Why a literal Genesis?

YouAreAwesome

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Why didn't God say...from the animals I made man?

He did. But He got in earlier than the animals. He got in right back at the dust. Before there was even life.

The bible tells us Satan was in the Garden of Eden in an unfallen state.

You were in Eden, the garden of God; every precious stone adorned you: carnelian, chrysolite and emerald, topaz, onyx and jasper, lapis lazuli, turquoise and beryl. Your settings and mountings were made of gold; on the day you were created they were prepared.

We learn from this passage:
a. Satan was in Eden.
b. On the day Satan was created he was adorned with precious stones.

I don't see a reason to firmly believe Satan was created in Eden, especially in light of Revelation 12:9:

And the great dragon was hurled down--the ancient serpent called the devil and Satan, the deceiver of the whole world. He was hurled to the earth, and his angels with him.

basing his reasoning for a command on something that could only be reasoned by assuming an original female is good evidence for a literal Genesis.

I believe Eve was a real person created by God and given His image. But I don't believe in a literal Genesis.
 
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Moral Orel

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Moses' original audience knew how to read allegory and parable and they also knew how to read history. The author of Genesis, as far as we can tell, wants to communicate history.
I didn't say they couldn't. I merely said there might be a reason He wanted them to think of it that way that doesn't apply to us. I've talked about some other hypothetical reasons I can think of that might be good reasons to have them think of things the way they did that wouldn't apply to us in some other posts. I'll admit they're all hypothetical, but that's only because I can't claim to know the mind of God.

There are more possible reasons that He might have decided to put it forth as historical than that they wouldn't understand allegory or that it was in fact historical.
 
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Moral Orel

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Unless the reason is simply that human beings were meant to be in harmony with God, but now we are not, and we need God (in the form of Jesus Christ) to fix that.

That's all the reasoning there actually is... now, the question is, "how to the falling away occur"?

It could be something drawn out and complicated, or it could be something as simple as two people taking bad advice from a talking reptile. But again, is an exact, literal story of what went wrong all those aeons ago as important as the fact that something did indeed go wrong and continues to be wrong, thus requiring reconciliation?
Well the one reason that was pointed out by 57 was directly tied to females. It's a little hard to imagine something long and drawn out by generations and generations of females that males wouldn't be implicit in. That's the sort of thing I'm having trouble getting past.
 
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Paul of Eugene OR

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It's funny how that concept can turn around and bite you. Yes, we learned tat the sun really doesn't rise in the morning. Science says so. ....But lets take it to the next level....Medical science says when you die on day three you stay dead. That's a medical fact. You're logic would tell us not only doesn't the sun rise in the morning neither did the Son rise in the morning of day 3.

....see how that works?
That's silly. Even first century citizens without modern science knew that dead people stay dead. They claim is was a miracle beyond the natural order of things, and that is still the claim today, isn't it? You're not trying to argue for Jesus becoming alive naturally without a miracle, are you?
 
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-57

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You make a good point. I don't think it would matter if it were simply that Paul thought Genesis was literal, as he had no reason to think it might not be at the time. However, basing his reasoning for a command on something that could only be reasoned by assuming an original female is good evidence for a literal Genesis.

When the christian view is that the bible is the inspired word of God....it stands to reason that Paul got it right for his time and our time.
 
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TLK Valentine

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Well the one reason that was pointed out by 57 was directly tied to females.


And we all know what ancient civilizations thought of females.The Hebrews wouldn't be the first or only culture to use religion to justify their behavior.

It's a little hard to imagine something long and drawn out by generations and generations of females that males wouldn't be implicit in. That's the sort of thing I'm having trouble getting past.

It was the females who got the blame from the beginning, thus justifying their treatment as chattel.
 
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TLK Valentine

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When the christian view is that the bible is the inspired word of God....it stands to reason that Paul got it right for his time and our time.

If Paul considered his own writings to be similarly inspired... I see nothing to indicate that Paul ever assumed that his letters, which were private correspondence to the various church leaders, to ever be made public, I find it unlikely that he would glibly declare himself "inspired."
 
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-57

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A lot less than how some of the Jesus' other sayings freaked people out:

John 2:19-21 showed people freaking out when Jesus talked about tearing down "the temple" (of his body, but they didn't get it).
John 3:4 shows Nicodemus freaking out when he thought being "born again" meant crawling back into his mother's womb.
John 4:11 has a Samaritan woman freaking out when Jesus offers her "living water" without a bucket.
And John 4:33 freaked out when Jesus said he had enough to eat, but none of them could remember who fed him.

Seems like early in John's Gospel, he has a lot of people completely missing Jesus' message precisely because they were taking him literally.

Maybe John was trying to tell us something?

Matt 4:4 But Jesus answered, “It is written: ‘Man shall not live on bread alone, but on every word that comes from the mouth of God.’”…
 
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-57

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Now that is inaccurate. Theistic evolutionists don't claim that God is incapable of creating in the way Genesis describes, they claim He didn't create in the way Genesis describes, which are vastly different things.

The reason I brought up parables is that Jesus liked to teach lessons by telling stories about things that didn't really happen, and have us discern the spiritual meaning. Don't focus too much on the "parable" word and instead think of all the figurative, metaphorical, allegorical, etc., parts of the Bible. It doesn't matter one jot if the stories Jesus told were true or not for us to discern the important message they were trying to convey.

