Yes. Everything in the story says so: made in God’s image, naming the animals.
God intended them to learn good and evil in a relationship with Him. This is the tree of life. God did not intend them to take shortcuts – assuming the authority to dictate good and evil without any actual understanding of it, and that is what the other tree was really about.
Indeed, it is what it means for God to create children rather than machines/servants.
But the transition from toddler to responsibility requires parental commandments like “don’t play in the street or you will die.” Then the problem isn’t saying no. It is the consequences of doing so. So God warned them that “no” in that particular case would be dangerous to them.
Disobedience is not the meaning of “sin” – that idea comes from turning religion into a tool of power over other people. The story is not about rebellion. There is nothing rebellious about Adam and Eve in that story. Disobedience is not the problem with mankind. Indeed obedience is responsible for just as much evil in the world as disobedience (if not more so). The problem is self-destructive habits and that is the real meaning of sin. The sin of Adam and Eve was not eating the fruit. It was the bad habit of blaming everyone and everything but themselves for their mistake.
Oh they can make a habit of it and then it does becomes sin and self-destructive.
And I don’t think so because there are already humans made in Genesis 1, which contrary to popular opinion is not the same story as Genesis 2.
Did your AI summary include the fact that in ANE oral tradition there was a set text that was passed down word-perfect for generations; the flexibility was that the tellers could adjust that text on the fly for different audiences.
Only if you think that spiritual matters are tied to DNA.
Maybe, maybe not. Reduce the names to their roots and you have “Dirt guy” and “Life” – but does “Life” mean physical or spiritual? I’ve made arguments either way, and on the basis of the text there’s really no way to tell.
Only to someone who doesn’t care that Genesis actually fits real ANE literary types.
And has nothing to do with believing anything “about humanity being corrupt(ed)”.
No, it doesn’t – that’s an assumption the text doesn’t actually support.
Where does it say that He lost His temper?
Why? That doesn’t fit with how things work in the real world!
You have this anti-God, self-righteous approach to the text that screams of extreme arrogance along with substantial unwillingness to actually engage with the text. You have this mental model and insist (like a YECer) on forcing the text to fit.
Right there is the original sin: the wish to be equal to God! To say that “No has to be a valid answer” is to say that you are equal to God.
Only because of corruption.
Now you declare the Torah and the Prophets to be wrong, since both insist that there are good and evil.
Yes, He does – Jesus “claimed Hell” on multiple occasions.
You really ought to start actually reading the Bible without demanding that it has to fit your preconceptions.
Excellently stated. The real question is why God should allow His new “kids” to do the equivalent of playing in the street (in rush hour!). The answer is that He wanted kids, not puppets.
Or just to avoid having to grow up and think – it is, after all, so much easier to have a set of rules than to actually engage in examining what is good even just for one’s self, let alone for others. Sin as disobedience is a belief connected far more to laziness than to any wish for power – and for the most part the efforts at power are just a way to avoid having to think, because allowing others to deviate from one’s own rules invalidates those rules.
Well, eating the fruit was a sin – but it was not the point of no return; that came with refusing to accept responsibility. I personally entertain the idea that if the two had come clean, God would have “hit reset” and tried again – it was insisting on their own righteousness that got them tossed from the Garden.
I disagree with equating sentience to intelligence. AI has intelligence but no sentience. Children give toys names because they are sentient. Intelligence is frankly more of a function of the brain – it is not sentience but computation. But language is the essence of the mind – it is being alive in whole new way.
I have no idea what you are saying. Are you saying that God is unnecessary for knowing good from evil?
So you prefer to ignore anything which disagrees with your reasons for denouncing it.
Yeah I have no idea how he made such a bizarre leap from what you said.
Ah… here is the connection which St. Roymond is probably thinking about. HOW are Adam and Eve the progenitors of all humanity? Is it DNA or is it culture/language?
That doesn’t follow. I don’t know if it has anything to do with ANE or not, but I am not sure I care. Maybe the point is that bringing ANE into the discussion is neither necessary nor helpful. I would agree with that.
No it doesn’t follow because we don’t agree that the tree gave them sentience. This is certainly not in the Bible. And I don’t think that is the way the vast majority of people read the Bible either. Adam and Eve are already both intelligent and sentient.
I don’t see anger there either. These are the consequences of God trying to preserve their potential in the face of this disaster. The flood wasn’t about anger either. What God felt in Genesis 6 was grief not anger.
