Jeff wrote:
There was no death before Adam and Eve fell.So if there were children before the fall, they would be relient also to eat as they did in order to fall....we have no evidence that they didnt....How stupid would that be as you watched your parents age before your very eyes.....to eat also.
First, I'm sorry that I don't understand what you wrote. what do you mean by "relient"? But the death part doesn't fit the real world. There has been death for millions of years, long before there were humans. This is obvious even if one takes a "long days" approach as Damien did, because millions of years of animals with no death would cause living bodies to be stacked over each other, deeper and deeper - not to mention food and many other issues. That's why so many theologians point out that the "no death before adam" idea is a misreading of the text.
Damien wrote:
Genesis 1 for example is written like poetry metaphors are used all the time but Genesis 2 is not where it is clear man was created from the dust of the earth and God breathed the breath of life into his nostrils.
You really think that the correct interpretation of text from a loving, truthful God is that Humans were made when that God performed mouth to nose resuscitation on a dirt clod?
This would give Adam 100 years to learn to speak and name all the animals. God would be of course at the core of that helping him and teaching him
There are estimated to be over 30 million animals. Even using your made up, non-biblical 100 year number, that would give Adam only 2 minutes to come up with, learn, and speak the name of each one, even if he worked day and night without sleeping or eating for 100 years. He's one quick learner, I guess!
after all it does say God "brought [the animals] to man to see what he would name them" so it is clear that God did help Adam so why not in his speech as well.
OK, so God physically brought the blue whale, perhaps levitating it and flying it over hundreds of miles to bring to Adam, along with insects that only live in rainforests, deep sea anglerfish being floated out of the depths, penguins twirling though the air towards Adam, and blind cave fish flying out of their caves? See how silly a literal interpretation is? Plus, a literal interpretation says that God is not omniscient ("to see what he would name them"). Ouch again.
just because you say the original Hebrew points to metaphorical cues doesn't make it so. if you wish to make a point then please let us all know these cues.
OK, I don't know all of them, but one is that Adam is formed from the dirt and named "dirt" ("Adam" in Hebrew means "dirt"). It's a joke, a cue that the story is not to be taken too seriously.
As mentioned earlier I know Genesis 1 is also poetry that's why it can be taken metaphorically. However Genesis 2 is not poetry and it has it's own creation account that agrees with Genesis 1.
Um, you are aware, I hope, that the chapter divisions are human additions that weren't made until the middle ages, right? Plus, the 1-7 days of the first creation story goes from the start into chapter 2, and it's not until partway through chapter 2 that the second story starts, again showing that your "chapter 2 is literal" doesn't make sense.
The fact that they don't agree has been discussed ad nauseum here. That's probably worth a whole separate thread if you doubt that they are different. The easiest way to see the difference is to just look at the order of creation in each one.
Originally Posted by
Papias
Speaking of those geneologies, have you compared, line by line, the geneology in 1 Cr 1 with that in Mt 1?
they both are pretty consistent when it comes to adam being the first.
OK, and they are also both pretty consistent in that they both use letters. I asked if you had compared them line by line. Have you done so? Do they give the same geneology?
You are using a another verse in the bible that is clearly metaphorical and using it to prove that genesis is also a metaphor.
No, I'm not. What I'm doing is pointing to a clearly metaphorical verse (which as you saw was embedded in the middle of historical verses), to show that there actually are metaphors in the Bibles. Now that I see you agree with me that there are metaphors in the Bibles (you agreed that Genesis 1, Song of Solomon, etc, are metaphorical), then that point is made. Because we both agree that there are metaphors in the Bibles, then for any verse, it may or may not be a metaphor, based on internal cues and on if it contradicts other parts of God's revelation if interpreted literally. I hope we can agree on that much.
My example is that Genesis should not be assumed a metaphor simply because it has a lot of symbolism and is used metaphorically in other passages. And if it were so then we can use the same reasoning for Jesus Christ's death on the cross which also has a lot of symbolism and is used metaphorically in other passages. In short I am exposing your circular reasoning because it doesn't prove anything.
You have repeatedly said that the interpretation of part of a Bible as a metaphor means that all of it becomes a metaphor and so one's entire Bible becomes meaningless. Then, you turn around and say that YOU see parts as metaphors, but somehow that doesn't mean your similar action makes your whole Bible unravel.
It's really quite simple. I hope we both agree that there are some parts that are metaphor, some that are to be interpreted literally, and that it takes careful examination of the verse in question to determine what is a metaphor, and that the interpretation should not cause a contradiction with another part of God's revelation. Do we agree on that?
Papias