Evolution, Creationism, Intelligent Design-Gallup Poll

[mark kennedy]

That is a perfect analogy. Creationism is just like scholasticism during Galileo's time. Neither really have anything to do with the Bible, but is instead a purely reactionary objection to true scientific discovery. Both were just digging in their heels against an obvious fact of reality.

Creation science, sometimes referred to as Creationism is a reaction to Darwinism and Liberal Theology, both of which are based on an argument against God being Creator. Creationism is nothing more then Christian conviction. It is reactionary, it's a reaction to the inflammatory rhetoric of Darwinians like yourself.

You made my argument for me and handed it to me on a silver platter. Your thinking boggles my mind, your arguments are so flimsy that half the time you totally loss it and appear to be arguing in favor of the opposite side of the argument. I've never seen anyone do this before in 30 years of online debates, but Creationists here do this consistently.

You never had an argument, you immediately resorted to ad hominem attacks. All of your posts are based on insults while you ignore substantive discussion. What your doing now is called begging the question of proof on your hands and knees.

 

[mark kennedy]

Creationism means the rejection of evolution based on a literal interpretation of Genesis, it has only bee around since the middle of the 19th century. How is that essential doctrine? And if the literal interpretation of Genesis was essential doctrine, then Augustine, Athanasius and Aquinas were heretics according to you view.

Close, Creationism is a rejection of Darwinian evolution as natural history based on a literal reading of Genesis, especially Genesis 1. It's always been around it was just never questioned until the advent of Darwinian metaphysics. Augustine never argued against a literal interpretation of Genesis 1, he argued against using the Scriptures to predict eclipses.

'On the Incarnation', the apologetic work of Athanasius starts right off on a discussion of the Creation and the Fall. All the early church fathers and Christian scholarship understood and expounded on Adam being our first parent, original sin is inextricably linked to it. There was no need to argue for creation since no one was arguing against it. There was a form of Darwinism in his day, they were the Epicureans:

In regard to the making of the universe and the creation of all things there have been various opinions, and each person has propounded the theory that suited his own taste. For instance, some say that all things are self-originated and, so to speak, haphazard. The Epicureans are among these; they deny that there is any Mind behind the universe at all.(On the Incarnation of the Word, Athanasius 296-373 AD)​

Creation is inextricably linked to the Incarnation, his apologetic defense of essential Christian theism starts with a rejection of the Darwinian mythology of his day.

If man is created ex nihilo in Gen 1:27 and this is supposedly essential doctrine, why is it contradicted by the ex materia creation of man in Gen 2:7 where God mad man, not out of nothing but our of material dust?

God made Adam's body from the dust, Adam was made a living soul (given life) ex nihilo. The word 'bara' is used of the creation of the universe (1:1), life (1:21) and Adam (1:27). Three times it's used in reference to the creation of Adam. This is a common Hebrew way of emphasizing at the heart of the emphasis through repetition. The Genesis account is describing as an historical narrative the creation of life, elaborating at length.

I have shown you what the Oxford English Dictionary says about the history and meaning of Creationism...

You have done nothing but equivocate natural science with naturalistic assumptions, Darwinian naturalistic assumptions with evolutionary biology and evidential apologetics with anecdotal diversions.

Vines was neither a Hebrew scholar nor the source of Christian doctrine. Of course you have read what it says about bara in scholarly Hebrew Lexicons like Gesenius; Brown Driver & Briggs (BDB); and Köhler, Baumgartner & Stamm's The Hebrew and Aramaic Lexicon of the Old Testament (HALOT). None of them say bara means create out of nothing, and you know this, but you prefer to quote the non scholar Vine because it agrees with your views. Be careful you don't fall into the trap Paul warned about 2 Timothy 4:3 The time is coming when people won't listen to good teaching. Instead, they will look for teachers who will please them by telling them only what they are itching to hear.

That's nonsense, Vine's is a more elaborate definition, not an inferior one. A lexicon is going to break the word down to it's parts and usage. Exegetical study is not limited to breaking the word down into it's principle parts. As a matter of fact, 'bara' is not complicated enough to warrant this kind of semantically precise dissection. You could of course but all your going to end up with are different grammatical constructions of ex nihilo creation.

How many times do I have to show you the same essential doctrine, based on sound exegetical analysis?

Preach the word; be prepared in season and out of season; correct, rebuke and encourage—with great patience and careful instruction. For the time will come when people will not put up with sound doctrine. Instead, to suit their own desires, they will gather around them a great number of teachers to say what their itching ears want to hear. They will turn their ears away from the truth and turn aside to myths.(II Tim. 4:2-4)​

Such a mythology exists today, it's called 'Darwinism'.

Have a nice day,
Mark

 

[Sophrosyne]

This set of statistics appears farther down in the same poll as mentioned in the OP. It would seem that Creationism is strongly correlated with lack of an edumaction:

If you were to believe such a nonsensical claim you would expect college graduates to not be statistically so close to high school education... 6% can be written off as "noise" since we don't really have a sample size listed of participants in the poll.

 

[Assyrian]

Close, Creationism is a rejection of Darwinian evolution as natural history based on a literal reading of Genesis, especially Genesis 1.

Not sure the point in rephrasing what I said just to throw in your own pet terminology.

It's always been around it was just never questioned until the advent of Darwinian metaphysics. Augustine never argued against a literal interpretation of Genesis 1, he argued against using the Scriptures to predict eclipses.

How can Creationism always have been around when it means a rejection of evolution? Or do you mean the literal interpretation of Genesis has always been around? It has, but not the Creationists insistence that Genesis has to be interpreted literally. Augustine had no problem with people interpreting Genesis literally, he just didn't interpret it literally himself, same as Athanasius and Aquinas. People like Basis interpreted Genesis but saw no problem with a figurative interpretation. This is another difference between Creationists and and traditional Christian doctrine. It was never a traditional Christian doctrine that Genesis has to be interpreted literally. It is a doctrine of Creationists and it is why they reject evolution.

Incidentally Augustine and Aquinas argued against any interpretation that contradicted science. There were people making claims about astronomy based on their interpretation of scripture that contradicted what was know to the science of the time. Augustine said it was "disgraceful and dangerous" and called them "Reckless and incompetent expounders of holy Scripture bring untold trouble and sorrow on their wiser brethren when they are caught in one of their mischievous false opinions and are taken to task by those who are not bound by the authority of our sacred books." But Augustine and Aquinas didn't limit this disgraceful behaviour to 'predicting eclipses' as you put it. Any interpretation that is contradicted by new scientific discoveries was wrong to start with. Since Holy Scripture can be explained in a multiplicity of senses, one should adhere to a particular explanation only in such measure as to be ready to abandon it if it be proved with certainty to be false, lest Holy Scripture be exposed to the ridicule of unbelievers, and obstacles be placed to their believing." Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica

'On the Incarnation', the apologetic work of Athanasius starts right off on a discussion of the Creation and the Fall. All the early church fathers and Christian scholarship understood and expounded on Adam being our first parent, original sin is inextricably linked to it. There was no need to argue for creation since no one was arguing against it. There was a form of Darwinism in his day, they were the Epicureans:

In regard to the making of the universe and the creation of all things there have been various opinions, and each person has propounded the theory that suited his own taste. For instance, some say that all things are self-originated and, so to speak, haphazard. The Epicureans are among these; they deny that there is any Mind behind the universe at all.(On the Incarnation of the Word, Athanasius 296-373 AD)​

Creation is inextricably linked to the Incarnation, his apologetic defense of essential Christian theism starts with a rejection of the Darwinian mythology of his day.

Athanasius linked the creation to the incarnation because the Word of God who was incarnated is the same Word of God through whom God created the heavens and the earth. There is nothing in what he said about having to interpret Genesis literally. There is nothing that would contradict TE. His criticism of the Epicureans is that they denied there was an intelligent mind behind the creation of the universe. TEs state very clearly there was an intelligence behind the creation, while evolutionary biology makes no comment at all. How is that Athanasius criticising 'the Darwinian mythology of his day'? He wasn't even talking about biology.

God made Adam's body from the dust, Adam was made a living soul (given life) ex nihilo.

Genesis 2:7 simply says the man became a living creature, nephesh chai. This is the same phrase to describe the beasts and birds God made out of the ground. Gen 2:19 Now out of the ground the LORD God had formed every beast of the field and every bird of the heavens and brought them to the man to see what he would call them. And whatever the man called every living creature, that was its name. nephesh chai referred to the whole being, man and beast. There is no basis in chapter for saying create refers only to the soul. That is eisegesis because you don't like the way even Genesis uses the word create.

The word 'bara' is used of the creation of the universe (1:1), life (1:21) and Adam (1:27). Three times it's used in reference to the creation of Adam. This is a common Hebrew way of emphasizing at the heart of the emphasis through repetition. The Genesis account is describing as an historical narrative the creation of life, elaborating at length.

Sure it is emphatic, but it is emphasising the meaning of bara, that the forming of Adam was a work of God according to his plan and purpose. You can say the repetition was for emphasis, don't get to say the repetition was to emphasise an idea you want to read into bara. We get the meaning of bara from how it was used throughout the OT, where it is used for people who are born naturally like the blacksmith, nations like Israel and the Ammonites, it is used for earthquakes, darkness, shrubs and trees. bara can be used for ex nihilo creation, but it is also used very often for things that are happen naturally.

You have done nothing but equivocate natural science with naturalistic assumptions, Darwinian naturalistic assumptions with evolutionary biology and evidential apologetics with anecdotal diversions.

What has that got to do with the Oxford English Dictionary description of the meaning and origin of Creationism and Creationist?

That's nonsense, Vine's is a more elaborate definition, not an inferior one. A lexicon is going to break the word down to it's parts and usage. Exegetical study is not limited to breaking the word down into it's principle parts. As a matter of fact, 'bara' is not complicated enough to warrant this kind of semantically precise dissection. You could of course but all your going to end up with are different grammatical constructions of ex nihilo creation.

Of course Vine's is inferior it is an beginners' dictionary written by a man who wasn't a Hebrew expert. BDB, Gesenius and HALOT are scholarly Lexicons written by Hebrew scholars. I suggest you read through the BDB, Gesenius and HALOT descriptions of bara again if you think they are just 'breaking the word down into it's principle parts'. You like Vine's because Vine's inexpert view of Bara meaning ex nihilo agrees with your view. That is 'looking for teachers to please you itching ears'. Paul was warning about Gnosticism, but it is just as easy today to look for teachers who tell us what we want to hear, and not care whether they know what they are talking about or not.

How many times do I have to show you the same essential doctrine, based on sound exegetical analysis?

Once would be great if you can manage it.

Preach the word; be prepared in season and out of season; correct, rebuke and encourage—with great patience and careful instruction. For the time will come when people will not put up with sound doctrine. Instead, to suit their own desires, they will gather around them a great number of teachers to say what their itching ears want to hear. They will turn their ears away from the truth and turn aside to myths.(II Tim. 4:2-4)​

Such a mythology exists today, it's called 'Darwinism'.

Simply claiming evolution is a mythology is not an argument.

 

[Assyrian]

If you were to believe such a nonsensical claim you would expect college graduates to not be statistically so close to high school education... 6% can be written off as "noise" since we don't really have a sample size listed of participants in the poll.

You find more information here:

In U.S., 46% Hold Creationist View of Human Origins
Results for this USA Today/Gallup poll are based on telephone interviews conducted May 10-13, 2012, with a random sample of 1,012 adults, aged 18 and older, living in all 50 U.S. states and the District of Columbia.
For results based on the total sample of national adults, one can say with 95% confidence that the maximum margin of sampling error is ±4 percentage points.
​

The 6% between high school education and college graduates for creationism is statistically significant. But even more significant is the 11% difference between college graduates and postgraduates.

 

[mark kennedy]

How can Creationism always have been around when it means a rejection of evolution?

