Mervin, it has nothing to do with “my way.” It has to do with, as the OP says, reality. Science is the study of nature, the study of reality. If the book of Genesis plainly says (and it does) that the Cosmos was created in 6 days, then by scientific accounts (our best understandings of reality), Genesis is wrong. No amount of saying, “Well, what the Bible really means is…” is going to fix it. And if the text doesn’t mean what it plainly says, that is a problem with either God being wrong or God keeping the truth of reality from the writers of scripture.
Of course, God’s purpose was not to communicate the structure of the universe with the writers of the scripture. If it was, He did an awfully poor job.
But you need to realize the vast asymmetry you are maintaining here.
Here is what you allow on the science side:
[quote=“trek4fr, post:21, topic:5153”]
…then by scientific accounts (our best understandings of reality)
[/quote][my emphasis added]
And here is what you allow for on the theology side:
No nuance, no “according to our best theologians”, no support or warrant for your bare assertion that this is the point of what Genesis 1 is intended to teach us.
This is like claiming that Americans are superior to Europeans at soccer because one of our best professional teams bested a random collection of boys playing streetball in London.
Science is allowed to develop and leave behind anything outmoded (we brag on this as one of its better qualities in fact!) But then we turn to theology and suddenly no learning or development is allowed. Whatever some received understanding of God’s actions was from thousands of years ago, we are allegedly supposed to be stuck in that static understanding now and are never allowed to grow from that or add anything to it.
You say “sure, but God should have given them wisdom for all time!” Well, God did! They understood it on their own terms then (within which God very wisely spoke to them), and we are given theologians, scholars, and spirit-led prophets today (with wide overlap between those groups) who help us understand enough of those very same ancient terms that we can distill the text’s eternal truths as they apply on through our time as well! But you won’t be satisfied unless you drive all the theologians and scholars from the room, telling them “I’ve got this; I can read, and you aren’t needed, thank you”; and then you invite in all the best current scientists into your room and proclaim “see! look how current science is!”
Can you see the incoherence of this approach?
I don’t really see the point in answering you when you clearly aren’t reading or attempting to understand what I was saying.
What you are doing is using a specific interpretation of Genesis to prove that it is scientifically inaccurate. What I and others have proposed is that Genesis revelation was a vision. Perhaps one presented over seven days. Using this interpretation these problems that you keep pointing out are not actually problems but strengths instead. In other words the objections you’ve raised have been answered. So stop raising them.
I think you don’t have any grounds in the first place for a so-called literal reading of the text. Many people in this very thread have pointed out that Genesis was poetry. By interpreting it word for word literal you are just taking an extreme position in light of the historical context. Not everything in the Bible is poetry. The non literal interpretation of some passages does not destroy the Integrity of others. Where in the Bible does it say that everything in the Bible should be taken literally?
I do believe I missed a posting! So… Genesis is a VISION. How, exactly, do you think you are going to convince the Evangelicals of this?
I was very clear in my earlier posts that I was not taking a literal 24 hour day position so I don’t understand why you keep trying to insist that I do. That seems to be your main objection so you’re really attacking something else that is not my position at all.
Algae are included in plant kind.
Yes… I missed that. Be sure to repeat that clarification often… there are lots of readers who don’t attempt to read ALL the posts in a thread… if they think they understand what is being written.
Every few days some NEW scenario or working hypothesis (that I’ve NEVER HEARD OF BEFORE) appears on these boards. Your proposal of a VISION of Eden and Adam & Eve satisfies TODAY’s quota. Thank you for that.
I’m not really aiming at evangelicals. I’m aiming at people who insist the Bible is not accurate whether they are atheists or members of other religions or Christians who are stuck with interpretation that conflicts with science. I don’t have anything against people who want to believe the Earth was created in six literal days. But when someone goes and learns about evolution or cosmology and realizes that that is not true, I think this interpretation offers a very satisfying and simple and cohesive way of harmonizing the Genesis account with modern science. I think that there are a lot of good things about the Evangelical movement but their position on creation is a mistake. I know a lot of people who have lost their faith over this because they we’re told by those in their church that they had to choose between science and the Bible as if there was no other option. The vision interpretation not only provides another option but it also fits so well with the science that it becomes a great asset to the apologist trying to convince people that the Bible is accurate and inspired.
