New early hominid fossil...

[laconicstudent]

"You can if you want, I don't really care. But personally my faith is Christianity, not Asatru."

If i did, I would spend an eternity in Hell being endlessly tortured - but you dont care?

Honestly, I don't know you at all. Don't expect me to get worked up.

Your point about the video is silly, some drugs are bad because of their bad effects, the Bible doesnt need to say this because we have physical evidence.

Honestly, I don't think he was making a point so much as mocking the post of yours he quoted directly above the video.

However we have neither physical evidence nor biblical evidence that God visited man 100-250k years ago.

No we don't, are you going to make a point, or keep repeating yourself?

Also your sig begs me to ask a question - Please explain what evolution is as u know it

No. Read a biology textbook. No one here is obligated to teach you the biology you should have learned in high school.

 

[Willtor]

Your point about the video is silly, some drugs are bad because of their bad effects, the Bible doesnt need to say this because we have physical evidence. However we have neither physical evidence nor biblical evidence that God visited man 100-250k years ago.

But physical evidence would be enough to make you change your views?

Also your sig begs me to ask a question - Please explain what evolution is as u know it

The field of evolution is the study of the change of the frequency of alleles in populations over the course of generations. Evolution is the change, itself. The theory of evolution is that these changes in frequency can be described in terms of small genetic mutations that are selected by nature.

As regards my sig, the theory of evolution supposes that no chimp could ever give birth to a human. That would violate the principle that evolution happens to populations as opposed to organisms (it also imposes a hierarchy that evolution doesn't know how to describe). The joke is that most creationists think that evolution says exactly the opposite! So if it ever happens, creationists are obligated to accept evolution and evolutionists are obligated to give it up.

 

[<3God]

On the contrary, I understand evolution very, very well and i wasnt asking you to explain it. i was asking willitor - His sig implies a grave misunderstanding of what evolution says

 

[<3God]

Ok so you accept evolution as a scientific theory i think - This clears things up - just a misunderstanding

 

[<3God]

"But physical evidence would be enough to make you change your views?"

Yup.

 

[<3God]

Im still waiting for someone to tell me how the words of Genesis could be a metaphor for evolution
A line by line explanation through creation would be fanastic

 

[laconicstudent]

I don't see how the theory that God visited man hundreds of thousands of years ago is relevant at all. And there isn't physical evidence either way, since that would make Christianity historical fact, not a religion.

 

[Willtor]

I feel like I have a pretty good grasp on evolution. I studied biology in college and I understand the tenets of the theory.

There is a big problem with it though, a problem so big that it led me not be able to accept it. It does conflict with Genesis.

You're stretching the Bible to it's breaking point when you try to reconcile the Genesis account with evolution. The order of appearance of organisms in Genesis is even different from what evolution would try to tell us. No where does it say one type turned into another and changed over time, those are just inventions to try to reconcile the Bible to science.

Why reconcile the Bible though? The Bible is perfect, it is science that needs reconciling.

I know that evolution is an attractive theory, it would seem to explain a lot, but when the choice is between believing the Bible or science, I know which i pick

It sounds like you don't have a problem with the evidence. So why aren't you trying to reconcile evolution and Genesis, yourself?

 

[laconicstudent]

Im still waiting for someone to tell me how the words of Genesis could be a metaphor for evolution
A line by line explanation through creation would be fanastic

I'm neither inclined nor obligated to interpret scripture for you. Ask a pastor, preferably multiple ones, from different churches and denominations so you get multiple views on the issue. The point I was making is that there is physical evidence contradicting Young Earth Creationism, therefore it must be allegorical.

In light of that, you have two choices:

1. Assume it is all incorrect and abandon your faith.

2. Believe that the creation isn't literal.

I chose 2, and frankly haven't bothered to come up with the highly specific exegesis that you are demanding. Nor does my argument rest on my ability to do so.

 

[<3God]

I must confess, I am losing my faith. Im trying my best to put on a tough facade.
Evolution makes perfect sense to me and it describes the variety of living things in the world extremely well.

It conflicts with Genesis though. It does - theres no reasonable reading of Genesis that gives you evolution. They cannot both be true. Theres no metaphor that can link Genesis with evolution, that couldnt be better explained by the biblical God just not having a hand in it at all.

