Was Jesus a Young Earth Creationist?

cloudyday2 · May 19, 2019

ViaCrucis said:
It's clear from the writings of the fathers, the theologians, and doctors of the Christian Church throughout history that Young Earth Creationism has never been dogma.

Yes, but would you agree that most Jews in the first century believed that Genesis described literal history? If so, then why wouldn't Jesus believe that? Being omniscient would be cheating. For Jesus to have been human, he had to be a normal Jew of his time with all the intellectual and cultural consequences.

Here is another question for you? Would it matter if Jesus was a Young Earth Creationist? Would that invalidate claims that Jesus was God in human form?

IMO, if Jesus was God then it was due to his deep relationship with God and perfect obedience. That was the only way that Jesus could be a human and also be God.

Akita Suggagaki · May 19, 2019

Did most Jews in the first century beleive Genesis to be literal history?

I think that may be a very good question. Who knows? We would have to be familiar with Jewish theology and other writings beyond what we call the Old Testament.

Quid est Veritas? · May 20, 2019

You are making a slew of anachronistic ideas here. Young Earth Creationism as a concept only came into existence very recently, so in that sense, He certainly wasn't.

Did Jesus think the Bible literal history? That is again an anachronism. History as we understand the term, is a development of the Greco-Roman historical tradition, but only really came to be after the Renaissance. Only then did Western man again have a Sense of the Past - in mediaeval historians we see Romans or Biblical figures dressed and going on as contemporaries did, there was little idea of difference. There is a famous passage which describes Ancient Romans going to Mass! Hellenistic historians were more concerned with the flavour of the events than their actuality - Lucan describes history writing as a way to inculcate virtue, so describing things that fit the mileau is perfectly acceptable - hence they invented speeches as part of the course. There is a a core of the 'historical' as we understand it, but that was not the aim. Literal History as a record of actual events is a later concept, as opposed to a literary construct of themes and such, written to make an often ethical point.

Now let us look at contemporary Jewish Historians to Jesus - we functionally only have Josephus (Philo hardly counts). He is fully of this Hellenistic school, with themes and events placed around literary tropes. The Bible itself also is like that, for instance Judges with its falling away and then returning to God structure repeated.

Even in 'Hellenistic Science', it is different. Have you ever heard of "saving the Appearances"? In Hellenistic thought, when constructing a hypothesis to explain observed phenomena, that was not something 'real', but saving the appearance, describing a model to account for what is observed as a postulate. One of Francis Bacon's major departures from previous empiric enquiry, was treating such attempts at 'saving' as potentially verdical in and of themselves. The ancient Greeks had a strong sceptical tradition, which is why so much time was spent on ideas like Forms and the ilk, to account for the sheer fallibility of everything.

So asking if Jesus thought Genesis or the OT was literal history, is importing ways of thinking from many centuries later. If anything, Jesus asserts He Himself is the Way, Truth and the Life and asserts Scripture as pointing towards Him, so He affirms the Truth of Scripture - but deciding this means 'literal history' is definitely an example of modern thinking.

cloudyday2 · May 20, 2019

Quid est Veritas? said:
You are making a slew of anachronistic ideas here. Young Earth Creationism as a concept only came into existence very recently, so in that sense, He certainly wasn't.

Did Jesus think the Bible literal history? That is again an anachronism. History as we understand the term, is a development of the Greco-Roman historical tradition, but only really came to be after the Renaissance. Only then did Western man again have a Sense of the Past - in mediaeval historians we see Romans or Biblical figures dressed and going on as contemporaries did, there was little idea of difference. There is a famous passage which describes Ancient Romans going to Mass! Hellenistic historians were more concerned with the flavour of the events than their actuality - Lucan describes history writing as a way to inculcate virtue, so describing things that fit the mileau is perfectly acceptable - hence they invented speeches as part of the course. There is a a core of the 'historical' as we understand it, but that was not the aim. Literal History as a record of actual events is a later concept, as opposed to a literary construct of themes and such, written to make an often ethical point.