That doesn't prove Genesis is allegory, but it does show that it might be allegory and thinking it might be doesn't mean you don't trust God.

As i said in another post...the authors of the NT took the account in Genesis as literal. And, I should repeat, biblical parables are based upon real life situations or events that could happen.

The Theo-Evos need to change to much of the bible to make Genesis an allagotical story. Something you may come to understand as you learn more of what the bible has to say on the topic.
 
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TLK Valentine

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Matt 4:4 But Jesus answered, “It is written: ‘Man shall not live on bread alone, but on every word that comes from the mouth of God.’”…

Great... but I was talking about John's Gospel, not Matthew's.
 
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-57

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But a mechanical interpretation of Genesis doesn't allow for "they began to die" so we already have to take the figurative approach at least slightly by seeing a spiritual death instead of a figurative one.

If they were going to die, but then God changed it by killing animals instead, then that means God contradicted Himself or changed His mind.
A mechanical interpretation of Genesis does allow for "they began to die"

As Gills commentary puts it...for in the day thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die; or "in dying, die" (z); which denotes the certainty of it, as our version expresses it;

Cambridge commentary...found on the Gills page puts it this way:...in the day that … die] Literally, in the day that Adam ate of the fruit, he did not die. This is one of the minor inconsistencies in the story which are not explained for us. Either we are to assume that, in some fuller version of it, the Lord God was described as “repenting” of the sentence of immediate death, as changing His mind and sparing man in His mercy: or the words “in the day, &c.” are to be regarded as metaphorical, and the doom, “thou shalt surely die,” merely means “thou shalt become mortal.”

The NIV translated the verse this way:...but you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for when you eat from it you will certainly die."
Several other translations found on that page translate the verse similarly.
 
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-57

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Maybe there are good reasons we don't know that God does know, and had He inspired Genesis in a way that fell more in line with evolution it would have created bigger problems for people back then. That's such a wishy washy answer though...

Maybe an extremely simplified version of the process was necessary to keep people from focusing on the details that didn't matter to their lives. If God created a lifeform in an instant, there's no room to question how life changes from one form to the next for people to build their own notions on that idea. What kind of weird and strange religions could have arose from people thinking about being related to animals?

It's hard to think about why God does things the way He does and often the most direct and obvious answer isn't the right one.

I see no reason to even begin to assume God would hide the truth of creation from us.

You had said..."What kind of weird and strange religions could have arose from people thinking about being related to animals?" We currently see the wierd and strange evolutionism does to the bible.
 
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YouAreAwesome

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As i said in another post...the authors of the NT took the account in Genesis as literal. And, I should repeat, biblical parables are based upon real life situations or events that could happen.

The Theo-Evos need to change to much of the bible to make Genesis an allagotical story. Something you may come to understand as you learn more of what the bible has to say on the topic.
Within my creation-by-evolution view God is still Creator. He set everything in motion. So biblically there is no contradiction to any verse calling Him Creator. Adam and Eve were real people Who God created in Eden (even though there were other humans around at the time, Genesis 4:16-17) so problem there either. What are the other parts of the Bible that cause a problem with this view?
 
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-57

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Does it matter where the line is drawn? If so, why?

I think it's safe to say it goes back to at least David since I know of prophecies about Jesus being from that ancestry, and that still isn't back in Genesis yet.

I may be wrong, but doesn't "Adam" mean "man"? If so, isn't it sufficient that Jesus was a descendant of humans to say he was a descendant of Adam?

Jude knew the linage was literal when he wrote...."It was also about these that Enoch, the seventh from Adam, prophesied, saying, “Behold, the Lord comes with ten thousands of his holy ones,"

Jude presented the linage as literal and historical.
 
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-57

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No, of course not. I only pointed it out because there are various interpretations even amongst people who take Genesis literally. What they said makes sense, though, but the Bible doesn't say the animals couldn't eat from the tree of life either. It seems like an unknown to me.

Funny thought, what if an animal, say a chicken, ate from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil?

Interesting concepts.
 
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-57

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It doesn't destroy the reason for Jesus. The reason for Jesus is that there is sin in the world. If the reason for sin being in the world is altered at all, it doesn't change the fact that sin is in the world and needs Jesus.

Partially true..there is sin in the world...but it changes the reason why there is sin in the world. The Bible tells us the reason is disobedience.
Evolutionism tells us we evolved into beings that sinned.
Romans 5:12 tells us "Therefore, just as sin came into the world through one man, and death through sin, and so death spread to all men because all sinned"

Theo-Evoism tells us populations evolve and it wasn't a result of one man.

That one man explanation is repeated in 1 Cor 15:21 For as by a man came death, by a man has come also the resurrection of the dead.

That's two more verses the Theo-Evos need to change to make the bible conform to evolutionism
 
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TLK Valentine

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Partially true..there is sin in the world...but it changes the reason why there is sin in the world. The Bible tells us the reason is disobedience.
Evolutionism tells us we evolved into beings that sinned.

Well, one has to understand an order before one can disobey... understanding has to come first, because to sin is a choice.
 
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