I want to believe but its really hard.

 

[Willtor]

I'm neither inclined nor obligated to interpret scripture for you. Ask a pastor, preferably multiple ones, from different churches and denominations so you get multiple views on the issue. The point I was making is that there is physical evidence contradicting Young Earth Creationism, therefore it must be allegorical.

In light of that, you have two choices:

1. Assume it is all incorrect and abandon your faith.

2. Believe that the creation isn't literal.

I chose 2, and frankly haven't bothered to come up with the highly specific exegesis that you are demanding. Nor does my argument rest on my ability to do so.

I actually went the other way. I used to be a YEC. And then I started studying some of the ancient interpretations of Genesis and then gave up YECism. For a while I went through an ID phase, and when I found that was faulty (to the benefit of evolution), I became a TE.

 

[<3God]

What troubles me more is if i dont believe I should spend an eternity in hell, even if i want to believe but just cannot

Also please read my post on the last page - its very serious to me

 

[laconicstudent]

It conflicts with Genesis though. It does - theres no reasonable reading of Genesis that gives you evolution.

Yes, if you take it literally.

They cannot both be true. Theres no metaphor that can link Genesis with evolution,

Wrong, There is absolutely no reason that Adam and Eve couldn't be emblematic of the first Homo sapiens, no reason Eden couldn't be representative of our unfallen nature, no reason God couldn't have given a special revelation to the first humans, and existed with them the same way he guided Israel in the OT, no reason that the eating of the apple couldn't represent the apostasy of a community versus that of individuals.

that couldnt be better explained by the biblical God just not having a hand in it at all.

Wrong, it isn't a better explanation, because that would directly contradict mountains of empirical evidence indicating that that earth and humanity has been around for longer then a measly 6,000 years.

 

[Willtor]

I must confess, I am losing my faith. Im trying my best to put on a tough facade.
Evolution makes perfect sense to me and it describes the variety of living things in the world extremely well.

It conflicts with Genesis though. It does - theres no reasonable reading of Genesis that gives you evolution. They cannot both be true. Theres no metaphor that can link Genesis with evolution, that couldnt be better explained by the biblical God just not having a hand in it at all.

I want to believe but its really hard.

I think the error is in thinking that God was eager for us to know about evolution. I don't think He was. He communicated to the ancient Israelites in a way they could understand. I don't think the Genesis account was intended to teach us cosmological truths so it really doesn't bother me when it doesn't line up with science.

Let me put it the other way around: if evolution were debunked tomorrow, my interpretation of Genesis wouldn't change.

 

[<3God]

How can you read that Adam and Eve evolved to become Adam and Eve - even through metaphor?
God said he created Adam from dust after he created the animals - how could this be even imagined as a metaphor for him having evolved from homo etrectus?

 

[laconicstudent]

How can you read that Adam and Eve evolved to become Adam and Eve - even through metaphor?

Again, they weren't actual people. They represent the first human beings. Plural. There were more then two.

 

[Willtor]

What troubles me more is if i dont believe I should spend an eternity in hell, even if i want to believe but just cannot

Also please read my post on the last page - its very serious to me

Faith is rightly put in Christ. I'm guessing it wasn't the age of the earth or the certainty that we didn't share common ancestors with other life that first caused you to believe in Jesus. Why not start at the beginning, again, and reflect on what it is that inspired you to come to Christ? Forget about what you heard someone say about how scientists are trying to undermine biblical authority, or how if Genesis isn't taken literally that Luke must also not be taken literally. What is the real object of your faith?

 

[<3God]

Also there had to be humanoid females before Adam and Eve, but God said he created Eve from Adam's rib - how's this a metaphor that explains anything about evolution?

 

[<3God]

I thought i felt Jesus when I was told what it was like to feel Jesus. That's how i came to my faith. How do i even know that feeling is Jesus though?

I understand science quite well, at least biology, not to brag - I studied it extensively in college. It has nothing to do with what scientists say about the Bible.

 

[laconicstudent]

Also there had to be humanoid females before Adam and Eve, but God said he created Eve from Adam's rib - how's this a metaphor that explains anything about evolution?

Shesh, I don't know. A community splitting?