A Literal Reading: Genesis 1

[cubinity]

What does this have anything to do with Genesis 1 and the creation week?

It tells us science can challenge our interpretation of the bible, that literal interpretations can be wrong and when they are we need to find better interpretations.

Interesting, but aren't both the literal interpretation made in ignorance of the discovery and the literal interpretation made in light of the discovery literal?

I mean, isn't our perception always influenced by the information available to us, and does that not effect the literal way we experience things?

Just look at the way "day" is being literally interpreted here in this thread. We all agree without saying so that the evenings and mornings of a fixed location are being caused by the earth's rotations, and not by the sun moving in the sky. It was historical science that provided us this explanation, and we base all literal interpretations of the text upon that knowledge, even though we know it was not knowledge available to the human authors.

Therefore, to say that there is a better interpretation than the literal one is to assume literal interpretations do not include the sciences. I would say that they do, and this thread was started with the exact intention of applying an often overlooked scientific fact to the literal interpretation.

So, I would say that science does not just challenge, but also heavily shapes, our literal interpretations of the Bible, particularly Genesis 1.

 

[Hentenza]

Look again at my example and following questions...

The beginning of the Sabbath has nothing to do with whether or not the person is traveling on the Sabbath. It starts at different times for different people because of their differing locations, not because they are traveling. It would have started for our observer eight hours earlier if he had not traveled the day before.

In my example, the person travels the day before the Sabbath, and the day that we are identifying as approximately 32 hrs long is not the Sabbath day, but the day preceding the Sabbath (Friday, in this example).

Therefore, we may conclude since the Spirit is resting on the seventh day (not traveling?), that the seventh day is likely our standard ~24 hour day. However, that says nothing about the duration of the previous six, when free motion is allowed, just as observing the Sabbath says nothing about the length of the day immediately preceding it for the observer.

Brother, you are still loosing me. One does not "gain" time by moving to a forward timezone. I don't live 8 hours longer simply because I moved 8 hours away. The Earth still rotates the same way.

It will also be good to look at the meaning of מְרַחֶ֖פֶת since I think you are taking the English definition for granted. The Spirit of God was not moving in the sense of circling the Earth or something of the sort but was "hovering" over the waters. Here is the definition:

8173 I. רָחַף (rā∙ḥǎp&#772: v.; ≡ Str 7363; TWOT 2148, 2149—1. LN 16 (qal) tremble, shake, quiver, i.e., the quick, non-linear, back and forth motion of an object (Jer 23:9+), note: for another interp, see 8174; 2. LN 15.245 (piel) hover, i.e., a non-linear flying motion of an object which is stationary above a surface, with a possibly associative meaning of caring superintendence over an object (Ge 1:2; Dt 32:11+), see also domain LN 16

Swanson, J. (1997). Dictionary of Biblical Languages with Semantic Domains : Hebrew (Old Testament) (electronic ed.). Oak Harbor: Logos Research Systems, Inc.

: qal: pf. רָֽחֲפוּ: rāḥafû ʿaṣmôtay Je 23:9 shake, tremble. †
piel: impf. יְרַחֵף; pt. f. מְרַחֶפֶת: hover (tremulously) Gn 1:2 Dt 32:11. †


Holladay, W. L., Köhler, L., & Köhler, L. (1971). A concise Hebrew and Aramaic lexicon of the Old Testament. (337). Leiden: Brill.

A better translation is "hovering" instead of moving.

 

[Assyrian]

My argument regarding the Sabbath comes from Exodus 20:8-11 and 31:17. Exodus 20:11 reads '11 For in six days the LORD made the heavens and the earth, the sea and all that is in them, and rested on the seventh day; therefore the LORD blessed the sabbath day and made it holy". The word "for" ( כִּ֣י"ki"also has the sense of "because" or "when") at the beginning of the verse is a causal explanation showing that the creation week is the basis for the "work" week. In these verses it is explicit that the creation days were the same as those for the human work week. There is no point even trying to understand the bible if a word in the same passage and the same grammatical context can switch meanings without any hint in the text itself. The Sabbath day in Exodus is the same Sabbath day in Genesis. It is not thousands or millions of years long but an evening to morning "day".

Isn't the same particle ki used in the the commandments in Deuteronomy? Deut 5:15 You shall remember that you were a slave in the land of Egypt, and the LORD your God brought you out from there with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm. Therefore the LORD your God commanded you to keep the Sabbath day. Yet the reason given for the Sabbath command in Deuteronomy is a metaphorical description of the Exodus from Egypt brought out by God's mighty hand and outstretched arm.

