Tom 1

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One only need to look through the subjects and various threads to note that on many issues the Bible does not seek to be precise. A brief tour of "General Theology" will prove that very point. As to Genesis the salient point is that "In the beginning God created..." beyond that the text is quite open to interpretation. This can be applied to the meaning of "day", Gen. 1:1-2, God spoke as the sole agency of creation, what "Let the land produce..." implies, etc. Ultimately some humility is required to accept that the details of "how" are not definitively set forth.

Sure, the exchange of messages was about the claim people sometimes make that they are not interpreting the bible, but just 'read it as it is'. I was hoping for some insight into why people think that is what they are doing.
 
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Jamsie

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Sure, the exchange of messages was about the claim people sometimes make that they are not interpreting the bible, but just 'read it as it is'. I was hoping for some insight into why people think that is what they are doing.

It may be that people read in a very superficial manner. Many of us from my generation were simply inculcated into the young earth creation week narrative. Upon more study and reading with sufficient delicacy views and interpretations can change. In point of fact they are interpreting...whether or not one chooses to believe so!
 
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coffee4u

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Well, a day without a sun or a moon is not, by definition, a day in the sense that you mean.

Anyway. The thing that puzzles me in your post, and in some other posts here, is the idea expressed that you are somehow not ‘interpreting’ the text, when that is plainly what you are doing. You are interpreting it according to what you think it means, not what it actually says. You are of course free to read it in any way that you like, but where does the idea come from that you are not interpreting the text?

Can you please show me where I interpreted according to what I thought and not what it actually says?
You should find any time I do that I preface it by saying "I believe" Or this is "speculation" or I might show 2 or more "possibilities" or words to that effect. I try very hard to only get from it what the text says.

It doesn't matter that we define a day by the sun. Evening and morning means that there was a type of 'sun rise' and daylight and a 'sun set' and darkness caused by a light source shining on the earth and the earth turning. If the light was God, the heavenly host or some temporary ball of light it doesn't matter. God didn't think it important enough to define, just that it was.

Saying God remade the sun indicating a previous creation which is a whole other thing and needs scriptural backup.
 
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coffee4u

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It may be that people read in a very superficial manner. Many of us from my generation were simply inculcated into the young earth creation week narrative. Upon more study and reading with sufficient delicacy views and interpretations can change. In point of fact they are interpreting...whether or not one chooses to believe so!

I came to faith later and from being an evolutionist changed to being a creationist. No indoctrination from a church.

I will continue to believe that the only reason people do not hold to 6-day creation is that they believe secular science has disproven it.
The plain reading of Genesis can be nothing other than God made each thing over a period of 6 days, that it was very good and that he rested on the 7th. That is what it says.
 
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Jamsie

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I came to faith later and from being an evolutionist changed to being a creationist. No indoctrination from a church.

I will continue to believe that the only reason people do not hold to 6-day creation is that they believe secular science has disproven it.
The plain reading of Genesis can be nothing other than God made each thing over a period of 6 days, that it was very good and that he rested on the 7th. That is what it says.

Interesting just how selective people are with science … that they use everyday. So, please explain how you interpret … Genesis 1:24?
 
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coffee4u

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Interesting just how selective people are with science … that they use everyday. So, please explain how you interpret … Genesis 1:26?

26 And God said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness: and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the birds of the heavens, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth.

That mankind was made in the image of God.

That we are over וְיִרְדּוּ֩ (and let them rule) and have to take care of the creatures that God made.

I am not following what you mean here.
 
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MrsFoundit

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Interesting just how selective people are with science … that they use everyday. So, please explain how you interpret … Genesis 1:24?

Interesting how selective people are with Creation, that they use everyday.
 
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Jamsie

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26 And God said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness: and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the birds of the heavens, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth.

That mankind was made in the image of God.

That we are over וְיִרְדּוּ֩ (and let them rule) and have to take care of the creatures that God made.

I am not following what you mean here.

Genesis 1:24 ...not Genesis 1:26?
 
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coffee4u

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Genesis 1:24 ...not Genesis 1:26?

You want my view on 1:24 now?

Genesis 1:24

24 And God said, Let the earth bring forth the living creature after his kind, cattle, and creeping thing, and beast of the earth after his kind: and it was so.


God created the land animals.

Is that what you want? You are going to have to use more words as I don't understand what you are asking.
 
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Jamsie

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You want my view on 1:24 now?

Genesis 1:24

24 And God said, Let the earth bring forth the living creature after his kind, cattle, and creeping thing, and beast of the earth after his kind: and it was so.


God created the land animals.

Is that what you want? You are going to have to use more words as I don't understand what you are asking.

I was simply asking how you interpret the verse. Notice what the verse actually states... "Let the land produce or bring forth the living creature..". God commanded the Land...that is mediate creation, God gave agency to the land. "And it was so"...what was so? That the land would bring forth! What does that tell one?
 
