Genesis Creation

YoursTrue · Apr 4, 2021

It Aint Necessarily So said:
Your expectations for your god are very low. Sure, the world appears flat, fixed and immovable, with the sun and stars orbiting it fixed in a dome that leaks rain which is why such a cosmology bears the fingerprints of man, not a deity. At the same time that believers are saying or implying that the biblical text is the word of a divinity and fit to base one's life on, they explain to us why that scripture looks just like human beings wrote it. You can't have it both ways. Either this book is a unique collection of thoughts and instructions from a transcendent mind and worthy of my study, or its just the impressions of people that didn't know where the rain came from or what a star is. If it's the latter, just put it in the pile with all of the other creation myths. Here's another one that's also wrong, but fit the naive expectations of primitive people (Sumerians):

"The mighty Marduk took his club and split Tiamat’s body in half. He placed half of her body in the sky and made the heavens [space]. He created the moon to guard the heavens, and set it moving back and forth, on endless [time] patrol [energy]. With the other half of Tiamat's body he made the land [matter].”

Why do you suppose that cosmological model you presented was any better than that? How about another from the Vikings? Why is the snow globe model from the Christian Bible better than this one? Would you base your life on the words of a book that contained this? :

"Odin, Vili, and Vé killed the giant Ymir. The sons of Bor then ... made the world from him. From his blood they made the sea and the lakes; from his flesh the earth; from his hair the trees; and from his bones the mountains. They made rocks and pebbles from his teeth and jaws and those bones that were broken. Maggots appeared in Ymir's flesh and came to life. By the decree of the gods they acquired human understanding and the appearance of men, although they lived in the earth and in rocks. From Ymir's skull the sons of Bor made the sky ... The sons of Bor flung Ymir's brains into the air, and they became the clouds. Then they took the sparks and burning embers that were flying about after they had been blown out of Muspell, and placed them in the midst of Ginnungagap to give light to heaven above and earth beneath. To the stars they gave appointed places and paths."

I don't think you know what accurate means. Genesis is wrong, not accurate. To consider it accurate is to be wrong yourself. If that's what you mean, once again, I have a higher standard, although I understand that you consider it arrogant for me to hole a god to any standard.

I have standards for entities I'm willing to call a god. This vexes the believer, who is forced to defend the low standards for a god his scriptures offer, and call the skeptic too picky.

Of course offense was intended. This is how the believer who believes he is instructed to be kind and charitable to others but just doesn't want to be attacks his critic. Then says, "Aw shucks, I was just kidding (smiley face). Where's your sense of humor?"

No problem. I don't require of you what you believe your god does. You're good with me.

No, you are limiting your god with your low expectations for it. I am limiting what I will accept as as a depiction of a god.

So you think your education at Georgia Tech was necessary to understand the science I proposed for scripture, such as the one about scientific cosmogenesis for cave men, or the one about antibiotics for goatherds? : " If thou groweth a particular mold and collect its discharges, they can be used to correct fever with pus, which is caused by tiny beings too small for you to see, but capable of causing death, and susceptible to the mold discharge."

Do you think that you needed a college education to understand that? I don't. You might need a formal education to come up with it, but not to understand it, and it would serve as notice of a superhuman intelligence better than any other biblical prophecy, better than any show of walking on water or turning into wine.

You're willing to dismiss the evidence that allows the impartial critical thinker to realize that scripture are the words of ordinary men with excuses for this god, such as, 'Look at what it had to try to speak to, people that hadn't been to Georgia Tech yet and thus not able to understand more than the snow globe cosmology memorializing the illusion of living on a flat, fixed, immovable earth with moving celestial objects overhead.' This is apologetics, the creative act of trying to make up down and black white, of excusing the flaws in scripture to try to defend the claim that the god is perfect, and any apparent defects in its description aren't really defects after all. Oh, and if someone thinks otherwise, they are arrogant.

Interesting. From my reading of the Bible, and, I must say, belief of who and what God is, I am learning that it is God who sets the standard. Not me or anyone else as to who or what He is.

YoursTrue · Apr 4, 2021

rrobs said:
Good questions. Food for further thought to be sure, but right off the top of my head I would think it easy to observe the sun is like a gazillion times brighter than the moon. It is also easily observed that the moon is way bigger than the stars and that the stars themselves are all of a different brightness.

Yes, interesting. Because, of course, the ancient writers may not have realized how far or distant an object was in the sky. Nevertheless, the Bible does say that star differs from star in glory. Now I daresay the topography of the moon is different than that of Mars and, of course, Jupiter, yet from a poetically descriptive viewpoint, they are void. Just like the earth was described by Moses as being void, formless, or empty. To elaborate on that, when I see pictures of the moon, I am not particularly thrilled, it looks desolate. Yet! when I look at beautiful trees or butterflies, I very much enjoy seeing that.
Genesis 1:2 - "Now the earth was formless and empty, darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was hovering over the waters."
(So I guess to the naked eye, it must have looked as desolate as the moon.)

YoursTrue · Apr 4, 2021

rrobs said:
By pure visual observation only, how can you prove that day and night are a result of the earth's rotation?

The only thing you could actually observe is that the sun comes up in the East, travels across the sky and sets in the West. With nothing but that observation, the only logical conclusion is that the sun moves, while the earth stands still.