Because it's not, evolution is the change of alleles in populations over time. Darwinism is one long argument against creation and Creation science is a reaction to the latter. Creation is, as I have pointed out to you in no uncertain terms is the starting point of evolution.

Or do you mean the literal interpretation of Genesis has always been around?

It's an historical narrative, the literal interpretation is always preferred.

It has, but not the Creationists insistence that Genesis has to be interpreted literally. Augustine had no problem with people interpreting Genesis literally, he just didn't interpret it literally himself, same as Athanasius and Aquinas. People like Basis interpreted Genesis but saw no problem with a figurative interpretation. This is another difference between Creationists and and traditional Christian doctrine. It was never a traditional Christian doctrine that Genesis has to be interpreted literally. It is a doctrine of Creationists and it is why they reject evolution.

Aquinas believed creation was accomplished in an instant, not a day. Athanasis makes an apologetic defense for Creation 'against the world' and your twisting of the facts will not change that. Creation is essential Christian doctrine, not just in Genesis 1 but everywhere it's mentioned in the New Testament. The Nicene Creed, John 1, Romans 1, Hebrews 1 all emphasis creation as essential and foundational. Where are your proof texts for Darwinian evolution?

Incidentally Augustine and Aquinas argued against any interpretation that contradicted science. There were people making claims about astronomy based on their interpretation of scripture that contradicted what was know to the science of the time. Augustine said it was "disgraceful and dangerous" and called them "Reckless and incompetent expounders of holy Scripture bring untold trouble and sorrow on their wiser brethren when they are caught in one of their mischievous false opinions and are taken to task by those who are not bound by the authority of our sacred books."

He was right, trying to predict eclipses based on the Scriptures is stupid. Creation and original sin on the other hand he held as essential doctrine. Your equivocating again.

But Augustine and Aquinas didn't limit this disgraceful behaviour to 'predicting eclipses' as you put it. Any interpretation that is contradicted by new scientific discoveries was wrong to start with. Since Holy Scripture can be explained in a multiplicity of senses, one should adhere to a particular explanation only in such measure as to be ready to abandon it if it be proved with certainty to be false, lest Holy Scripture be exposed to the ridicule of unbelievers, and obstacles be placed to their believing." Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica

This rationalization has no bearing on Creation as essential doctrine. It's not hard to understand, it's hard to believe but you must be a Creationist in order to be a Christian, Augustine and Aquinas both were and Christians still are.

Athanasius linked the creation to the incarnation because the Word of God who was incarnated is the same Word of God through whom God created the heavens and the earth. There is nothing in what he said about having to interpret Genesis literally. There is nothing that would contradict TE. His criticism of the Epicureans is that they denied there was an intelligent mind behind the creation of the universe. TEs state very clearly there was an intelligence behind the creation, while evolutionary biology makes no comment at all. How is that Athanasius criticising 'the Darwinian mythology of his day'? He wasn't even talking about biology.

The Epicureans were the atheistic materialists of his day. They rejected the natural conclusion of most people of an Intelligent Designer. Who is opposed to Intelligent Design, even militantly antagonistic today?

Genesis 2:7 simply says the man became a living creature, nephesh chai. This is the same phrase to describe the beasts and birds God made out of the ground. Gen 2:19 Now out of the ground the LORD God had formed every beast of the field and every bird of the heavens and brought them to the man to see what he would call them. And whatever the man called every living creature, that was its name. nephesh chai referred to the whole being, man and beast. There is no basis in chapter for saying create refers only to the soul. That is eisegesis because you don't like the way even Genesis uses the word create.

Bara is used three times in Genesis 1:27, your grasping at straws.

Sure it is emphatic, but it is emphasising the meaning of bara, that the forming of Adam was a work of God according to his plan and purpose. You can say the repetition was for emphasis, don't get to say the repetition was to emphasise an idea you want to read into bara. We get the meaning of bara from how it was used throughout the OT, where it is used for people who are born naturally like the blacksmith, nations like Israel and the Ammonites, it is used for earthquakes, darkness, shrubs and trees. bara can be used for ex nihilo creation, but it is also used very often for things that are happen naturally.

Creation in the sense of 'Bara' only has God as the subject and you know it.

What has that got to do with the Oxford English Dictionary description of the meaning and origin of Creationism and Creationist?

Creation is defined by the Scriptures, not Oxford press.

Of course Vine's is inferior it is an beginners' dictionary written by a man who wasn't a Hebrew expert. BDB, Gesenius and HALOT are scholarly Lexicons written by Hebrew scholars. I suggest you read through the BDB, Gesenius and HALOT descriptions of bara again if you think they are just 'breaking the word down into it's principle parts'. You like Vine's because Vine's inexpert view of Bara meaning ex nihilo agrees with your view. That is 'looking for teachers to please you itching ears'. Paul was warning about Gnosticism, but it is just as easy today to look for teachers who tell us what we want to hear, and not care whether they know what they are talking about or not.

I had no idea you were an expert on exegetical studies. If you are then you will have no problem coming to the same conclusion Vine, Unger and White did with regards to the meaning of 'bara' because they were. It's not that hard to understand, it is very hard to equivocate with naturalistic assumptions, in fact it's impossible.

You've never been able to manage a substantive point. It's not because you can't but because you simply refuse.

Preach the word; be prepared in season and out of season; correct, rebuke and encourage—with great patience and careful instruction. For the time will come when people will not put up with sound doctrine. Instead, to suit their own desires, they will gather around them a great number of teachers to say what their itching ears want to hear. They will turn their ears away from the truth and turn aside to myths.(II Tim. 4:2-4)​

Simply claiming evolution is a mythology is not an argument.

Creation is sound doctrine and Darwinism has always been little more then mythography. Who is the Muse of Darwinism?

BY firm immutable immortal laws
Impress'd on Nature by the GREAT FIRST CAUSE,
Say, MUSE! how rose from elemental strife
Organic forms, and kindled into life;​

(The Temple of Nature, By Erasmus Darwin)

Have a nice day
Mark

 

[Assyrian]

How can Creationism always have been around when it means a rejection of evolution?

Because it's not, evolution is the change of alleles in populations over time. Darwinism is one long argument against creation and Creation science is a reaction to the latter. Creation is, as I have pointed out to you in no uncertain terms is the starting point of evolution.

I have shown you from the Oxford English Dictionary that the words Creationism and Creationist meant a rejection of evolution and that the term has only been around since we had evolutionary science for Genesis literalists to reject. Playing your games with the definition of evolution doesn't change that, nor does conflating creation with a rejection of the Genesis literalist idea of 'special creation' and 'creation science', Darwin never rejected Creation or the possibility of a Creator. Now could you please explain how Creationism has always been around when the word describes a nineteenth century reaction against evolutionary biology?

It's an historical narrative, the literal interpretation is always preferred.

Prefered by some, but it certainly wasn't preferred by Athanasius, Origen, Augustine, Duns Scotus, Abelaard or Aquinas. Even the chruch fathers who preferred it didn't think it was essential as you do.

Aquinas believed creation was accomplished in an instant, not a day. Athanasis makes an apologetic defense for Creation 'against the world' and your twisting of the facts will not change that. Creation is essential Christian doctrine, not just in Genesis 1 but everywhere it's mentioned in the New Testament. The Nicene Creed, John 1, Romans 1, Hebrews 1 all emphasis creation as essential and foundational. Where are your proof texts for Darwinian evolution?

The question isn't how they understood creation but whether they interpreted Genesis literally as Creationists insist. They didn't.

He was right, trying to predict eclipses based on the Scriptures is stupid. Creation and original sin on the other hand he held as essential doctrine. Your equivocating again.

No not equivocating. Augustine and Aquinas didn't just criticise one specific instance where people spoke nonsense about known science based on their interpretation of scripture. They said that said that any time Christians stood their bible interpretation against established science was disgraceful and dangerous, and that any interpretation that is contradicted by a new scientific development was never what the scripture meant. As my Aquinas quote said. I am afraid the only equivocation here is your equivocation of Creation and a literal interpretation of Genesis.

This rationalization has no bearing on Creation as essential doctrine. It's not hard to understand, it's hard to believe but you must be a Creationist in order to be a Christian, Augustine and Aquinas both were and Christians still are.

The literal interpretation of Genesis was never essential doctrine. And if you are right that that you have to be a Creationist to be a Christians, because there were no Christians before 1859 when On the Origin of Species was published. Kind of makes our quoting the Nicene creed, Augustine and Aquinas is irrelevant doesn't it.

The Epicureans were the atheistic materialists of his day. They rejected the natural conclusion of most people of an Intelligent Designer. Who is opposed to Intelligent Design, even militantly antagonistic today?

Don't conflate belief in an intelligent Creator who makes all things according to his plan and purpose, with the Intelligent Design[sup]®[/sup] movement whose purpose is to show God didn't use evolution.

Bara is used three times in Genesis 1:27, your grasping at straws.

You're not answering my point.

Creation in the sense of 'Bara' only has God as the subject and you know it.

Of course I do, I never denied it. What you are doing here is a bait and switch between your claim bara is ex nihilo, and bara meaning a work of God. And you haven't addressed my point.

Creation is defined by the Scriptures, not Oxford press.

The words 'Creationism' and 'Creationist' are. Not because the OED can make up any meaning they like, but because they are the ones who do the research to see where words originate and how they are used.

I had no idea you were an expert on exegetical studies. If you are then you will have no problem coming to the same conclusion Vine, Unger and White did with regards to the meaning of 'bara' because they were. It's not that hard to understand, it is very hard to equivocate with naturalistic assumptions, in fact it's impossible.

You don't know that Unger and White are the ones who wrote about bara in Vine's Dictionary. You do not know how far off Vine's Hebrew would have to be before they stepped in and edited an entry he wrote. You do know that Vine was not a Hebrew expert. I have shown you in one of the introductions to Vines Dictionary where F.F. Bruce said Vine wasn't, and that he never claimed to be, a Hebrew expert. You are still clinging to Vine's non expert, beginners Dictionary and ignoring all the expert scholarly works because Vine says what you want hear. Even if you could show that Unger or White claimed bara meant ex nihilo in one of their own books, it would still be a disputed meaning for bara and not one widely accepted by Hebrew experts. But you haven't even got that you just have the non expert Vine's opinion and you assume Unger or White would have changed it if it was wrong.

You've never been able to manage a substantive point. It's not because you can't but because you simply refuse.

Preach the word; be prepared in season and out of season; correct, rebuke and encourage—with great patience and careful instruction. For the time will come when people will not put up with sound doctrine. Instead, to suit their own desires, they will gather around them a great number of teachers to say what their itching ears want to hear. They will turn their ears away from the truth and turn aside to myths.(II Tim. 4:2-4)​

Is my supposed lack of substantive points the reason you keep having to change the subject? You keep basing your argument on the idea bara has to mean ex nihilo, when I have shown you that scholarly Hebrew Lexicons simply do not support the claim. Instead you keep keep quoting Vine as though he was not only a Hebrew expert but the definitive source of all Hebrew meanings. Vine is a great teacher in many ways, but he wasn't a Hebrew scholar, and you only choose him as your Hebrew teacher because he suits your desires.

Creation is sound doctrine and Darwinism has always been little more then mythography. Who is the Muse of Darwinism?

BY firm immutable immortal laws
Impress'd on Nature by the GREAT FIRST CAUSE,
Say, MUSE! how rose from elemental strife
Organic forms, and kindled into life;​

(The Temple of Nature, By Erasmus Darwin)

Have a nice day
Mark

Yes Charles Darwin's grandad fancied himself a poet, but that is not the reason scientists adopted and developed Charles Darwin's theory of evolution. They did it because the scientific evidence fits. Your calling evolution a myth says more about your desires and wishful thinking than anything else.

 

[mark kennedy]

Darwin wrote one long argument against creation and his grand father wrote one long myth about evolution, it's a hymn of praise to Artemise.

