Should Genesis be taken literally?

[KWCrazy]

A figurative reading of the creation story along with Adam and Eve in particular from the rest of Genesis seems essential in light of both common experience and modern science.

There are 333 miracles in the Bible, none of which conform to modern science.
Do you reject them all?
If not, on what basis do you decide what to accept and what to reject?

 

[joshua 1 9]

Yes, I do know this. But how is this relevant? The fact that Jesus knew the scriptures is not evidence that He had comprehensive knowledge of the entire history of human development.

Col 1:16 "For in him all things were created: things in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or powers or rulers or authorities; all things have been created through him and for him."

 

[Sine Nomine]

There is an important difference. I am quite confident (although I have not actually confirmed this) that it can be shown that, within Hebrew culture, the snake is seen as a symbol of evil quite apart from Biblical writings. That should tip us off to the possibility that the snake in Genesis is a symbol.

Within all of ancient Semitic culture, the snake is a symbol of evil. A distinction in Hebrew culture is that God is sovereign over the snake and that Man (though tainted by the snake) was a good creation of God, made to be the heirs and overseers of God's creation. The contrasts between ancient Semitic and the Hebrew story of Genesis are quite stark, although the understanding of ancient cosmology and geology/climate are similar if not identical. The differences say a lot about the likely intent of Genesis.

 

[joshua 1 9]

There are 333 miracles in the Bible, none of which conform to modern science. Do you reject them all?

They all conform to modern science because a miracle restores things back to God's purpose and intention. The problem with a miracles is to show that there was ever a problem and to show that there was ever a need for the miracle. When people say I am cured, I am healed the problem is to show that they were ever sick in the first place. I have had healing that the doctor said was impossible. Then after I am healed they change their tune and say it is possible in some cases. Yet they still consider this to be spontaneous remission and they do not give God the honor and the glory for what He has done.

 

[Speedwell]

Great.
So you accept the six day creation, the creation of man on day six, the fall of man, the Garden of Eden, the Great Flood and the genealogies of the Bible?

LOL! I said I accepted the Bible as the word of God. I want nothing to do with your limited interpretation of it.

 

[Sine Nomine]

Sure. One would think for such a proponent of evolution, at least you'd be familiar with its concepts. It's not that hard as the myth that the planets were spit out of stars, where life just happened to "poof", is all over the place. Here are a few 'non-reputable' sources for you, like Space.com and Harvard University.

The Big Bang: What Really Happened at Our Universe's Birth?

Over time, stars gravitated together to form galaxies, leading to more and more large-scale structure in the universe. Planets coalesced around some newly forming stars, including our own sun. And 3.8 billion years ago, life took root on Earth.​

5(a). Evolution of the Universe

As the Universe expanded, matter began to coalesce into gas clouds, and then stars and planets. Our solar system formed about 5 billion years ago when the Universe was about 65% of its present size​

5(b). Early History of the Earth

The Earth formed as cosmic dust lumped together to form larger and larger particles until 150 million years had passed. At about 4.4 billion years, the young Earth had a mass similar to the mass it has today. The continents probably began forming about 4.2 billion years ago as the Earth continued to cool. The cooling also resulted in the release of gases from the lithosphere, much of which formed the Earth's early atmosphere. Most of the Earth's early atmosphere was created in the first one million years after solidification (4.4 billion years ago). Carbon dioxide, nitrogen, and water vapor dominated this early atmosphere.

As the Earth continued to cool, the water vapor found in the atmosphere condensed to form the oceans and other fresh water bodies on the continents. Oxygen began accumulating in the atmosphere through photo-dissociation of O2 from water, and by way of photosynthesis (life). The emergence of living organisms was extremely important in the creation of atmospheric oxygen and ozone. Without ozone, life could not exist on land because of harmful ultraviolet radiation.​