The rest of your discussion with Roymond is frankly bonkers on both sides.
How do the AI based large language models fit into your views?
But I do think AI is forcing us to look at what makes us human in a new light. The cold logic and associative powers that AI has is pretty impressive and is improving all of the time. What does that leave us with? I tend to think of humanity’s less rational and logical qualities, such as self preservation, selfishness, biases, irrationality, emotions, and subjectivity. Would an AI understand why we are biased towards our own family over strangers? Would an AI understand the emotions evoked by a sunset?
Bending this back on topic, these human qualities are what we must understand when reading ancient literature.
It finally dawned on me, I’d say it was a prompt but that would be self righteous… Your faith is second hand. You study because you need someone or something to tell you what to beleive. If you had an orignal thought you would dismiss it because it could not be verified. You despise original thinking. it is “making things up!”
I think I had better stop now. I have probably said tooo much already.
Suffice it to say, i do not value yur learning. It is human. And your understanding of Scripture?
I don’t think it has any more significance than computer manipulation of devices. Yes computers can do that. But they are not self-organized (living) entities making their own choices about what they want and how they will live. And we don’t just do that biologically but also in the medium of language.
But with the ability of AI to learn and even teach us how to better do the things we have always associated with intelligence, it is just hiding from the truth to say this is not intelligence. On the other hand, it is a simple fact that computers just follow instructions and this means that the very essence of intelligence is more just a matter of following instructions as well. It is certainly the essence of using mathematics for example. I think it may more strongly underline that old wisdom which sees the questions as more important than the answers. For while AI is good at coming up with answers, we are ones asking the questions.
YES! One of the most fundamental philosophical changes brought by science and technology is the clarification brought to old concepts like life and intelligence. I think this is one of the things where religion needs to adapt the most. It must not cling to the outdated conceptual structures or it becomes meaningless/obsolete. It is one of the principle reasons I joined this forum – to see Christian theology updated in this way.
By clarification, I mean that the old use of those words become vague to the point of uselessness. Language is fluid and adaptive regardless, and thus failing to take advantage of the precision offered by science will only keep our thinking pointlessly muddled and useless as well.
With the discovery of other worlds and the all too real possibility of life different from our own, it would well advised to expand our understanding of “life” beyond the particular forms on the earth (asking ourselves what does it mean to say something is alive). With AI we are well advised to break down (separate out) some of the vast collection abilities included under the umbrella term of intelligence.
I was raised to think intelligence was all important. And now I think we have good reason to question this, giving ourselves the opportunity to find a better identity for humanity in a world that is likely soon to be filled with the superior intelligence of AI.
It leaves us with that principle observation I make so often. Science requires objective observation, but life requires subjective participation. I think perhaps it is like other times when we have been consumed by something that seems all important and then we come to realize its superficiality.
My favorite anime is “parasyte, the maxim” and it is a very interesting examination of our humanity. It shows that a lot of that emotional irrationality ultimately supports a very valuable survival skill – that of cooperation. And it is these cooperative abilities that ultimately renders the alien invaders (superior in every other way) not only defeated but even helpless and pathetic.
But if they are not just of academic interest but have any value in our lives today then it cannot just be about understanding the original message understood by its original readers.
I guess it is merely a matter of perspective, and / or understanding.
Both the reactions in the Garden and the whole notionof the flood do not sit well with a God of love and forgiveness.
On a practical side, if the flood had any effefft at all it should have cancelled any consequence of the Garden (assuming either or both were actual events) Theologically the new start should be just that, so any notionof Original or persevering sin from Adam should literally have been washed away. Of course the subsequent drunken episode rather negated the whole thing.
The pont here is that theses narratives make God very “human” and are no more accurate than the warring Pantheons of Rome, Greece or Vikings. Scripture does not get God right from day 1, it leads us through the learning process… Which is why I desapir of the significance paid to the early Narratives.
Genesis 3
22 And the Lord God said, “The man has now become like one of us, knowing good and evil
That is clearly the consequence of their actions. ANd it was precisely as the Devil foretold
“You will not certainly die,” the serpent said to the woman. 5 “For God knows that when you eat from it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.
The point being that soemtimes the truth can be as evil as lying.
OR… there is more than one understanding of what the text is teaching and it changes as we and our values change. The toddler may see their parent as a threat getting in the way of what they want - but that is the limit of their own comprehension and NOT about the meaning of what the parent is doing at all.