 

[cubinity]

Brother, you are still loosing me. One does not "gain" time by moving to a forward timezone. I don't live 8 hours longer simply because I moved 8 hours away. The Earth still rotates the same way.

If all we are measuring time with is the position of the sun in the sky relative to our perception, then gaining time is exactly what happens when we move west.

To say that you don't extend sunlight (and thus gain time if that is your sole measurement, as it is in the text) because you don't live any longer is to confuse two unrelated phenomenon. Your lifespan is completely disassociated from the measurement of time, and thus introducing it is fallacious. Sorry.

The Earth does still rotate the same. I'm not arguing that it doesn't. However, the text does not use the earth rotating as a basis for measuring time, so neither will I when literally interpreting the text.

It will also be good to look at the meaning of מְרַחֶ֖פֶת since I think you are taking the English definition for granted. The Spirit of God was not moving in the sense of circling the Earth or something of the sort but was "hovering" over the waters. Here is the definition:

A better translation is "hovering" instead of moving.

My horoscope today also uses the word "possibly" when talking about its own associative meaning to my life. I wouldn't exactly call it concise, though.

Thanks for the definition, though. It helps me understand how others have chosen to perceive the content of the text. I will hold onto it for later use, for sure.

For the sake of this thread, I will continue to perceive the Spirit as moving, and let Holladay's definition stand for what it is; Holladay's definition. (After all, that is what this thread is about, isn't it: the different ways we choose to define the terms we read in text?).

 

[Assyrian]

This is something that always baffles me. The Biblical authors, laymen, and the church believed for thousands of years that the Sun itself literally moved across the sky. Science proved that view wrong and forced the Church to change its views.

And yet, if we look at any other literal interpretation of Genesis that conflicts with reality, once again we have people and the churches claiming science is wrong, that the Earth is only 6,000 years old, that dinosaurs did walk with man, that there was a global flood. All disproven by science just like the movement of the sun. And yet they have no problem ignoring the thousands of years of Church/Biblical error regarding the sun's movements, while still holding onto the other absurdities.

It's hypocrisy and a double standard like no other. I do not get the intellectual disconnect between the 2 positions.

It's puzzling, all right. I'd say inconsistency and double standards though, rather than hypocrisy.

 

[Sum1sGruj]

All this contempt for creationists, and yet you all hide behind a theory that doesn't really work. You all have fell into common belief, just like how it was common for people, religious or not, to think the Earth was flat.
It is a practical impossibility that information can be added to DNA. It can only be rearranged. Combine all the creationist rebuttals, and the finishing idea is just that, plain and simple.

It is a problem that no one has been able to rectify or even theorize. It's a completely stumped issue and is several nails to the coffin of ToE.
All evolutionists have is a bunch of fossils amd organisms that actually do not die at the slightest contending issue in the environment. The recipe for common descent is damningly incomplete.

Once it starts to settle in peoples heads over the next few decades, you will ironically see science shifting to what is actually truth and not wishful thinking.

 

[Assyrian]

Just think how much information in the world is nothing more than the Oxford English Dictionary rearranged.

 

[Hentenza]

If all we are measuring time with is the position of the sun in the sky relative to our perception, then gaining time is exactly what happens when we move west.

I guess I'll buy me a plane to fly west.

To say that you don't extend sunlight (and thus gain time if that is your sole measurement, as it is in the text) because you don't live any longer is to confuse two unrelated phenomenon. Your lifespan is completely disassociated from the measurement of time, and thus introducing it is fallacious. Sorry.

But then we are still confined to roughly 24 hours since that is the extent of the Earth's rotation. That was my point.

The Earth does still rotate the same. I'm not arguing that it doesn't. However, the text does not use the earth rotating as a basis for measuring time, so neither will I when literally interpreting the text.

It actually does. The phrase evening to morning makes that explicit.

My horoscope today also uses the word "possibly" when talking about its own associative meaning to my life. I wouldn't exactly call it concise, though.

Thanks for the definition, though. It helps me understand how others have chosen to perceive the content of the text. I will hold onto it for later use, for sure.

For the sake of this thread, I will continue to perceive the Spirit as moving, and let Holladay's definition stand for what it is; Holladay's definition. (After all, that is what this thread is about, isn't it: the different ways we choose to define the terms we read in text?).

