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In actuality, if you are “chosen” in Scripture, lots of times it’s because you were a loser no one thought would amount to much. 1 Cor 1:27-29 and all…
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The need for a savior comes from the inherent brokenness of humanity and humanity’s relationship with God. The doctrine of original sin is an attempt to explain that brokenness and need for reconciliation, but the brokenness is there whether the explanation is given in literal or figurative terms. Is anyone really going to argue that there was no literal Adam and Eve, and that’s proof that humanity is not messed up. Humanity is messed up. That is self-evident.
Well, brokenness would mean there was something to break. Otherwise its messed up condition is entirely random and necessary, or, it is god’s fault.
Does it have to mean that? (I’m just exploring the idea, I don’t even know if I’m going to agree with myself and what I’m typing because my brain is really tired.) It is focusing backwards to insist that if something is broken, at one point it wasn’t. We can’t really prove that. And it doesn’t fit with our human experience, where each of us has always been broken and limited and imperfect from the very beginning of our lives. If we focus forward, then being broken just implies that we are something that could be healed, not something that was once perfect. I guess different people get spun up on different questions, but the “how did we get this way” question is not nearly as interesting or vital to me as “what do we do about the fact that humanity is messed up?” Other than making for prettier theology, does it really matter if we have an airtight explanation of why we are the way we are? I’m okay with the idea that the Adam and Eve narrative is there to hold a mirror to ourselves and show us “you are messed up and need a savior” not to offer some airtight formal explanation for the mechanism by which brokenness entered humanity.
No, I didn’t mean you, I meant others who believe in a fully literal Adam & Eve.
This might be a good question if you were writing a novel. But when you are given an explanation, it seems rather a pointless question. Yes it is more important to understand what God has done about our messed up condition.
Interesting, perhaps this is what non believers in a literal Adam generally believe and it does make some sense. However, consider this: Paul talks as if there was a literal Adam. It seems highly likely that for much of Judeo / Christian history, people thought that there was a literal Adam. To this day, the great majority of Christians, certainly evangelical Christians, believe it. It’s too far a leap for them to go from that to believing Adam was just figurative. And so, the future of evangelical Christianity is seriously suffering as more and more young people (even those where are raised Christian) reject it when given strong scientific information. Unfortunately there is no “in between” that many see. I want what BioLogos is about, to see reconciliation of science and faith. I want to believe God wouldn’t allow such a huge misunderstanding occur about the Adam and Eve story (that it was ‘only’ a figurative story), although I can’t rule that, or the people who believe it, out. However, I certainly, for the sake of the evangelical movement, don’t want to rule out the possibility that there was a combination of figurative and literal - as I suggested at the beginning of this blog subject.
I think we need to be careful about conflating other culture’s conceptions of “true story” with our own modern conception of what counts as historically accurate. To say that people in other cultures believed Adam was a real person is not quite the same thing as to say people in those cultures had the mindset that everything in Genesis “literally occurred” the way we mean “literal.” There has not always been this binary absolute distinction between history and fiction that we are hung up on today.
I guess I’m having a hard time seeing how associating some pre-historic couple with a literal biblical Adam really solves the “problem.” The “problem” is not biological, genetic, or historical; it’s related to one’s view of the appropriate way to approach revelation and truth/error in Scripture.
Here is my summary of the options and the problems:
A) Jesus and Paul and the church for centuries believed Adam and Eve were real people (I avoid historical, because I think that word has baggage for us that it didn’t have for them) from relatively recent human history, but maybe they weren’t and it doesn’t really matter. (Problem for many people who need Jesus and Paul to not be “mistaken” about anything and the Bible to be “truthful” in very specific terms.)
B) Jesus and Paul didn’t really believe that Adam and Eve were real people, they just talked about them like they were to make theological points. The church through the centuries has misconstrued things. (Problem for people who wonder why they/the Bible would mislead people, when it could have been clearer.)
C) Jesus and Paul knew Adam and Eve were pre-historic people but talked about them like they were people in more recent history, because that’s what everyone else knew and understood. (Same problem as B.)
D) Jesus and Paul thought Adam and Eve were real people in recent history, but they were really pre-historic people. (Same problem as A)
E) Jesus and Paul thought Adam and Eve were real people in recent history, and they were. (No problems, hence the appeal of the young earth position on this one.)
F) Jesus and Paul knew what the bible said and referenced the story to make their point. Nothing more and nothing less.
