The Bible still has authors. That is, people who wrote the text in Hebrew for the original audience, God's chosen people, the isrealites.
Adam didn't write Genesis. Adam isn't even his name, Adam is a Hebrew word that means "man". So when you read Genesis, you have to consider context of the Hebrew writers, which in Genesis is traditionally considered to be Moses.
Your response is like arguing that we should ignore Hebrew. Well sorry, the Bible is written in Hebrew. So if you want to understand it, you have to read it as it was written. That's not to deny oral tradition, rather it's just to say that you can't justifiably ignore context of those who wrote it down and the original audience that received it.
In fact, as noted above such as with my quote of Augustine, but more importantly an absence of such readings of immortality in any ancient near east writing that anyone is aware of, animal death before the Fall is neither excluded by Scripture nor foreign to the Christian tradition. What is foreign is the expectation that Genesis should answer modern questions about biology or depict a deathless ecosystem. That framework is not demanded by the text and does not arise from its original context.
The idea that life is immortal before the fall, is purely a sunday-school reading of Genesis that is not actually found in scripture. People in history have guessed that it may be a correct reading. But many have guessed that it's not just the same. It's just not stated in the text.
At best, humanity could be sustained in their lifespan by the tree of life. I would grant that interpretation. But that has nothing to do with the animal kingdom. It's not like whales were springing out of the ocean to eat of the fruit.
And even that would still be a heavily concordist reading with deeper issues when drawn into discussions of modern science.
When we actually stick with scripture, we see that the idea of immortal animals (like gods) in the garden is completely made-up.
Are you assuming that God wrote Genesis? As if perhaps God writes in Hebrew?
Psalm 104 ESV
21 The young lions roar for their prey, seeking their food from God.
24 manifold are your works! The earth is full of your creatures.”
Job 38:39-41 – “Do you hunt the prey for the lioness… Who provides for the raven its prey?”
Nothing about sin and rebellion here. Just God and His manifold works.
Then let me apply your metric. Nothing about billions of years of violence, suffering and predation. Plenty of references in your bible about creation. Here's a handful
Genesis 1:1–31: The primary narrative detailing God's work over six consecutive days.
Genesis 2:1–3: Concludes the creation week, stating that God finished His work and rested on the seventh day, blessing and sanctifying it.
Exodus 20:8–11: Part of the Fourth Commandment, which links the human work week to the divine pattern: "For in six days the Lord made the heavens and the earth... and rested the seventh day".
Exodus 31:16–17: Reinforces the Sabbath as a sign, stating that in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, and on the seventh day He rested and was refreshed.
Hebrews 4:4: A New Testament reference to the creation week: "And God rested on the seventh day from all his works".
Of course since these are inconvenient we can simply reinterpret them. Of course that means we can also reinterpret any text we desire. Perhaps psalms is referring to eager young men.
Really, it is disingenuous to reinterpret your bibles claim of a 7 day creation when the entire economy of Israel was built on it. The weekly cycle was capped every 7 days by a memorial to that creation.
I am not arguing the veracity of a 7 day creation but I am pointing out the dissonance of trying to shoehorn evolution into the bible.
I accept creation as it is. But more importantly, the Bible never says that death in the animal kingdom is a bad thing. Especially not in the old testament. Quite the opposite as noted above.
You seem to place a great deal of trust in what the bible doesn't say? Certainly it infers that animals death is part of the fall. God made a covenant with not only Noah but all of the animals as well. Event more importantly how can we cherry pick what to reinterpret and what to take at face value. Death came by Adam romans 5:14. I know that you reinterpret this to only mean "Spiritual" death but your can't have one without the other.
There are parts of scripture where people complain about suffering, such as in the book of Job. But even there, God is overseeing the matter and is in complete control. When Job questions God, God essentially says, Did you lay the foundations of the earth? How dare you question me?
Yet here we are.
I question the god you portray. No death before the fall is biblically more sound and secure an argument than death, suffering, and predation. I can create a strong textual argument for that based on what the bible does say rather than what it doesn't.
Instead of labeling this position “dissonant,” the argument needs to be made from the text itself. When you read Genesis, where does it say that animals were immortal in the garden? That idea is assumed, not stated.
Inferred not assumed. The Bible strongly implies that animals did not die before the Fall of man, even if it does not state it in a single sentence. In Genesis 1:29–30, God gives both humans and animals plants for food, with no mention of hunting or killing, which suggests a peaceful creation without death. God then calls this world “very good,” a description that is hard to reconcile with a system built on suffering, predation, and extinction. When sin enters in Genesis 3, death, pain, and corruption appear as consequences, not as normal features of creation. This understanding is reinforced later in Scripture, where Paul teaches that death entered the world through sin (Romans 5:12) and describes all creation as now “subjected to corruption” and “groaning” as it waits for restoration (Romans 8:20–22). If animals had always lived and died through violence, it would make little sense to describe creation as fallen or awaiting freedom. Taken together, these passages strongly suggest that death—human and animal alike—was not part of God’s original design, but a result of humanity’s rebellion.
In fact, the presence of the Tree of Life raises a serious problem for that assumption. What would be the point of a tree that grants ongoing life if all creatures already possessed immortality by nature? The text itself implies contingency, not inherent deathlessness. The belief that all animals were immortal before the fall is a modern anachronism, not a conclusion drawn from Genesis.
