Should Genesis be taken literally?

[expos4ever]

I know what I know from reading the Bible.

How are you not intentionally misrepresenting? I have proven that Jesus does not have the full knowledge of the Father. You cannot argue this point - the Biblical text is definitive.

The right thing is to accept the facts, but instead you obfuscate.

So let me ask you directly: do you accept that there are some things the Father knows that Jesus doesn't?

If you dance away from this clear question, I will keep on you about it.

Now: If there are some things that Jesus does not know - and I have proven there are - how do you know that Jesus does not know that Adam and Eve are "metaphorical" characters?

Again, if you do not answer this question, I will keep after you.

 

[HenryM]

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.

Chemistry is not a "theory developed through the application of scientific reasoning". Biology is not a "theory developed through the application of scientific reasoning". They are testable knowledge about reality. A science.

Evolution is not testable knowledge about reality, it's a premise about reality. It's a theory. A story.

"Testable" means that you can recreate law of reality through test. Evolution has never been observed or recreated in any test.

But again, why do you care to argue so fruitlessly here? You love God so much that you want all the people to think they came from apes?

 

[Speedwell]

.

But again, why do you care to argue so fruitlessly here? You love God so much that you want all the people to think they came from apes?

Why does it matter if God made us in His image from a handful of dust or from a precursor hominid?

 

[HenryM]

Why does it matter if God made us in His image from a handful of dust or from a precursor hominid?

We have a word of God that He made us upon His own image. We have a word of some fraudsters (at least original evolutionists were serious con men, deceiving the world) that we came from monkeys.

You choose how you like it. I'll choose how I like it.

 

[Speedwell]

We have a word of God that He made us upon His own image.

So we do, and evolution does not negate it.

We have a word of some fraudsters (at least original evolutionists were serious con men, deceiving the world) that we came from monkeys.

What do you have against monkeys? They're God's creatures too.

 

[expos4ever]

Chemistry is not a "theory developed through the application of scientific reasoning". Biology is not a "theory developed through the application of scientific reasoning". They are testable knowledge about reality. A science.

Chemistry and Biology are umbrella terms that refer to particular areas of scientific inquiry. They are not "theories" in the same sense that evolution through natural selection is a theory. It is not fair to compare these two things to the theory of evolution by natural selection.

Evolution is not testable knowledge about reality, it's a premise about reality.

Nonsense - no person with something to lose (i.e. their standing in a reputable university) will agree with this. You, of course, have nothing to lose by making such a patently incorrect assertion. Evolution is not testable in the sense that we cannot "run experiments" that confirm the entire evolutionary picture. But it is indeed a fully legitimate scientific theory.

From Scientific American:

Creationist Claim: Evolution is unscientific, because it is not testable or falsifiable. It makes claims about events that were not observed and can never be re-created.

Response: This blanket dismissal of evolution ignores important distinctions that divide the field into at least two broad areas: microevolution and macroevolution. Microevolution looks at changes within species over time--changes that may be preludes to speciation, the origin of new species. Macroevolution studies how taxonomic groups above the level of species change. Its evidence draws frequently from the fossil record and DNA comparisons to reconstruct how various organisms may be related.

These days even most creationists acknowledge that microevolution has been upheld by tests in the laboratory (as in studies of cells, plants and fruit flies) and in the field (as in Grant's studies of evolving beak shapes among Gal¿pagos finches). Natural selection and other mechanisms--such as chromosomal changes, symbiosis and hybridization--can drive profound changes in populations over time.

The historical nature of macroevolutionary study involves inference from fossils and DNA rather than direct observation. Yet in the historical sciences (which include astronomy, geology and archaeology, as well as evolutionary biology), hypotheses can still be tested by checking whether they accord with physical evidence and whether they lead to verifiable predictions about future discoveries. For instance, evolution implies that between the earliest-known ancestors of humans (roughly five million years old) and the appearance of anatomically modern humans (about 100,000 years ago), one should find a succession of hominid creatures with features progressively less apelike and more modern, which is indeed what the fossil record shows. But one should not--and does not--find modern human fossils embedded in strata from the Jurassic period (144 million years ago). Evolutionary biology routinely makes predictions far more refined and precise than this, and researchers test them constantly.

Evolution could be disproved in other ways, too. If we could document the spontaneous generation of just one complex life-form from inanimate matter, then at least a few creatures seen in the fossil record might have originated this way. If superintelligent aliens appeared and claimed credit for creating life on earth (or even particular species), the purely evolutionary explanation would be cast in doubt. But no one has yet produced such evidence.

It should be noted that the idea of falsifiability as the defining characteristic of science originated with philosopher Karl Popper in the 1930s. More recent elaborations on his thinking have expanded the narrowest interpretation of his principle precisely because it would eliminate too many branches of clearly scientific endeavor

 

[HenryM]

The only reason why I have posted more than a few messages on this thread is because these people who so boldly stand for story of evolution present themselves as Christians, and I don't question it.

But let't not make more mistakes and get in the mud with them.

 

[expos4ever]

The only reason why I have posted more than a few messages on this thread is because these people who so boldly stand for story of evolution present themselves as Christians, and I don't question it.

But let't not make more mistakes and get in the mud with them.

Probably a good suggestion, since the facts are the side of those who accept the reality that evolution has basically attained the status of established fact. To deny evolution puts one in the unenviable position of having to argue either:

1. Tens of thousands of experts are all wrong;
2. Tens of thousands of experts are engaged in a conspiracy to propagate falsehood.

Neither options seems very palatable.