Now let us look at contemporary Jewish Historians to Jesus - we functionally only have Josephus (Philo hardly counts). He is fully of this Hellenistic school, with themes and events placed around literary tropes. The Bible itself also is like that, for instance Judges with its falling away and then returning to God structure repeated.

Even in 'Hellenistic Science', it is different. Have you ever heard of "saving the Appearances"? In Hellenistic thought, when constructing a hypothesis to explain observed phenomena, that was not something 'real', but saving the appearance, describing a model to account for what is observed as a postulate. One of Francis Bacon's major departures from previous empiric enquiry, was treating such attempts at 'saving' as potentially verdical in and of themselves. The ancient Greeks had a strong sceptical tradition, which is why so much time was spent on ideas like Forms and the ilk, to account for the sheer fallibility of everything.

So asking if Jesus thought Genesis or the OT was literal history, is importing ways of thinking from many centuries later. If anything, Jesus asserts He Himself is the Way, Truth and the Life and asserts Scripture as pointing towards Him, so He affirms the Truth of Scripture - but deciding this means 'literal history' is definitely an example of modern thinking.

As I understand it, Josephus presented the history from the Bible as literal history.

Quid est Veritas? · May 20, 2019

cloudyday2 said:
As I understand it, Josephus presented the history from the Bible as literal history.

"As I understand it" is exactly the problem. Josephus wrote a Hellenistic history, that is a far different animal than a modern one, or our idea of 'literal history'.

As a good example, take the historians of Alexander the Great - even the best one, Arrian, still arranges events around his theme. He has Darius III accept his men's water in the desert, while has Alexander pour out the offered helmet full; only later to have Darius being offered it by the Greeks. He juxtaposes the manly virtue of Alexander prior to the sack of Persepolis with his decline thereafter into Asian luxury.

To Josephus, he places Roman governors in juxtaposition to his patrons Vespasian and Titus. So Pilate brings his votary shields to the Temple and builds an Aquaduct, while Titus cuts the Aquaduct and storms the Temple. The two accounts are mirroring each other in a literary construction, as per Hellenistic usage. The idea is to show the Roman conquest justified, but that the Jewish revolt was a consequence of Julio-Claudian misrule. Pilate's contempt for the Temple, vs Titus' acknowledgment thereof (though he burns it). To suggest this is straight 'literal history' in the modern sense, is to have no familiarity with the source material. Josephus 'contradicts' himself between Wars and Antiquities too, because he is busy with different themes in each. This makes him no different from any other ancient historian. Outside of Myth, ideas of the creation of the world - like Aristotle's constancy or Empedocles' mixing, weren't even asserted as True, rather than 'Saving Appearances', as postulates to work from. Myth certainly wasn't asserted as coherent, though considered 'true' often enough - the multiple accounts of the origin of the gods or overlapping attributions of myths abound, sometimes in the same texts.

A Hellenistic history is a literary construction, closer in spirit to a modern historical novel, than a modern history - though significantly different from either. More an examplar or cautionary tale. Just as the idea of 'history' is different, too. Our history writing creates an artificial narrative that the historian considers to be 'probable', but that hardly equates to 'what happened'. Read any two modern historians on the same subject, and they may represent events miles apart, but both are trying to create 'what happened'; or a news story. The difference between Eric Hobshawn or Niall Ferguson on 19th century history is stark, for instance - so please tell me, which of the two constitutes Literal History? And they are both attempting it! When you don't even really have such a concept, as with the ancients, how much greater the incongruence?

cloudyday2 · May 20, 2019

Quid est Veritas? said:
"As I understand it" is exactly the problem. Josephus wrote a Hellenistic history, that is a far different animal than a modern one, or our idea of 'literal history'.

As a good example, take the historians of Alexander the Great - even the best one, Arrian, still arranges events around his theme. He has Darius III accept his men's water in the desert, while has Alexander pour out the offered helmet full; only later to have Darius being offered it by the Greeks. He juxtaposes the manly virtue of Alexander prior to the sack of Persepolis with his decline thereafter into Asian luxury.