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JackRT

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I was simply asking how you interpret the verse. Notice what the verse actually states... "Let the land produce or bring forth the living creature..". God commanded the Land...that is mediate creation, God gave agency to the land. "And it was so"...what was so? That the land would bring forth! What does that tell one?

One could very well interpret that as a support for evolution.
 
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coffee4u

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I was simply asking how you interpret the verse. Notice what the verse actually states... "Let the land produce or bring forth the living creature..". God commanded the Land...that is mediate creation, God gave agency to the land. "And it was so"...what was so? That the land would bring forth! What does that tell one?

Which is when you look at other scripture to get further information or confirmation.
Genesis 2
19 Now the Lord God had formed out of the ground all the wild animals and all the birds in the sky. He brought them to the man to see what he would name them; and whatever the man called each living creature, that was its name.


So yes, they were produced out of the land, ground, dirt, by God. The land didn't do it by itself if that's what you are trying to imply.
 
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Tom 1

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It doesn't matter that we define a day by the sun. Evening and morning means that there was a type of 'sun rise' and daylight and a 'sun set' and darkness caused by a light source shining on the earth and the earth turning. If the light was God, the heavenly host or some temporary ball of light it doesn't matter. God didn't think it important enough to define, just that it was.

There you go - none of that is in the text.
 
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coffee4u

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There you go - none of that is in the text.

The text says there was a light source, light and dark, evening and morning, the first day.
That is what I said.

I also said we don't know what the light source was and offered a few possibilities. I never said those possibilities were in the text.

Not sure if you are just being purposely obtuse or what.
 
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Tom 1

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The text says there was a light source, light and dark, evening and morning, the first day.
That is what I said.

I also said we don't know what the light source was and offered a few possibilities. I never said those possibilities were in the text.

Not sure if you are just being purposely obtuse or what.

Well, there you go - you are interpreting the text. You’re taking it to mean what you think it means - you really don’t see that you are doing that? I’m not suggesting there’s anything wrong with that. Everyone who reads it is interpreting it - you have a certain idea of what it means and you fill in the gaps to make it fit. I would say a context based interpretation is more reliable than a more or less arbitrary approach.
 
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coffee4u

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Well, there you go - you are interpreting the text. You’re taking it to mean what you think it means - you really don’t see that you are doing that? I’m not suggesting there’s anything wrong with that. Everyone who reads it is interpreting it - you have a certain idea of what it means and you fill in the gaps to make it fit. I would say a context based interpretation is more reliable than a more or less arbitrary approach.

The text says
3 And God said, “Let there be light,” and there was light. 4 God saw that the light was good, and he separated the light from the darkness. 5 God called the light “day,” and the darkness he called “night.” And there was evening, and there was morning—the first day.

I believe the text exactly as it is written.
1. God created the light.
2. God saw that the light was good.
3. God separated the light from the darkness.
3. God called the light day and the darkness night.
4.There was evening and morning the first day.


That is what the text says and that is what I believe. If you have nothing to actually add to this conversation I am done answering.
 
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Tom 1

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I believe the text exactly as it is written.

If you take the text 'exactly as it is written' then you have to add your own interpretation. The 'plain meaning' of a day has always been from sunrise to sunset. That is what a day is. Since the world has been the world, a day has been a day. Once you start inventing ideas about a 'day' where there is no sunrise or sunset, you are into the realm of random speculation - you are no longer taking the text exactly as it is written. That is quite simple a factual statement; there are many figurative uses of the word 'day' in many languages, but taken literally it has and has always had a single meaning that everyone understands. Since human language first developed every language has had some means of referring to the period between sunrise and sunset; that is what a day is.

Reading the text 'exactly as it is written' makes it supremely obvious that is was never meant to be taken as a literal desctription, as it simply does not meet any criteria for a literal description.
 
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LoG

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Let me withdraw and modify that --- it actually does not support evolution, it supports abiogenesis.

From a Gap or Ruin/Reconstruction perspective, the land bringing forth the beasts calls to mind a type of resurrection of animals from the previous world/creation after the "kind" they were then. Think of the valley of bones in Ezekiel 37:

4 Then he said to me, “Prophesy to these bones and say to them, ‘Dry bones, hear the word of the Lord! enter you, and you will come to life. I will attach tendons to you and make flesh come upon you and cover you with skin; I will put breath in you, and you will come to life. Then you will know that I am the Lord."

In the same way the grass, trees and herbs are brought forth in Gen 1:11 after the kind they were in the previous world.
To me that allows for a literal creation/reconstruction event 6000 years ago following the extinctions of the last ice age while yet showing as if many of these species to be much older then would be assumed from a YEC perspective.




 
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MrsFoundit

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I would say a context based interpretation is more reliable than a more or less arbitrary approach.

This is a false dichotomy. If there is a justification for your preferred "context based interpretation" can you please explain what it is?
 
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