No apology necessary.
Can you say more about why Moses or God would feel it necessary to misrepresent reality in order to teach the Israelites an ethical principle? Are you saying they could not have taught the ethical principle without giving an erroneous time frame for creation?
I refer to you @Socratic.Fanatic’s recent post on this subject here.
You give me too much credit. Whatever continental drift is doing to my life is well beyond my notice.
You were responding here to my comment about our ability to go to the moon and back. As I undertand it, it would be impossible to chart a course to the moon and back unless you knew that the earth was moving.
I agree that there can be. The problem, however, is when a new revelation seems to contradict the word of God. That’s what causes us to have these discussions.
Because we can’t change the past. Even God doesn’t change the past; otherwise, He could have avoided the cross by rewinding the Eve tape.
No, except to explain that it’s a fiction. I cannot conceive of telling my children something was true that I would one day have to tell them was not true. It’s repugnant on multiple levels.
There is indeed good reason to exercise discretion in such matters, but discretion merely requires the avoidance of details - not the construction of fictions. The stork idea is as batty as Santa Claus. If you’re trying to raise your children to believe in an invisible Jesus, you’re working against yourself if you simultaneously teach them about an invisible figure who’s not there.
I see no reason whatsoever to think that the ancients couldn’t have handled descriptions of the creation that involved, say, “untold ages of time.” I think they were probably as flummoxed by the “six-day” explanation as we are. There was just no one around pushing an alternative answer at them like we have today.
Bill, I can certainly agree with you that God’s mind is way beyond my ability to discern. But to comfort you, be assured I’m only trying to figure out the piece of it He’s revealed to us in the Bible.
You’re a good guy, and I know you mean me well.
Hope all is going well for you on this Lord’s Day.
I think you need to add some more assumptions to you original post, Mike. Foremost among them:
1. I should expect the Bible to provide complete, clear answers to every question considered important in every age, regardless of the subject matter.
Also, lengthy discussion has revealed other assumptions:
2. God expects me to use the Bible to infer conclusions to scientific and historical questions, even when the Bible itself does not seem to care about the inference.
Also,
3. God intended for the view of creation in 6 days to be interpreted by Israel in a literal, historical manner, and He intends for that interpretation to be authoritative even in the age of the New Covenant.
Also.
4. Sola Scriptura means that when different scholars offer different, good faith interpretations of the Scripture that all rely on Scriptural authority, we cannot look to other forms of evidence outside the Scriptures to select the most likely interpretation.
Grace and peace,
Chris Falter v
[quote=“Mike_Gantt, post:220, topic:36410”]
Should we tell people asking about transgenderism that it’s not important and none of us need to be talking about it because the Bible is not explicit about it?[/quote]
We should be saying there’s no Bible-based position on it other than:
Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. This is the first and great commandment. And the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.
Yes, unless it impacts on the Great Commandment quoted above.
[quote]Is the Bible’s omission of any prohibition against same-sex “marriage” God’s way of making sure that people never think that He cares which side they take on the issue?
[/quote]Yes. You’re making it clear that you’re listening far more to your church’s political stances than you are to the Bible.
What about divorce and taking in strangers? Christ’s position on those is literal and clear.
So, let the clarification of the clarifications continue…
Firstly, my reference to your congregation was intended merely to mean the congregation where you attend.
Secondly, I am flattered that you find me difficult to read; I find you equally so.
Thirdly, it has been my observation that the posts you are most likely to ignore are the one’s I am most seriously concerned about… which makes me doubt your intentions behind these discussions. I don’t believe there is a single post of yours I haven’t answered… and some I have answered more than once.
Fourth, please don’t confuse my willingness to throw some humor into the discussion with my treating any of your discussion as a parlor game. I consider this process to be a fairly grave proceeding. . . Hence my occasional attempt to lighten the mood.
The only thing that I find similar to any parlor game is that we are seriously weighing the relative merits for the Genesis Creation account, which presents one incredible proposition after another:
o creation of the Earth before the sun;
o creation of light before the Sun;
o counting of days before the Sun;
o creation of birds before land animals;
o creation of a solid Firmament;
o introducing a talking snake as the beginning of all human troubles;
o punishing Adam & Eve for a transgression made before they knew the difference of good and evil;
o all of this ultimately leading to a post-creation regional flood story that becomes distorted into an impossible global flood.
I’m a grown man and I still can’t believe stories like these form the faith core of generations of YECs.
I thought I would jump in on your response to @Jay313 's discussion. How would Moses have even known the age of the earth would become an issue?
I don’t see how he would.
Yes I read his comments, but even if you translate it as the dirt under my feet the modern understanding is the dirt can move. If you stand with your feet on opposite sides of a geologic fault your feet will move even if the movement is too small to notice. That is what I meant when I say we have a greater understanding of nature than the ancients.