To Josephus, he places Roman governors in juxtaposition to his patrons Vespasian and Titus. So Pilate brings his votary shields to the Temple and builds an Aquaduct, while Titus cuts the Aquaduct and storms the Temple. The two accounts are mirroring each other in a literary construction, as per Hellenistic usage. The idea is to show the Roman conquest justified, but that the Jewish revolt was a consequence of Julio-Claudian misrule. Pilate's contempt for the Temple, vs Titus' acknowledgment thereof (though he burns it). To suggest this is straight 'literal history' in the modern sense, is to have no familiarity with the source material. Josephus 'contradicts' himself between Wars and Antiquities too, because he is busy with different themes in each. This makes him no different from any other ancient historian. Outside of Myth, ideas of the creation of the world - like Aristotle's constancy or Empedocles' mixing, weren't even asserted as True, rather than 'Saving Appearances', as postulates to work from. Myth certainly wasn't asserted as coherent, though considered 'true' often enough - the multiple accounts of the origin of the gods or overlapping attributions of myths abound, sometimes in the same texts.

A Hellenistic history is a literary construction, closer in spirit to a modern historical novel, than a modern history - though significantly different from either. More an examplar or cautionary tale. Just as the idea of 'history' is different, too. Our history writing creates an artificial narrative that the historian considers to be 'probable', but that hardly equates to 'what happened'. Read any two modern historians on the same subject, and they may represent events miles apart, but both are trying to create 'what happened'; or a news story. The difference between Eric Hobshawn or Niall Ferguson on 19th century history is stark, for instance - so please tell me, which of the two constitutes Literal History? And they are both attempting it! When you don't even really have such a concept, as with the ancients, how much greater the incongruence?

As you point out, even modern histories are literary constructions. The authorized biography of Ronald Reagan is an interesting example of that.

But to successfully avoid the question of whether Jesus believed the events in Genesis somewhat literally requires us to assume that Jesus never even CONSIDERED that issue. Maybe people of that time were so accustomed to reading literary malarkey in their histories that they had given up all hope of knowing what truly happened?

Quid est Veritas? · May 20, 2019

cloudyday2 said:
But to successfully avoid the question of whether Jesus believed the events in Genesis somewhat literally requires us to assume that Jesus never even CONSIDERED that issue. Maybe people of that time were so accustomed to reading literary malarkey in their histories that they had given up all hope of knowing what truly happened?

We are still at an impasse here. The phrase "what truly happened" is still implying a sense of history that is simply a later development. That our representation of the past differs from what really occured, is itself an idea that must first develop. As I pointed out, Mediaeval writers dressed biblical figures as Knights or applied feudal relations to Roman statesmen. These were all anachronistic, but they never realised as much. Legend and History in the form of texts, and Current Events, were poorly differentiated if at all. That the past differed markedly from their own world or way of thinking, was simply beyond them. Likewise, we are stuck in an idea of History, of linear time, so we have difficulty putting ourselves in the mind of people that would do these things. We think drawing a distinction between Actuality and Representation thereof is obvious - but that certainly is not the case, within a culture that put so much stock in "It is Written". Another related culture, Ancient Egypt, illustrates this well, where words were essentially magical, and writing something down seemed to somehow solidify that reality. So that Pharoahs didn't write down reverses.
That their histories were literary constructions, has no bearing on whether they were considered truthful as such. Look at the Iliad, widely held to be history in Hellenistic times, but thought the height of the Epic.