And the literal treatment of this text is simply absurd. The notion that by one simple action we can acquire all God’s knowledge of good and evil is completely preposterous. That cannot be what it means if this has any value whatsoever. However there are simple and immediate changes which can put one in the position of authority over what is good and evil. And this is something which can do a great deal of harm.
LOL no. Just NO. The truth is not evil. That is a ridiculous notion of “evil” which I will never accept. Knowledge can certainly be dangerous when you are not prepared for the responsibilities it brings. But that doesn’t make the truth evil. And precision can certainly be very unhelpful when we are not prepared for that also. Thus kindergarten teachings of science greatly lack truth in that sense of precision. But that doesn’t make the truth evil evil either.
It certainly can be true that an incomplete truth is sometimes far worse than a lie. But then this is so well known, that we frequently equate an incomplete truth with lying.
But that is the thing about shortcuts (which is what I think this story is about), the truth they provide is always incomplete or superficial – just like when we get the position of authority to say what is evil without the substance which requires learning in a relationship with God. It may make us “look” a great deal like God in a childish superficial way but without actually being like God in much more important ways. It is like the person who has a dream of being some great or important person without the will to do the work in which all the substance of being such a person is found and requires.
The whole precept is absurd, but you can’t just dismiss one while holding onto other parts. The fact is, if you haven’t got snetience you would not know what it meant. Admittedly Eve just thought it looked tasty \9which is another “mistake” by God) but without it the instruction not to eat becomes random (Like Justice in TNG),
We either take the story warts and all, or just use its theology, and even then we have to discrimnate between human vanity / justice and actual God. The “punishments” make no sense. Why should God make life any harder than it already is? Why wuld God inflict such things onto the whole of humanity? Surely God knew what would hapeen if and whe we had the ability to say no!
If you try and rationalise the first creation Story with the Gardem it doesn’t compute. Humanity cannot have dominion without sntience (God would not withold it either). Pan, suffering and weeds are just human gripes. They are part of the freedom of iving, not punishents for sin. If you want to be free to live you have to accept the possibilty of both suffering and dying. Birth pains are a necessary evil not a punishment. Amnity between humans and any other creature is primarily self preservation, Avaoidance is enough. A rose in a wheat fireld is a weed. There is no malicious intent.
Once you start rationalising or claimiing andy sort of reality or literalism you have to take it all or you are doing the old “Take what you want” syndrome.
Science and reality denies the literal Garden. That is that. So claimng details such as the first sin, as real is automatically overiding those criticisms.
Without consequences? I don’t have kids either, but I have been a substitute teacher in an elementary school and an employee in the Internal Revenue Service. No consequences nobody pays taxes and schooling is a free-for-all environment that merely gives parents a couple of hours relief and/or time to work.
Where does this “can be” arise in the text? I am at a loss to explain this.
Is this an appeal to authority? An unsupported opinion offered as a moral standard?
Richard, I perceive you putting Richard above Scripture. An infant’s first scream of rage is there before you. We sympathize with the poor helpless infant’s shock of bare wet skin in air that is about 25 degrees cooler than inside the womb, but tell me that the infant’s reaction is the accepting bliss of a perfect soul.
Science also reveals that every ancestor managed to survive and reproduce. That, in turn, requires that surviving and reproducing are wired into every part of our being.
Jesus gave his life for us. “No one has love greater than the one who lays down life for another.”
Having these two immutable prime directives defines us as sinful from conception. The degree of “must reproduce” varies from zero to overwhelming; when the degree of “must survive” is low, life itself is “unlikely.”
Net net, assuming absolutes as I observe you doing here is the essence of misunderstanding.
There is no Scripture to support that. In fact there is little Scripture to support any of your evil view of humanity.
And what has that to do with the price of fish? Or anything theological.
That does not prove Original sin. All it proves is that God sacrificed His son as atonement for any sins committed. it does not claim that Sin is rife and otherwise unchecked
You diverted with an accusation instead of answering.
Jesus claimed that people culd “not sin again”, That contradicts any notion of Original or persistent sin.
Paul does not claim Original Sin. it is a misuse of a phrase that is about a bigger picture. If Paul was ging to emohasise Original Sin He would have made it the subject of his discourse not a passin argument.
Like 2 Tim 3. People are trying to separate odd phrases or “verses” from the whole text if there were no verses you would not necessarily latch onto either of them.
Original Sin is an evil Doctrine.
I am not putting myself above Scripture I just claim that it does not support Original Sin.
Humans being able to grow and mature is not relevant?