"PRIESTESS OF NATURE! while with pious awe
Thy votary bends, the mystic veil withdraw;
Charm after charm, succession bright, display,
And give the GODDESS to adoring day!
So kneeling realms shall own the Power divine,
And heaven and earth pour incense on her shrine​

(Erasmus Darwin, Temple of Nature)

I have shown you from the Oxford English Dictionary that the words Creationism and Creationist meant a rejection of evolution and that the term has only been around since we had evolutionary science for Genesis literalists to reject. Playing your games with the definition of evolution doesn't change that, nor does conflating creation with a rejection of the Genesis literalist idea of 'special creation' and 'creation science', Darwin never rejected Creation or the possibility of a Creator. Now could you please explain how Creationism has always been around when the word describes a nineteenth century reaction against evolutionary biology?

First of all, the Oxford Dictionary does not define Creation as essential Christian doctrine. Secondly, Creation Science is an apologetic defense against Darwinism, evolution as it is defined scientifically isn't the issue. Most importantly, Genesis is taken literally for the same reason the Gospels are taken literally, it's because it's an historical narrative and not just any history but redemptive history. Creationism has never rejected evolution, it rejects Darwinism, it rejects the a priori assumption of universal common descent by exclusively naturalistic means. It's an evidential apologetic defense 'against the world', just like the one Athanasius wrote.

The word 'Creation' is an English translation representing at least thee different Hebrew words. Bara is used of the creation of the universe, life and man explicitly with a special emphasis put on the creation of Adam. All the early church fathers as well as the New Testament writers who mention Adam regarded him as the source of sin as death because he was the first parent of humanity

Prefered by some, but it certainly wasn't preferred by Athanasius, Origen, Augustine, Duns Scotus, Abelaard or Aquinas. Even the chruch fathers who preferred it didn't think it was essential as you do.

The church fathers took Adam quite literally, the creation of the universe and life was never a question, unless you were an Epicurean in the time of Athanasius. Agustine and Aquinas were bot creationists and all the early Church Fathers took Genesis literally:

But this man [of whom I have been speaking] is Adam, if truth be told, the first-formed man....WE, however, are all FROM him; and as WE are FROM him, WE have INHERITED his title [of sin]. (ST. IRENAEUS (c. 180 AD))

"Because by a man came death, by a man also comes resurrection" [1 Cor 15:21]. Here, by the word MAN, who consists of a body, as we have often shown already, I understand that it is a fact that Christ had a body. (TERTULLIAN c. 200 AD)

IN ADAM ALL DIE, and THUS the world FALLS PROSTRATE and requires to be SET UP AGAIN, so that in Christ all may be made to live [1 Cor 15:22] (ORIGEN c. 244 AD)

EXCEPT THAT, BORN OF THE FLESH ACCORDING TO ADAM, HE HAS CONTRACTED THE CONTAGION OF THAT OLD DEATH FROM HIS FIRST BEING BORN. For this very reason does he approach more easily to receive the REMISSION OF SINS: because the SINS FORGIVEN HIM are NOT his OWN but THOSE OF ANOTHER [i.e. inherited from Adam]. (ST. CYPRIAN OF CARTHAGE c. 250 AD)

Man too was CREATED WITHOUT CORRUPTION....But when it came about that he transgressed the commandment, he suffered a terrible and destructive fall and was reduced to a state of death. (ST. METHODIUS OF PHILIPPI c. 300 AD)

For the Spirit is ABSENT from all those who are BORN OF THE FLESH, until they come to the WATER OF RE-BIRTH; and then they receive the Holy Spirit [cf. John 3:5; Acts 2:38]. Indeed, in the first birth they are born possessed of an animal spirit, which is created within man, nor afterwards does it ever die, for it is written: "Adam became a living soul" [cf. Gen 2:7; 1 Cor 15:45]. (APHRAATES THE PERSIAN SAGE c. 340 AD)

Adam, the first man, altered his course, and through sin death came into the world....When Adam transgressed, SIN reached out TO ALL MEN.
(ST. ATHANASIUS c. 360 AD)

In a similar way Adam, IN WHOM ALL DIE [1 Cor 15:22], besides being an example for imitation to those who willfully transgress the commandment of the Lord, by the hidden depravity of his own carnal concupiscence, depraved in his own person all those who come from his stock...."Through one man," the Apostle says, "sin entered the world, through sin death" [Rom 5:12]. (ST. AUGUSTINE c. 354 - 430 AD)​

On the doctrine of Original Sin - Church Fathers

The question isn't how they understood creation but whether they interpreted Genesis literally as Creationists insist. They didn't.

They did take it literally as did all the New Testament writers who spoke if it, especially Paul and even Peter and Jude spoke of the Flood as global judgement. Genesis is an historical narrative, should I take Abraham, Isaac and Jacob figuratively because it's unpopular to think of them as literal?

No not equivocating. Augustine and Aquinas didn't just criticise one specific instance where people spoke nonsense about known science based on their interpretation of scripture. They said that said that any time Christians stood their bible interpretation against established science was disgraceful and dangerous, and that any interpretation that is contradicted by a new scientific development was never what the scripture meant. As my Aquinas quote said. I am afraid the only equivocation here is your equivocation of Creation and a literal interpretation of Genesis.

Augustine and Aquinas both took Genesis literally, they believed God created life and man on the sixth day and that it didn't take all day for God to do it. It is disgraceful and dangerous to demean the Scripture either to pacify atheistic materialists like the Epicureans or to make it a source book for astronomy. Both extremes are dangerous, erroneous and without Biblical or Scientific veracity. Equivocating evolution with Darwinism being a prime example.

The literal interpretation of Genesis was never essential doctrine. And if you are right that that you have to be a Creationist to be a Christians, because there were no Christians before 1859 when On the Origin of Species was published. Kind of makes our quoting the Nicene creed, Augustine and Aquinas is irrelevant doesn't it.

Genesis has always been and always will be understood by Christian scholarship as an historical narrative and you know it. You must be a Creationist in order to be a Christian, it's one of two prerequisites the other is original sin. The doctrine of creation is inextricably linked to essential doctrine, it's transcendent and it's foundational. That's why atheistic materialists attack it exclusively or at least they used to.

Don't conflate belief in an intelligent Creator who makes all things according to his plan and purpose, with the Intelligent Design[sup]®[/sup] movement whose purpose is to show God didn't use evolution.
You're not answering my point.

Epicureans rejected Intelligent Design and Athanasius rightfully defended the doctrine of Creation against them. They were the Darwinians of his day. He defended essential doctrine 'against the world' as Christians are still doing in our time.

Of course I do, I never denied it. What you are doing here is a bait and switch between your claim bara is ex nihilo, and bara meaning a work of God. And you haven't addressed my point.

No I'm not, I'm defending essential Christian doctrine from the canon of Scripture.

The words 'Creationism' and 'Creationist' are. Not because the OED can make up any meaning they like, but because they are the ones who do the research to see where words originate and how they are used.

Bara and the doctrine of creation originated from the Hebrew.

You don't know that Unger and White are the ones who wrote about bara in Vine's Dictionary. You do not know how far off Vine's Hebrew would have to be before they stepped in and edited an entry he wrote. You do know that Vine was not a Hebrew expert. I have shown you in one of the introductions to Vines Dictionary where F.F. Bruce said Vine wasn't, and that he never claimed to be, a Hebrew expert. You are still clinging to Vine's non expert, beginners Dictionary and ignoring all the expert scholarly works because Vine says what you want hear. Even if you could show that Unger or White claimed bara meant ex nihilo in one of their own books, it would still be a disputed meaning for bara and not one widely accepted by Hebrew experts. But you haven't even got that you just have the non expert Vine's opinion and you assume Unger or White would have changed it if it was wrong.

You want to deride and deprecate Christian scholarship on matters you don't, but should understand. The Oxford Dictionary on the other hand is perfectly trustworthy but experts on exegetical studies you shamelessly disparage. Your interpreting a Biblical doctrine and an historical narrative based on superficial semantics which neglecting the clear mean of Scripture and detailed analysis from credible Christian scholarship.

If you have a sound exegesis of the Genesis account let's see it, but wait, you don't do that. You don't have to make the slightest effort to produce your own positive argument, all you have to do is undermine the credibility of others.

Is my supposed lack of substantive points the reason you keep having to change the subject? You keep basing your argument on the idea bara has to mean ex nihilo, when I have shown you that scholarly Hebrew Lexicons simply do not support the claim. Instead you keep keep quoting Vine as though he was not only a Hebrew expert but the definitive source of all Hebrew meanings. Vine is a great teacher in many ways, but he wasn't a Hebrew scholar, and you only choose him as your Hebrew teacher because he suits your desires.

The NAS Old Testament Hebrew Lexicon using the Brown, Driver, Briggs, Gesenius Lexicon all break the word down the same way. Lexicons, as I already told you and you already know, simply identify the literal meaning and grammatical constructions

Definition
(Strong's H1254 בָּרָא bara') to create, shape, form
(Qal) to shape, fashion, create (always with God as subject): of heaven and earth: of individual man, of new conditions and circumstances, of transformations
(Niphal) to be created: of heaven and earth,of birth of something new, of miracles
(Piel) to cut down or to cut out
(Hiphil) to make yourselves fat
[bless and do not curse]
[bless and do not curse]NAS Word Usage - Total: 53
brings about[bless and do not curse]1, clear[bless and do not curse]2, create[bless and do not curse]6, created[bless and do not curse]32, creates[bless and do not curse]1, creating[bless and do not curse]3, Creator[bless and do not curse]4, cut them down[bless and do not curse]1, make[bless and do not curse]2, produced[bless and do not curse]1 (The Hebrew lexicon is Brown, Driver, Briggs, Gesenius Lexicon this is keyed to the "Theological Word Book of the Old Testament.")

Yes Charles Darwin's grandad fancied himself a poet, but that is not the reason scientists adopted and developed Charles Darwin's theory of evolution. They did it because the scientific evidence fits. Your calling evolution a myth says more about your desires and wishful thinking than anything else.

Charles Darwin, his grand father, his father and his brother were all atheists. Darwin wrote one long argument against creation and his grand father wrote one long myth about evolution, it's a hymn of praise to Artemise.

V. "ORGANIC LIFE beneath the shoreless waves
Was born and nurs'd in Ocean's pearly caves;
First forms minute, unseen by spheric glass,
Move on the mud, or pierce the watery mass;
These, as successive generations bloom
New powers acquire, and larger limbs assume;
Whence countless groups of vegetation spring,
And breathing realms of fin, and feet, and wing​

(Erasmus Darwin, The Temple of Nature)

Have a nice day
Mark

 

[Assyrian]

Darwin wrote one long argument against creation and his grand father wrote one long myth about evolution, it's a hymn of praise to Artemise.

"PRIESTESS OF NATURE! while with pious awe
Thy votary bends, the mystic veil withdraw;
Charm after charm, succession bright, display,
And give the GODDESS to adoring day!
So kneeling realms shall own the Power divine,
And heaven and earth pour incense on her shrine​

(Erasmus Darwin, Temple of Nature)

I addressed your Erasmus Darwin point at the end of my last post. Look down to the end of you post I see you didn't answer my point.

First of all, the Oxford Dictionary does not define Creation as essential Christian doctrine.

There is a difference between defining a Christian doctrine and telling us what a word in English means. I see you are still switching from 'Creationist' to 'Creation', which shows you simply cannot answer my point. The word 'Creationist' means a person who opposed biological evolution because of their literal interpretation of Genesis. Creationists and Creationism have only been around since the middle of the nineteenth century so it is ludicrous to claim Creationism is an essential Christian doctrine. And since Creationists and Creationism are different from Creation it is equivocation when you conflate the two, a logical fallacy you keep repeating even though you have shown yourself unable to defend it.