@GJDS
Quite the contrary. I thank the good Lord for a long and happy life and for the guidance that steered me clear of ‘negative experiences’. During my long career in science I have been fortunate to have made close friends with colleagues of various faiths: Buddhism, Shinto, Hindu and agnostics, all of whom had made at least a tentative effort to see what Christianity had to offer by reading the Bible. Without exception they were put off by what they saw as Christianity’s claim to be ‘the only road to Heaven’ or to hold ‘the keys to the Kingdom’. They cited Mark 16:16 and John 14:6 as proof. I was embarrassed to admit I had not paid attention to these passages before, and I did not have the expertise that you, Eddie, or the other BioLogos scholars have to explain their context and true meaning. But how many Christian evangelists have that training? If my embarrassment constituted a ‘negative experience’ then of course you are right.
I was successful in one case of ‘evangelizing’, but I had ‘outside help.’
Al Leo
I remember once having a discussion with a Buddhist who claimed that Buddhism encompasses and includes all religions. I asked him how buddhism would deal with Jesus claim that “I am the truth, the way, and the life. No one comes to the father, except through me.” He had not heard it before. I also asked him how buddhism could include two religions who contradicted each other, and each claimed to be the only way.
So there is contradiction and exclusivity in all faiths, even in the buddhism that claims not to do so. It is impossible to legitimately claim that two contradictory beliefs fit within your own faith, as buddhism apparently does. Neither Christianity nor Islam can fit within Buddhism because they are in disagreement that all faiths can fit within buddhism, unless buddhism is not a faith at all, but merely a discipline such as math or reading.
It is impossible to legitimately claim that two contradictory beliefs fit within your own faith, …
Impossible that is … until somebody up and does it. Who said that a large system of faith can’t encompass a few contradictions? Read Proverbs 26:4, resolve to follow that advice; and then go on to read Proverbs 26:5.
First of all, I want to acknowledge you are right that we don’t know exactly what Judeo/Christian people believed throughout history. You are also correct to highlight what Jesus and Paul said because they were at a key point of both Jewish and Christian history. However, I definitely don’t consider what Jesus said about marriage "from the beginning’ to be an endorsement of a recent Adam (or technically, a literal Adam). What he says does indicate a belief in the early significance of marriage/monogamy.
As for Paul, BioLogos’ Pete Enns, who is disinclined to believe in a historical Adam, says that the Apostle Paul believed in a historical Adam. And Pete says “However you slice it, what Paul says about Adam is a very important point of Christian theology.” That approach rules out A and B - for me at least. As for C, just like I said for Jesus, I don’t see any strong reason to believe that he believed in a particular time-period of Adam. It wasn’t necessary for the spiritual point and nothing was written about the time period.
You could be referring to Luke’s genealogy from Adam to Jesus, in Luke 3:23-38. This is somewhat problematic and I need to study more about that. For now I will say that Luke does not mention years in his genealogy.
David Opderback on BioLogos says “from my study of scripture and its context, it seems to me that genealogy, in the ancient context, is at heart about the representative responsibility of the progenitor and of other key figures in the genealogical line. It is of course true that ancient genealogy also involves physical descent, but not every member of the progenitor’s line necessarily would have to be a direct physical descendant of the progenitor alone.”
That brings up all sorts of questions. But that’s a subject for a different blog.
So, I guess if I had to choose, I would choose Patrick’s F.
But I want to point out again, that my original ‘plausible’ story at the beginning of this blog, has a literal Adam in a partially figurative story (50,000 to 100,000 years ago). Paul would be referencing a historical Adam. Do you see that as a possibility?
I’m more generally referring to the fact that people in Christ’s time didn’t have a concept of prehistoric people like we have a concept of prehistoric people. I would say they were definitely not envisioning emerging homo sapiens 50,000-100,000 years ago when they talked about Adam and Eve as their ancestors. Evolving hominins weren’t part of their concept of the world.
I don’t think it’s a possibility that Paul was referencing someone that he believed lived 50,000-100,000 years ago. I don’t think it’s a possibility that humans passed on a historical record or a genealogy for that many generations for it to arrive from pre-history to the Jewish people.
I thought the whole need for a historical Adam stemmed from the need for Paul and Jesus not to be wrong (that is, historically inaccurate) in what they thought and believed and based their teaching on, not for them to be technically correct in some reinterpreted meaning of their words that they could not have had in their minds when they said them.
I’m fine with F too, but you were talking about allaying the concerns of certain Evangelicals who are hung up on what was in Paul and Jesus’ mind when they said what they said about Adam and Eve. So I don’t really see how your proposal actually addresses those concerns that Jesus and Paul did not know what we know today, and so in effect, were teaching truth from a “wrong” concept of the world.
