That's not what you said, Willtor. You're just being dishonest now.
I don't want to talk about the age of the earth. If Genesis is to be interpreted literally the age of the earth may follow from that. But until it's resolved between us it's another discussion. For the purposes of this discussion, I will concede that the earth is 6000-10,000 years old.
Deep time arguments are not especially relevant. I've conceded (for the sake of this discussion) that the world is 6000-10,000 years old. Again, think of me, now, as a YEC, who thinks that the figurative interpretation is preferred.
... for the purposes of this discussion, don't think of me as an "old earther." Since we're discussing Biblical interpretation, let's just deal with the text, itself.
What?! I said I conceded for the purpose of discussion that the earth was young, not that I actually believed that it was young. And I did it so we could talk about how the ECFs interpreted the Bible and leave science out of it.
.
both Bible believing Christians and also the atheist evolutionist professors of Hebrew and OT studies can see clearly -- apparently.
We had some T.E. posts trying to 'wish this away' recently - but the facts remain.
Originally Posted by BobRyan ============================================
[FONT="]One leading Hebrew scholar is James Barr, Professor of Hebrew Bible at Vanderbilt University and former Regius Professor of Hebrew at Oxford University in England. Although he does not believe in the historicity of Genesis 1, Dr. Barr does agree that the writer's intent was to narrate the actual history of primeval creation. Others also agree with him. [/FONT]
[FONT="]
[/FONT]
[FONT="]Probably, so far as I know, there is no professor of Hebrew or Old Testament at any world-class university who does not believe that the writer(s) of Genesis 1-11 intended to convey to their readers the ideas that (a) creation took place in a series of six days which were the same as the days of 24 hours we now experience; . . . Or, to put it negatively, the apologetic arguments which suppose the "days" of creation to be long eras of time, the figures of years not to be chronological, and the flood to be a merely local Mesopotamian flood, are not taken seriously by any such professors, as far as I know. [/FONT]
James Barr, letter to David Watson, 1984.
================================
For the sake of readers who don't know me, I've gone back through our discussion to distinguish whether I said I was actually a YEC or just conceding it for the purpose of discussion. Apparently, I had to repeat myself a couple of times to you:
These are unambiguously the words of someone who has conceded a young earth for the purpose of discussion, and not someone actually claiming to be a YEC. You can click on the links to see the original posts, and you can see that I haven't edited those posts.
They're very ambiguous and your views of an old earth very obviously influence your interpretation of Genesis. Your view is not based on the Bible nor ancient theologians. This is why you only want to talk about early fathers that interpreted the days figuratively and refuse to talk about:
Theophilus of Antioch
Methodius
Victorinus of Pettau
Ephrem the Syrian
Epiphanius of Salamis
Basil of Caesarea
Cyril of Jerusalem
Ambrose of Milan (Augustine's mentor)
These guys don't count because they don't support your old earth views. It's a silly meaningless conversation.
I don't know what source you got this list from, but I'm sure St. Basil took Genesis literally. You don't have to believe me. Again, this is the great thing about primary sources! The Hexaemeron is online and you can read it for yourself. I have. I'd be happy to discuss anything you'd like about it.
Not sure what this has to do with calling me a troll or a liar... or going out of your way to do so in a totally unrelated thread. I suppose an apology is too much to ask for...
St. Basil counts a great deal, but that's obviously not the point. If any of these people you mention had anything to do with anything, why throw up a smokescreen? Obviously, I didn't refuse to talk about any of them:
So, I have to ask, again, why the smokescreen? You basically self-destructed in this thread, here. At this point, I'm happy to discuss St. Basil, but if you're going to lash out when your preconceptions get challenged, I don't want to discuss him with you. If we discuss him, let's do away with the ad hominems and other nonsense, okay? Think more Diane Rehm, and less Sean Hannity.
Another condition, too: You actually have to read the Hexaemeron. It isn't especially obtuse language, and I think you will find it spiritually edifying. It will also change your views about Genesis.
I'm not following what you're accusing me of here. I posted the above fathers because they all believed in literal days a young earth, and Genesis as historical narrative. I'm merely pointing out that old earthers seem to never bring them up. Only augustine. why do you think that is?
Honestly, there's just so much evidence for evolution and an old earth and all that stuff; to be a creationist, you have to deny radioactive decay, half-life dating (e.g. potassium-argon or strobidium-brontium dating), relative dating, everything we know about astrophysics and the formation of the universe, and almost all of biology, including observed instances of speciation. In essence, you must deny the large majority of astrophysics, regular physics, biology, geology, archaeology, chemistry, medicine... a huge amount of observable facts that directly disprove the claims of those who believe that Genesis is a literal, historical account.
The thing is, it's up to the one making the positive claim to substantiate it*; science disagrees with the Bible, and since the Bible can't come up with anywhere near as many things as physical evidence of its claims than science can, in a contest of science versus the Bible, science wins.
*You have to prove the positive claim simply because you can't disprove something without a contradicting positive. I don't believe in an invisible unicorn because there is no evidence for such, and I don't believe in a literal Genesis account because there is both no to support it and a great deal of evidence which contradicts it.