Secondly, Creation Science is an apologetic defense against Darwinism, evolution as it is defined scientifically isn't the issue. Most importantly,

I agree, it is an unnecessary and mistaken apologetic defence, but an apologetic defence none the less. I also agree that the fact it tries to use science isn't the issue. But if it isn't an issue, why bring it up here?

Genesis is taken literally for the same reason the Gospels are taken literally, it's because it's an historical narrative and not just any history but redemptive history. Creationism has never rejected evolution, it rejects Darwinism, it rejects the a priori assumption of universal common descent by exclusively naturalistic means. It's an evidential apologetic defense 'against the world', just like the one Athanasius wrote.

Literalists assume Genesis is a historical narrative and so they take it literally the same as the gospels. Your false distinction between evolution and Darwinism bears no resemblance to the development of evolutionary biology. Creationists do not accept evolution if you rejects parts of science because of your religious interpretation you are rejecting science. You either follow the scientific evidence or you don't.

The word 'Creation' is an English translation representing at least thee different Hebrew words. Bara is used of the creation of the universe, life and man explicitly with a special emphasis put on the creation of Adam. All the early church fathers as well as the New Testament writers who mention Adam regarded him as the source of sin as death because he was the first parent of humanity

And Creationist is a word in English from the nineteenth to describe Genesis literalists who rejected evolution because they thought they knew better then.

The church fathers took Adam quite literally, the creation of the universe and life was never a question, unless you were an Epicurean in the time of Athanasius. Agustine and Aquinas were bot creationists and all the early Church Fathers took Genesis literally:

...

In a similar way Adam, IN WHOM ALL DIE [1 Cor 15:22], besides being an example for imitation to those who willfully transgress the commandment of the Lord, by the hidden depravity of his own carnal concupiscence, depraved in his own person all those who come from his stock...."Through one man," the Apostle says, "sin entered the world, through sin death" [Rom 5:12]. (ST. AUGUSTINE c. 354 - 430 AD)​

On the doctrine of Original Sin - Church Fathers

Doesn't change the fact that the Church Fathers and scholars I mentioned didn't take Genesis 1 literally, or that even the ones who took it literally had no problems with other Christians taking it figuratively.

They did take it literally

Wherefore those things were announced first, from which came those that were second, all things being originated together from one essence by one power. For the will of God was one, in one identity. And how could creation take place in time, seeing time was born along with things which exist.
Clement of Alexandria Stromata

'The text said that "there was evening and there was morning", it did not say "the first day", but said "one day". It is because there was not yet time before the world existed. but time begins to exist with the following days. For the second day and he third and fourth and all the rest being to designate time'.
Origen, Homily 1

'What man of intelligence, I ask, will consider a reasonable statement that the first and second and third day, in which there are said to be both morning and evening, existed without sun and moon and stars, while the first day was even without a heaven? And who could be found so silly as to believe that God after the manner of a farmer, “planted trees in a paradise eastward in Eden”… And… when God is said to walk in the paradise in the evening…I do not think anyone will doubt that these are figurative expressions which indicate certain mysteries through a semblance of history…’
Origen, First Principles 4:3.

‘God created all things simultaneously at the beginning of the ages, creating some in their substance and others in pre-existing causes’
Augustine, The Literal Meaning of Genesis, 7:42

‘The day in the account of creation, or those days that are numbers according to its recurrence, are beyond the experience and knowledge of us mortal earth-bound men. And if we are able to make any effort towards understanding of those days, we ought not to rush forward with an ill-considered opinion, as if no other reasonable and plausible interpretation could be offered.’
Augustine, The Literal Meaning of Genesis, 4:44

I answer that, The expression "morning" and "evening" knowledge was devised by Augustine; who interprets the six days wherein God made all things, not as ordinary days measured by the solar circuit, since the sun was only made on the fourth day, but as one day, namely, the day of angelic knowledge as directed to six classes of things. As in the ordinary day, morning is the beginning, and evening the close of day, so, their knowledge of the primordial being of things is called morning knowledge; and this is according as things exist in the Word. But their knowledge of the very being of the thing created, as it stands in its own nature, is termed evening knowledge; because the being of things flows from the Word, as from a kind of primordial principle; and this flow is terminated in the being which they have in themselves.
Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica
​

as did all the New Testament writers who spoke if it, especially Paul and even Peter and Jude spoke of the Flood as global judgement. Genesis is an historical narrative, should I take Abraham, Isaac and Jacob figuratively because it's unpopular to think of them as literal?

What has that got to do with taking the creation accounts literally?

Augustine and Aquinas both took Genesis literally,

they believed God created life and man on the sixth day and that it didn't take all day for God to do it. It is disgraceful and dangerous to demean the Scripture either to pacify atheistic materialists like the Epicureans or to make it a source book for astronomy. Both extremes are dangerous, erroneous and without Biblical or Scientific veracity. Equivocating evolution with Darwinism being a prime example.

You haven't addressed their points that rejecting science because of your interpretation of the bible is disgraceful and dangerous and brings the gospel into disrepute. It is ok if you disagree with them. I disagree with them over Original Sin. Just admit that is what you are doing.

Genesis has always been and always will be understood by Christian scholarship as an historical narrative and you know it. You must be a Creationist in order to be a Christian, it's one of two prerequisites the other is original sin. The doctrine of creation is inextricably linked to essential doctrine, it's transcendent and it's foundational. That's why atheistic materialists attack it exclusively or at least they used to.

No attempt to address my point

Epicureans rejected Intelligent Design and Athanasius rightfully defended the doctrine of Creation against them. They were the Darwinians of his day. He defended essential doctrine 'against the world' as Christians are still doing in our time.

No attempt to address my point there either.

No I'm not, I'm defending essential Christian doctrine from the canon of Scripture.

Just because you think you are defending an essential Christian doctrine does mean you aren't using a bait and switch between you claim bara always means ex nihilo, which I have shown is wrong, and bara in the sense of create always having God as the subject which I completely agree with. Of course claiming you are 'defending and essential Christian doctrine' is another bait and switch.

Bara and the doctrine of creation originated from the Hebrew.

Which has nothing to do with the fact Creationism and Creationist originated in English to describe literals who rejected evolution. You are still conflating Creationsm and Creation, do you have a single argument in you defence?

You want to deride and deprecate Christian scholarship on matters you don't, but should understand.

This from someone who ignrores all the scholarly Hebrew lexicons you have been shown in favour of a beginners dictionary written by a non expert in Hebrew because you prefers what it says.

The Oxford Dictionary on the other hand is perfectly trustworthy but experts on exegetical studies you shamelessly disparage.

You are right about the OED, it is the standard lexical work on the English, Vine no matter how much you want to rephrase it, wasn't a Hebrew expert.

Your interpreting a Biblical doctrine and an historical narrative based on superficial semantics which neglecting the clear mean of Scripture and detailed analysis from credible Christian scholarship.

You are the one using superficial semantics conflating Creationism with Creation to try to claim Creationism is an essential Christian doctrine. I have exposed you superficial semantics with a proper understanding of the words you conflate. I challenge you claims about what has been essential historical Christian doctrine by showing you what church father and scholars through the ages actually believed. However I base my biblical doctrine on scripture and the best Hebrew scholarship I have access to. Do you do that or do you pick the beginners book by a non expert that tells you what you want to hear?

If you have a sound exegesis of the Genesis account let's see it, but wait, you don't do that. You don't have to make the slightest effort to produce your own positive argument, all you have to do is undermine the credibility of others.

I have often discussed the interpretation of Genesis with you. I don't know how you can be comfortable with yourself making claims like that.

The NAS Old Testament Hebrew Lexicon using the Brown, Driver, Briggs, Gesenius Lexicon all break the word down the same way. Lexicons, as I already told you and you already know, simply identify the literal meaning and grammatical constructions

Definition
(Strong's H1254 בָּרָא bara') to create, shape, form
(Qal) to shape, fashion, create (always with God as subject): of heaven and earth: of individual man, of new conditions and circumstances, of transformations
(Niphal) to be created: of heaven and earth,of birth of something new, of miracles
(Piel) to cut down or to cut out
(Hiphil) to make yourselves fat
[bless and do not curse]
[bless and do not curse]NAS Word Usage - Total: 53
brings about[bless and do not curse]1, clear[bless and do not curse]2, create[bless and do not curse]6, created[bless and do not curse]32, creates[bless and do not curse]1, creating[bless and do not curse]3, Creator[bless and do not curse]4, cut them down[bless and do not curse]1, make[bless and do not curse]2, produced[bless and do not curse]1 (The Hebrew lexicon is Brown, Driver, Briggs, Gesenius Lexicon this is keyed to the "Theological Word Book of the Old Testament.")

​

Did You notice when you copied all that, that BDB doesn't support your claim bara is ex nihilo?
​

Charles Darwin, his grand father, his father and his brother were all atheists. Darwin wrote one long argument against creation and his grand father wrote one long myth about evolution, it's a hymn of praise to Artemise.

V. "ORGANIC LIFE beneath the shoreless waves
Was born and nurs'd in Ocean's pearly caves;
First forms minute, unseen by spheric glass,
Move on the mud, or pierce the watery mass;
These, as successive generations bloom
New powers acquire, and larger limbs assume;
Whence countless groups of vegetation spring,
And breathing realms of fin, and feet, and wing​

(Erasmus Darwin, The Temple of Nature)

Have a nice day
Mark

None of that addresses my point.

 

[Smidlee]

This set of statistics appears farther down in the same poll as mentioned in the OP. It would seem that Creationism is strongly correlated with lack of an edumaction:

Or evolution and atheism is in correlation with the education system. Scientist seems to agree that even as children we are programmed to see design in nature. We have to be "brain washed" by our education system not to see design. Rather for good or for bad education is designed to make someone to think in a certain way... to brain washed you. This is why the war between evolution vs creation is fought the hardest at high schools and college. Evolutionist will even bring in the court in order to weed out any evolution "heretics".

This idea that it's harder to deceive someone with greater education has proven false in the last few years in USA (in the business realm). If anything the more educated are easier to deceive ... again because we are trained to think a certain way just like a soldier in the Army.

 

[mark kennedy]

I addressed your Erasmus Darwin point at the end of my last post. Look down to the end of you post I see you didn't answer my point.

I did address it, it just wasn't a very substantive point.

There is a difference between defining a Christian doctrine and telling us what a word in English means. I see you are still switching from 'Creationist' to 'Creation', which shows you simply cannot answer my point. The word 'Creationist' means a person who opposed biological evolution because of their literal interpretation of Genesis. Creationists and Creationism have only been around since the middle of the nineteenth century so it is ludicrous to claim Creationism is an essential Christian doctrine. And since Creationists and Creationism are different from Creation it is equivocation when you conflate the two, a logical fallacy you keep repeating even though you have shown yourself unable to defend it.

So Creationism is based on a literal reading of Genesis, which is an historical narrative and the creation events of Genesis define Creationism. Now, the evidential apologetic effort that has risen up to answer Darwinian evolution is contemporary because Darwinism is fairly new. Reading historical narratives like Genesis or the Gospels is nothing new, in fact, that's how Christians have always read them.

I agree, it is an unnecessary and mistaken apologetic defence, but an apologetic defence none the less. I also agree that the fact it tries to use science isn't the issue. But if it isn't an issue, why bring it up here?

Creation is a doctrinal issue, I think you know that.

Literalists assume Genesis is a historical narrative and so they take it literally the same as the gospels. Your false distinction between evolution and Darwinism bears no resemblance to the development of evolutionary biology. Creationists do not accept evolution if you rejects parts of science because of your religious interpretation you are rejecting science. You either follow the scientific evidence or you don't.

I take the creation account literally because I take the Creator literally. Creationists don't reject evolution, they reject Darwinian logic and the requisite naturalistic assumptions that have transposed into arguments of science, falsely so called.

And Creationist is a word in English from the nineteenth to describe Genesis literalists who rejected evolution because they thought they knew better then.

