Opposing views of "yom"

greentwiga said:

A. I don't care what leading Christian Scholars say. Neither do I care what leading Hebrew Professors say. I care what the Bible says. The traditional interpretation leaves a has of the story of Adam and Eve. Going to non 24 hour days brings out the accuracy of Gen 2-4.

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Sorry, can you explain this? What is the problem with Gen 2-4 that you are seeking to resolve by reading Gen 1 as non-literal days?

Roonwit

Roonwit said:

Sorry, can you explain this? What is the problem with Gen 2-4 that you are seeking to resolve by reading Gen 1 as non-literal days?

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Gen 2 goes such:
4. This is the account of Creation.
5. There are no plants growing or even soil
6. Water came from springs.
7. God formed man
8. God created a functioning garden and placed Man in it.
9. God created food trees and knowledge trees.
10. God created rivers that had various functions.
Genesis 2 Parallel Chapters
If we were fashioning a planet to naturally create life, this would not be how we'd "grow" a species from scratch.


Genesis 1 does not follow a "grow from scratch" process order either.
Genesis 1 Parallel Chapters

What's your point?

Roonwit said:

Sorry, can you explain this? What is the problem with Gen 2-4 that you are seeking to resolve by reading Gen 1 as non-literal days?

Roonwit

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I am not trying to interpret Gen 1 in a specific way to resolve something else. I am analyzing the Bible very carefully to see what it says. There have been some classical issues, such as plants being created before man in Gen 1 and after man in Gen 2. Another question has been who was Cain's wife. When I analyzed Gen 2-4, I saw that the Bible said that Domestic plants came into being after man, in Gen 2. The Bible clearly says that the Garden of Eden was in SE Turkey, and not some earlier rivers that also went by the name of Tigris and Euphrates, as some maintain. It also indicates that there were generations since the creation of the heavens and earth. Thus, Cain could have married another lady also descended from the first humans created according to Gen 1. Notice also, that Gen 1 calls both male and female "Adam" and doesn't limit the creation to two humans. A whole variety of issues get resolved by letting the Bible speak.

greentwiga said:

I am not trying to interpret Gen 1 in a specific way to resolve something else. I am analyzing the Bible very carefully to see what it says.

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I agree this is important, but I don't think the conclusions you have drawn are justified.

There have been some classical issues, such as plants being created before man in Gen 1 and after man in Gen 2.

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As you note below, the words in Gen 2 appear to refer to cultivated plants. Therefore, it is perfectly reasonable to suppose that plants in general were created on Day 3, but by the time man was created on Day 6 "no cultivated plants had yet sprung up, for the Lord God had not sent rain on the earth and there was no man to work the ground". No contradiction.

Another question has been who was Cain's wife.

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Not a problem. Brothers could marry sisters originally. Even in Abraham's time Abraham married his half-sister, and brother-sister marriages were even reported occasionally down to around the time of Christ. The reason brother-sister marriages are bad is because of genetic defects arising due to common mutations inherited from parents. By marrying more distantly, you are less likely to have the same mutations as your partner, and so the chances of there being problems for your children are reduced. In the early times, Adam and Eve's genetic code would not have had mutations, and so there would not be a problem with brothers and sisters marrying. It is only later, after mutations began to build up in the gene pool, that this becomes a problem.

When I analyzed Gen 2-4, I saw that the Bible said that Domestic plants came into being after man, in Gen 2.

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See above.

The Bible clearly says that the Garden of Eden was in SE Turkey, and not some earlier rivers that also went by the name of Tigris and Euphrates, as some maintain.

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How did you reach this conclusion? It describes four rivers that originate from a common source, two of which we can't even identify today. Why would you assume they are the same Tigris and Euphrates as today? Besides the geography of that time will have been completely changed by the Flood.

It also indicates that there were generations since the creation of the heavens and earth.

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No, I don't think it is indicating that.

Notice also, that Gen 1 calls both male and female "Adam" and doesn't limit the creation to two humans.

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This is true, but Gen 2 clearly describes the formation of two humans, a male made from the dust, and a female made from the man's side. This accords with Gen 1:27, which says that "he made them male and female". Besides, are you suggesting there were two creation processes, an earlier one where God made mankind in general, and a later one where he stepped in to create two specific individuals who were unrelated to the existing humans that were created?

A whole variety of issues get resolved by letting the Bible speak.

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And a whole variety get caused by not letting it do so. The suggestions you have made spring from an assumption that it can't mean what it naturally seems to mean. I reject that assumption, which is surely a better way of "letting the Bible speak".