At this point, creationism has been virtually destroyed within the scientific community due to the vast amount of data. The Devil in Dover (about the Kitzmiller v. Dover trial re: teaching evolution in schools in '06), Your Inner Fish (about how we're all just evolved fish), and Dawkins' Why Evolution Is True all make really great arguments, if anyone wants to read them; I'm not a fan of his anti-religion stuff, but he makes some great arguments and is an evolutionary biologist, and he really knows his stuff when he's talking about the field he has a doctorate in.
I really love this quote from Pope Francis, though I am not a Catholic and disagree with a huge amount of their doctrines: "God is not a magician with a magic wand." He works within our universe; he may have created the world ex nihilo, but that doesn't mean that His works in the world after that were all done in a similar fashion. He doesn't have to create everything in such a fashion; rather, he seems to set up systems to work independently of him, such as the weather cycle, and because he interacts and changes things within the universe, we can see his effects on said universe.
I'm not a theistic evolutionist, per se, because I think that evolution and theology are completely separate subjects; rather, I think God put in place the system that caused humanity to be created, including the processes of evolution and abiogenesis.
All the Bible literally says is that the heavens and the earth were created, 'in the beginning'. So for all we know the universe and the globe we inhabit was made billions of years ago and it is perfectly comparable with Scripture. The creation of life in general and man in particular is another story given the genealogies that are not only an unbroken timeline but feature prominently in the prophetic oracles.
I'm accusing you of self-destructing, publicly, for reasons that only you know.....
Fair enough. I just think that kind of rhetoric is trollish and pointless. And I've totally refuted everything you've said about Augustine. I think we're done. I'm moving on.
Yeah, if it actually happened historically, but, once again, I'll defer to St. Augustine to show that people that have a historical and respected authority to interpret the bible do not interpret Genesis literally as it is written. .....
Actually the "in the beginning" quote is referring to the creation of the heavens and earth which is a phrase meaning the entire universe. This phrase appears both before and after the six day account forming a context sandwich of sorts.
It's literally exegetically impossible to attach the term beginning (re'shiyth) in Gen. 1:1 to anything but the six days.
And this idea of naming a beginning followed by the details of that period is very common in the OT. If you look at how it's used in other places, we often see a beginning period followed by details that happened within that period. Example: Jeremiah 26. This is one of the many major problems with the new gap theories that are pipping up.
Plus Christ himself identified the beginning of creation as the period of time Adam was created.
Matt. 19:4 And He answered and said to them, “Have you not read that He who made them at the beginning ‘made them male and female
Mark 10:5 And Jesus answered and said to them, “Because of the hardness of your heart he wrote you this precept. 6 But from the beginning of the creation, God “made them male and female.’
"It seems to me that the creationist argument is just... silly"
The creation story goes hand and glove along with the gospel itself.
As that first created man, Adam, brought death and pain to the world - so the 2nd or last Adam brought redemption through His shed blood.
The gospel message is simply a way of preaching that message.
"For the word of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God. For it is written,
“I will destroy the wisdom of the wise,
And the cleverness of the clever I will set aside.” (1 Corinthians 1:18-19)
Of course creation seems foolish and silly to you.
You should probably be asking yourself why that is.
"It seems to me that the creationist argument is just... silly"
The creation story goes hand and glove along with the gospel itself.
As that first created man, Adam, brought death and pain to the world - so the 2nd or last Adam brought redemption through His shed blood.
The gospel message is simply a way of preaching that message.
"For the word of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God. For it is written,
I will destroy the wisdom of the wise,
And the cleverness of the clever I will set aside. (1 Corinthians 1:18-19)
Of course creation seems foolish and silly to you.
You should probably be asking yourself why that is.
And yet as allegorical as Augustine was, he was still a young earther that took Genesis as historical narrative. He even believed in the historical global flood.
IOW's you've picked out the most liberal father you could find and he still doesn't agree with your interpretation of Genesis. I think that speaks volumes, don't you?
Actually the "in the beginning" quote is referring to the creation of the heavens and earth which is a phrase meaning the entire universe. This phrase appears both before and after the six day account forming a context sandwich of sorts.
It's literally exegetically impossible to attach the term beginning (re'shiyth) in Gen. 1:1 to anything but the six days. And this idea of naming a beginning followed by the details of that period is very common in the OT. If you look at how it's used in other places, we often see a beginning period followed by details that happened within that period. Example: Jeremiah 26. This is one of the many major problems with the new gap theories that are pipping up.
Plus Christ himself identified the beginning of creation as the period of time Adam was created.
Matt. 19:4 And He answered and said to them, Have you not read that He who made them at the beginning made them male and female
Mark 10:5 And Jesus answered and said to them, Because of the hardness of your heart he wrote you this precept. 6 But from the beginning of the creation, God made them male and female.
Grace and peace
Augustine 'imagined' that 7 days was wayyyyy too long for God to create the world and it must have all been done in 1 literal day so then he imagined ways to bend the Bible to fit is a priori imagination.
Not unlike the outside agenda that some believers in blind faith evolutionism choose to bring to the text.
in Christ,
Bob