If Genesis 3 is a metaphor...

[lifepsyop]

why "of men". This is all just basic facts. Why do we just deny/reject facts, that makes the Bible look fallible. We need to have an intelligent basis for these things otherwise, what arguments can we have that differ from other religions if we are all just basing things on mere-belief by reading? How can you say "God's word is true" when not only does your claims get disputed by academics and basic reasoning?

Oh, "facts" ...
Spontaneous Generation was considered a fact only a few centuries ago.
Strict Uniformitarianism was considered a fact of earth history much more recently.
Facts are always facts until they are overturned.

This is just holding the current wisdom of men over God's word. Claiming you're merely relenting to "facts" does not cover up that choice.

I've asked you, how is a 6 day creation possible for a sphere earth? If it is Thursday 8pm in NYC, it's Friday 9am at Hong Kong? Even if you say the continents where all joined together (as science says with continental drift theory), there is still no way for every land on earth to experience the same time. Unless it's flat.

So people on the other side of the world didn't just experience the same 5 minutes I did?

If you're referring to day/night cycles... well, the Sun wasn't even created until the 4th day of the creation week, so a day of creation clearly wasn't beholden to the position of the Sun in the sky.

So if i take the description: "the land flowing with Milk and Honey" to be literally a land flowing with stuff that comes from cows and honey, does this mean I believe in the Bible?

You can't honestly compare a phrase like that to an explicitly worded account (X happened, then X happened, then X happened)

 

[Cis.jd]

But then in the Genesis account there are more details laid out matter-of-factly, (e.g. After X days the water was this high, after X days it was this high, etc.)

You can believe Genesis is an allegory, but I don't think you can honestly claim that it is written as one. It reads as a factual historical account no matter how much we might want it not to.

And then it is up to us whether we want to believe God's word or change it according to our own desires.

Maybe you should start reading more books so you can know that those details (time description) in Genesis is completely normal in writing. You already have an example of an account with metaphors in it, a long with actual dates.

Your second paragraph shows the ignorance you still have in the meaning of metaphors or any form of creative writing.

 

[Cis.jd]

Oh, "facts" ...
Spontaneous Generation was considered a fact only a few centuries ago.
Strict Uniformitarianism was considered a fact of earth history much more recently.
Facts are always facts until they are overturned.

Uniformitarianism was never considered a fact, it's been classified as an assumption years ago. We had people who fully believed it, but it was never academically grounded as fact.

This is just holding the current wisdom of men over God's word. Claiming you're merely relenting to "facts" does not cover up that choice.

You need to stop giving yourself this "holy credibility" by just dismissing facts with narrow minded reasoning such as "wisdom of men".

So people on the other side of the world didn't just experience the same 5 minutes I did?

Not really in terms of "day". Your 5 min of this morning is someones 5min during night time. So technically a 1st day can't be for the entire planet unless you believe it was flat and that small that the entire sun is visible during the same time.

If you're referring to day/night cycles... well, the Sun wasn't even created until the 4th day of the creation week, so a day of creation clearly wasn't beholden to the position of the Sun in the sky.

Right, and on that same 4th Day the evening and the morning was established, hence on v5 it says "the first day".

 

[DamianWarS]

Yet they were clearly written as literal accounts. We are even given the exact year, month, and day that certain events took place.

Are the doctrines of men more important? Why not just trust God's word that it happened like he says it did? Believe him.

you point out the "clearly literal" to say it is literal but reject the clearly metaphorical to say it a metaphorical. The metaphorical is abundant in the text, far more than the "clearly literal", even the literal numbers themselves, so why ignore them?

In actuality, any account may be built on factual things and use dates and measurements and even be written in a literal style but still not have literally happened.

According to a biography of George Washington "The Life of Washington" published 1800 Washington as a child was extremely truthful and when he was 6 he admitted to cutting down a cherry tree because of his high standard of keeping truth rather than lying to his Father. Because of this he was praised by his Father and by all who read it. This account itself has extended beyond the book and even if you know nothing about Washington chances are you've heard this story. This is a testament to the power of storytelling.

The account is written in a factual and literal style in a factual and literal genre with lots of details building it. The account is used to establish the innate honesty of Washington yet the account itself is a fabrication that never happened. because it never happened does this mean Washington never existed? does this mean Washington was dishonest or wasn't a good child? Does it mean the author was insincere? Does it mean the person who made up the story was insincere? Does it mean we today should reject this account? Does it void the meaning of the account? It actually means none of those things yet this account is completely arbitrary to the impact of our lives today.

This kind of stuff has been going on since man has been able to tell stories and its abundant in Christianity. If a secular human account like this cherry tree can carry such meaning how much more powerful would a divine account carry? Saying the account is non-literal in no way devalues the words but actually, quite the opposite as it makes every word that much more intentional and packed in with meaning rather than just stuff that happened. Nor does saying these things about the early Genesis accounts demand that Christ himself is a metaphor or the rest of scripture is a metaphor. This methodology can responsibly be used to show pre-Abrahamic accounts differ in literal content than post-Abrahamic accounts but do not devalue the truth they point to.