darkness was over the surface of the deep&#8221; (Gen 1:2).

It is interesting to know also that the Hebrew word for "was" &#8211; &#8220;hayah&#8221; &#8211; can also mean &#8220;to become&#8221;.

This means that Genesis 1, verse 2, can be read:

&#8220;Now the earth had become formless and empty, and darkness was over the surface of the deep&#8221;

This sounds like a planet that might have experienced a global catastrophe that destroyed the planet&#8217;s biosphere.

Verses 3 through 31 may then be a description of how God created a new atmosphere and a new lithosphere in &#8220;six days&#8221; for planet earth. The hydrosphere was already present.

This means that Genesis 1 can be read:

&#8220;In the beginning God created the earth&#8217;s Atmosphere and the earth&#8217;s lithosphere...Then God saw everything that He had made, and indeed it was very good. And the evening and the morning were the sixth day.&#8221;

The creation account in Genesis 1 may very well be an account of the recreation of the earth&#8217;s biosphere following a global catastrophe.

I guess the bottom line on that type of case, is that one cannot say the bible says any recreation happened. One cannot omit the far heavens being included in what was meant that was created, one can only speculate that what was meant excluded them.

From the rest of the bible, however, I doubt that that position could be supported strongly.

Seems to me that that whole basic sort of line of interpretation is an attempt to align God's word with science and what man thinks he 'knows'.

My own feeling is that it would be better to align what man claims he sort of knows, with what God says.

When God says..."He made the stars also" (after just mentioning the sun and moon were made that creation week no less) -- it is best to place the stars and sun and moon in the creation, rather than straining to try to find some recreation.

 

[sandwiches]

It is so difficult to keep up with each scientist's interpretation of moon formation.

So, you're are saying that like scientists regarding the moon, Christians do not know which interpretation of Genesis is correct. That's an interesting admission, I'd say.