So no. If Jesus was a standard 1st century man, He probably would never have considered the issue at all, if there was no opposing tradition, to act as antithesis to it. So this is the equivalent of trying to decide if Jesus was a Socialist or a Capitalist, trying to slot old ways of looking at the world into modern concepts and ideas. Do you think people considered life on other worlds when they thought only the earth existed? Of course not. An anachronism, nothing more - though you can argue that it implies that had Jesus been a more modern person, He would have affirmed it literally - but that is importing your own opinion, instead of working in 1st century context.

cloudyday2 · May 20, 2019

Quid est Veritas? said:
We are still at an impasse here. The phrase "what truly happened" is still implying a sense of history that is simply a later development. That our representation of the past differs from what really occured, is itself an idea that must first develop. As I pointed out, Mediaeval writers dressed biblical figures as Knights or applied feudal relations to Roman statesmen. These were all anachronistic, but they never realised as much. Legend and History in the form of texts, and Current Events, were poorly differentiated if at all. That the past differed markedly from their own world or way of thinking, was simply beyond them. Likewise, we are stuck in an idea of History, of linear time, so we have difficulty putting ourselves in the mind of people that would do these things. We think drawing a distinction between Actuality and Representation thereof is obvious - but that certainly is not the case, within a culture that put so much stock in "It is Written". Another related culture, Ancient Egypt, illustrates this well, where words were essentially magical, and writing something down seemed to somehow solidify that reality. So that Pharoahs didn't write down reverses.
That their histories were literary constructions, has no bearing on whether they were considered truthful as such. Look at the Iliad, widely held to be history in Hellenistic times, but thought the height of the Epic.

So no. If Jesus was a standard 1st century man, He probably would never have considered the issue at all, if there was no opposing tradition, to act as antithesis to it. So this is the equivalent of trying to decide if Jesus was a Socialist or a Capitalist, trying to slot old ways of looking at the world into modern concepts and ideas. Do you think people considered life on other worlds when they thought only the earth existed? Of course not. An anachronism, nothing more - though you can argue that it implies that had Jesus been a more modern person, He would have affirmed it literally - but that is importing your own opinion, instead of working in 1st century context.

You have some good points, but I think you are stretching them too far in claiming that Jesus never even considered what actually happened in the times described by Genesis. The Essenes were known for emphasizing the hidden meanings of scripture over the literal meanings. The composition of apocalyptic literature shows that Essenes and others thought there was nothing dishonest in the invention of fictional scriptures. So I can imagine that Jesus might have thought of Genesis as just another fiction with hidden spiritual meanings, and maybe Jesus thought that the actual historical events were unknowable.

Starcomet · May 20, 2019

Jesus likely believed what any other Jewish individual believed. He certainly felt that many of the accounts of the bible were true but I think Jesus knew there was room for metaphor and non-literalism. It is possible, since I believe Jesus had a unique connection with God, that he knew what was and was not true, but did not disclose for whatever reason.

Quid est Veritas? · May 21, 2019

cloudyday2 said:
You have some good points, but I think you are stretching them too far in claiming that Jesus never even considered what actually happened in the times described by Genesis.

Thinking that it is required to differentiate between what "actually happened" is anachronistic, as I pointed out.

The Essenes were known for emphasizing the hidden meanings of scripture over the literal meanings.

As I told you before, there is no real evidence for this statement. That the Essenes are supposed to have used metaphorical meanings is based on a paragraph in Philo - who is talking about the Therapeutae, a sect which have not been established conclusively to be Essenes. Further, it nowhere asserts a metaphorical or allegorical reading has primacy over another sense.

In the old days, it was common for multiple meanings to be taken from Scripture. In the Mediaeval times, there was a Literal, Anagogical, Typological and Moral interpretation of each passage, but none had primacy over any other. The idea that the Literal takes precedence and thus somehow lessens the worth of the metaphor or vice versa, is a much later idea, Post-Reformation and beyond into Form and Higher Criticism. So there is no grounds to assert they had 'hidden meanings' and therefore disbelieved the literal interpretation, or even valued it any the less for it.

Incidentally, there are even Pagan forms of this, like Virgilomancy, where they would read special meanings into the Aeniad. The idea of Omens are strong here - that literal events had special deeper meanings, and is something most humans believed in till fairly recently. That something was an Omen, didn't mean you believed in its literal occurence any less.

