shernren
you are not reading this.
- Feb 17, 2005
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Basically, what this means is that they look at the context that the verse is in, the historical background, the type of text the verse or passage is and then the correct reading and meaning is revealed. There is nothing "wrong" or "dangerous" about this. If you want to know the true meaning of a passage of a text, you need to look at all these things to determine it's true meaning and reading. This is particularly more so with the Old Testament being written in Hebrew, whose writing is very different from modern day English. The smallest descriptive language or repitition and so on, give some BIG clues on what the author intended to be the main points and so on.
Unfortunately there is more than one possible interpretation of Scripture. I'm not saying that it is dangerous to interpret Scripture by Scripture. I'm saying that it is dangerous to find an interpretation and then pass it off as being on equal authority with Scripture, especially when alternative interpretations exist.
Besides, where in the Bible does it say that the Bible makes confident inerrant scientific assertions?
What is, however, "dangerous", is when Christians take ideas from outside of the Bible and shove them into the Bible and twist the Bible to make it fit them and then justify those worldly views from the Bible. Which is, um, to put it bluntly what Christian theistic evolutionists do.
Nope, Christian theistic evoluionists do not try to find evolution from the Bible or justify it by finding it in the Bible. We believe that God did not reveal evolution in the Bible because He was talking to a people who weren't scientifically literate enough to handle the whole works and omitted it because it was not necessary to His message of creation.
What they are saying is that this reading of Genesis is the only one that the Bible supports and the only conclusion that an unbiased reader could come to from the text. In other words, the context, historical background, text style and so on, all point to this reading as the true or intended reading or understanding of this passage.
There are posters here who say that they have read Genesis 1 with an open mind and never been able to come to the conclusion that God really wanted to tell us how long He took. We have people as far back as St. Basil and St. Augustine telling us that the six days of Genesis 1 need not be literal days.
Also, it's the interpretation of the evidence that "supports" evolution - not the evidence itself because the evidence can't speak. It is viewed in light of a theory or a person's opinion - nothing more. If it is consistent with the belief and that beliefs assumptions and presuppositions, then it may provide some evidence for it -- but note that this evidence is based on the larger assumption that the presupposition of the theory is true.
Easy to say, hard to prove. Give me a coherent, scientific, creationist interpretation of why there are so many fossils and how they could have been produced within the space of 2,000 years. Specifically this example with mammoths: http://www.christianforums.com/showthread.php?p=19655613#post19655613
This occurs many times in dating rocks with fossils inside of them. As Dr Monty White explains:
"Of course, the proof of the accuracy of the different dating methods should be that different methods give the same age for teh same rock sample. However, as I searched the literature I became aware of articles in which it was reported that different methods gave different ages for the same rock. In these papers the authors spent a great deal of space discussing why there were discrepancies and why the age should be deterined from the fossil content of the rock or from teh fossils in the adjoining rocks. But there is circular reasoning here:
* The age of the rock is determined from the age of a fossil, the age of which in turn is determined by evolution;
* The proof of evolution is the age of the rocks in which the fossil is found.
In other words, I saw that the basis for dating rocks is evolution and the only proof of evolution is the ages of the rocks in which the fossils are found. The assumption of evolution is, therefore, the main evidence for evolution."
Even if he is right (which he isn't: radioactive decay rates can be measured independently of dead prehistoric animals, thank you very much) he still wouldn't solve the problem of the age of the earth itself. This is because the earth was dated at a few billion years old because some of its oldest minerals fall on the same curve as meteoric rocks, showing the date of the accretion of the solar system's planets. And the circular age argument doesn't work here because meteoric rocks don't have fossils for circular dating. How now?
It is, in a sense, the only conclusion that one can come from given a reading of Genesis and considering those things listed above.
This can only imply that if evolution really is true, then it is not a matter of us reading the Bible wrong (since, after all, this is the "only way" to read the Bible) but a matter of the Bible itself being wrong. In other words "if I am wrong about YECism then God was wrong when He wrote the Bible" which is precisely what this thread is about.
Unfortunately there is more than one possible interpretation of Scripture. I'm not saying that it is dangerous to interpret Scripture by Scripture. I'm saying that it is dangerous to find an interpretation and then pass it off as being on equal authority with Scripture, especially when alternative interpretations exist.
Besides, where in the Bible does it say that the Bible makes confident inerrant scientific assertions?
What is, however, "dangerous", is when Christians take ideas from outside of the Bible and shove them into the Bible and twist the Bible to make it fit them and then justify those worldly views from the Bible. Which is, um, to put it bluntly what Christian theistic evolutionists do.
Nope, Christian theistic evoluionists do not try to find evolution from the Bible or justify it by finding it in the Bible. We believe that God did not reveal evolution in the Bible because He was talking to a people who weren't scientifically literate enough to handle the whole works and omitted it because it was not necessary to His message of creation.
What they are saying is that this reading of Genesis is the only one that the Bible supports and the only conclusion that an unbiased reader could come to from the text. In other words, the context, historical background, text style and so on, all point to this reading as the true or intended reading or understanding of this passage.
There are posters here who say that they have read Genesis 1 with an open mind and never been able to come to the conclusion that God really wanted to tell us how long He took. We have people as far back as St. Basil and St. Augustine telling us that the six days of Genesis 1 need not be literal days.
Also, it's the interpretation of the evidence that "supports" evolution - not the evidence itself because the evidence can't speak. It is viewed in light of a theory or a person's opinion - nothing more. If it is consistent with the belief and that beliefs assumptions and presuppositions, then it may provide some evidence for it -- but note that this evidence is based on the larger assumption that the presupposition of the theory is true.
Easy to say, hard to prove. Give me a coherent, scientific, creationist interpretation of why there are so many fossils and how they could have been produced within the space of 2,000 years. Specifically this example with mammoths: http://www.christianforums.com/showthread.php?p=19655613#post19655613
This occurs many times in dating rocks with fossils inside of them. As Dr Monty White explains:
"Of course, the proof of the accuracy of the different dating methods should be that different methods give the same age for teh same rock sample. However, as I searched the literature I became aware of articles in which it was reported that different methods gave different ages for the same rock. In these papers the authors spent a great deal of space discussing why there were discrepancies and why the age should be deterined from the fossil content of the rock or from teh fossils in the adjoining rocks. But there is circular reasoning here:
* The age of the rock is determined from the age of a fossil, the age of which in turn is determined by evolution;
* The proof of evolution is the age of the rocks in which the fossil is found.
In other words, I saw that the basis for dating rocks is evolution and the only proof of evolution is the ages of the rocks in which the fossils are found. The assumption of evolution is, therefore, the main evidence for evolution."
Even if he is right (which he isn't: radioactive decay rates can be measured independently of dead prehistoric animals, thank you very much) he still wouldn't solve the problem of the age of the earth itself. This is because the earth was dated at a few billion years old because some of its oldest minerals fall on the same curve as meteoric rocks, showing the date of the accretion of the solar system's planets. And the circular age argument doesn't work here because meteoric rocks don't have fossils for circular dating. How now?
It is, in a sense, the only conclusion that one can come from given a reading of Genesis and considering those things listed above.
This can only imply that if evolution really is true, then it is not a matter of us reading the Bible wrong (since, after all, this is the "only way" to read the Bible) but a matter of the Bible itself being wrong. In other words "if I am wrong about YECism then God was wrong when He wrote the Bible" which is precisely what this thread is about.
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