What to make of Genesis 4?
It would seem that Cain’s offering of food was equivalent to Abel’s offering, meaning meat was considered food. That’s how I read it. It wasn’t as if Abel offered wool.
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What is Genesis 1:30 really saying and implying, if God gave us plants for animals to eat, but as the evidence demonstrates animals learned to hunt down and kill other animals for food (or raise domesticated animals for food as Abel did)? It is saying that what we do is NOT all according to some prearranged plan by God because living organisms do their own thing. Now which does this agree with? Creationism and the watchmaker intelligent design god of Deism or evolution and the shepherd notion of God found in the Bible? Sorry taypeng, but it turns out that Genesis 1:30 is just another way in which evolution fits better with Christianity and the Bible than does creationism and the only way to make the anti-science dogma of creationism work is to change the Bible to fit it.
What I mean is, it is redundant to explain to me that plants are meant for food if there are animals (herbivores) whose diet is food. and if an explanation is required for that, why is there no explanation for predation? I hope you don’t mind my questioning because I’m just trying to make sure I understand this verse correctly.
Yes, that is my point. Carnivores are conditioned to eat meat. Herbivores are conditioned to eat plants. It is redundant to then tell the herbivore that the plant is given to them as food…Abel domesticated animals for food but that came after the Fall. From the reading of the text itself, it seems that the meat-eating came after the Fall.
God sacrificed an animal and made coverings for Adam and Eve. It could mean that meat-eating came after the Fall… that is how I’m reading it.
Genesis is not a cook book (though I’m sure Jacob’s ‘red stuff’ was delicious). I think verse 30 shows the purpose of vegetation. It’s not about limiting diets. Predation isn’t mentioned for the same reason intense weather and angelic rebellion aren’t mentioned: the account portrays creation as calm and orderly work and so leaves out any hints of conflict (except, perhaps, for the word “subdue”).
That puts a lot of weight on what’s found between the lines. Neither sacrifice nor killing an animal is mentioned. I can see how Abel’s sacrifice suggests that he raised (and ate) livestock, but that’s because he’s a normal human character. If Jesus could make wine without crushing grapes, surely God could make leather underwear without killing beasts. Even if God did use an animal, the only one to be specifically mentioned in the Eden account could provide a skin without being killed. And even if God did kill an animal to clothe them, the killing was so insignificant as to not be worth mentioning.
Sacrifice and killing animals do show up a chapter later with Cain and Abel, and there they’re presented without any comment about their novelty. Similarly, when clean and unclean distinctions show up before the flood (a clean animal being one that can be eaten), there’s no indication this is some new shift. Within the parts of Genesis that call God “Yahweh/LORD,” meat-eating, sacrifice and clean/unclean distinctions are just assumed to have always been there.
According to some parts of the Bible it seems the Earth was flat. And THAT wasn’t before the fall either. So, what you think the Bible “seems” to say isn’t what it actually says. It does not say that meat-eating came after the fall. That was not one of the curses in Genesis 3.
Did God also change the shape of the earth just before people made observations showing it wasn’t flat like a table? The idea that God changed the biology of living organisms after the fall to eat meat is just as absurd. It is like the idea that God created the universe this morning with all our memories as they are. Such ideas contrary to what our memories and all the data from the earth and sky are unreasonable because it makes a surreal disconnect from reality as we experience it and makes too much of our lives meaningless. If the Bible is going to make our lives meaningless then it is better to dispose of it in the garbage. Fortunately there is another way… stop calling God a liar, accept what He is telling us in the data from the earth and sky, then reread the Bible in the light of scientific findings and adjust your understanding of what it means accordingly.
This notion that God changed the whole universe so you can make some interpretation of the Bible work better is ludicrous. A little humility and common sense would have you change your interpretation of the Bible instead.
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One final thing that came to my mind. Scripture interprets Scripture.
Would you say that in the new heavens and the new earth, there will be meat-eating?
The wolf will live with the lamb, the leopard will lie down with the goat, the calf and the lion and the yearling together; and a little child will lead them. Isaiah 11:6
They will neither harm nor destroy on all my holy mountain, for the earth will be filled with the knowledge of the LORD as the waters cover the sea. Isaiah 11:9
I’m working backwards here. The Bible teaches that creation is distorted by the Fall but God will restore all of it back to what it was intended to be one day. So if I’m reading Isaiah 11:6-9 correctly, the “lion lies down with the lamb” - this is the original intent. Animals weren’t created meat-eaters at the start which would be consistent with the plain reading of Gen 1:30.
I’m not calling God a liar my friend. I don’t know why you are putting such words in my mouth. I’m taking a different position from you and questioning your position because I’m trying to learn. I’m approaching this subject of Biblical interpretation carefully. In any scientific study, you have peer reviewers. To me, that is what we are doing now.
Maybe the title of my posting was too provocative…I’m actually trying to understand and interpret Gen 1:30 in light of what we know.
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Apparently you misunderstood so I will rephrase that…
If the Bible is going to make all the information about the past meaningless, then it is better to dispose of it. Fortunately there is another way… accept what God is telling us in the data from the earth and sky, then reread the Bible in the light of scientific findings and adjust your understanding of what it means accordingly.
What we know of biology tells us that you shouldn’t change the words of the Bible from “God gave us plants to eat” to “man and animals ate only plants.”
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Ok so am I asking a reasonable question? I’m asking why does God have to tell us that “He gave us plants to eat”. Why doesn’t he bother to tell man that animals are given as food as well? Shouldnt either one be obvious to a herbivore/carnivore?