The composition of apocalyptic literature shows that Essenes and others thought there was nothing dishonest in the invention of fictional scriptures. So I can imagine that Jesus might have thought of Genesis as just another fiction with hidden spiritual meanings, and maybe Jesus thought that the actual historical events were unknowable.

Where on earth did you get this? Apocalyptic literature nowhere means that 'fictional scriptures' were 'invented'. It was probably seen as Revelation, if it was accorded any status above merely midrashic writings. To assume that it was seen as fictional accounts because it has deeper meaning, simply does not necessarily follow.

Anyway, Jesus taught in parables, so was a storyteller. This doesn't mean He thought the Biblical accounts merely stories, and using history as an example to teach a lesson was the standard ancient practice of history writing to boot. Sufficed to say, it looks more to me as if you are introducing distinctions and taking exceptions, not yet made at the time.

cloudyday2 · May 21, 2019

Quid est Veritas? said:
Where on earth did you get this? Apocalyptic literature nowhere means that 'fictional scriptures' were 'invented'. It was probably seen as Revelation, if it was accorded any status above merely midrashic writings. To assume that it was seen as fictional accounts because it has deeper meaning, simply does not necessarily follow.

Anyway, Jesus taught in parables, so was a storyteller. This doesn't mean He thought the Biblical accounts merely stories, and using history as an example to teach a lesson was the standard ancient practice of history writing to boot. Sufficed to say, it looks more to me as if you are introducing distinctions and taking exceptions, not yet made at the time.

Well I suppose a modern case that is similar to the books of Enoch and similar works would be the book of Mormon. I know there are Mormons who consider the book of Mormon to be legit, but to me it obviously wasn't legit. Nevertheless, millions of Mormons don't think the book of Mormon is fiction. So maybe you are correct.

cloudyday2 · May 21, 2019

@Quid est Veritas? , I think the larger issue is getting lost, so let me ask you a different question. Did Jesus believe that humans evolved over millions of years from apes? I assume that you believe in evolution, so was Jesus allowed to erroneously believe something different and still be Son of Man/Son of God/Messiah? Evolution affects theology, because it can potentially remove God from the process and it removes the artificial distinction between humans and animals and so on.

Quid est Veritas? · May 21, 2019

cloudyday2 said:
@Quid est Veritas? , I think the larger issue is getting lost, so let me ask you a different question. Did Jesus believe that humans evolved over millions of years from apes? I assume that you believe in evolution, so was Jesus allowed to erroneously believe something different and still be Son of Man/Son of God/Messiah? Evolution affects theology, because it can potentially remove God from the process and it removes the artificial distinction between humans and animals and so on.

Look, there are differences between 'believe'. Do I believe in Evolution as I believe in the Resurrection of Jesus of Nazareth? No, I do not. The Sciences fall under the problem of Induction, hence we have to work around them with ideas like Kuhnian paradigms, Popperian Falsification, Evidence-Based analysis, etc. None of these really prove anything, so neither do they thus require me to believe their conclusions as necessarily veridical. They are models of testing empiric data, or attempts to at least not hold something verifiably false as valid. So I would 'believe' in Evolution in a far more qualified way, at least if being Scientific, than I believe that I had breakfast in the morning. Our cultural model assumes Evolution nowadays, but it is nothing but that. Scientific Orthodoxy has been overthrown in the past, like Phlogiston in Chemistry, or Lamarckism in Biology even. That we 'believe' or hold it as a model to currently best account for observed data, doesn't impact the validity of those that do not - certainly not retro-actively or in completely unrelated contexts.

So whether Jesus believed in Evolution matters not one iota. We haven't demonstrated it as an ultimate Truth, and its best defence is essentially a petitio from observed data - which modifies mechanism, but not markedly the model - so, I certainly have no grounds to assert it 'erroneous' to not believe it, anyhow, unless I bring my own framework of Empiric reasoning to bear and go out on an epistemologic limb. That itself, lacks veridicality if Evolution itself is solely at play, from the Argument from Reason. Therefore, Evolution by no means can remove God at all.