It's like 'literalist', you just made it up to define something, i.e. taking historical narratives literally. The word means what you define it as and Creation as doctrine is defined by the Scriptures.

Doesn't change the fact that the Church Fathers and scholars I mentioned didn't take Genesis 1 literally, or that even the ones who took it literally had no problems with other Christians taking it figuratively.

Yes they did take it literally, especially the creation of Adam and original sin. Not one of them ever suggested taking creation figuratively with the exception of a few who mentioned that 'day' could be taken figuratively. That's the whole problem with Darwinian logic, they want you to take it all or none. The truth is that the creation of Adam is a literal creation event and not one of the early church fathers denied that. What you doing is a fallacy called equivocation and it's a fatal flaw in your reasoning.

Wherefore those things were announced first, from which came those that were second, all things being originated together from one essence by one power. For the will of God was one, in one identity. And how could creation take place in time, seeing time was born along with things which exist.
Clement of Alexandria Stromata

That's the original creation, Genesis 1:1. There is no reference to time except to say that it was 'In the Beginning' which came to be the title of the book we call Genesis. I agree with the statement taken in context, your distortion of it is another matter.

'The text said that "there was evening and there was morning", it did not say "the first day", but said "one day". It is because there was not yet time before the world existed. but time begins to exist with the following days. For the second day and he third and fourth and all the rest being to designate time'.
Origen, Homily 1

Right, there is a difference between the creation of the universe and creation week that would follow.

'What man of intelligence, I ask, will consider a reasonable statement that the first and second and third day, in which there are said to be both morning and evening, existed without sun and moon and stars, while the first day was even without a heaven? And who could be found so silly as to believe that God after the manner of a farmer, “planted trees in a paradise eastward in Eden”… And… when God is said to walk in the paradise in the evening…I do not think anyone will doubt that these are figurative expressions which indicate certain mysteries through a semblance of history…’
Origen, First Principles 4:3.

Origen did take the word 'day' figuratively but not 'Adam'.

‘God created all things simultaneously at the beginning of the ages, creating some in their substance and others in pre-existing causes’
Augustine, The Literal Meaning of Genesis, 7:42

But simultaneously with time the world was made, if in the world's creation change and motion were created, as seems evident from the order of the first six or seven days. For in these days the morning and evening are counted, until, on the sixth day (The City of God (Book XI), Augustine)

And though all these things may not unsuitably be interpreted in a spiritual sense, yet “male and female” cannot be understood of two things in one man, as if there were in him one thing which rules, another which is ruled; but it is quite clear that they were created male and female, with bodies of different sexes, for the very purpose of begetting offspring, and so increasing, multiplying, and replenishing the earth; and it is great folly to oppose so plain a fact. The City of God, Book XIV, Augustine)

‘The day in the account of creation, or those days that are numbers according to its recurrence, are beyond the experience and knowledge of us mortal earth-bound men. And if we are able to make any effort towards understanding of those days, we ought not to rush forward with an ill-considered opinion, as if no other reasonable and plausible interpretation could be offered.’
Augustine, The Literal Meaning of Genesis, 4:44

There's a question in his mind as to the interpretation of days, not of a literal creation and certainly not the creation of Adam.

I answer that, The expression "morning" and "evening" knowledge was devised by Augustine; who interprets the six days wherein God made all things, not as ordinary days measured by the solar circuit, since the sun was only made on the fourth day, but as one day, namely, the day of angelic knowledge as directed to six classes of things. As in the ordinary day, morning is the beginning, and evening the close of day, so, their knowledge of the primordial being of things is called morning knowledge; and this is according as things exist in the Word. But their knowledge of the very being of the thing created, as it stands in its own nature, is termed evening knowledge; because the being of things flows from the Word, as from a kind of primordial principle; and this flow is terminated in the being which they have in themselves.
Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica

The sun was not made on the fourth day, it already existed along with the rest of the created universe. God made the light to shine, there is no 'bara' creation here. God separated the light from the dark, day from night:

Let there be lights in the firmament of the heaven to divide the day from the night; and let them be for signs, and for seasons, and for days, and years (Gen. 1:14)​

That's not the same as creating them from nothing, 'bara' isn't used here and God is creating the conditions by which the light of the sun, moon and stars could reach the surface of the earth. Everything in this narrative is from the surface of the earth, it's a literary feature.

You haven't addressed their points that rejecting science because of your interpretation of the bible is disgraceful and dangerous and brings the gospel into disrepute. It is ok if you disagree with them. I disagree with them over Original Sin. Just admit that is what you are doing.

I'm taking the Genesis account literally because it's an historical narrative, the Gospels literally because they are literal narratives and God as Creator literally because God literally exists. The rejection of 'original' sin is disgraceful and dangerous and your disagreement with them is anathema to Catholics.

If any one does not confess that the first man, Adam, when he had transgressed the commandment of God in Paradise, immediately lost the holiness and justice wherein he had been constituted; and that he incurred, through the offence of that prevarication, the wrath and indignation of God, and consequently death, with which God had previously threatened him, and, together with death, captivity under his power who thenceforth had the empire of death, that is to say, the devil, and that the entire Adam, through that offence of prevarication, was changed, in body and soul, for the worse; let him be anathema. (Council of Trent)​

I'm taking Adam as being our first parent literally, to do otherwise is dangerous and disgraceful. Essential doctrine is inextricably linked to original sin. According to the Council of Trent your disagreement with them is anathema.

Just because you think you are defending an essential Christian doctrine does mean you aren't using a bait and switch between you claim bara always means ex nihilo, which I have shown is wrong, and bara in the sense of create always having God as the subject which I completely agree with. Of course claiming you are 'defending and essential Christian doctrine' is another bait and switch.

No bait and switch, I define essential Christian doctrine from the Scriptures and the Gospel. Always have and always will.

Which has nothing to do with the fact Creationism and Creationist originated in English to describe literals who rejected evolution. You are still conflating Creationsm and Creation, do you have a single argument in you defence?

No Creationists do not reject evolution as defined scientifically. Creationists reject the 'apriori assumption of universal common descent by exclusively naturalistic means' because it's mutually exclusive with God being Creator. Your strawman argument is based on an equivocation of evolution as science and Darwinian naturalistic assumptions and an argument I have never made.

This from someone who ignrores all the scholarly Hebrew lexicons you have been shown in favour of a beginners dictionary written by a non expert in Hebrew because you prefers what it says.

I have quoted, cited and linked the Lexicon entry repeatedly and explained why the fuller explanation from a New Testament dictionary is called for. I ignored nothing and your unrelenting, fallacious personal attacks are pedantic rhetoric, nothing more.

You are right about the OED, it is the standard lexical work on the English, Vine no matter how much you want to rephrase it, wasn't a Hebrew expert.

You haven't even done a superficial exposition of the text, why would I need an expert, or a Lexicon to refute your baseless rationalizations? All you do is attack the credibility of others, dealing with fallacious arguments like that is as simple as pointing out the flaws your arguments are riddled with.

You are the one using superficial semantics conflating Creationism with Creation to try to claim Creationism is an essential Christian doctrine. I have exposed you superficial semantics with a proper understanding of the words you conflate. I challenge you claims about what has been essential historical Christian doctrine by showing you what church father and scholars through the ages actually believed. However I base my biblical doctrine on scripture and the best Hebrew scholarship I have access to. Do you do that or do you pick the beginners book by a non expert that tells you what you want to hear?

We've been over this, Creation as essential doctrine is defined by the Scriptures and the meaning of 'bara' is an act of God without precursors. It doesn't matter if Vine was an expert or not because nothing from other Lexicons contradict his definition, his definition simply expands on it. If you want to introduce a definition from a Hebrew expert be my guest.

I have often discussed the interpretation of Genesis with you. I don't know how you can be comfortable with yourself making claims like that.

You have discussed creation and Genesis 1 with me before and you've lost every argument. You can't support your claims and instead resort to fallacious rhetoric rather then substantive support for your claims. I'm perfectly comfortable confronting error on this level.

Did You notice when you copied all that, that BDB doesn't support your claim bara is ex nihilo?

Yes it did, it was just limited to a literal meaning and grammatical construction without a full exposition.

Well your back to talking in circles, again. Funny how one fallacy can give rise to so many at the same time.

Have a nice day
Mark

 

[Assyrian]

I did address it, it just wasn't a very substantive point.

Claiming it wasn't substantive isn't addressing it either.

So Creationism is based on a literal reading of Genesis, which is an historical narrative and the creation events of Genesis define Creationism. Now, the evidential apologetic effort that has risen up to answer Darwinian evolution is contemporary because Darwinism is fairly new. Reading historical narratives like Genesis or the Gospels is nothing new, in fact, that's how Christians have always read them.

That doesn't changes the fact that Creationism and Creationist are terms for people who reject evolution because of their interpretation Genesis, not just people who read Genesis literally.

Nor are you dealing with the major different between today's creationists and people like Basil who read Genesis literally themselves but saw no problem with other Christians interpreting it figuratively.

Creation is a doctrinal issue, I think you know that.

Of course it is. The issue is with you confusing the doctrine of Creation with Creationism. I think you know that, I said it to you often enough.

I take the creation account literally because I take the Creator literally.

Even when he speaks figuratively? Exodus 19:4 You yourselves have seen what I did to the Egyptians, and how I bore you on eagles' wings and brought you to myself. Or are you confusing literal with real?

Creationists don't reject evolution, they reject Darwinian logic and the requisite naturalistic assumptions that have transposed into arguments of science, falsely so called.

If you reject the parts of science you don't like, you are rejecting science, no matter how many other bits of science you do like. Evolution means the whole field of evolutionary biology, creationists many be ok with the allele frequency definition, but if they reject the rest of the field and its conclusions, they are rejecting evolution. Saying Creationist don't reject evolution is just playing word games.

It's like 'literalist', you just made it up to define something, i.e. taking historical narratives literally. The word means what you define it as and Creation as doctrine is defined by the Scriptures.

You are conflating Creation and Creationist again Mark. Of course Creation is a word that exited long before the English language and the Christian use, and the doctrine of Creation are taken from the bible. Creationism isn't in the bible and the word only existed since it was coined in the nineteenth century. I don't actually get to define the word literalist myself, I can only define words I make up myself, I cannot take a word that has already entered the English language and insist on a different meaning. Creationism is a word that comes from the nineteenth century and means the rejection of Evolution for religious reasons.

Yes they did take it literally, especially the creation of Adam and original sin. Not one of them ever suggested taking creation figuratively with the exception of a few who mentioned that 'day' could be taken figuratively. That's the whole problem with Darwinian logic, they want you to take it all or none. The truth is that the creation of Adam is a literal creation event and not one of the early church fathers denied that. What you doing is a fallacy called equivocation and it's a fatal flaw in your reasoning.

That's the original creation, Genesis 1:1. There is no reference to time except to say that it was 'In the Beginning' which came to be the title of the book we call Genesis. I agree with the statement taken in context, your distortion of it is another matter.

Right, there is a difference between the creation of the universe and creation week that would follow.

Origen did take the word 'day' figuratively but not 'Adam'.

Did you notice how one of my Origen quotes said:

And who could be found so silly as to believe that God after the manner of a farmer, “planted trees in a paradise eastward in Eden”… And… when God is said to walk in the paradise in the evening…I do not think anyone will doubt that these are figurative expressions which indicate certain mysteries through a semblance of history…’
Origen, First Principles 4.3
​

That is talking about God planting the garden in Genesis 2. Here is Augustine discussing God forming Adam out of clay.

That God made man with bodily hands from the clay is an excessively childish thought, so that if Scripture had said this, we should rather believe that the writer used a metaphorical term, than to suppose God is bounded by such lines of limbs as we see in our bodies.
Augustine, the Literal meaning of Genesis 6.12
​

Or how about Chrysostom discussing the formation of Eve.