A proverb is not a faith nor a belief, it is advice. These two compliment each other, like do not exasperate your children vs do not avoid correction.
We wouldn’t be having this Adam and Eve discussion every other week if the “given explanation” of a literal interpretation of Genesis 2 was satisfying on every level. It’s not.
We all have friends and colleagues who adopt a different view, have a different background, differ in beliefs, and so on. During my lengthy career in science. no-one has as yet, sat down with me to examine their beliefs or mine. I am surprised that accomplished scientists would not have a basic understanding of most of the major belief systems - the majority do and in one way or another, and are happy to leave matters with each other, as they are. So you embarrassment is an odd experience to me - but you desire to “evangelize” others to your unique take on scripture is, to my experience, a very odd outlook - as I said, those scientists who take an interest in any faith (or none) seem to have taken the trouble to understand/ comprehend their own outlook (which inevitably will include some “home grown” metaphysical considerations).
The negative experiences that I refer to in my discussions with you, could include personal angst at what the Bible may “say” to some, but mainly the politics of aggressive people who conflate and misuse almost anything they can. I think all of us have experienced to varying degrees this type of hype - in my experience, the Faith is a great asset to us in dealing with such nonsense - and never an embarrassment.
I don’t think it matters exactly what they thought about Adam, as long as they got the spiritual/functional message. Same thing for Paul, except, as a writer ‘inspired’ by God, it seems like we have to trust that God would not let him mangle a important point of Christian theology.
I do think there’s evidence that at least a certain amount of it may be true and consistent with history, but not likely all of the pre-history part. Also mistakes could have been made in the history part at some point or another. (Additional information - The more I study, the more I believe that “fathers” (“ab”) and “sons” (“ben”) have been mistranslated and should be “ancestors” and “descendants.” Luke, Paul, and Jesus would have likely known that.)
Considering the fact that souls, good and evil, sin, death, and a need for a savior came to humanity, introducing it through interacting with 2 individuals is a pretty good way of doing it (that happens also to match up with what Paul believes - per Pete Enns - is an actual ‘Adam’).
Another point, God clearly interacted with humans at key points. Certainly when he caused Jesus virgin birth, Jesus’ miracles and messages, his resurrection, etc. Also, with the disciples, especially with the sending the Holy Spirit. I certainly think that he interacted with key biblical characters and to one extent or another, with the Jewish people. Considering that, it seems to me to be hard to believe that when it comes to giving the first humans souls and free will, with all its consequences, He wouldn’t do it through some direct interaction with some humans and/OR ultimately inspire a writer to preserve the basic highlights of how it was done and more importantly, the spiritual message. To be sure, it almost certainly had a significant amount of allegorical aspects plus the incidental cultural aspects of the writer and original readers.
I don’t know for sure how He did it. I’m sure that there are other plausible scenario’s. I would like to hear them. And Adam doesn’t have to be literal in them, but I still think that the story needs to include how souls, good and evil, sin, death, and a need for a savior came to humanity.
If I understand Peter Enns correctly that’s pretty much what he says. But it matters to a lot of people exactly what Jesus and Paul thought about Adam. Enns is arguing it shouldn’t and he hasn’t exactly been warmly embraced for suggesting that. People don’t want to focus on the theological point, they want to focus on biblical inerrancy.
Why does God have to give a moral law and spiritual accountability to the very first humans with souls 50,000-100,000 years ago? (Does having a soul equate with an eternal destiny, or is it something different?) Many Christians today would say that children, the mentally unstable, or those in places where the gospel is not preached are not held to the same standard of moral accountability for their sin, but they still have souls/are fully human.
I think it might be a mistake to equate “having a soul” with “morally accountable” and maybe even “having an immortal soul.” People weren’t morally accountable to God until he revealed himself to them, communicated his standard to them, and they rebelled against it. Couldn’t generations of people pre-Adam be “given a pass” on their immorality because they weren’t lawbreakers/sinners until the law was given? (Not the Mosaic law, law in the general “God gave a command” sense) Maybe they were “fully human” for generations, but an eternal soul or the “breath of life” was something that was given to humanity much later on when God decided to make a covenant with them and reveal himself more personally. I don’t think the Bible has definitive answers on this kind of thing, no matter how much fun it may be to speculate about.
And personally I think creation has always stood in need of redemption to reach its full teleological potential, and Christ would have come to earth and become incarnate and united with his creation in order to bring that redemption and eschatological purpose about, independent of humanity’s rebellion and need for a savior.