Maybe they have better things to do. That’s like saying, every time I ask someone to explain trigonometry to me, they can’t or won’t. No kidding. If you are actually interested, here is Dennis’ free crash course. I’m sure you are aware that we now have amazing things that we didn’t have in 1972. Like tunneling electron microscopes, fossils of “missing links,” and a map of the genome. It could be that you have some gaps in your knowledge of the subject.
The definition of evolution is change in allele frequencies within a population over time. Your wait is over!
There is nothing in the evolutionary model that necessitates a belief in a “cosmic accident.”
What about the evolutionary model in your mind rules out complexity?
I agree life points to a designer and a purpose and something about us intuitively looks to God when we see creation. I also believe miracles occur. That doesn’t rule out the evolutionary process itself, just a commitment to scientific materialism.
You are quoting an organization that actively opposes everything we do. Do you honestly think they are giving an objective assessment of what we are all about? Did you notice any actual quotes of things BioLogos has published? There are a couple other threads on the topic of this book here and here if you are interested.
You’re reading statements about specific passages in the Pentateuch, and assuming they’re talking about the entire Pentateuch. For example, the words in Deuteronomy 31:24 are an explicit reference only to the words which “Moses said to the assembly of Israel in the Transjordanian wastelands” (Deuteronomy 1:1). This is a basic Bible literacy issue.
This is not at all surprising if you are dealing with Pro-Evolutionists who are trying to explain things without God’s involvement. This is the beauty of BioLogos and its discussions.
It is the best of both worlds! God is there to use natural processes as part of his creation . . . while still having the ability to provide the miraculous as needed.
I don’t think your ‘best’ Bible scholars are right. I can read the Bible myself and if they think it is not historical, then they cannot understand plain English - or Hebrew or Greek for that matter. I heard someone say it is poetry. That would be the worst poetry I have ever heard. It is so obviously prose that you can’t miss it unless you really want to miss it for some reason.
The passages Are about the whole Pentateuch in many if not most of the passages. The Bible calls the Pentateuch the Law of Moses over and over and over, hundreds of times and I quoted a few of the many times (100 in the NT?) where the Bible attributes quotes of the Pentateuch to Moses. The Jews have always talked of the OT as the Law and the Prophets. It is obvious that Moses wrote it. According to your logic, he didn’t write anything that wasn’t quoted in the NT or have the words “Moses commanded this” added to every verse. It sounds like the only way to establish Moses wrote the whole thing by your logic is if every single verse is quoted of tagged with his name. That is just ridiculous. That would be like someone attributing a hundred quotes from Romeo and Juliet to Shakespeare and then saying because he didn’t quote the entire play that he doesn’t believe Shakespeare wrote it.
No, you quoted a handful of places where specific passages are attributed to Moses. In contrast I have given you the Bible’s own witness, verse by verse.
No that is nothing like what I said. I pointed out a single verse, for example, as evidence that Moses wrote 33 whole chapters.
P.S.S.
The Bible says that ‘all’ scripture is inspired of God. It doesn’t say all except certain words. You can see that the writers of the new testament treat the text the same way as I do. Jesus said not one jot or tittle would pass from the law, that is a smaller division than even words. Jesus said his words would never pass away. When Jesus talked with the Jews, they both treated the words of scripture as accurate, the way I do, and had no disagreement on this. For example, Jesus quoted words from a Psalm to prove his point in John 10:24-36 and said the scripture cannot be broken. Paul also in Gal 3:16 points out that the scripture uses the word ‘seed’, not ‘seeds’, depending on the accuracy of this word of scripture to prove his point. If you read through the NT you see scripture used exactly as I am using, word for word accurate.
If you read through the New Testament you will quickly see that the Old Testament is often not quoted word for word at all. Sometimes what is quoted is different to the Old Testament we read in English.
Yes Jesus said that, but you take his words and represent them as meaning something completely different. This is clear evidence that you are not taking his words at face value.
Evidence that the passages are about the whole Pentateuch is my example from Romeo and Juliet. The law is always attributed to Moses when it is quoted. It is never attributed to anyone else. By the way, I am obviously not talking about the parts that God probably had Joshua add. I say probably Joshua because God did instruct Joshua to add the Bible after Moses was gone. That of course is who wrote Joshua.
No, because your example of Romeo and Juliet was trying to address an argument no one was making. The real problem here is that you are not actually listening to what the Bible says about the Law of Moses.
But the Law is not the Pentateuch. The Law is inside the Pentateuch. What you are saying is like saying “The letter to the Romans is always attributed to Paul, therefore Paul wrote the New Testament”.
And right here you show that you are perfectly happy to decide for yourself that some parts of the Pentateuch weren’t written by Moses, and even decide for yourself who actually did write them, even though the Bible doesn’t say anything like this. Again, this proves you do not read the Bible at face value. You look at the words on the page, and then you make up your own mind about what they meant.