See the condescendence of divine Scripture, what words it uses because of our weakness. 'And He took', it says, 'one of his ribs.' Do not take what is said in a human way, but understand that the crassness of the words fits human weakness."
Chrysostom, Homily on Genesis, 22.21
​

I agree they all believed Adam and Eve were real human beings, but they did not take the descriptions of how they were created literally.

But simultaneously with time the world was made, if in the world's creation change and motion were created, as seems evident from the order of the first six or seven days. For in these days the morning and evening are counted, until, on the sixth day (The City of God (Book XI), Augustine)

You should have read on a bit:

...all things which God then made were finished, and on the seventh the rest of God was mysteriously and sublimely signalized. What kind of days these were it is extremely difficult, or perhaps impossible for us to conceive, and how much more to say!
Augustine The City of God Book XI
​

Augustine wasn't talking about ordinary literal days.

And though all these things may not unsuitably be interpreted in a spiritual sense, yet “male and female” cannot be understood of two things in one man, as if there were in him one thing which rules, another which is ruled; but it is quite clear that they were created male and female, with bodies of different sexes, for the very purpose of begetting offspring, and so increasing, multiplying, and replenishing the earth; and it is great folly to oppose so plain a fact. The City of God, Book XIV, Augustine)

It isn't the things in Genesis that Augustine took literally that are the issue, but all the things he interpreted figuratively.

There's a question in his mind as to the interpretation of days, not of a literal creation and certainly not the creation of Adam.

As we have seen, Augustine didn't take the description of God forming Adam from mud literally either.

The sun was not made on the fourth day, it already existed along with the rest of the created universe. God made the light to shine, there is no 'bara' creation here. God separated the light from the dark, day from night:

Let there be lights in the firmament of the heaven to divide the day from the night; and let them be for signs, and for seasons, and for days, and years (Gen. 1:14)​

That's not the same as creating them from nothing, 'bara' isn't used here and God is creating the conditions by which the light of the sun, moon and stars could reach the surface of the earth. Everything in this narrative is from the surface of the earth, it's a literary feature.

The issue we were looking at with these quote was not whether bara was ex nihilo, but church fathers and scholars who interpreted Genesis figuratively. You are playing change the subject again.

I'm taking the Genesis account literally because it's an historical narrative, the Gospels literally because they are literal narratives and God as Creator literally because God literally exists. The rejection of 'original' sin is disgraceful and dangerous and your disagreement with them is anathema to Catholics.

If any one does not confess that the first man, Adam, when he had transgressed the commandment of God in Paradise, immediately lost the holiness and justice wherein he had been constituted; and that he incurred, through the offence of that prevarication, the wrath and indignation of God, and consequently death, with which God had previously threatened him, and, together with death, captivity under his power who thenceforth had the empire of death, that is to say, the devil, and that the entire Adam, through that offence of prevarication, was changed, in body and soul, for the worse; let him be anathema. (Council of Trent)​

I'm taking Adam as being our first parent literally, to do otherwise is dangerous and disgraceful. Essential doctrine is inextricably linked to original sin. According to the Council of Trent your disagreement with them is anathema.

Bear in mind, that quote was in reply to my point:

You haven't addressed their points that rejecting science because of your interpretation of the bible is disgraceful and dangerous and brings the gospel into disrepute. It is ok if you disagree with them. I disagree with them over Original Sin. Just admit that is what you are doing.
​

Looks like all you can do is change the subject.

No bait and switch, I define essential Christian doctrine from the Scriptures and the Gospel. Always have and always will.

I am sure you think you do, but stating it does not answer the point I made which was on a completely different subject.

Assyrian on bara and ex nihilo

Sure it is emphatic, but it is emphasising the meaning of bara, that the forming of Adam was a work of God according to his plan and purpose. You can say the repetition was for emphasis, don't get to say the repetition was to emphasise an idea you want to read into bara. We get the meaning of bara from how it was used throughout the OT, where it is used for people who are born naturally like the blacksmith, nations like Israel and the Ammonites, it is used for earthquakes, darkness, shrubs and trees. bara can be used for ex nihilo creation, but it is also used very often for things that are happen naturally.
​

Mark changes the subject to bara only used of God

Creation in the sense of 'Bara' only has God as the subject and you know it.​

Assyrian points out Mark changing the subject

Of course I do, I never denied it. What you are doing here is a bait and switch between your claim bara is ex nihilo, and bara meaning a work of God. And you haven't addressed my point.
​

Mark changes the subject again.

No I'm not, I'm defending essential Christian doctrine from the canon of Scripture.
​

If you had a decent argument you wouldn't have to keep switching topics

Which has nothing to do with the fact Creationism and Creationist originated in English to describe literals who rejected evolution. You are still conflating Creationsm and Creation, do you have a single argument in you defence?

No Creationists do not reject evolution as defined scientifically. Creationists reject the 'apriori assumption of universal common descent by exclusively naturalistic means' because it's mutually exclusive with God being Creator. Your strawman argument is based on an equivocation of evolution as science and Darwinian naturalistic assumptions and an argument I have never made.

Changing the subject again.

I have quoted, cited and linked the Lexicon entry repeatedly and explained why the fuller explanation from a New Testament dictionary is called for. I ignored nothing and your unrelenting, fallacious personal attacks are pedantic rhetoric, nothing more.

You have quoted a series of scholarly lexicons, which leaves without excuse for ignoring what they say.

You haven't even done a superficial exposition of the text, why would I need an expert, or a Lexicon to refute your baseless rationalizations? All you do is attack the credibility of others, dealing with fallacious arguments like that is as simple as pointing out the flaws your arguments are riddled with.

I have shown you how bara is used throughout the OT and instead of attacking the credibility Of vine I have simply told you what F.F. Bruce said about Vine in one of the introductions to Vine's dictionary, that vine never claimed expertise in Hebrew. How am I attacking his credibility when Vine himself disagrees with the claims you are trying to make about him.

We've been over this, Creation as essential doctrine is defined by the Scriptures and the meaning of 'bara' is an act of God without precursors. It doesn't matter if Vine was an expert or not because nothing from other Lexicons contradict his definition, his definition simply expands on it. If you want to introduce a definition from a Hebrew expert be my guest.

Aren't Gesesiius BDB and HALOT enough? You don't get to make up any meanings for bara and say it isn't contradicted by the lexicons, you need scholarly Lexicons to support you claims that bara is ex nihilo. They don't say that because that is not the meaning of the word.

You have discussed creation and Genesis 1 with me before and you've lost every argument. You can't support your claims and instead resort to fallacious rhetoric rather then substantive support for you claims. I'm perfectly comfortable confronting error on this level.

So you are withdrawing your claim I don't discuss Genesis? That is great, can you try to remember that and not make the claim again?

AFAICR most of our discussions end up with you giving up and not responding, though there was one where I missed your last reply and only found it much later. Even in this discussion, most points end up with you changing the subject because you cannot address the points I make.

Did You notice when you copied all that, that BDB doesn't support your claim bara is ex nihilo?

Yes it did, it was just limited to a literal meaning and grammatical construction without a full exposition.

How is that BDB supporting your claim bara is ex nihilo?

 

[Papias]

mark wrote:

I kind of agree that is one factor. One of the main issues in the culture war was gay activism. When Proposition 8 went back to the Federal court I figured that was the end of the culture war. The whole creation/evolution thing was over in Dover when the Intelligent Designer was recognized by the court to be God using the Lemon test. Abortion on demand appears to be here to stay and now I think Christians are drifting away from political activism.

May I ask for clarification on something you've said?

You've said that "the culture wars are over", and explained a bit as above. Below are my rephrases of what I've understood, so I'm just asking if you agree with the statements below:

Culture war fronts:

Gay marriage: The conservative position against gay marriage has lost, gay marriage acceptance is becoming (already is in many places) the norm.

Abortion: You stated that abortion on demand is here to stay, so that sounded to me like the anti- abortion position is becoming less tenable, so the conservative position has lost.

Evolution: Evolution is becoming the norm, since you stated that at the Dover trial even the sanitized version of UCA denial (ID) lost. So again it seems like you are saying there that the conservative position lost. But earlier you stated that (YEC) creationism was going up. Could you clarify you position on that last point?

Thanks-

Papias

 

[mark kennedy]

Claiming it wasn't substantive isn't addressing it either.

Claiming it wasn't answered doesn't make it substantive.

That doesn't changes the fact that Creationism and Creationist are terms for people who reject evolution because of their interpretation Genesis, not just people who read Genesis literally.

Notice your range is now expanded from Genesis 1 to Genesis itself. See how that works? Evolution has to be defined, creation has to be defined and Genesis has to be understand as it was originally intended in the literary context it was written in. I've elaborated at length as to how to discern the differences between definitions and how they are equivocated and you just continue to repeat erroneous arguments. Evolution is not the issue and how creation and creationism have specific contexts. I won't continue to chase you arguments in circles. Your definitions are bogus.

Nor are you dealing with the major different between today's creationists and people like Basil who read Genesis literally themselves but saw no problem with other Christians interpreting it figuratively.

Sometimes and certain words, 'days' and 'Adam' are two different issues as I have already shown you conclusively.

Of course it is. The issue is with you confusing the doctrine of Creation with Creationism. I think you know that, I said it to you often enough.

Chanting it like a mantra doesn't make it substantive. Talking in circles around the clear testimony of Scripture and neglecting the real work of an exegetical study isn't substantive. Creation is an English word that is translated from at least three Hebrew words, sometimes used interchangeably. Certain forms of 'bara' and in certain contexts render it an ex nihilo

Ex nihilo is a Latin phrase meaning "out of nothing". It often appears in conjunction with the concept of creation, as in creatio ex nihilo, meaning "creation out of nothing"...Biblical scholars and theologians within the Judaeo-Christian tradition such as Augustine (Confessions) John Calvin (^ "Commentaries on The First Book of Moses Called Genesis), John Wesley (Notes On The First Book Of Moses Called Genesis)[13] and Matthew Henry (Commentary) cite Genesis 1:1 in support of the idea of Divine creation out of nothing. Ex nihilo​

The same word used for Creation in Genesis 1:1 is used of the creation of life (Gen. 1:21) and three times it's used of the creation of man (Gen. 1:27). The natural revelation of God has already made this plain to you and I have elaborated on this at length, there is no chance you have missed it. It's not that you don't understand, it's that you prefer naturalistic explanations in some mystical blend with divine micromanaging. That may well be the case in some instances and certain other miracles but with regards to the origin of the universe, life and man there is one explanation, God alone.

Even when he speaks figuratively? Exodus 19:4 You yourselves have seen what I did to the Egyptians, and how I bore you on eagles' wings and brought you to myself. Or are you confusing literal with real?

Now your conflating figurative language with literal narratives. It's another equivocation, when using figurative language the Scriptures usually have an 'as' or 'like'. Sometimes it's explicit as with the parables and visions and sometimes it's implicit as with the eagles wings. In the case of creation there is no figurative language used, in fact, 'bara' is an explicit word indicating God acting by divine fiat not in concert with naturalistic processes.

If you reject the parts of science you don't like, you are rejecting science, no matter how many other bits of science you do like. Evolution means the whole field of evolutionary biology, creationists many be ok with the allele frequency definition, but if they reject the rest of the field and its conclusions, they are rejecting evolution. Saying Creationist don't reject evolution is just playing word games.

You making the words 'science', 'evolution', and 'creation' mean whatever you like. Your equivocating completely different meanings. I have defined my terms explicitly making distinctions between the genuine article of science and Darwinism, Creation and Creation Science and evolution as it is defined scientifically.

You have done none of that instead you argue in circles around fallacious arguments that have nothing to do with science and are useless for a sound exposition of Scripture.

You are conflating Creation and Creationist again Mark.

Around around he goes....does arguing this in circles make you dizzy?

