I’m insisting that it be taken seriously as a piece of literature rather than twisted by adding to the text and ignoring the story line.
And yes, it was meant to convey “some sort of reality”. You can’t understand what it was meant to convey unless you treat it as coherent literature.
And that is something you do because of how good you are?
Or is it because God came down to earth and restored something to us?
If the latter, then that is the whole point. Jesus came to bring us back to Eden where we are walking with God again.
The entire Earth won’t qualify as Eden until everyone walks with God.
That’s the thing about Eden: walking with God was the norm.
Obviously not.
That is an overly simplified/inaccurate explanation.
Yes Christ facilitated the means of walking with God, but the relationship is not thesame as portrayed in Eden.
Adam did not walk with God. God walked with Adam. I hope you can see the differenece.
In the Garden Aam and Eve were no more than pets. They did not have the cognisance to understand a relationshp. They could not call on God. And they hid from Him.when they were in trouble.
The earth as it stands cannot be Eden. even if everyone walked with God there would still be disease, accdents and death. The definition of Eden on this forum appears to have no death.
The biblical New Heaven and New Earth is impossible with our current reality. It cannot work, This earth cannot survive without death. It is ecologically impossible. It is not just predators like the Lion that kill. There is a whole group of creatures who survive on carion and/or the dying. There is barely enough edible vegitation to keep humanity alive let alone the rest of the animal kingdom. And strictly speaking you are still killing vegetation to consume it. The bible is not scientific, that we know, and it applies to Eden.
Richard
Difference from what?
So when you say you walk with God, you do not mean that it is God walking with you? … its not God coming to you but… you going to God?
Sound like you are contradicting your “obviously not” reply.
So… No. I do not see the difference.
You make an empty criticism (no actual content). What ARE these differences do you see?
I guess you are referring to the fantasy Eden of the creationists which is contradicted by everything in how the bodies of animals work. Obviously we don’t believe such a thing ever existed. But a time when Adam and Eve walked with God (i.e. God walked with them just as He walks with me)? Yeah… I believe in that.
The lion lies down with the lamb is not a description of Eden. And taking the lack of mention of something (like predators) in some part of the Bible to mean they did not exist at that time is a terrible nonsensical hermeneutic for any writing let alone the Bible.
Sigh,
Adam was basically treated as a pet. His walking with God was as a dog might. He had no understanding other than to obey (or not)
My relationship with God is as a son, or family member. It is a two way street… There is complete communication.
I am sorry if you cannot see the dynamics of the Garden. It is the difference beteen having cognisance and not.
Richard
Being a son is not a static unchanging thing. You start as an infant and you grow up. And in the case of this relationship with God I don’t think that growing up ever ends.
I see this most in the change from the OT to the NT. Some see such a different between the two, they suppose it is a different God. But I think it is the people who are different. They are growing up. To be sure, the parenting of a two year old is very different than the parenting of a teenager… or it should be.
Oh I can see the dynamics of this Garden of your theology. I just don’t think that is the Garden of the Bible.
Where in the Bible is God treating Adam as a dog? When Christ is referred to as a second Adam is that like a second dog?
I see God giving them tremendous responsibilities and being very disappointed when they cannot meet the challenge.
I know you’re fixated on this fantasy, but it has nothing to do with the actual text.
One doesn’t give pets the responsibility to understand the essential being of all the living creatures and put them in charge of managing them.
What he “can’t see” is your made-up version of Eden.
That’s what’s in the text: understanding the essential nature of all the different species is a heck of a responsibility!
The whole point is that without the knowledge of good and evil Adam would have been incapable of having dominion over nature. The story is incoherent. It does not work.
It was not real!
Richard
I agree this interpretation of yours doesn’t work. An authentic knowledge of good and evil is a good thing and it only comes over a great deal of time in a relationship with God and not suddenly by one simple action or event. AND we don’t see an increase of real knowledge of good and evil by Adam and Eve. What does come suddenly is the authority to dictate good and evil – to be in a position where you are expected to know the difference between good and evil. And that is the source of enormous problems in human history and it IS something which comes suddenly by one simple action/event… like parenthood, or… inheriting the throne of a kingdom.
It is not my interpretation that is in question. It is the literal or reality one. I do not accept the story in any way literally, but it appears many do and in the process produce more and more convoouted doctrine.
Then you are leaving the text, because that is precisely what eating the fruit was supposed to have done.
Again you are ;leaving the text. “they knew they were naked”
Now whether you are a nudist or not, human morality says that we should be clothed. And that is the increase of knowledge scripture designates. It is just an example.thst the audiance would understand.
All I am doing is pointing out the inconguities of the text. I am not claimng any other realitiy.
Richard
The story is perfectly coherent – what’s incoherent is your bizarre reading of it.
