Joseph Smith, founder of the Latter-Day Saints religion, did something similar in his “translation” of the Bible. Not exactly a translation, the LDS call it the inspired version. Instead of limiting himself to Hebrew and Greek manuscripts, he pulled in all kinds of sources asl well as his own ideas.
Joseph Smith was trying to reconcile the Book of Mormon with the Bible by his new translation. The King James Version already did what I am suggesting by using the word ‘firmament’ rather than the more literal word ‘expanse’. Literal translation has strict rules, created by man, just as words are created by man. I am suggesting the use of God’s creation to translate Genesis in a way that produces no change to the original Hebrew words or syntax. The ‘literal’ translation remains as the foundation of human knowledge 3,000 years ago. A creation based version would be an ‘epistemic’ translation that makes no change to the original Hebrew text.
Fred_W – “The ‘literal’ translation remains as the foundation of human knowledge 3,000 years ago. A creation based version would be an ‘epistemic’ translation that makes no change to the original Hebrew text.”
The ‘Concordist View’ of Genesis 1 presented previously on this thread (with a Dropbox link) is based on the scientific knowledge of the present universe and its origin compared with the creation narrative of Genesis 1. To this extent, it appears that the Concordist View corresponds with an ‘epistemic’ interpretation that harmonizes with science. Would you agree with this understanding?
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Not true. My point was that he was reading lots of stuff into his “translation.” We call this eisegesis.
“Expanse” is not more literal than “firmament.” The firmament/raqia, in the eyes of the writer of Genesis, was a hard dome that separated the waters above from the waters below.
Your words are created by man also. Not sure I follow what you are after. What I prefer is scholarly translations and scholarly commentary. I like Robert Alter’s translation of Genesis. It’s best to use 2 or more translations.
It might be helpful to discuss these things with ray9will, who has his own unique take on Genesis.
God is created by man too, so the whole debate is circular reasoning.
Others have concluded differently.
The grounds of [true] belief in God is the experience of God: God is not the conclusion of an argument but the subject of an experience report.
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An epistemic interpretation must include and begin with translation. Simply putting the literal translation into some kind of modern scientific framework would be insufficient. In an epistemic translation, the earth would be formed in Genesis 1:9 when God gathers some of the fluid matter into ‘one place’ that consists of land and water. Interpretation begins with translation. If a translation describes nonsense to an educated reader, then belief will rest on the reader’s aptitude for suspending reality in favor of fantasy.
It may depend more on the reader’s presumptions and presuppositions than their education.
The New Testament mentions no other grounds for belief in God than experiencing God, and there is good reason to be skeptical any argument that purports to prove his existence. That reason is found in Col.1 where Paul says God has created everything “visible or invisible.” It’s a tautology that everything is either visible or not, and that includes the laws found in creation. This means God created the laws of logic, the laws we use to prove conclusions true. But if God is the creator of the laws or logic (and math), then God’s being cannot be proven by means of them because they don’t apply to him. In fact, the proper inference is that whatever can be proven would thereby not be God.
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That does not mean however that that strong and correct inferences cannot be drawn from factual (and not merely subjective) evidence! Hence my repeatedly citing you. 
You are correct. A complete education should inspire a person to question assumptions and suppositions. That is often when new discoveries are made.
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Many an education is lacking because its presuppositions exclude God?
Does that include the assumption that there is no God?
Does the existence of God rely on impiracle data?
Richard
Please explain.
Agreed. Apologetics can still use arguments to correct misunderstandings, to refute arguments against belief in God, and to critique beliefs in God-substitutes.
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Shawacka! There it is. And thus the shocking reality (synthesis) of an argument which disproves atheism, but does not prove theism.
Can you spell out how it disproves atheism? It’s not obvious to me.
I’ll write you a private message so as not to derail the thread
No, I’m looking at the meanings of terms, in this case how far they can be “stretched”. If you don’t like it, that’s not my problem.
BTW, nice article by Enns, though he skips over the root and thus the possible meaning of “expanse”. But he and I were doing two different things; he argues for the common use while I was asking, “How far does this stretch?”
Look back at my prior comment:
Um, not quite – make that “In the beginning God created the immaterial and the material” – that catches both the modern and the ancient concepts.
Ugh – “vibrating” is a terrible word choice! My main Hebrew instructor went with “hovering (/meditating)”, and referenced the image of a mother bird, though given the wording, in this case the mother bird is also the wind.
I’ve found I can no longer think of the “hovering” in English without firm intention; the Hebrew is what always comes to mind.
Interesting – my main Hebrew instructor said “fluttering” rather than “vibrating”; he illustrated it with the fluttering hand gesture expressing “more or less”.
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