Of course Creation is a word that exited long before the English language and the Christian use, and the doctrine of Creation are taken from the bible. Creationism isn't in the bible and the word only existed since it was coined in the nineteenth century. I don't actually get to define the word literalist myself, I can only define words I make up myself, I cannot take a word that has already entered the English language and insist on a different meaning. Creationism is a word that comes from the nineteenth century and means the rejection of Evolution for religious reasons.

Do you know who Francis Bacon is? Did you know he argued against Creationism? He called it a natural theology. Do you have the slightest idea why Francis Bacon's work is foundational to the Scientific Revolution?

I've had quite enough of this, one more circular argument is all it's going to take.

Did you notice how one of my Origen quotes said:

And who could be found so silly as to believe that God after the manner of a farmer, “planted trees in a paradise eastward in Eden”… And… when God is said to walk in the paradise in the evening…I do not think anyone will doubt that these are figurative expressions which indicate certain mysteries through a semblance of history…’
Origen, First Principles 4.3​

He never said that about the creation of life or man.

That is talking about God planting the garden in Genesis 2. Here is Augustine discussing God forming Adam out of clay.

That God made man with bodily hands from the clay is an excessively childish thought, so that if Scripture had said this, we should rather believe that the writer used a metaphorical term, than to suppose God is bounded by such lines of limbs as we see in our bodies.
Augustine, the Literal meaning of Genesis 6.12​

You've done this before, specifically with Romans 5. Your cry of 'it's figurative' when it failed then you just repeated it. When some of the passages in Genesis are taken figuratively occasionally you want to make the whole thing a myth and a metaphor. Sound exegesis doesn't work that way and certainly, sound doctrine will never be the result.

Or how about Chrysostom discussing the formation of Eve.

See the condescendence of divine Scripture, what words it uses because of our weakness. 'And He took', it says, 'one of his ribs.' Do not take what is said in a human way, but understand that the crassness of the words fits human weakness."
Chrysostom, Homily on Genesis, 22.21
​

I agree they all believed Adam and Eve were real human beings, but they did not take the descriptions of how they were created literally.

Adam being made from dust and Eve from a rib are secondary issues. The creation 'bara' of Adam becoming a living soul is the main issue here. Whatever some might presume about how the physical frame was fashioned it was not alive and then it was. The expression 'living soul' in the Hebrew is an expression indicating becoming a living, literally, breathing creation.

You should have read on a bit:

...all things which God then made were finished, and on the seventh the rest of God was mysteriously and sublimely signalized. What kind of days these were it is extremely difficult, or perhaps impossible for us to conceive, and how much more to say!
Augustine The City of God Book XI
​

Augustine wasn't talking about ordinary literal days.

He simply said he didn't know.

It isn't the things in Genesis that Augustine took literally that are the issue, but all the things he interpreted figuratively.

He took the creation of Adam literally and Adam is literal both in the historical narratives of Genesis and Romans 5. It isn't what is obscure here that is at issue but what is explicit.

The issue we were looking at with these quote was not whether bara was ex nihilo, but church fathers and scholars who interpreted Genesis figuratively. You are playing change the subject again.

That ought to do it, I told you I'm not chasing this in circles anymore.

Get some new material, I don't have the time to waste on pedantic, fallacious arguments that go in circles endlessly.

Have a nice day
Mark​

 

[mark kennedy]

mark wrote:


May I ask for clarification on something you've said?

You've said that "the culture wars are over", and explained a bit as above. Below are my rephrases of what I've understood, so I'm just asking if you agree with the statements below:

Culture war fronts:

Gay marriage: The conservative position against gay marriage has lost, gay marriage acceptance is becoming (already is in many places) the norm.

I was willing to consider the Conservative compromise but gay activists will settle for nothing short of it being recognized as a civil right. Civil Unions, while objectionable, wouldn't be a threat to the civil rights of others if pursued through state legislatures. When the Proposition 8 case when to the USSC I was profoundly disturbed. It's at a stalemate now, I just hope it stays that way.

Abortion: You stated that abortion on demand is here to stay, so that sounded to me like the anti- abortion position is becoming less tenable, so the conservative position has lost.

They didn't lose, you have to remember that the doctrine for the Church goes all the way back to the first century. Roman fathers could leave their daughters in a field, that was condemned by Church doctrine then, and Christians were the lone voices in opposition to this practice in our time. With an issue like abortion it's a matter of conviction not a victory dance in the end zone. They never lost, sometimes you just have to stand or fall by your convictions win, lose or draw.

Evolution: Evolution is becoming the norm, since you stated that at the Dover trial even the sanitized version of UCA denial (ID) lost. So again it seems like you are saying there that the conservative position lost. But earlier you stated that (YEC) creationism was going up. Could you clarify you position on that last point?

Again, it's a matter of conviction. I looked into the legal history and apparently when Jefferson was writing the Danbury Baptists he used a theological phrase, 'the wall of separation'. It's the idea of the ancient Hebrew garden wall where the lady of the house raised food and other things for her household. Because of the 'wall of separation' the Federal government is barred from interfering in religious matters and I think that is a profoundly beneficial thing for Christians. The last thing I wanted to see was Creationism in the public schools and BTW, the conservatives were never on board with Creationism. There were isolated attempts to introduce it into the curriculum here and these but nothing of any great scope or significance. It might also interest you to know that the Scopes monkey trial was over social Darwinism, they hardly discussed evolution at all. The Dover case simply ended something I never liked in the first place, not because I don't believe it but because it deprecates Christian theism and it's a terrible diversion when learning the life sciences.

That's what I mean by the culture wars. Creationism being taught in public schools was the first issue that I became interested in. On a secular board I mentioned in passing that I didn't support teaching Creationism in the public schools even though I happened to be a Creationist. I was inundated with flaming retorts to arguments I never made so I looked into it. I followed the legal cases right up until the Dover case where Intelligent Design was declared a theistic and therefor religious philosophy barred by the First Amendment. That ended that fight and I think it neutralized both sides on the political front.

The whole Prolife/Prochoice debate was a particularly nasty one, I personally am Prolife and admire the Catholics for being 100% consistent going all the way back to contraception. It's not commonly known but there was a time when babies were drowned and starved to death, not in ancient times but in the 70s. One of the early leaders of the Prolife movement was a girl that was left to starve on a gurney and a conscientious nurse took her home and raised her. That girl became the President of one of the largest and most effective Prolife activist organizations in the history of the movement.

Gay marriage, I guess I always knew that would be recognized but it was a far larger threat then people realize. Darwinism is based on an observation of a Missionary who noticed that the tendency of populations to grow beyond the ability of resources to support them. Over population just scare Darwinians half to death and the whole eugenics and birth control ideology goes directly back to that problem. In short, when Proposition 8 went back to the Federal Court and the USSC refused to declare it a civil right I knew the fight had ended in a stalemate. Not unlike the other fronts.

My interest in Creationism has long been intellectual. It's the fact that it has none of the trappings of the other two legal and political issues that made it seem benign. Abortion horrifies me and I'm appalled at gay marriage but if they pursue their goals through legitimate means I can at least tolerate them. Creation on the other hand is inextricably linked to essential doctrine. Now that these issues have started to fade away into obscurity I've noticed the scientists who used to support evolutionists in these discussions are thinning out considerably.

The culture wars are over, we are all going to move on whether we like it or not. There are no worlds left for the Darwinians to conqueror and the Church has weathered the storm admirably well.

Grace and peace,
Mark

 

[Assyrian]

Claiming it wasn't answered doesn't make it substantive.

You could have shown it wasn’t substantive if you answered it, but you didn’t.

Notice your range is now expanded from Genesis 1 to Genesis itself. See how that works? Evolution has to be defined, creation has to be defined and Genesis has to be understand as it was originally intended in the literary context it was written in. I've elaborated at length as to how to discern the differences between definitions and how they are equivocated and you just continue to repeat erroneous arguments. Evolution is not the issue and how creation and creationism have specific contexts. I won't continue to chase you arguments in circles. Your definitions are bogus.

Your only answer to the Oxford English Dictionary and the meaning of Creationism is that the definitions I got from it are bogus?

Sometimes and certain words, 'days' and 'Adam' are two different issues as I have already shown you conclusively.

I have shown you that the figurative interpretation of the creation accounts in the early church went way beyond taking days figuratively and included God planting the garden of Eden, forming Adam from mud, making Eve from Adam's side, and walking in the garden. Now would you care to comment on the difference between modern Creationists who insist the literal interpretation of Genesis is vital and literalists in the early church who had no problem with other Christians interpreting the Genesis creation accounts figuratively?

Chanting it like a mantra doesn't make it substantive. Talking in circles around the clear testimony of Scripture and neglecting the real work of an exegetical study isn't substantive. Creation is an English word that is translated from at least three Hebrew words, sometimes used interchangeably. Certain forms of 'bara' and in certain contexts render it an ex nihilo

Ex nihilo is a Latin phrase meaning "out of nothing". It often appears in conjunction with the concept of creation, as in creatio ex nihilo, meaning "creation out of nothing"...Biblical scholars and theologians within the Judaeo-Christian tradition such as Augustine (Confessions) John Calvin (^ "Commentaries on The First Book of Moses Called Genesis), John Wesley (Notes On The First Book Of Moses Called Genesis)[13] and Matthew Henry (Commentary) cite Genesis 1:1 in support of the idea of Divine creation out of nothing. Ex nihilo​

The same word used for Creation in Genesis 1:1 is used of the creation of life (Gen. 1:21) and three times it's used of the creation of man (Gen. 1:27). The natural revelation of God has already made this plain to you and I have elaborated on this at length, there is no chance you have missed it. It's not that you don't understand, it's that you prefer naturalistic explanations in some mystical blend with divine micromanaging. That may well be the case in some instances and certain other miracles but with regards to the origin of the universe, life and man there is one explanation, God alone.

And you change the subject again Mark I talked about you confusing the doctrine of Creation and Creationism. You reply by saying bara is ex nihilo.

Now your conflating figurative language with literal narratives. It's another equivocation, when using figurative language the Scriptures usually have an 'as' or 'like'. Sometimes it's explicit as with the parables and visions and sometimes it's implicit as with the eagles wings. In the case of creation there is no figurative language used, in fact, 'bara' is an explicit word indicating God acting by divine fiat not in concert with naturalistic processes.

No you conflated narratives being literal with God being literal, You said:

I take the creation account literally because I take the Creator literally.
​

But that last phrase phrase only makes sense in terms of taking God literally when he speak. It does not mean, (as I presume you intended), that God is real, because God himself is not a statement or narrative whose meaning we can take in a literal sense. It's a common mistake with the word literally, but it means you were conflating the use of 'literally' referring to a narrative, with the misuse of the term to refer to things being real.

You making the words 'science', 'evolution', and 'creation' mean whatever you like. Your equivocating completely different meanings. I have defined my terms explicitly making distinctions between the genuine article of science and Darwinism, Creation and Creation Science and evolution as it is defined scientifically.

You have done none of that instead you argue in circles around fallacious arguments that have nothing to do with science and are useless for a sound exposition of Scripture.

No you are still making the mistake of thinking the meaning of evolution is limited to the change in allele frequency definition, when the term evolution is much broader than that and covers the whole scientific study from the mechanisms leading to the change in allele frequency and thus the changes in the organisms themselves, to the study of the history of these changes throughout the billions of years of life on earth.

Around around he goes....does arguing this in circles make you dizzy?

I pointed out the difference between the doctrine of Creation and Creationism, you change the subject. It gets circular because while you can't respond when I show you your mistakes, you insist on repeating same mistakes over and over again, and I have to show you over again. Why do you keep making claims you cannot defend? If you don't like discussions going around in circles, either respond to my points, and we can discuss them, or stop repeating claims that have already failed.

Do you know who Francis Bacon is? Did you know he argued against Creationism? He called it a natural theology. Do you have the slightest idea why Francis Bacon's work is foundational to the Scientific Revolution?