I don't think you can remove the distinction between 'animals' and humans either, merely by Evolution. Humans are distinct in that we have Civilisation, immensely more powerful abilities embodied by Rational faculties, and the only beings we are certain to be Conscious. Even mediaeval Scholastics gave man an Animal soul, but with an additional Rational one. The argument is flawed. It depends on a later rationalisation of 'animal' into a system of nomenclature including Homo Sapiens, not necessarily the traditional understanding.

So do I think Jesus 'believed' in Evolution? No, I do not, as that concept had not yet existed nor been articulated in the 1st century (barring ideas like Empedocles vaguely trending towards something like it). You can only 'believe in' or 'disbelieve' something once exposed to it, which barring an addendum to the Gospels I am unaware of, Jesus never was. I don't think He believed in Representational Democracy, or Communism, or Scientific Method, or Quantum Theory either. I don't think this matters at all to His theology, to whether He was God Incarnate, or not. The whole point of the Incarnation requires an emptying out of Omniscience to some extent. I really see only fallacies result from such a question. To assume He didn't, you are again retroactively importing modern ideas anachronistically, where they really have no place nor really belong.

cloudyday2 · May 21, 2019

Quid est Veritas? said:
I don't think you can remove the distinction between 'animals' and humans either, merely by Evolution. Humans are distinct in that we have Civilisation, immensely more powerful abilities embodied by Rational faculties, and the only beings we are certain to be Conscious. Even mediaeval Scholastics gave man an Animal soul, but with an additional Rational one. The argument is flawed. It depends on a later rationalisation of 'animal' into a system of nomenclature including Homo Sapiens, not necessarily the traditional understanding.

The thing about evolution is the gradual process. There is also the idea of periods slow change punctuated by periods of faster change, but I assume that "fast" change does not imply that a child could ever have claimed to be human and made in the image of God while the child's parent could NOT have also claimed that. The intermediate forms connecting humans and our living ape cousins might have disappeared, but we are still related. A religion that doesn't include animals as equal partners to humans is not sensible, because this would force an arbitrary division between a human parent and a human child somewhere in our evolutionary past. The parent would be an animal in the sight of God while the child would be a human. This assumes an abrupt spiritual change that doesn't seem plausible to me.

Quid est Veritas? said:
So do I think Jesus 'believed' in Evolution? No, I do not, as that concept had not yet existed nor been articulated in the 1st century (barring ideas like Empedocles vaguely trending towards something like it). You can only 'believe in' or 'disbelieve' something once exposed to it, which barring an addendum to the Gospels I am unaware of, Jesus never was. I don't think He believed in Representational Democracy, or Communism, or Scientific Method, or Quantum Theory either. I don't think this matters at all to His theology, to whether He was God Incarnate, or not. The whole point of the Incarnation requires an emptying out of Omniscience to some extent. I really see only fallacies result from such a question. To assume He didn't, you are again retroactively importing modern ideas anachronistically, where they really have no place nor really belong.

That is what I think too. Jesus was human. Some Christians imagine Jesus as some sort of superman. They think Jesus could have magically levitated down from the cross anytime he pleased, and that Jesus knew everything because the gospel of John says Jesus was present at the Creation. I suspect that if Jesus was anything other than a Jewish failed Messiah then he was more like a saint's saint. Just as saints through effort can seem closer to God and can apparently be a tool in God's miracles, Jesus worked to achieve that status and far beyond until he could accurately be described as a perfect image of God. Maybe Jesus was the first to achieve that status and possibly nobody else will be able to match that feat during their natural lives.

Quid est Veritas? · May 22, 2019

cloudyday2 said:
The thing about evolution is the gradual process. There is also the idea of periods slow change punctuated by periods of faster change, but I assume that "fast" change does not imply that a child could ever have claimed to be human and made in the image of God while the child's parent could NOT have also claimed that. The intermediate forms connecting humans and our living ape cousins might have disappeared, but we are still related. A religion that doesn't include animals as equal partners to humans is not sensible, because this would force an arbitrary division between a human parent and a human child somewhere in our evolutionary past. The parent would be an animal in the sight of God while the child would be a human. This assumes an abrupt spiritual change that doesn't seem plausible to me.