I’m not the only person on this post who is proposing the vision interpretation. So don’t go trying to dismiss it as some wild idea I just dreamed up. There is extensive material in this thread pointing out the reasons why a vision interpretation fits so well with science and Genesis and the nature of Revelation in the Bible
I have to agree. Making Genesis into a VISION solves many issues. It certainly should be mentioned as a solution. But remember, if it’s a vision, it doesn’t have to delve into speculations like an Earth covered in clouds.
Well the Earth having been covered with clouds is a scientific fact not just a speculation. That’s one of the reasons that the vision interpretation is so powerful. If you set up a time lapse video camera on the surface of the Earth starting from the first clumps of dust all the way through to the beginning of mankind and then divided it into 6 installments, titled it “God creates the world”, and showed it to an ancient person asking them to describe it in their own words (with some help) what happens in each installment I think you would end up with something very similar to Genesis.
If it’s a vision… then a mention of the clouds would be expected. If it isn’t mentioned… and a vision doesn’t have the burden of actually being REAL … then you can imagine blue gelatin in the sky if you like.
I would suggest that the less contrived the elements of the vision are … the easier it is to imagine it as being an authentic way to look at Genesis.
Well since the Ancients thought that the sky was a dome how would they even start to tell the difference between a alien looking overcast sky and a Dome without any sun and stars. Without the knowledge of outer space the idea that something could be beyond the sky would be totally foreign to them. So it appears to them that the Sun and Moon suddenly appear in the Dome. It doesn’t seem very contrived to me it actually seems very straightforward. It also explains where the light was coming from. The Sun.
Good to see you have not been frightened away by the onslaught of polarised comments here. As you might remember, I asked in the beginning that people should try to write their own story of genesis in a way that it could be understood by someone who cannot read or write.
It is interesting to consider that life including the existence of plants (not just meaning the stuff you have in your garden) predate the solar / lunar cycle on this planet, let alone to think where and what earth was before it was part of the solar system and if the life forms perceived as not moving predated that time.
If you were an observer of reality from the position of spacedust colonising earth you would have perceived this order and even if you would have existed as an asteroid’s point of view landing here. It is just the bean counters that struggle here because they do not want others to see it not their way forgetting that the truth they see is limited by the language they think in, particularly if their language is not based on love, thus look for signs of their own intellectual superiority in Genesis instead of admiring the intellectual superiority of the creator that allowed them to write this all those thousands of years ago.
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I am proposing here that the vision recorded in Genesis was a accurate depiction of how the world really begin, shown to an ancient prophet from a normal human point of view on the surface of the Earth. The point is that because of things like the order of the plants and animal kinds being correct and the Sun and Moon not appearing in the sky until after the plants actually show that it was a divinely inspired vision that depicted what really happened.
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I agree with you Jamie.
If you look at the days in Genesis from God’s timeline it could be 6 days for creation.
Day 1 let there be light and separation of darkness from the light was the big bang
Day 2 the separation and formation of land and sea from sky
Day 3 plant life which consumes CO2 and generates oxygen
Day 4 the skies are cleared by plant life and behold you now see the sun and the moon and the stars as they were now created for viewing on the earth for purposes of separating night from day.
Day 5 sea creatures and birds
Day 6 land creatures and man
Day 7 rest
The evening and morning represents the conclusion of a day - each day could be 24 hours in God’s ( the Holy Spirit) time and represents a distinct workday by God in that period. All of this is consistent with scientific evidence.
Praise God and Science - they are one!
Neal
“Plain sense of the text” is how fundamentalists talk, not Bible scholars. And it’s not true that the only options are “plain sense” or “means whatever you want.” To say this you have to dismiss the entire academic field of biblical studies which relies on other academic disciplines such as linguisitcs, archaeology, comparative literature, history, philosophy, and theology. All those areas contribute meaningful knowledge to the interpretation process that goes well beyond a typical 21st century English speaker’s “plain sense of the text.”
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