Astronomy 280: Evolution of the Universe

The course includes the origin of the simplest chemical elements shortly after the Big Bang, the condensation of matter in the early universe into large structures such as galaxies and clusters of galaxies, and scenarios that explain why we find different types of galaxies in the universe. The Milky Way is used as a specific example of a spiral galaxy to examine how matter is cycled from the interstellar medium into stars that evolve and eventually die, putting their matter back into the interstellar medium. This process creates more complex elements, including those necessary for life as we know it.​

Here's a video for you: Watch the entire evolution of the universe in under 3 minutes

https://www.cfa.harvard.edu/~ejchaisson/cosmic_evolution/docs/text/text_plan_2.html

Current consensus envisions the genesis of a planetary system as a natural, perhaps frequent, outgrowth of the birth of a star. The condensation model can generally account for each of the 7, earlier-noted properties characterizing our Solar System today. But exactly how those atoms of gas and grains of dust managed to coalesce into the present planets and moons remains one of the great riddles of modern science.​

5.1 - Planetary Evolution

a large, slowly rotating cloud of interstellar gas and dust about a light-year in diameter begins to slowly shrink. As it draws itself together gravitationally over a period of perhaps ten million years,1945 it becomes denser...As the protostar collapses, its magnetic field lines of force are dragged closer together but are held firmly in place...The planets themselves form in the disk of matter surrounding the protostar.​

Evolution has a generic meaning as well as the more specialized one meant in the "Theory of Evolution". The genesis, development, and evolution of the universe are all synonymous and quite distinct from the biological understanding of evolution.

You may be interested to know that it was an Episcopal priest (and astrophysicist) that showed Einstein and the scientific community the evidence supporting rejection of the "steady state hypothesis" and favoring acceptance of the "Big Bang theory".

 

[Speedwell]

Yes, I do know this. But how is this relevant? The fact that Jesus knew the scriptures is not evidence that He had comprehensive knowledge of the entire history of human development.

Whether He did or not is beyond our ken. The point to remember is that His references to the OT were all literary references. When He spoke of creation He was careful to make clear that He was invoking the text of the stories, not the events themselves. Jesus' use of the OT stories does not guarantee any particular genre determination. The whole "You're calling Christ a liar" line of argument is merely vicious, not substantive.

 

[SeventyOne]

They all conform to modern science because a miracle restores things back to God's purpose and intention. The problem with a miracles is to show that there was ever a problem and to show that there was ever a need for the miracle. When people say I am cured, I am healed the problem is to show that they were ever sick in the first place. I have had healing that the doctor said was impossible. Then after I am healed they change their tune and say it is possible in some cases. Yet they still consider this to be spontaneous remission and they do not give God the honor and the glory for what He has done.

They all do? What about the floating axe head in 2 Kings 6?

 

[SeventyOne]

Evolution has a generic meaning as well as the more specialized one meant in the "Theory of Evolution". The genesis, development, and evolution of the universe are all synonymous and quite distinct from the biological understanding of evolution.

You may be interested to know that it was an Episcopal priest (and astrophysicist) that showed Einstein and the scientific community the evidence supporting rejection of the "steady state hypothesis" and favoring acceptance of the "Big Bang theory".

It's not that distinct. They may be able to be compartmentalized for certain purposes, but one builds on the foundation of the other.

 

[Sine Nomine]

There are 333 miracles in the Bible, none of which conform to modern science.
Do you reject them all?
If not, on what basis do you decide what to accept and what to reject?

There is nothing in modern science that leads me to reject miracles in general. Unless, by miracle, you mean that something unnatural happened. That I would reject.

You assert that none of 333 conform to modern science. Do you believe that the man blind from birth upon being healed was able to see without a functioning retina and/or optic nerves? Do you think the wine at Cana was not real wine?

Also, just because the Bible uses the word sign or wonder, translated sometimes as miracle, doesn't mean that the author is telling the reader that something impossible has happened--simply that something extraordinary has happened. How these wonders happened is unknowable from the text and thus the process is a subject of belief, not fact. (E.g. Do you know how Jesus raised Lazarus? Just because you and I don't know, doesn't mean it must be a non-natural process.)