Even on completely materialist grounds, I think an 'abrupt change' would be exactly what we see. The difference between a crow getting grubs with a hook, and human art is staggering. The rise of human complexity, even if it may have started gradually, had to have taken off exponentially at some point - we even see this Archaeologically with the rise of Civilisations, or in our own times, with the exponential change brought on by Industrialisation. It really does not seem implausible to me.

Besides, most religions have a moment of separation. Take Genesis, in which God breathes into Adam. Why can't this 'clay' be thought of as previous matter? Or the narrative of the Fall - at some point the idea of Moral action, of something being the way things ought to be, occurred by any measure. When a proto-Man first thought his own action objectionable, that was a Fall from innocence, and in essence, the rise of Man as we know him. It had to have occured, and would have been abrupt as such. This would be true, regardless if this was purely developmental or spiritual.

That is what I think too. Jesus was human. Some Christians imagine Jesus as some sort of superman. They think Jesus could have magically levitated down from the cross anytime he pleased, and that Jesus knew everything because the gospel of John says Jesus was present at the Creation. I suspect that if Jesus was anything other than a Jewish failed Messiah then he was more like a saint's saint. Just as saints through effort can seem closer to God and can apparently be a tool in God's miracles, Jesus worked to achieve that status and far beyond until he could accurately be described as a perfect image of God. Maybe Jesus was the first to achieve that status and possibly nobody else will be able to match that feat during their natural lives.

I believe Jesus was Fully Man and Fully God, as the Orthodox position holds. Holding Him merely as the best a man can achieve, sounds almost adoptionist to me. As such, God is unlimited, but to take human form obviously required emptying out some aspects of Himself. Jesus still hungered as in the Wilderness, slept, asked "who touched me", etc. This is how He was human as you and I. Though He was perfectly obedient to the Father, as we never can be, and in this way, He could have done such things in aspect as God, but chose not to - and inevitably would choose not to, as it is His own Will in fact, to do so. So whether He was able to, if He could have acted against His own will, sounds like an illogical construct - for if He had, that would have been His exercise of Will, then how did He go against it? So in a sense, He could not have acted otherwise than He did, being God. The position is a hard one, difficult for us to wrap our minds around, but I feel it best accords the Biblical text I read.

ViaCrucis · May 25, 2019

cloudyday2 said:
Yes, but would you agree that most Jews in the first century believed that Genesis described literal history?

I don't have--or rather am not familiar enough with--an adequate amount of evidence to say one way or the other.

-CryptoLutheran

ViaCrucis · May 25, 2019

The modern interest in material origins seems to be just that, modern. Ancients tend to be less interested in this question, and more interested in talking about the order of the world. Many of the ancient Greeks were perfectly fine with the idea that the world always existed, but that it had undergone changes at different times, Greek myths speaking of stages of order and chaos; and many ancient creation myths show these themes: a change of state of the world. There was a primordial world, and then some kind of order. The gods became, and then they either directly or indirectly affect change in the world. And not all stories, even in the same culture, say the same things, but say different things as was needed.

The biblical creation story (the first one) likewise does not present an account of material origins, but instead begins with an already existing world which God crafts and shapes, imbuing the chaotic and primordial world with order and purpose. Right in the beginning we already have the heavens and the earth, and God takes the primordial earth which was "a formless waste" and a primordial oceanic abyss over which the Spirit of God "hovered"; it is out of this primordial world that God shapes and crafts to give it ordered form and purpose. The days of creation acting as poetic structure: dividing light from darkness, dividing the primordial ocean into the waters above and below, and separating the dry earth from the seas; followed then by the creation of creatures to rule--the sun, moon, and stars to rule day and night, things which fly and swim to rule sky and sea, and things which crawl, creep, and walk to rule the dry land.