 

[Speedwell]

Probably a good suggestion, since the facts are the side of those who accept the reality that evolution has basically attained the status of established fact. To deny evolution puts one in the unenviable position of having to argue either:

1. Tens of thousands of experts are all wrong;
2. Tens of thousands of experts are engaged in a conspiracy to propagate falsehood.

Neither options seems very palatable.

The third option, that Creationists are wrong about their interpretation of Scripture, will never be considered.

 

[dannheim]

The Torah was not written by Moses. Unless Moses was a schizophrenic who had a time travel machine.

Oh wait, I don't believe in silly MAN MADE TRADITIONS.



,the issue is the MAN MADE TRADITION OF CREATIONISM.

Last time I heard Origin of Species was written by a man, thus a man made tradition.

 

[JackRT]

Last time I heard Origin of Species was written by a man, thus a man made tradition.

The Bible was written by men.

 

[dannheim]

Probably a good suggestion, since the facts are the side of those who accept the reality that evolution has basically attained the status of established fact. To deny evolution puts one in the unenviable position of having to argue either:

1. Tens of thousands of experts are all wrong;
2. Tens of thousands of experts are engaged in a conspiracy to propagate falsehood.

Neither options seems very palatable.

It is still called the Theory of Evolution! Since when does the majority establish anything as factual?
I vote for option 1 ( It will not be the first time Tens of thousands of "experts" are all wrong )

Why don't we vote on whether Jesus raised Lazarus from the dead or for that matter himself. Has anyone of you personally observed this? There is no scientific proof that a man can raise himself from the dead. There is no scientific proof that God will accept this purported 'Sacrifice' as atonement for your sins. There is no scientific proof there is a God. I can go on . . .

 

[expos4ever]

It is still called the Theory of Evolution!

Oy Vey, not this again?!

Again, from Scientific American:

Creationist Claim: Evolution is only a theory. It is not a fact or a scientific law.

Response: Many people learned in elementary school that a theory falls in the middle of a hierarchy of certainty--above a mere hypothesis but below a law. Scientists do not use the terms that way, however. According to the National Academy of Sciences (NAS), a scientific theory is "a well-substantiated explanation of some aspect of the natural world that can incorporate facts, laws, inferences, and tested hypotheses." No amount of validation changes a theory into a law, which is a descriptive generalization about nature. So when scientists talk about the theory of evolution--or the atomic theory or the theory of relativity, for that matter--they are not expressing reservations about its truth.

In addition to the theory of evolution, meaning the idea of descent with modification, one may also speak of the fact of evolution. The NAS defines a fact as "an observation that has been repeatedly confirmed and for all practical purposes is accepted as 'true.'" The fossil record and abundant other evidence testify that organisms have evolved through time. Although no one observed those transformations, the indirect evidence is clear, unambiguous and compelling.

All sciences frequently rely on indirect evidence. Physicists cannot see subatomic particles directly, for instance, so they verify their existence by watching for telltale tracks that the particles leave in cloud chambers. The absence of direct observation does not make physicists' conclusions less certain.

 

[expos4ever]

Why don't we vote on whether Jesus raised Lazarus from the dead or for that matter himself.

Misleading, of course. You give the reader the impression that the virtually unanimous agreement among the experts is arbitrary, or without underlying justification. But that is simply not true - the theory of evolution did not attain its status as "fact" (as that term is normally used) by some kind of "vote". No - the theory was developed through the rigorous process of vetting and skeptical inquiry that underlies the scientific enterprise.

 

[KWCrazy]

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

These things are written of in the Bible. It is not an interpretation. Read the actual words.

 

[Calminian]

Crazy fast moving thread, and I don't know if the OP is participating any longer, but I would like to try to take the thread back to his initial premise, that the story of Genesis was passed down by oral tradition. I challenged that view based on modern archeology which now supports the antiquity of writing going back many more thousand of years than previously thought.

The Origins of Genesis: Solving the Toledoth Mystery

We can argue creation evolution all day, but there is a flaw in the OPs argument that should be explored. He's positing the telephone game argument, but this is rendered nonsensical by archeology. This, to me, completely undermines the OP's argument.

 

[KWCrazy]

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.

If it's not unnatural it's not a miracle.

Do you believe that the man blind from birth upon being healed was able to see without a functioning retina and/or optic nerves?

We don't know the reason he was blind, but since it was from birth we know it's not a conversion reaction. That fact is, he was blind, then he could see. That was the miracle.

Do you think the wine at Cana was not real wine?

It was real water, then Jesus changed it, and it was real wine.

(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.)

We know Lazarus was dead for four days.
We know that a body after three days in the heat would be horribly decomposed.
John 11:39 Jesus said, “Take away the stone.” Martha, the sister of him who was dead, said to Him, “Lord, by this time there is a stench, for he has been dead four days.”
There is no natural process for reanimating decomposed tissue. Even Frankenstein knew to use freshly dead body parts.

 

[KWCrazy]

IActually two, and the order of creation differs.

Nobody who understands the Bible believes this.
Nobody who can read objectively concludes this.

 

[1213]

...
So, is it possible that this is what happened with Genesis?

I believe what the Bible and Genesis tells. And I think its story explains best what we can nowadays see in nature. For example, the results of the great flood Are you a disciple of Jesus?.

 

[Speedwell]

These things are written of in the Bible. It is not an interpretation. Read the actual words.

LOL! So you read ancient Hebrew fluently? You understand ancient Hebrew literary constructions, tropes and genres? Or do you just read it in translation under the influence of the doctrine of perspicuity, a 19th century novelty?