I didn’t say it quoted it word for word. I am saying that it was quoted as being accurate word for word. The NT can paraphrase an OT quote and both the original passage and the NT paraphrase can be word for word 100% accurate. Just because it paraphrases the OT doesn’t mean it is saying that the original is not 100% accurate. It is only demonstrating that you can paraphrase the original 100% accurate statement and still have another 100% accurate statement.
You’re not seeing the disconnect here. What’s the point of saying the Bible is “word for word accurate”, if you agree that we can use other words to say what the Bible says, and still be accurate? If all you really meant was “The Bible is accurate and reliable”, then you could have just said that. It is clear that the New Testament writers did not consider it important to reproduce exactly the same words which are in the Old Testament, so what’s the point of your comment about every jot and tittle?
The Bible does say that Moses wrote the Law (=the Pentateuch) and it also says that God instruct Joshua to add to the revelation. It is a reasonable assumption that Joshua wrote about Moses’ death, however maybe Moses wrote that also. It could easily be a prophetic writing by Moses. Either one is possible without changing the fact that Moses wrote the Pentateuch. Where Joshua started his contribution to the revelation is a small detail. It doesn’t change the fact that Moses wrote at least 99% of it and therefore would be the author.
So, the answer to your first question is Moses wrote the Pentateuch. Any more questions for me?
I did not say the WE can use other words to say what the Bible says, I said the authors of the Bible can paraphrase(with God’s help to get it accurate) and have another 100% accurate statement. When you or I use different words to say what the Bible says, we might be close, but cannot be guaranteed to be 100% accurate.
I hate to do this again, but I need to leave again. I was not able to start earlier because this site prevented me from posting too many posts on my first day and so I had to wait a couple of hours before I could start today. I hope you all have a nice evening.
How do you know which is poetry in Hebrew and which isn’t? Do you realize you have mortally offended a few hundred thousand Rabbi with your assertion that it is “the worst poetry I have ever heard” ?!
No, the Law of Moses is in the Pentateuch. Where did you get the idea that the Law of Moses is the Pentateuch?
Where does the Bible say God told Joshua to write parts of the Pentateuch? Which parts are we told that he wrote?
My second question was “Why do you believe that?”, and your answer has basically been “Because I think it’s true”. Importantly, your view is not based on what the Bible actually says.
Here’s another question. What are these verses talking about?
Leviticus 13:
9 When the plague of leprosy is in a man, then he shall be brought unto the priest;
Ezekiel 13:
18 And say, Thus saith the Lord GOD; Woe to the women that sew pillows to all armholes, and make kerchiefs upon the head of every stature to hunt souls!
Ezekiel 13:
20 Wherefore thus saith the Lord GOD; Behold, I am against your pillows, wherewith ye there hunt the souls to make them fly, and I will tear them from your arms, and will let the souls go, even the souls that ye hunt to make them fly.
Then how do you know if the English translation you are reading is 100% accurate?
What some people avoid doing is trying to determine where the Greeks got their sense of immortality from? While they may not have obtained immortalist views from the Zoroastrian Magi directly … it seems that Indo-Euro. tribes on the edges of the Persian Empire may well have been the ultimate source of the Greek views.
The Greek idea of immortality doesn’t appear to have any connection to the Egyptian views. But I’m not convinced that Greeks invented immortality on their own!
Here’s the basic presumption about Immortality and the Bible:
Soul in the Bible
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The traditional concept of an immaterial and immortal soul distinct from the body was not found in Judaism before the Babylonian exile, but developed as a result of interaction with Persian and Hellenistic philosophies.[2]
Accordingly, the Hebrew word nephesh, although translated as “soul” in some older English Bibles, actually has a meaning closer to “living being”. Nephesh was rendered in the Septuagint as ψυχή (psūchê), the Greek word for soul. The New Testament also uses the word ψυχή, but with the Hebrew meaning and not the Greek.
“For mortalists the Bible did not teach the existence of a separate immaterial or immortal soul and the word ‘soul’ simply meant ‘life’; the doctrine of a separate soul was said to be a Platonic importation.”
No. They spend their days, evenings, and weekends doing nothing more than arguing about topics they say no one understands— except them of course.
Really? How about explaining what this statement of yours means.
Oh, I disagree.
There is either energy, or atoms which came about from nothing, and experienced some form of overload, resulting in a big bang style event, resulting in the existence of the cosmos. As no one is able to explain where those originate from, and how they happen to interact, resulting in all matter, and subsequent life, I see no reason to take it seriously.
On the otherhand, an highly intelligent Creator, who’s experience and expertise make him uniquely qualified to make everything there is— there’s plenty of reason to take it seriously.