So he didn't use the word Creationism? What makes you think that is what he was arguing against?

I've had quite enough of this, one more circular argument is all it's going to take.

Try answering my points and maybe we will make some progress. As long as you keep running around the mulberry bush avoiding answering my points and repeating the same mistakes I will keep showing you where you are wrong. You yourself may not ever be convinced by being shown where you are wrong and not being able to respond, but other people reading these posts will be able to see how empty the arguments for creationism are. That is fine with me too.

He never said that about the creation of life or man.

You are dodging again. You claimed figurative interpretations of Genesis in the early church were limited to taking the days figuratively. I showed you Origen taking the planting the garden of Eden and God walking in the garden figuratively. You respond, ah but he didn't talk about something else. That doesn't change the fact figurative interpretations of the Genesis creation accounts went way beyond interpreting the days in Genesis 1, and includes parts of Genesis 2 and 3. My next quote actually addresses one of the points you say Origen didn't take figuratively (or claim he didn't), showing that Augustine thought it childish to interpret God forming Adam from mud literally. Bet you will dodge that one too.

You've done this before, specifically with Romans 5. Your cry of 'it's figurative' when it failed then you just repeated it. When some of the passages in Genesis are taken figuratively occasionally you want to make the whole thing a myth and a metaphor. Sound exegesis doesn't work that way and certainly, sound doctrine will never be the result.

Yes you dodged it. This is not about me interpreting passages figuratively, it is showing you how the church fathers interpreted different parts of the creation accounts figuratively.

In fact Augustine's interpretation of the creation of Adam figuratively shows there was no contradiction between his doctrine of Original Sin and not taking the creation of Adam literally. Which is the position of TEs here who accept Adam and Eve were real people and believe an Original Sin, but don't take God making Adam from clay literally.

Adam being made from dust and Eve from a rib are secondary issues. The creation 'bara' of Adam becoming a living soul is the main issue here. Whatever some might presume about how the physical frame was fashioned it was not alive and then it was. The expression 'living soul' in the Hebrew is an expression indicating becoming a living, literally, breathing creation.

And you change the subject again. Unless by saying Adam being made from dust and Eve from a rib are 'secondary issues', you are admitting the church fathers took much of the the Genesis creation accounts figuratively.

The word bara is not used to describe Adam becoming a living soul.

He simply said he didn't know.

Augustine wouldn't have said he didn't know if he thought they were literal days. People understand ordinary days, Augustine though their meaning was beyond human comprehension. In other words he didn't take the days literally.

He took the creation of Adam literally and Adam is literal both in the historical narratives of Genesis and Romans 5. It isn't what is obscure here that is at issue but what is explicit.

He didn't take the creation of Adam literally, he said taking it literally was childish. And if he didn't take the description of God forming Adam from mud literally, that means he didn't take the creation account as a historical narrative. He took Adam as a real person, but what happened is described figuratively.

The issue we were looking at with these quote was not whether bara was ex nihilo, but church fathers and scholars who interpreted Genesis figuratively. You are playing change the subject again.

That ought to do it, I told you I'm not chasing this in circles anymore.

Get some new material, I don't have the time to waste on pedantic, fallacious arguments that go in circles endlessly.

You didn't address the change in subject you tried to pull.

Ah well it was nice talking to you while it lasted. I do wish you would engage in a proper discussion though. Maybe next time.

Have a nice day
Mark

May the Lord bless you and keep you safe.

 

[KWCrazy]

Scientific accuracy is not determined by plebiscite.

If something was created by a force outside of science, then science can never possibly determine the cause.
All theories of origination violate the known laws of science.
Therefore, either something outside of science created the universe, or it doesn't exist.

 

[KWCrazy]

Incidentally Augustine and Aquinas argued against any interpretation that contradicted science.

All miracles contradict science. That's why they are miracles.
Remove the miracles and you have no religion at all.

The Bible doesn't get into cosmology, but it DOES state that God created the universe including man in six days.

There is nothing in what he said about having to interpret Genesis literally. There is nothing that would contradict TE.

Then he was wrong.
The Fourth Commandment, written by God on a stone tablet, specifically states that the Sabbath is holy because God created the heavens and the earth in six days and rested on the seventh.

Religious leaders are very often wrong. It was the religious leaders of the day who had Jesus crucified.

Genesis 2:7 simply says the man became a living creature

Genesis 2 begins with, "Thus the heavens and the earth were completed in all their vast array." The creation of man was detailed in Genesis 1. Genesis 2 does not contradict that, but merely summarizes it. When people use the summary and pretend that the detailed version doesn't exist, it's called false teaching.

 

[Papias]

The culture wars are over, we are all going to move on whether we like it or not. There are no worlds left for the Darwinians to conqueror and the Church has weathered the storm admirably well.

Grace and peace,
Mark

It seems I was incorrect in my previous reading of your posts, and instead it looks like you see the culture wars as having ended in stalemates. Thanks for the thorough response & interesting background.

Blessings-

Papias

 

[mark kennedy]

Your only answer to the Oxford English Dictionary and the meaning of Creationism is that the definitions I got from it are bogus?

What I said was that Creationism as doctrine is defined by the Scriptures. The canon of Scripture is found in the original and Oxford was commenting on one facet of Creationism, not the Biblical doctrine. When I introduced the actual definition from Vine's and other Lexicons you simply rejected the Vine's and offered nothing in defense of you 'interpretation' of the text. I don't know what you think your accomplishing here but you moving further away from an understanding of the Scriptures.

I have shown you that the figurative interpretation of the creation accounts in the early church went way beyond taking days figuratively and included God planting the garden of Eden, forming Adam from mud, making Eve from Adam's side, and walking in the garden. Now would you care to comment on the difference between modern Creationists who insist the literal interpretation of Genesis is vital and literalists in the early church who had no problem with other Christians interpreting the Genesis creation accounts figuratively?

Adam was created from the earth for the earth, his body was made from dust. If you want to take that figuratively that's your prerogative but that doesn't make it a valid exposition of the text. Adam is our first parent according to every New Testament witness and the overwhelming consensus of Christian scholarship. Parts of the Genesis 1 account have been erroneously been rationalized away as figurative, 'day' and 'dust' are not figurative but so be it. You may not believe it but that doesn't give you the right to dictate how it reads.

And you change the subject again Mark I talked about you confusing the doctrine of Creation and Creationism. You reply by saying bara is ex nihilo.

Bara is ex nihilo creation, you in denial. Only once is it used in the perfect tense, which isn't a reference in time but of completion. I know it will make no difference since you can't handle a basic exposition for there is the exegetical treatment for the grammatical construction. Pay attention to what's being created and try to understand, it's used exclusively of divine activity:

Qal Perfect Genesis 1:1 19t.; Imperfect יִבְרָא Genesis 1:21,27; Numbers 16:30; Infinitive בְּראֹ Genesis 5:1; Imperative בְּרָא Psalm 51:12; Participle בּוֺרֵא Isaiah 42:5 10t.; suffix בֹּרַאֲךָ Isaiah 43:1; בּוֺרְאֶיךָ Ecclesiastes 12:1; — shape, fashion, create, always of divine activity (Brown-Driver-Briggs Hebrew and English Lexicon)​

There's nothing left to be learned, drawn out of the text or explained. We did the exact same thing with Adam in the New Testament and you wouldn't listen then either. I made every effort to show you plainly what the word means and why it's the basis for creation as doctrine and you preferred a superficial secular source of the the Scriptures and Christian scholarship. So be it.

No you conflated narratives being literal with God being literal, You said:

I take the creation account literally because I take the Creator literally.
​

But that last phrase phrase only makes sense in terms of taking God literally when he speak. It does not mean, (as I presume you intended), that God is real, because God himself is not a statement or narrative whose meaning we can take in a literal sense. It's a common mistake with the word literally, but it means you were conflating the use of 'literally' referring to a narrative, with the misuse of the term to refer to things being real.

For the last time, you don't get to dismiss an historical narrative as figurative because you don't happen to believe it. If there were figurative language there would have been a 'like' or 'as', whether explicit or implied. There is no such language in the text and 'bara' is never used figuratively. An act of God cannot be figurative, I don't know why you don't see the sheer absurdity of what you are arguing but you arguing it in circles.

No you are still making the mistake of thinking the meaning of evolution is limited to the change in allele frequency definition, when the term evolution is much broader than that and covers the whole scientific study from the mechanisms leading to the change in allele frequency and thus the changes in the organisms themselves, to the study of the history of these changes throughout the billions of years of life on earth.

Every single time I have managed to get an evolutionist to produce a definition it was the change of alleles in populations over time. The a priori assumption of exclusively naturalistic causes are never a part of the definition from the genuine article of science. Again, I don't know why you cant or won't understand the difference between Darwinian logic and evolution, Creation and Creation science, science and supposition but that's on you, I am really out of time for this.

I pointed out the difference between the doctrine of Creation and Creationism, you change the subject. It gets circular because while you can't respond when I show you your mistakes, you insist on repeating same mistakes over and over again, and I have to show you over again. Why do you keep making claims you cannot defend? If you don't like discussions going around in circles, either respond to my points, and we can discuss them, or stop repeating claims that have already failed.

I have always said that Creation as doctrine and Creation Science are discernibly different. They stem from the same transcendent, hermeneutic that is mutually exclusive with the naturalistic assumptions you defend. The issue here was never semantics, it's a doctrinal issue. You must be a creationist in order to be a Christian, you can't say the same thing for Theistic Evolution now can you?

So he didn't use the word Creationism? What makes you think that is what he was arguing against?

Again with pedantic hair splitting. Darwinism always has been and always will be one long argument against Creation. I think you understand that, you just won't admit it.

Try answering my points and maybe we will make some progress. As long as you keep running around the mulberry bush avoiding answering my points and repeating the same mistakes I will keep showing you where you are wrong. You yourself may not ever be convinced by being shown where you are wrong and not being able to respond, but other people reading these posts will be able to see how empty the arguments for creationism are. That is fine with me too.

You haven't made a single point stick, offered virtually nothing in the way of substantive proof and when soundly refuted you just repeat your original error.

In fact Augustine's interpretation of the creation of Adam figuratively shows there was no contradiction between his doctrine of Original Sin and not taking the creation of Adam literally. Which is the position of TEs here who accept Adam and Eve were real people and believe an Original Sin, but don't take God making Adam from clay literally.

It's not now, nor has it ever been all or none. Original sin is essential doctrine, inextricably linked to original creation, undeniably requisite to accepting the Gospel. Your getting your theology twisted, I take that so much more seriously then I do whether or not you think we evolved from apes. You would to if you knew what you were saying.

And you change the subject again. Unless by saying Adam being made from dust and Eve from a rib are 'secondary issues', you are admitting the church fathers took much of the the Genesis creation accounts figuratively.

They took 'day' figuratively and on occasion to 'dust' figuratively. They never took Adam or creation figuratively and all of them argued in the strongest possible terms for original sin. Your actually the only Theistic evolutionist I've seen plunge this deep into this kind of grievous error.

I don't know what happened to you, I don't know why you are still doing this. Look around, the theater is empty. The Creationists never listened to you and the evolutionists have left the building. What you have now is a compromised theology and a secular philosophy that is opposed to anything remotely theistic. I'm not trying to read you your pedigree here, I honestly believe you were sold a bag of goods that can't deliver on the hype.

As I have always said, if your convinced that Darwinism has made it's case and can still hold to you faith, go in peace I have no problem with you. I do want to caution you that you are in serious error doctrinally and I cannot in good conscience continue this. I avoided doctrinal issues with Theistic Evolutionists for that very reason for years for that reason. Creationism as it's argued for and against for the most part is intellectual and philosophical, having no bearing on science or theology. That your doing is dangerous to both but most importantly, profoundly dangerous for you.

Thanks for the exchange,
Mark