I generally quote two sources for definitions as I did here so that folks don't say what you just said (it is his definition). Here are three more:

†II. רָחַף S7363 TWOT2148, 2149 GK8173, 8174 vb.Pi. hover (NH id., cf. GrünbaumZMG xxxix (1885), 607; Syriac Pa. ܪܰܚܶܦ (raḥep) move gently, also cherish, and brood, cf. Thess.v.; connexion with I. ר׳ dub.);—Pi. Impf. 3 ms. יְרַחֵף עַל Dt 32:11 (poem) of vulture hovering over young; Pt. רוּחַ א׳ מְרַחֶפֶת עַל־פְּנֵי הַמָּ֑יִם Gn 1:2 (P); hovering over face of waters, or perhaps (v. Syriac) brooding (and fertilizing), so JerQuaest. in Gen. ed. 4 (reading ‘marahaefeth’), cf. Di Gunk.

Brown, F., Driver, S. R., & Briggs, C. A. (2000). Enhanced Brown-Driver-Briggs Hebrew and English Lexicon (electronic ed.) (934). Oak Harbor, WA: Logos Research Systems.

2149 רָחַף (rāḥap) 11, hover. This verb occurs only in the Piel (Gen 1:2; Deut 32:11).

Harris, R. L., Harris, R. L., Archer, G. L., & Waltke, B. K. (1999). Theological Wordbook of the Old Testament (electronic ed.) (843). Chicago: Moody Press.

7363. רָחַף râchaph, raw-khaf´; a prim. root; to brood; by impl. to be relaxed:—flutter, move, shake.

Strong, J., S.T.D., LL.D. (2009). Vol. 2: A Concise Dictionary of the Words in the Greek Testament and The Hebrew Bible (108). Bellingham, WA: Logos Research Systems, Inc.

 

[elopez]

Verse 3 during the first day. Luminaries were created in the 4th day.

Verse three doesn't even come close to saying God was the sun. The passage says God said let there be light, not that the light was God Himself. You're simply adding to the text to reinforce your beliefs, which is quite the pathetic attempt. Just saying...

 

[Hentenza]

Verse three doesn't even come close to saying God was the sun. The passage says God said let there be light, not that the light was God Himself. You're simply adding to the text to reinforce your beliefs, which is quite the pathetic attempt. Just saying...

Ok so God said let there be light. No luminaries had been created yet. No sun or moon light since that was created on the 4th day. So where do you think that light came from?

 

[Hentenza]

Isn't the same particle ki used in the the commandments in Deuteronomy? Deut 5:15 You shall remember that you were a slave in the land of Egypt, and the LORD your God brought you out from there with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm. Therefore the LORD your God commanded you to keep the Sabbath day. Yet the reason given for the Sabbath command in Deuteronomy is a metaphorical description of the Exodus from Egypt brought out by God's mighty hand and outstretched arm.

Context would be nice. You can not use the whole semantic definition of a particle simply because it is the same particle.

 

[cubinity]

But then we are still confined to roughly 24 hours since that is the extent of the Earth's rotation. That was my point.

You seem to be missing something fundamental about my argument, and the hangup seems to be your commitment to modern science, ironically enough.

The earth's rotations causing evenings and mornings is a modern scientific explanation. But, I'll get to that in the next section.

As far as answering this statement, it frankly doesn't make any sense to me in the literal context of Genesis 1.

In that context, there are no clocks, there is no record of "time" as we know it. There are no time zones, and there is no such this as an "hour." There is only a globe, rotating and revolving around a sun (a scientific explanation we are going with for the sake of this argument. None of this, of course, is in the text).

So, if you have a single entity moving around over the water (that it is apparently looking over like a mother bird), then only its perception determines the passage of "time."

In the explicit description in the text, that entity records the passage of time in "days," and marks these days as having one local "evening" and "morning," which are described as transitions between periods of "light" and "dark."

Therefore, if while "hovering" over the water like a mother bird, it moves west, the "day" it is in will be longer than if it didn't, or if it went east.

That's just the way things are if we accept the modern scientific description of what causes daylight and nighttime, and assuming there is a light source in place of the sun before there was a sun (of course, none of which is actually in the text...).

It actually does. The phrase evening to morning makes that explicit.

Again, evening and morning are references to transitions between periods or light and dark in the text. It says nothing about the mechanism that causes these transitions, only that they occur. Therefore, no, it is not explicit that rotation has anything being described.

I generally quote two sources for definitions as I did here so that folks don't say what you just said (it is his definition). Here are three more:

Cool. I'll take 'em all.

However, I will note that the word being described is said by one of them to only being used twice: once in this context, and once more when describing a mother bird watching over the nest. Not really a sufficient number of examples to narrow down the scope of that definition, don't you think.