Roonwit

Roonwit said:

I agree this is important, but I don't think the conclusions you have drawn are justified.


As you note below, the words in Gen 2 appear to refer to cultivated plants. Therefore, it is perfectly reasonable to suppose that plants in general were created on Day 3, but by the time man was created on Day 6 "no cultivated plants had yet sprung up, for the Lord God had not sent rain on the earth and there was no man to work the ground". No contradiction.


Not a problem. Brothers could marry sisters originally. Even in Abraham's time Abraham married his half-sister, and brother-sister marriages were even reported occasionally down to around the time of Christ. The reason brother-sister marriages are bad is because of genetic defects arising due to common mutations inherited from parents. By marrying more distantly, you are less likely to have the same mutations as your partner, and so the chances of there being problems for your children are reduced. In the early times, Adam and Eve's genetic code would not have had mutations, and so there would not be a problem with brothers and sisters marrying. It is only later, after mutations began to build up in the gene pool, that this becomes a problem.


See above.


How did you reach this conclusion? It describes four rivers that originate from a common source, two of which we can't even identify today. Why would you assume they are the same Tigris and Euphrates as today? Besides the geography of that time will have been completely changed by the Flood.


No, I don't think it is indicating that.


This is true, but Gen 2 clearly describes the formation of two humans, a male made from the dust, and a female made from the man's side. This accords with Gen 1:27, which says that "he made them male and female". Besides, are you suggesting there were two creation processes, an earlier one where God made mankind in general, and a later one where he stepped in to create two specific individuals who were unrelated to the existing humans that were created?


And a whole variety get caused by not letting it do so. The suggestions you have made spring from an assumption that it can't mean what it naturally seems to mean. I reject that assumption, which is surely a better way of "letting the Bible speak".

Roonwit

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Yes, you have brought up the traditional answers, for the most part. You are one of the few to agree that Gen 2 is describing domesticated plants.

I have a problem with answering so many issues with the flood. Again, it is an interpretation that the flood was worldwide rather than region wide. That is a separate debate, worthy of its own thread, so lets not go sidewards onto it. Just, if the flood was region wide, your argument about the rivers collapses.

Instead, look at the description. It doesn't say the Tigris. It clarifies it as the Tigris that flows east of Asshur. Asshur was smack on the west bank of the Tigris.

Look at the description of the location. We can see that it is between the Tigris and Euphrates. What most people ignore, is the clues that it was where figs and wheat grew. Look at the 200 mm isohyut line. Wild wheat and wild figs must grow north of it, where more rain falls. Look at the Taurus mountains. They didn't grow north of them, the mountains were too cold. Between the two rivers and between these two lines is a diamond shaped region. There is one mountain in the center, Karacadag. The snowpack on top feeds four rivers, the Tigris and Euphrates, the Khabur to the south, and a small one to the north, both fit the winding characteristic of the Bible. This is the location where science says wheat was domesticated. Just as the Bible says, before Adam, there was a massive drought and no domestic plants. Adam domesticates plants and he or Able domesticates sheep, agreeing with science. I find the Bible amazingly accurate.

As for Adam and Eve, the description is very similar to the NT description of being born again. I agree, Mankind was created in Gen 1. If the description in Gen 2 is of God separating a group of people for his own like he did with Shem or Israel, a group that is spiritually alive, this leaves Adam as dying spiritually on the day he sinned. Otherwise, for him to die on the day he sinned means that day was close to 900 years long. This argues that days are not just 24 hours.

greentwiga said:

I have a problem with answering so many issues with the flood. Again, it is an interpretation that the flood was worldwide rather than region wide. That is a separate debate, worthy of its own thread, so lets not go sidewards onto it. Just, if the flood was region wide, your argument about the rivers collapses.

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Well, the discussion kind of comes to a halt if we disagree here. If the Flood was local then we should be able to identify the places described, as you have sought to. If it was global, we won't be able to. I would just say, when the writer says "All the high hills under the entire heavens were covered", what more would you expect him to write if he actually had intended us to understand that it covered the whole world?

If you make the Flood local, not only do you have to reinterpret Gen 6-9, but you also have to reinterpret Gen 2. What you are describing is not a natural reading of the text, which describes a river that separated into four streams, not four separate rivers (even if you can identify the Pishon and the Gihon). And why is the writer writing anachronistically about Asshur and Havilah and Cush, which didn't exist until after Gen 10? Such a reading would lead one to conclude that Gen 2 is not a historical account at all, but is made up by someone writing much later. If so, we can dispense with the historicity of Adam and Eve altogether. But that raises other biblical issues, and the whole thing begins to unravel therefrom. Alternatively, we could assume that many of the same names from before the Flood were carried on through and given to post-Flood names and places, in the same way as happened when Europeans went to America and Australia for the first time.