The Tree of Life does not imply that death was already present; it implies the opposite—that life was sustained by God’s provision, not threatened by natural decay. Genesis never says Adam or the animals were immortal by nature. Their life was contingent on remaining in God’s ordered creation, where access to the Tree of Life symbolized continued fellowship and life from God. Contingent life is not the same thing as inevitable death. A lamp depends on electricity to stay lit, but that doesn’t mean it is already “dying” while the power is on.
In fact, Genesis 3 makes the point very clear. After the Fall, God removes Adam from the garden “lest he reach out his hand and take also of the tree of life and live forever” (Genesis 3:22). This shows that death becomes a real threat only after sin, not before. If death were already a normal part of creation, barring access to the Tree of Life would make little sense—Adam would have been dying anyway. Instead, the text presents death as something newly introduced, requiring separation from the Tree to ensure it takes effect.
This is not a modern assumption; it is a straightforward reading of the narrative. Genesis portrays a world sustained by life, called “very good,” with death entering only after rebellion. The Tree of Life does not undermine that view—it reinforces it by showing that life was God’s gift, maintained in a creation not yet corrupted by sin.
"By this deed...they forfeited the wonderful condition that was to be bestowed upon them in the tree of life...they contracted that liability to disease and death which is present in the flesh of animals."
"How admirable these things are in their own natures" and "how beautifully adjusted to the rest of creation".
"Even their poisons...are wholesome and medicinal when used properly"
"It is ridiculous to condemn the faults of beasts and of trees...for these creatures received at their creators will, an existence fitting of them by passing away and giving place to others to secure that lowest form of beauty, the beauty of seasons which in its own place is a requisite part of the world."
-Saint Augustine of Hippo, City of God Book XII Chapter 4.
Who knew that one of the most influential church fathers was so "twisted" and "dissonant" in his understanding of scripture.
Augustine is possibly the most influential theologian in Western Christianity. Yet here you identify his position as if he were crazy.
First of all you are trying to put the bible downstream from Church Fathers. I would guess that you are Catholic with that understanding (
no disrespect, just an observation.) Secondly, you are ignoring the larger scope of his writings.
At first glance, this quote can sound like Augustine believed animal death was always part of God’s original design. But that is not what he meant. Augustine was responding to people who claimed the world was bad because it contains things that decay, change, or pass away. His point was that created things can still be good even if they are temporary.
Augustine made an important distinction between changeability and punishment. He believed animals were created as finite creatures that live and die, but humans were different. Adam was not created under the necessity of death. When Augustine says Adam “contracted” the same liability to death found in animals, he means that humans fell into a lower condition, not that death was always meant to rule over humanity. Human death, for Augustine, was the result of sin, not God’s original plan.
When Augustine talks about creatures “passing away and giving place to others,” he is describing the normal passing of time and seasons, not violent struggle or evolution through suffering. He is saying that change can still have beauty, not that death and destruction were tools God used to create life.
Most importantly, Augustine never taught that death was a creative force. He consistently called death a corruption and an enemy, especially when it comes to human beings. The goal of salvation, for Augustine, was resurrection and restoration, not accepting death as a good or necessary part of creation.
So while Augustine acknowledged that animals are mortal, he did not believe death was part of God’s perfect design for humanity or that God used death to bring about higher life. That idea fits modern theistic evolution, but it does not fit Augustine’s understanding of creation, the Fall, and redemption.
Animal death before the fall has always been present and indeed there is no evidence of any ancient near east source indicating that this is how the text was understood.
This is based on your evolutionary bias but you have no biblical evidence to support such an assumption. In fact it runs counter to what the bible does say.
So it is not some recent theological distortion to affirm animal death before the fall.
It absolutely runs counter to what the bible clearly infers. I could run it by you again and again, but you won't hear it.
But even more importantly than the position of earlier church fathers such as Augustine, on the contrary, there is no evidence from the ancient Near Eastern context was ever understood to teach universal animal immortality. That assumption comes much later, and it is being read into the text, not drawn from it.
Animal death before the fall has long been affirmed by major Christian thinkers and is not excluded by Scripture.
And I'm not avoiding confronting anything. I'm referencing the Bible, I'm referencing tradition. What are you referencing? Not Genesis.
I have laid it out time and time again with texts. Your bible reference is empty of words because it is what the bible does not explicitly say. But the inferences are overwhelming.
So your position is that God came along to this rock about 4.5 billion years ago, give or take a few billion. After about a billion years and some change, He deposited some microbial life that He had figured out how to make. Then He sat back to watch all of the death, suffering, and destruction to see who was the strongest, most cunning, and ruthless among the population and would win the day. Eventually, through this random process, predators and prey existed. Oh, what joy to hear the dying screams of the weak and helpless—just what was needed to advance the process. God made the world very random in everything so that only the fittest could survive. This world was a very negative place, as you can imagine. The dinosaurs were beating out almost everyone, although the insects were quietly thriving.
Perhaps God was disturbed that He hadn’t seen the dinos doing so well and, if not checked, they would soon take over the mammals, so He threw a rock at the planet and boom—no more dinos. Or maybe it was just a lucky coincidence. Finally, apes appeared, and one species of them had random mutations that gave them bigger brains.
God then changed His mind and decided against this evolutionary process. He thought He might try love, but how would He stop all of this? Then He got the idea of making His law and putting an end to all the chaos. So He tried to tell these apes to go opposite of evolution and love their enemies, care for the poor, weak, and less fit. But He must have underestimated what billions of years had baked into these apes, because only a few heeded His call.