Intelligence. Art, reason, science, principles governing laws (in all the academic, and practical disciplines we presently know to date), the concept of beauty, wisdom, and understanding.
Ever look at any of the human’s physiological components?
As stated above, I am a stage 4 metastatic melanoma survivor. I lived with a cancer for 10 years, that typically kills within 1-2 years. Undiagnosed, untreated… I was walking around, living life, and had stage 1, stage 2, and stage 3 metastatic melanoma dwelling in my body. A few weeks ago I met a young man who’s friend had died 2 weeks after diagnosis. Melanoma, like pancreatic cancer kills fast.
Due to the path my surgeon took with my first surgery in July 1997, I lost all my lymph nodes. I really didn’t know much about the lymph system, except that it was a main element of the immune system for the human body. Since then… I’ve learned a lot about the lymph system. Mostly because my health, and keeping my left leg depended on me following doctor’s instructions. For me, I’m the kind of guy who follows instructions better when I understand the why behind those instructions. Thankfully, there are two textbooks dealing with this topic of the lymphatics.
You know what I learned— it’s the second part of the circulatory system.
Without which, humans cannot live. Like the main part of the circulatory system— veins, artieries, capillaries, etc…, the lymph system picks up proteins, and fluids which “leak” out of the capillaries, and through a series of pick-up extractors, chambered vessels, nodules, which have filtering, manufacturing, and production stations, to filter out toxins, and other “bad stuff” which gets into our blood, it finally returns the cleansed fluids/proteins back to the vena cava, at the top of the heart, and starts all over again.
I have to ask… at what point does the lymph system evolve? Before, or after the first several million hominids die off because they did not have a working immune system?
There are several body parts on the human which required to be in fully-functioning mode for them to operate. Did God just walk away, and only show up at certain points in our development? I.e., theistic evolution, or deistic evolution?
That doesn’t read like the God which I’m familiar with, from the bible, Jesus, and my own life’s experiences.
As I read the bible, as I’ve experienced life… YHVH was directly involved, at every step of the way, and did a hands on creation.
When people claim complexity of life is why they believe in evolution, I see— I’ve never actually looked really closely at the critters, animals, etc… which exist, as far as anatomy, physiology, and the complexity of their organisms. But, just looking across at how many different critters there are, it seems reasonable to say that they evolved.
I.e., I literally read ignorance in their claims.
Even Darwin said he could not explain the human eye. I have several oncology doctors who can’t even understand the lymphatic system enough to treat me when problems arise.
I have to travel to a handful of locations around the nation, or Europe where specialists, who have studied it can help, but even they’re limited in scope, due to the complexity of the system. And these are people who’ve spent decades, studying it.
Look, I get that you really believe in theistic evolution. I don’t. I don’t see evidence for it, and I sure can’t identify it in the bible, and I’ve been reading if for over 40 years now. You’re more than welcome to believe that YHVH is not who he says he is. You’re more than welcome to ignore who he said he actually is.
As I read the 10 commandments, that’s known as idolatry. Thankfully, God said he will cleanse his people of their idols, and false beliefs. Ezekiel 36:25, and Jeremiah 1:10.
Here’s what I will say, and it’s what I’ve been doing for a long time now-- decide who you’re going to believe.
1- yourself, and your finite human intellect’s capacity to wrap your mind around what you are faced with.
2- the claims of people with whom you have little to no familiarity. Who are also highly limited in knowledge, awareness, and understanding.
3- The Infinite, incomprehensibly humongous, and intelligent, YHVH, creator of the cosmos.
Only one of those actually has a level of knowledge, and understanding which is unlimited.
After 30 years, I came to the realization that I too had to make that choice. I finally realized that I’m not God, never will be, don’t have even 1E-10000000000000000th of the level of understanding, and awareness he has.
So, I chose… actually chose to believe him, over my fellow man, over myself, and whatever other outside influences there may be. And it’s not because I haven’t attended college, or don’t know really intelligent people. I simply realized that I can either trust a finite perspective, or an infinite perspective.
I chose the infinite perspective.
I encourage you to both consider, and try it. I"m confident you’ll be as blown away by His capacity to reach, and teach us as I have been, and continue to be.
Moreover, being a cancer survivor, I’ve found that living with cancer-- as opposed to dying from cancer— requires far more recognition of my mortality, of my intellectual, and the intellects of my doctors— who’ve spent 17 years telling me they have no idea why I’m still alive (I.e., men and women who’ve assiduously studied medical science are clueless as to why someone who has advanced stage 4 metastatic cancer, which normally kills within a year or two, is still alive, after now 30 years of living with it), and to keep doing what I’m doing… which is just learning to follow Jesus.