Let's also wonder about your location for Eden. Gen 2 describes it as being "in the east". East of where is not clear. But your reading would presumably mean the writer's point of view was somewhere in modern Turkey. Which author do you think this would be? If it was being written from the point of view of an Israelite or Mesopotamian author, this garden would be in the north. Besides which, I'm not sure that an ice-pack on top of a mountain quite qualifies as a 'garden'.

For you to say here that "I find the Bible amazingly accurate" is rather odd. If it is a description of the origins of agriculture along the lines commonly understood by secular scientists, there are significant errors. If indeed the account is accurate, then your interpretation must be wrong.

As for Adam and Eve, the description is very similar to the NT description of being born again. I agree, Mankind was created in Gen 1. If the description in Gen 2 is of God separating a group of people for his own like he did with Shem or Israel, a group that is spiritually alive, this leaves Adam as dying spiritually on the day he sinned. Otherwise, for him to die on the day he sinned means that day was close to 900 years long. This argues that days are not just 24 hours.

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Which part of the NT describes being born again in these kinds of terms, let alone having different processes for men and women?

As for dying on the day he ate the fruit, as before, the word in Gen 2:17 is b'yom. The best translation is something like 'when', as the NIV does, not 'in the day'. Also, the verb form of dying (I'm going beyond my knowledge of Hebrew, but I have looked into various renderings and this seems the best) implies something of an inexorable process set in motion, rather than the immediacy of a single event. So the meaning would be something like "when you eat of the fruit you will die until you are dead". Which is exactly what happened. No need to postulate 900 year long days. (By the way, the idea of 'spiritual death' applying here is also anachronistic. Nowhere else in the Pentateuch does 'death' refer to anything other than physical death, and there is no textual reason to suppose differently here.)

I always find it slightly odd when people insist on allegorising Gen 1 but taking Gen 2-3 literally. Gen 2-3 has all the characteristics one would expect for an allegorical account - gardens, mythical trees and fruits, talking snakes, an archetypal man and woman. Allegorising the whole thing would be far more plausible. Gen 1, by contrast, is a straight out description of a sequence of events (albeit written with a certain literary elegance).

Of course, if you allegorise the whole thing, where do we stop allegorising? The genealogies in Genesis and Chronicles and Luke make a continuous line from Adam through to Jesus. Paul parallels the resurrection of Christ with the death of Adam. Jesus, and the writer to the Hebrews, talk about Abel and Noah as historical characters. And the narrative style of early Genesis is much the same as in the rest of the history part of the OT, and Genesis has always been placed at the start of the historical section of the OT. So I think it's history.

Roonwit

SkyWriting said:

Gen 2 goes such:
4. This is the account of Creation.

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No, it says, "Thus the heavens and the earth were finished, and all the host of them." Creation was described in Genesis 1. Genesis 2 doesn't deal with the creation of the new world, but rather the history of the new world. "These are the generations of the heavens and of the earth when they were created, in the day that the Lord God made the earth and the heavens."

5. There are no plants growing or even soil

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Genesis 2 is not a new chronology of creation. It deals with another subject. there were no grasses or trees prior to day four. They were created on day four, and were watered prior to the creation of man. As many have said, man didn't yet exist to cultivate food crops, but then he wasn't there to eat either on day four.

6. Water came from springs.

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Water came from a mist. "But there went up a mist from the earth, and watered the whole face of the ground."

7. God formed man
8. God created a functioning garden and placed Man in it.

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The creation of Eden is contemporaneous with the creation of man. It's pretty clear that man was intended to live in Eden. It's more likely that Eden was actually created first as a home for the man who was about to be created than for man to be set aside while Eden is planted. Either way, the two events probably happened on the same day.

9. God created food trees and knowledge trees.

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Trees bearing fruit were created on day four, and likely so was Eden. I believe the trees of knowledge and life pre-dated man. They were a part of the creation, just as the existence of evil was part of the equation from the beginning. First mention does not equal first cause. It does not indicate sequence.

If we were fashioning a planet to naturally create life, this would not be how we'd "grow" a species from scratch.

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So create your own life on your own planet and show God how to do it better.

Genesis 1 does not follow a "grow from scratch" process order either.

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God said "Let there be" and there was. I like that recipe.