So? That doesn’t change how the story is read.
Of course it’s your interpretation that is in question, because you do not treat the story as the kind of literature it is; instead you read it as though you don’t need to know anything to understand it, and thus you come out with the incredibly arrogant declaration that the story is wrong!
Not according to the text it wasn’t: you’re talking about intellectual knowledge, which has next to nothing to do with the knowledge the Hebrew talks about. What eating the fruit gave them was experiential knowledge of evil because that eating constituted disobedience.
That’s not in the text, either. They ‘knew’ they were naked because thanks to their disobedience they felt vulnerable, and being naked makes most people feel vulnerable.
You’re pointing out your strange ideas about the text. There are no incongruities; the story is internally consistent.
Ok… point taken.
This is the weakest part of your argument. To me this sounds like the white invaders of the American and African continents calling people savages because they do not live up to this medieval European fabrication of self-righteousness based on cultural trivialities.
HOWEVER… the text does have God saying they now know good and evil in 3:22. But it only makes sense to me if this is speaking of the authority rather than real knowledge. And St.Roymonds talk of experiential knowledge doesn’t work for me any better than the literal one you describe.
And there you just labeled people as non-human if they don’t follow your cultural dictates.
Not mine. I am just repeating biblical views.which is what the text is based on.
Unfaortunate such things muddy the waters all the time and we end up arguing over trivialities.
No I am taking it as literally as is possible.
I guess you have never heard of the “Deviil’s advocate” where by you are gure to the extreme, regardless of personal views.
That is you imposing your views on Scripture. Scripture does not say that.
Agan that is not what is said.
The tree was supposed to give then the knowledge of good and evil. IOW before they ate they did not have that knowledte. Afterwards they did.
You have constructed your own version of the story to fit your doctrine.
Richard
Let’s first look at some things Jesus said:
"He said to another man, “Follow me.” But he replied, “Lord, first let me go and bury my father.” Jesus said to him, “Let the dead bury their own dead, but you go and proclaim the kingdom of God.” " (Luke 9:59-60, NIV)
(This implies that those who believe in Jesus and proclaim the Kingdom of God are not spiritually dead.)
“To the angel of the church in Sardis write: These are the words of him who holds the seven spirits of God and the seven stars. I know your deeds; you have a reputation of being alive, but you are dead. … Yet you have a few people in Sardis who have not soiled their clothes. … I will never blot out the name of that person from the book of life.” (Revelation 3:1,4-5)
So you can clearly be spiritually dead in Jesus’ eyes. In the end, that will lead to physical death. And being spiritually alive will lead to eternal physical life.
Now on to Paul:
“We are those who have died to sin; how can we live in it any longer? Or don’t you know that all of us who were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? We were therefore buried with him through baptism into death in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, we too may live a new life. … In the same way, count yourselves dead to sin but alive to God in Christ Jesus. … offer yourselves to God as those who have been brought from death to life …
“When you were slaves to sin, you were free from the control of righteousness. What benefit did you reap at that time from the things you are now ashamed of? Those things result in death! But now that you have been set free from sin and have become slaves of God, the benefit you reap leads to holiness, and the result is eternal life. For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.”
(Romans 6:2-4,11,13,20-23, NIV)
Through Jesus, God has made us spiritually alive. Which will lead to eternal physical life. But if we renounce this gift, we will reap death.
The New Testament has an “already-but-not-yet” theology. The Kingdom of God is already here, but it will fully arrive when Jesus returns. The same applies to life and death. We are already spiritually alive. And when Jesus returns we will gain eternal physical life. (1 Thessalonians 4:13-18)
Yes it does – that’s what the Hebrew word means; it’s the same one that’s used to describe sexual intercourse.
I thought we had had enough of bringing sex into things. regardless of the translation of a single word, Scripture stares
Then the LORD God said, “Behold, the man has become like one of Us, knowing good and evil.
That is a complete knowledge, not a gradual one.
You must take the story as a whole and not try and break it into pieces.
Adam had no knowledge of good and evil. He ate the forbidden fruit. He now had the knowedge of good and evil.
And now, lest he reach out his hand and take also from the tree of life, and eat, and live forever…”
23Therefore the LORD God banished him from the Garden of Eden
He is banished in case he eats the other fruit. Not just because he disobeyed, but because, having done it once he may (probably) do it again.
Furthermore, the fact that there was a tree of life implies that Adam never had eternal life.and God was preventing him forever from getting it.
Now, how that applies to Jesus’ teaching I do not wish to debate. All that matters is that all;; this talk about there being no death before Adam ate is codswallop. If God actually said anything about death (taking the story as literal) it was not the natural death that we all must pass…
Richard
“Let your conversation be always full of grace, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how to answer everyone.” -Colossians 4:6
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