Reading Genesis Through Ancient Eyes: Reconciling Scripture, Science, and the Unseen Realm

Faith & Science Conversation
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112

I accept your criticism there Bill…however, if you put the evidence i present here alongside the corresponding biblical themes and narratives, you would have to concede that its not possible for me to provide you with a believable and consistent world view unless my own views closely align with what is clearly presented in the Bible i claim to follow!

Let me put it another way, if you were buying a house off the plan, would you sign a contract for that investment based on Biologos method, where large parts of the contract are torn out because they are not consistent with the overall theme of the building model?

Of course you would not sign such a contract for a new home off the plan!

So why on earth should any individual be stupid enough to accept the Biologos model when its not consistent with the very writings it claims to follow? (and make no mistake, Biologos does not consistently follow the biblical model even by their own direct and indirect admission/s)

Another more direct illustration…

Christ called the apostle Peter to walk on water to him on the shore. Peter got out of the boat begins to walk towards Christ (who is on the beach) then begins to sink. Christ suddenly appears right by Peters side and grab hold of him and preventing him from sinking into the water (likely to his death).

How many Biologos members here genuinely believe that is a real historical event?

How many members here genuinely believe that the apostle Paul was really bitten by a poisonous snake on the Isle of Malta given that there is zero evidence of any poisonous snakes ever having existed on that island!

Water to wine…do Biologos members really believe that is a historical event?

OK…what about Lazurus being raised from the death…he had been dead for days (suffering cellular decay) and yet he was raised back to fully conscious life. Do Biologos members really believe that is a historical event that really happened?

Or how about the Second coming?

Dead are raised first to meet the living in the sky

  • rotted bodies thousands of years old being raised back to full consciousness…Biologos believe that is a historical event, really?
  • humans levitating up into the atmosphere against the laws of gravity…Biologos believe that is a future event, really?

The fact is, the reason why i know 100% that Biologos is promoting a lie is because of exactly the above inconsistencies in their own claims…they claim that old testament historical stories cant be true, they are not real because they are apparently unscientific, and yet i have plenty of new testament ones that are even worse when it comes to scientific impossibilities!

Ohh and lets not forget…spirits do not have voice boxes and vocal chords and these physical elements are required for speech…so how can we go to heaven as spiritual bodies and communicate in the manner in which spirits apparently communicated with individuals in the new testament such as Christ himself and/or the Saul / Apostle Paul (or old testament individuals such as Abraham for that matter)?

To mandate the atheistic Darwinian Evolutionary approach is the foundation for ones religious belief when it clearly does not align with the Bible is inconsistent and promotes and severely deficient religious belief. One ends up with a world view that is poorly founded and largely indefensible falsified by its own foundational demands in Darwinian Evolution and observational scientific facts (such as biological death, laws of gravity, spirits cant talk, and the fact humans cannot walk on water)!

I would suggest that all Biologos members here do themselves a favour and research former Evangelical Pastor of 19 years Dan Baker. This man is now not a believer and his reasons are largely exactly because of those i have raised above!

Dan is exactly the reason why inconsistency destroys faith!

Ancient eyes did not read Genesis differently to what we read it today…there is no difference in interpretation and we can know this based on a wealth of cross referenced statement from a wide variety of bible authors and extra biblical writers!

113

You were invited to start your own thread. How is that a restriction on free speech? BTW, notice that free speech does not exist at all at AiG or CMI, maybe you want to talk to those guys.

So, you intend to continue off topic posts which derail the conversation?

Good luck. Christy is a moderator, and you are not.

114

i dont think you really understand what i have stated there Ron…

Firstly, the title of the thread is “Reading Genesis through Ancient Eyes”

this forum then goes off on a tangent spreading all sorts of nonsense claiming that modern views such as those of Biologos, are based on Ancient Eyes. The fact is, the vast majority of Ancient Eyes (both internal and external to the Bible) whos writings we have on the topic of Genesis DO NOT ALIGN with the modern Biologos model!

I have provided archeological evidences in my post (which was hidden) that falsify the very claim this thread makes…the thread title is demonstrably false according to archeological evidence that i can actual see and touch…its not based on historical sciences!

Its a real shame that individuals on this forum ignore historical evidences that we can actually see and touch that disprove most of the crazy ideas that float around here!

BTW, you have not addressed the problems i pointed out in my last post (conveniently they have been ignored)

  • Peter walking on water
  • Lazurus and Christ being raised from biological cellular death and decay to full conscious life
  • second coming - the claim in the future humans will rise up into the sky against gravity and, flying off into outer space (a vacuum)
  • spirits cannot talk because they have no voicebox with which to interract with air molecules
115

I suspect “none”, because it’s been mentioned here at least six times that the island probably wasn’t Malta, but Melita in the Adriatic, which does have poisonous snakes.

So all you are doing is putting a lower bound on the number of times you have to be told something before you can remember it.

116

I suspect a great number of Biologos members have no issues understanding that Jesus–who was God incarnate— could perform acts that are impossible to us. Those who think otherwise must either disagree with the accounts or do exegetical violence to Scripture.