Your arguments suggest you are unhappy with having to be a free agent.
You and the YECers! They’re only synonomous if you ignore the other definitions the scripture gives.
One should hope so – that’s why stories have details!
Then how did Adam “corrupt nature”?
I know, you like to pretend he didn’t, despite the theme in scripture to the contrary.
The meanings do not necessarily mean what you claim.
You claim to champion alternative interpretations, yet your posts are as dogmatic as any pope speaking ex cathedra.
So you regard the Creation accounts as not tied to history, unrelated to culture, detached from the original language, disconnected from what the writer meant and his original audience understood.
That, sir, is called “making stuff up” – it would get you a total failing grade in any serious literature course (those that say that words mean whatever the reader wishes don’t count).
My only science is that of linguistics and literature where words have the meaning the writer intended.
Your science fiction – that is not in the text.
No, it isn’t – you may want it to be, but it doesn’t read like one, it reads like a judge in court explaining the legal ramifications of someone’s actions, or a mechanic explaining why an owner shouldn’t have put maple syrup in the motor oil compartment.
Making objective observations: from your posts, you regard God as a cruel tyrant you want to remake in your own image, and you make pronouncements like the head of the Inquisition.
Odd claim when so much of your theology demands that humans be equal to God.
No accusations, observations.
Then you haven’t read the scriptures: “I will be like God!” is the original sin.
Only if it is a “No” between equals. I suppose you think that an employee saying, “No” to the boss and doing as he pleases is just fine, or a private saying “No” to a colonel is perfectly acceptable.
According to scripture God is king – one does not disobey one’s king unless one thinks it an empty title. Indeed according to scripture God is the potter and we are the clay!
How you can water down scripture to making the Cross so meaningless is baffling.
No. As an ancient Father out it, “God made this world, but this world is not what God made”. Your position requires humans and everything else to be nothing but cogs in a machine, with absolutely no responsibility for actions or consequences. You claim to hate the idea of God as puppeteer, but your ideas about God demand it.
Then stop making theological pronouncements! The moment you put your philosophy above the scriptures, you have said, “I will ascend above the inspired writer, I will be like the Most High”.
No, I study because I do believe and want to know the One in Whom I believe.
No, I despise making up things that have no basis in the data.
They are both superb examples of love and forgiveness.
If love says, “Do anything you please”, it is not love but a curse because it cheers people on as they go to their doom.
If forgiveness is not tied to consequences, it is not forgiveness but license.
You think that love would just let humanity live in a condition where their thoughts and intents were only evil continually? You think that forgiveness should allow the children to burn down the house?
Any deity matching those would not be God, but the worst Devil.
Where in the text does it indicate that the Flood had anything to do with the Garden? It in fact indicates what it had to do with, and the Garden is not mentioned.
Given that Jesus and the Apostles, not to mention the Prophets, gave heavy significance to the early narratives, I have to ask: why do you set yourself above all three by “despairing” of their views?
Now you attribute lying to God.
Your entire procedure is to define God for yourself and use that to decide what in the scriptures is acceptable, instead of searching the scriptures in order to know God – it’s totally backwards.
This fails to distinguish between meaning and application: the text is teaching what the original writer meant; that does not change, but the application does. In scientific terms, the data does not change.
As, BTW, was noted by ancient rabbis.
Most of whom in turn noted that “know” in that context indicates experiencing and dealing with, given that it is the same word as in “the man knew his wife”.
I got a chuckle here, imagining presenting the difference between the pual and hitpael Hebrew verb forms to ten-year-olds.
Yes – the presence of the (at the time) forbidden Tree in the Garden suggests that it was meant to be accessible at some point. It makes us wonder, though, as one ancient rabbi put it, why God didn’t wait and plant it there later (and a more modern one noted that its presence was a lesson that the new humans were meant to understand that there are limitations and expectations).
That’s no different than saying science and reality deny rocks falling from the sky – something that the French academy of sciences actually said until some of them happened to observe rocks falling from the sky.
It’s basically an appeal to incredulity.
Science can’t deny what it cannot observe.
Is acknowledging reality – the only other option is that existence is eternal and sin has always been present . . . which makes God both a liar and a monster.
As one education professor put it, without discipline/consequences school isn’t even babysitting, it’s guarding the asylum.
My older brother back in high school had a poster that read, “Having children is genetic: if your parents didn’t have any, you aren’t likely to either”.
And you use that to throw out any scripture you don’t agree with.