I am not talking about changing the past, just our understanding of the words that were written to describe the past. Socratic.Fanatic mentioned in his post, “I’m NOT saying that the ancient Hebrews had a scientifically sound cosmology.” So in effect we disregard their cosmology because our modern understand of cosmology is different. Nobody, except the Flat Earthers, thinks this is a problem or does violence to God’s Word. The reason for the change is what science tells us. So if science tells us that the Hebrews did not have a scientifically sound history why is it not possible to likewise disregard the written history that we know is not correct? What is the difference? Both cosmology and history are recorded in the Word of God.
This would not change the essence of my response to you.
I can accept that; I hope that you can accept that I have no reliable way of discerning which of your posts are more important to you than others.
You’ve expressed this doubt about my intentions before, which is another reason why I have been, and will continue to be, selective in my responses to you. Life is too short, and there’s too much work to be done, to interact with people who doubt your intentions. So much energy gets wasted.
You are perhaps the most prolific poster I have encountered at BioLogos. I don’t know who can keep up with you. I sure can’t.
That said, just because you write a “response” to me doesn’t necessarily mean you’ve answered me. And when you respond in ways that don’t incorporate acceptance of what I’ve explained to you, or, worse yet, misrepresentations of what I’ve said, I’d have been better off if you hadn’t responded.
Indeed, you have. Hence, the badger emoji.
Of course. Good-natured and light-hearted humor can be a blessing in these discussions. My “parlor game” comment had nothing to do with that, which I appreciate in a person; rather, it had to do with the gamemanship and flippancy that show up in some of your comments.
You are able to present more issues than any one person can reasonably address. You certainly differ with me on far more biblical issues than we will have time to address together.
Alas, I expect that you will continue to be disappointed in my rate of, or lack of, response to your posts. Let me therefore take this opportunity to say that I respect you as a serious person. However, there are too many differences between us, most notably our respective views on my intentions, for us to be able to have very many productive interactions in this forum.
Yes, we do have a greater understanding. But we have to translate the text on their terms, not ours. For example, you assume that the ground on each side of a fault line has moved even if a person standing there and straddling the fault didn’t feel any movement. Yet, in many cultures they would find that claim absurd and illogical. In many cultures, they would assume that if the movement can’t be noticed by a person standing there, it is perfectly valid for a speaker to state that the ground did not move. It is a difference in worldview and expression.
Indeed, because Brownian motion is always present, should we impose a “rule” on English speakers saying that it is NEVER valid to speak of anything being fixed or unmoving—and claim that science demands such a rule? Should every book which speaks of a stable or unmoving surface be corrected?
As I’ve said, I don’t see the Bible teaching science, but I do see it teaching history. If the Bible is the word of God, I don’t see how we can say it has taught us something erroneous that needs correction.
If God is indeed speaking to us through science and correcting something He said in the Bible, it looks something like this: “Remember when I said six days and rest? Well, it’s actually billions of years and ongoing.” To do such a thing seems to me utterly senseless and completely unnecessary. At least with His suffering on the cross, I see the point of the absurdity.
Another assumption you have not yet listed.
This sounds like you trying to have things both ways. What I should have asked is how would Moses even know how old Earth was?
Did not knowing the precise details of creation even matter, if what he wanted to do was present Creation in a way that supported a “holy metaphysics” in support of the practice of a 7 Day Sabbath?
Perhaps it would be better to describe the Bible as the “Inspiration of God”, instead of the “Word of God”. The former would actually be more consistent with how the New Testament itself described scripture.
The use of the phrase “Word of God” seems very much a Strict Inerrantist slogan.
Which is the only point that I was trying to get across. I like your example of cosmology better.
Hebrew question. Does that fact that Exodus 10:11 and 31:17 are both missing the preposition for “in” mean anything that is significant? In other words, should we consider “In six days” to be different from “six days”?
Christ was asked a question - what should we do - and His reply began with “keep the commandments”.
The point that includes reverence for the bible begins with that, and the only commandment that includes a notion of time and specific period is the Sabbath.
If an accurate calculation of time were necessary, it must be that of calculating the exact period that was the first Sabbath. Clearly the bible does not make such a calculation; it is reasonable to conclude belief in the bible does not involve an exact chronology. This view is supported by other passages dealing with matters on time and periods.
This matter remains one of preference and argument - your strongest point is that any inference to be drawn from biblical passages would not amount to billions of years. The counter to this would be that it is unlikely anyone during ancient times would have understood the term “billion”.
…and the argument(s) would go on and on, without benefit to anyone.
They’re all the same issue.
They are all simple observations that falsify your dichotomy of science being so different because it sometimes uses telescopes and microscopes. Even without science at all, these all show that this was never meant to be taken literally, particularly when combined. That’s why George combined them.
Oh, please. The Word of God is a synonym for the Bible or Scripture. Its use doesn’t imply any position whatsoever on inerrancy.
[quote=“Mike_Gantt, post:233, topic:36410”]
If God is indeed speaking to us through science and correcting something He said in the Bible,[/quote]
God isn’t correcting anything in the Bible. It was obviously a parable designed to illustrate something else.
[quote] …it looks something like this: “Remember when I said six days and rest? Well, it’s actually billions of years and ongoing.” To do such a thing seems to me utterly senseless and completely unnecessary.
[/quote]Which is why you employ it as a straw man.
“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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