You could probably make a valid point if you zoomed in and asked Biologos members specifically about exorcisms though. I don’t think Jesus accommodated ancient beliefs about possession and healed diseases and physical afflictions through misleading conversations with demons that didn’t actually happen, or by putting spit in people’s eyes for show. So either the gospels are creative here or Jesus was completely mistaken in how he was healing people. But based on past experience, cogent and carefully structured arguments seem beyond your capabilities. Instead, lots of rambling that says very little at times.

Vinnie

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117

No matter where you put your “evidence” that doesn’t change the fact that the evidence is not convincing. Adding to it doesn’t help. Only if I put Scripture ahead of reality would it be convincing, but then it isn’t needed as it is only Scripture that matters. That might work for you but not me. And, BTW, if you want to put Scripture first then you need to be a flat earther as that is what the Bible says.

Given the NT ones are miracles performed by God incarnate calling them “scientific impossibilities” is incorrect. With God all things are possible.

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118

I think Walton is being sloppy here – with the Hebrew; “wives” is just the word for “women”, and IIRC “to take as women” is an idiom for keeping for sexual purposes. Saying “wives” adds a concpet I don’t think is actually in the text.

Why would they want to take on a form considered inferior, a status of property?

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That is a slanderous representation of the Biologos position – in fact to be accurate, the YEC position is to rewrite basic parts of the contract to fit their own desires.

You only claim it isn’t consistent because you fail to treat the scriptures as what they are – ancient literature. YEC is what is not consistent because it makes the demand that God had to inspire writings that were meant for modern ideas and not for the ideas of the people the writings were aimed at!

That is itself a lie – some people here may lean towards such views, but Biologos makes no such claims.

You’ve never provided one. Sure, you make claims, but so far every one of them has been shown to be false. Your claims only work if you make an idol of science by ascribing to it powers it does not have.
I ill point out here that ascribing power to things falls under the Old Testament definition of worship.

There is no such thing.
And the irony is that YEC is founded on forcing a MSWV onto the scriptures.

Yes, they did – and that can be, and has been, shown right from the text itself.

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120

Frequently. A good portion of it remains just speculation and opinions. It can still be wrong and it often is. At most, it is just worth paying attention to.

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@adamjedgar

Today’s Christians have a variety of ways of dealing with the minor miracles of
the Bible. But as I argue in a separate thread, we really can’t attack the core of
modern Trinitarian theism: a divine birth and a divine resurrection.

Those who dispute these two miracles are arguing against the entire work
of Christianity. In my view, such criticisms are beyond the scope of these
BioLogos boards. And any disputes that attempt to reject Christianity
because miracles are not scientific are arguing “trans-denominationally”,
which is also beyond the scope of these boards.

G.Brooks

122

I like the way The Chosen portrays miracles as a reasonable/natural extension of who Jesus was/is.

123

What you consistently fail to understand is that it is entirely irrelevant if YEC does not align with the BioLogos model. The issue is that YEC does not align with the observable facts of the universe. You have to ignore massive swaths of reality in order for YEC to work.

What about miracles ascribed to Jesus or others? There’s no existing evidence that contradicts them. That isn’t true of YEC. There are mountains and mountains of observable evidence that disproves YEC.

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124

What are these minor miracles you speak of?

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@Vinnie

I have 3 categories of miracles:

The Primary Category: Divine Birth, Divine Resurrection
+ 2 more Optional (Creation of Adam, Creation of Eve)

Minor Miracles: Water into Wine, Walking on Water, etc.
events that don’t challenge Age of the Earth and Universe
physics.

Fabulous Fictions Modified to Exaggerated Minor Miracles:
Talking Donkey, Sun Standing Still, Magical Hair, Global Flood

Bonus Category: Ancient Mythology like Six days of creation or the serial “creation”
of each “kind” of life, over and over again.

126

Nor with established facts about the text – or about language and literature, for that matter.

Despite the popularity of arguments claiming that miracles are contrary to science.

127

If someone can be bodily raised from the dead, the sun can stand still in the sky. Not saying it necessarily happened but I can’t draw a clear distinction between “walking on water” and “sun standing still” as if one is a reasonable supernatural event and the other is not. Either we think it’s a revealed truth from God or not. A supernatural miracle is a supernatural miracle.

You are missing the Exodus. And creation of Eve is interesting because an argument could be made that the Catholic Church tends to strongly teach this in an official capacity. Personally, I’ve never understood why the virgin birth is a necessity for someone without a specific formulation of original sin? Of all the places where creativity and midrash might be happening, those accounts are prime candidates. I get that it is in the creeds and I firmly believe it occurred with Mary’s full consent (which is in scripture) but beyond the Creed I’m not sure why some modern Christians give it the veneration they do.

Vinnie

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128

One is clearly needed for the Gospel message, the other is not. It is left as an exercise for the reader to figure out which is which.

129

Sure, but that is not relevant to anything said here and I don’t arbitrarily only accept revealed miracles in the Bible when they are essential to the core Gospel message and reject them when they are not. That is silly and an exegetical poison.

Vinnie

130

I guess it is related to who the father is. If the pregnancy starts without a man and the child is a boy, it becomes quite clear that there is someone else involved. Either there has been an encounter with a man (rape or illegitimate sex), or the birth is a miracle of God.

The opponents tried to claim that there had been sex before the pregnancy while the Christians believe that the child was the son of God.

A special formulation of original sin that demands Mary to live without sex is a peculiarity of the RCC.

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