The YEC view that Genesis 1 presents a material origins account is anachronistic, and forces modern ways of thinking onto an ancient text. The text is not addressing the question of material origins, but rather addressing God's ordered purpose for and in the world, and mankind's place in it--which is to be the image-bearing creature of God. Man's place in creation, unlike other creatures, is as a moral animal to relate with God and reflect God in the ordered creation.

As such it's simply impossible to say that anyone in the ancient world was a "Young Earth Creationist", because that's that is imposing upon ancient people ways of thinking that would have been fundamentally alien to them.

This is why Augustine could look at the creation narrative in Genesis 1 and read it as allegory, and instead looked at the Latin translation of Sirach and say God "created all things in one day". Augustine takes an idea not present in Genesis, creation ex nihilo, to argue that God is the Prime Mover and Cause, and brought forth everything in seminal form. Augustine is also working from, in part, a Neoplatonic philosophical model (see rationes seminales).

It is these philosophical inquiries that eventually, over centuries, evolve into the basis of western science. As such scientific inquiry as we know it simply does not exist when we are talking about the Old Testament or the Hellenistic mythological corpus. Getting to those bigger questions of "Where did everything come from? And how?" involved centuries of philosophical development in the West. To eventually emerge as a burgeoning new methodology of observation and inquiry which we know today as science. This makes trying to force the Genesis stories into a [pseudo-]scientific model not only impossible, but inappropriate.

-CryptoLutheran

hedrick · May 25, 2019

Akita Suggagaki said:
So for you omniscience is a requirement of divinity?

What about Matthew 24-36 “However, no one knows the day or hour when these things will happen, not even the angels in heaven or the Son himself. Only the Father knows."

Also Luke 2:52, which says that Jesus grew in wisdom as he matured.

Of course omniscience is a requirement for God. But Christ is a union of God and human. The early Church (correctly) rejects ideas that blended those, e.g. that Christ didn't have a separate human soul or human will. I don't think it's possible even in principle for a human to be omniscient: the brain is finite.

It's also a bit hard to be sure whether Jesus believed in the historicity of Noah. I will cite Biblical stories in theological discussions even when I don't believe they happened historically. Indeed in Sunday School lessons I'll cite Harry Potter, in just the way that Jesus did Noah. Most preachers do similar things.

cloudyday2 · May 25, 2019

hedrick said:
Also Luke 2:52, which says that Jesus grew in wisdom as he matured.

Hedrick, let's say hypothetically that Jesus believed exactly what Bart Ehrman and others have deduced. In other words, let's say that Jesus was an apocalyptic prophet who expected a dramatic conflict between the sons of light and the sons of darkness resulting in a new world order under the kingship of Jesus with his twelve disciples as his trusty lieutenants, etc.

Would that mistaken belief disprove the claims that Jesus was the Messiah/Son of God/Son of Man? Is it possible that Jesus himself didn't understand what kind of Messiah he was? So Jesus was the promised Messiah but not the kind he had imagined.

hedrick · May 25, 2019

cloudyday2 said:
Hedrick, let's say hypothetically that Jesus believed exactly what Bart Ehrman and others have deduced. In other words, let's say that Jesus was an apocalyptic prophet who expected a dramatic conflict between the sons of light and the sons of darkness resulting in a new world order under the kingship of Jesus with his twelve disciples as his trusty lieutenants, etc.

Would that mistaken belief disprove the claims that Jesus was the Messiah/Son of God/Son of Man? Is it possible that Jesus himself didn't understand what kind of Messiah he was? So Jesus was the promised Messiah but not the kind he had imagined.

It would be a more serious issue than his use of Noah as an illustration, because it would mean that his view of his own mission was wrong.

Jesus could have believed that the End was coming sooner than it actually was without causing the problem. After all, he said himself that he didn't know. What causes the problem is if his primary mission was to proclaim an immediate End.

But this wasn't his primary mission. His mission was to bring the kingdom now, but mostly to show us how to live in the kingdom. That kingdom was (and is) a foretaste for the final kingdom. But the timing of when it becomes final wasn't a key element of his mission.

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