Or isn’t there room to interpret it as God limiting the diets of animals and mankinds to plants?
I understand it completely does not gel with what we observe. Otherwise, I won’t even be asking this question in the first place. I want to be cautious as well when “rereading the Bible in the light of scientific findings” - because man and science are not infallible.
100 years or so ago, if you tried to read the Bible in the light of science you’ll have to say that the Old Testament had no historical value. The OT was considered rubbish until the discovery of the dead sea scrolls.
But anyway you and I are getting nowhere because you are insisting that the verse can only be interpreted based on what we observe. There are meat-eaters therefore this verse isn’t about limiting of diets.
But is man any less fallible when reading the Bible than when practicing science? Either way, we are the weak link it seems.
On the face of it though, everything about the physiology of a carnivore argues against their ever* having been a herbivore. It wouldn’t be as simple a matter as swapping out pointy teeth for grinders.
*Well, never is an awfully long time. In fact herbivores would need to have come first in order to provide the meat carnivores require. So at some point every carnivore had a herbivore ancestor … but not in its current form.
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Of course, if you accept that Genesis was first written done during the exile or shortly after, we see it as probably being a collection of oral stories, organized to help reunite a fragmented and oppressed peope and provide a backstory for their culture. As such, it becomes even more strained to the read “all before that point were vegetarians” as a historical cultural fact into the text.
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Yeah…
Maybe this prophecy will be fulfilled…
…when scientists come up with a perfect imitation of meat and all natural habitats are gone so the only lions are the ones lying down in cages not so far from pens with the goats and calves.
Abel is the one who made the sacrifice to God, and it was a fatty portion of an animal. This was compared to Cain’s offering which was plant food. The comparison is rather obvious, at least to me.
Let me guess: God isn’t a vegan. 
Maybe! Isaiah looks ahead to a time when, along with wiping away every tear and swallowing up death forever, God provides “a feast of rich food, a feast of well-matured wines, of rich food filled with marrow, of well-matured wines” (Isaiah 25:6, 8). So apparently the tastiest meat will still be served – but again, just as God can make leather clothes without killing, perhaps God will also barbecue meat without killing. Or, more likely, the picture of eating the best meats and wines is intended to show us something about the bounty and goodness of the new earth, not describe its physical details.
In this verse, peacefulness is portrayed by how the lion is tame. In Isaiah 35:9, peacefulness is portrayed by the lion not being there: “No lion shall be there, nor shall any ravenous beast come up on it [the road]; they shall not be found there, but the redeemed shall walk there.” So contradictory imagery is used to picture the same thing, peace. Since Isaiah can make that point both by saying lions are gone and saying lions have become tame, we probably should let his language tell us about the peace without pressing it to tell us about the diet of lions.
Again, that depends on giving a lot of weight to ideas added between the lines. Why assume that the way things will be is the same as the way things started? I think the new creation is going to be better than anything prior. Our final position will be better than our first. The new heavens and earth aren’t a giant reset button – they’re a new creation we are welcomed into.
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Although Calvin, writing before the availability of geological evidence, was favorably inclined to the idea of no carnivory before the Fall, in commenting on Genesis 1:30 he pointed out that it says nothing about eating meat, one way or anther, just that the plants were given for food. Psalm 104, which in many ways seems like a meditation on Genesis 1, explicitly credits God with feeding the carnivores. Jesus ate fish and presumably the occasional serving of lamb or kid. Claiming that there is anything morally wrong with animals being carnivores is highly problematic. Certainly humans have a moral obligation to treat animals well, but approving a sacrificial system doesn’t fit well with banning the consumption of meat. The distinction between clean and unclean animals is assumed in directions for loading up the ark, yet it is specifically related to edibility- contact with a live horse or camel is fine as long as you don’t eat it, under Levitical law. Permission after the landing may plausibly contrast with not wiping them out during the boat ride.
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The fossil record suggests predation back into the Precambrian. Fossil Cloudina tubes, from the latest Precambrian, sometimes have holes in them that have been interpreted as from predation. Some of the Precambrian animal fossils appear to be cnidarians of some sort. Cnidaria (jellyfish, corals, etc.) is distinguished by the ability to sting. You don’t need to sting a plant to catch it. Certainly there are both jaws and damaged individuals that point to predation starting in the early Cambrian. The oldest known fangs for venom are Triassic, again something useful only to a carnivore. Likewise, protective structures such as spines and armor point to the existence of predation. Tooth marks on fossil animals and coprolites (fossil poop) containing remains of animals are additional evidences of the long history of predation. Indeed, larger herbivores would be unlikely to be able to completely avoid accidentally eating some small insects or other animals along with the leaves or fruit.
One reason so little connection (or progress) is being made here is that you and others here are not operating from a common set of underlying assumptions. Correct me if I’m wrong, but you seem to be treating the Genesis 1-3 accounts as a straightforward, blow-by-blow account of a literal conversation in which a newly formed adult human needs instruction about what he can put in his mouth.
Whereas some others here see early Genesis writings as a Hebrew narrative inspired much later that seeks to “provide a seat” or show the divine purpose for the world and its inhabitants as they then saw it. Contrary to what some will insist here, that latter view doesn’t make it one whit less true, less inpsired, or less God’s word. But what it would mean is that it is [can be] a fool’s errand, then, to try to draw from such narratives what the original author(s) had no interest in putting into them.