Oh, and no matter how many definitions we get, those definitions aren't exactly divine truth, are they?

Eh, enough of that nonsense, even if I fully accept the definition provided, you've got a Spirit watching over the waters like a mother bird, which it moved about to do, thus my interpretation is not derailed by it. Thus, I happily move on...

 

[cubinity]

Ok so God said let there be light. No luminaries had been created yet. No sun or moon light since that was created on the 4th day. So where do you think that light came from?

It doesn't matter where he thinks that light came from. If it is not explicitly in the text, then any conclusion is merely speculation. I think that is his point.

Your conclusion is implied from your perspective, but it is not there in the text, and therefore cannot be concluded from a literal reading of the text.

 

[Hentenza]

It doesn't matter where he thinks that light came from. If it is not explicitly in the text, then any conclusion is merely speculation. I think that is his point.

Your conclusion is implied from your perspective, but it is not there in the text, and therefore cannot be concluded from a literal reading of the text.

It is the same light as depicted in Rev. 21:23. No speculation.

 

[cubinity]

It is the same light as depicted in Rev. 21:23. No speculation.

Not to be rude, but, "It is the same light as depicted in Rev. 21:23." is speculation.

Nowhere in either text do they identify these as the same light source.

 

[Hentenza]

You seem to be missing something fundamental about my argument, and the hangup seems to be your commitment to modern science, ironically enough.

The earth's rotations causing evenings and mornings is a modern scientific explanation. But, I'll get to that in the next section.

As far as answering this statement, it frankly doesn't make any sense to me in the literal context of Genesis 1.

In that context, there are no clocks, there is no record of "time" as we know it. There are no time zones, and there is no such this as an "hour." There is only a globe, rotating and revolving around a sun (a scientific explanation we are going with for the sake of this argument. None of this, of course, is in the text).

The reference to evening and morning is definitely in the text. Whether the Earth rotated (which it does) or not (which might not have at that particular time) is subordinate to the fact that the transitions are in the text.

So, if you have a single entity moving around over the water (that it is apparently looking over like a mother bird), then only its perception determines the passage of "time."

In the explicit description in the text, that entity records the passage of time in "days," and marks these days as having one local "evening" and "morning," which are described as transitions between periods of "light" and "dark."

Therefore, if while "hovering" over the water like a mother bird, it moves west, the "day" it is in will be longer than if it didn't, or if it went east.

Read the verses please. The Spirit of God "hovered" over the surface of the waters (Hebrew הַמָּֽיִם׃ rendered plural). The waters covered the whole globe which means that the Spirit hovered over the whole globe not just a portion of it.

 

[Hentenza]

Not to be rude, but, "It is the same light as depicted in Rev. 21:23." is speculation.

Nowhere in either text do they identify these as the same light source.

I have no doubt. You don't have to believe it though.

 

[elopez]

Ok so God said let there be light. No luminaries had been created yet. No sun or moon light since that was created on the 4th day. So where do you think that light came from?

Well, I don't buy a literal interpretation of Genesis. I don't think the sun or moon was created on day 4, I do not think there was some 'light' that acted in place as the sun, and I surely do not think that anywhere in Genesis that it states God is the sun Himself. All of it is nonsense piled on more nonsense.

 

[cubinity]

The reference to evening and morning is definitely in the text. Whether the Earth rotated (which it does) or not (which might not have at that particular time) is subordinate to the fact that the transitions are in the text.

I don't understand why you are harping on this point. I have not ever denied that these transitions occur in the text. In fact, these transitions are a fundamental aspect of the OP. What are you getting at?

I have only argued that the earth's rotations are not explicitly in the text; a point you concede above anyway.

Read the verses please. The Spirit of God "hovered" over the surface of the waters (Hebrew הַמָּֽיִם׃ rendered plural). The waters covered the whole globe which means that the Spirit hovered over the whole globe not just a portion of it.

So, if the period of "light" and "dark" effects the whole earth at the same time, then we are not even dealing with the same kind of light/dark phenomenon as is caused by the sun/earth relationship. Therefore, from that assumption, there is no evidence in a literal reading of the text that these described days were any particular duration at all, as they are not even the result of the same conditions.

Since I am making this assumption in the OP that rotation is fundamentally tied to the occurrence of half the globe being illuminated at any given time, then an argument for the entire globe being illuminated or darkened doesn't fit into the model being described in this thread.

 

[cubinity]

I have no doubt. You don't have to believe it though.

Speculation is not dependent upon you being doubtful, nor does it have any relevance on whether or not I also believe it. So...