 

[Sine Nomine]

It's not that distinct. They may be able to be compartmentalized for certain purposes, but one builds on the foundation of the other.

No. They do not build on one another. They are distinct. Evolutionary Biology is not informed by astrophysics or vice versa.

 

[expos4ever]

I did earlier.
Genesis 3:8-24

This text says nothing about Jesus knowing about Adam and Eve.

You need to prove, Biblically and not via Sunday School reasoning, that the incarnated Jesus knows everything the Father knows.

Good luck - we know that Jesus denies having the complete knowledge the Father has:

But about that day or hour no one knows, not even the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father.

 

[expos4ever]

I did earlier.
John 1:18

Here is that text: No one has seen God at any time; the only begotten God who is in the bosom of the Father, He has explained Him.

How does this text make the case that Jesus knows about biology?

 

[expos4ever]

I did earlier.
1 John 4:12

Here is the text of this verse: No one has seen God at any time; if we love one another, God abides in us, and His love is perfected in us.

How does this text make the case that Jesus knows about the facts relative to the mechanics of how humanity arose?

 

[expos4ever]

Here are a few 'non-reputable' sources for you, like Space.com and Harvard University

Nothing from Harvard University supports your misrepresentation. Again, The important thing to remember is that evolutionary theory is a scientific theory about how life has developed — this means that it begins with the premise that life already exists.

Now: If and when you show me a statement from a credible source that claims that the theory of evolution through natural selection, as defined by the experts and not layman in church basements, makes claims about the very origin or life, then, and only then, will your view be established.

Where in anything from Harvard does such a claim appear?

 

[Archivist]

I'm not talking about the Good Samaritan. I don't even know why you brought that up.

If you had bothered reading my post 125 you would know that I said "I for one do not believe that God "lied about creation." I do believe that He presented an allegory in the Book of Genesis that could be understood by the people of the time. That isn't a lie on God's part. Tell me, is the parable of the Good Samaritan any less real if there was not an actual Good Samaritan?"

Much that is in the Bible is there for our instruction, but it didn't all actually happen. Was there an actual Good Samaritan? Probably not. Does it make the story any less valid? No. Was there an actual Adam and Eve? Probably not. Does it make the story any less valid? No.

​

One account. Genesis 2 is just a detailed look at a portion of Genesis 1.

Actually two, and the order of creation differs.

Well, when He states that in the beginning, God created us male and female, but then grab ahold of an idea that actually at first there was an asexual life form, then it's saying he was wrong at best and an outright liar at worst.

No, the Bible says that God created mankind male and female. It says nothing about the sex of life that evolved earlier.

 

[expos4ever]

Your position is not based on science (I don't know how many times to repeat that even liberal Wikipedia cannot get itself to define evolution as science)

I don't know which is worse. (1) That you don't understand that this is a bad argument; or (2) That you know it is a bad argument and are making it anyway.

Evolution is a theory that has been developed through application of the scientific method. Playing games with word definitions does not change this. I challenge you to name just one professor at a real university who would deny that evolution is not a theory developed through the application of scientific reasoning.

 

[expos4ever]

Col 1:16 "For in him all things were created: things in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or powers or rulers or authorities; all things have been created through him and for him."

How is this evidence that the incarnated Jesus knows about whether Adam and Eve existed. We know that Jesus does not know all the things the Father knows - I just proved this:

But about that day or hour no one knows, not even the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father.

No one is denying that Jesus "existed" prior to His incarnation. But you cannot simply assume that Jesus does not "give up" perfect knowledge of the world when He takes on human form.

And, as just proved, we know that the incarnated Jesus indeed does not know all things!

 

[joshua 1 9]

We know

I know what I know from reading the Bible.

 

[expos4ever]

Consider what we have seen in this thread:

1. Misrepresentation of what the theory of evolution through natural selection claims;

2. Misrepresentation of the relationship between the theory of evolution through natural selection and "science;

3. Repeated failure to make the case that the incarnated Jesus would have perfect knowledge of the world (i.e. in relation to the matter of what Jesus believed about the history of human development).