That's getting a little deep.

YoursTrue · Apr 4, 2021

rrobs said:
When there is nothing of substance to say it's all to easy to just say things like, "you don't want to learn." Sounds like, "blah, blah, blah" to me.

Personally, I try my best to avoid personal attacks like that. I don't know where to go from there when someone says that to me. Like you said, it is almost impossible to have a meaningful discussing when it gets to that level.

Nonetheless, you are holding forth the scriptures and God says it will not return void but will accomplish the purpose for which He intended.

2 Cor 5:20,

Now then we are ambassadors for Christ, as though God did beseech [you] by us: we pray [you] in Christ's stead, be ye reconciled to God.

An ambassador is responsible for proclaiming the exact message given him by his leaders. He is in no ways responsible for the answer. All we do is speak and then we can pray for someone accepting the message, but we don't have to force them. When we hold forth that wonderful Word of God, we have fulfilled our responsibility before God.

1Cor 3:6,

I have planted, Apollos watered; but God gave the increase.

We water and plant, but it's God that gives the increase. God does all the heavy lifting, not us.

God bless...

As I have said, I did well in school. Not bragging, but I studied and paid attention. So it's not like I did not know how to say the right answers that the teachers wanted to hear. Now so -- and I do give credit to many of the posters who have argued with me, called me dumb in a sense, etc., because after I learned what the Bible said I began to doubt the theory of evolution in its extremity. I still do. But I do not doubt that scientists can make a successful vaccine, invent x-ray machines, gun powder, and things like that and more. And so I must admit that these conversations have proved interesting to an extent. In serious actuality, have caused me to further doubt the general theory of evolution.

Tiberius · Apr 4, 2021

blü 2 said:
Only if it's asserted to be literally true. If it's taken as a story, or as folk history, there's usually no such problem.

If it's just a story, then there was no original sin and there was no need for Jesus to die on the cross.

blü 2 · Apr 5, 2021

Tiberius said:
If it's just a story, then there was no original sin and there was no need for Jesus to die on the cross.

Even worse ─ whether it's true or not, the Garden story never mentions sin, original sin, the Fall of Man, death entering the world, spiritual death, the need for a Redeemer or anything like that. Nor does it identify the snake with Satan, nor does the snake say anything untrue. Not only that, but if you're denied knowledge of good and evil then it's impossible for you to form the intention to do wrong, hence it's impossible for you to sin ─ exactly the condition of Adam and Eve at the time they each ate the fruit. And not only that, but at Genesis 3:22-23, God clearly states [his] reasons ─ and never any others ─ for chucking Adam and Eve out of the Garden, and they too have nothing to do with sin.

joelr · Apr 5, 2021

rrobs said:
Oh well, if the gospels are in fact fiction then Luke has no meaning and your proposition could be true. Still, Luke was written and he tried to say something.

What do you suppose he meant by chapter 24, verse 27:

And beginning at Moses and all the prophets, he expounded unto them in all the scriptures the things concerning himself.

There are in fact many Jewish scholars who would take this for what it says.

The gospel writers were creating a new narrative, same as any religion, Islam, Hindu, and wanted to tie the OT into the new. Luke is actually the most egregious is re-working stories from the OT. He uses the Kings narrative line by line as well as several others.
Luke copies the boy Jesus/Emmaus story and redoes the Elija -Elisha story but with Jesus.
Luke either transforms, or literally reverses the Kings narrative. This is a mainstream view and several scholars have done work on this.
So yes It looks like fiction.

rrobs said:
The scholars say the gospel writers were not eye witnesses and you appear to agree with them. The scriptures, on the other hand, say there were many witnesses. Hmmmm....who to believe?

The gospels do not claim to be eyewitnesses? The gospel narratives claim there were witnesses, that is a completely different thing. When creating a myth of course the authors are going to have people witness miraculous events? It isn't hard to figure out who to believe. Christian scholarship has put forth a solid argument that the synoptic gospels were sourced from Mark and the content of Mark uses all sorts of mythic devices. Besides wild improbabilities it's full of OT stories transformed, ring structure and any literary myth device you can think of.
This thing about scholars who study all available source material, review each others work and spend their lives studying the historicity of the material vs a layman who goes to church and is taught a completely inaccurate version of history to make the gospel narratives plausible doesn't make sense?
Just because one grows up in a religion being told things that do not align with history doesn't make them true? Of course the scholars would know more?

Tiberius · Apr 5, 2021

blü 2 said:
Even worse ─ whether it's true or not, the Garden story never mentions sin, original sin, the Fall of Man, death entering the world, spiritual death, the need for a Redeemer or anything like that. Nor does it identify the snake with Satan, nor does the snake say anything untrue. Not only that, but if you're denied knowledge of good and evil then it's impossible for you to form the intention to do wrong, hence it's impossible for you to sin ─ exactly the condition of Adam and Eve at the time they each ate the fruit. And not only that, but at Genesis 3:22-23, God clearly states [his] reasons ─ and never any others ─ for chucking Adam and Eve out of the Garden, and they too have nothing to do with sin.

In some of my discussions with believers, they have told me that while Genesis itself never says the snake was Satan, there is apparently a later verse somewhere in the Bible that says thatSatan was that serpent, and I'm usually happy to give them that. But everything else you say is completely true.

rrobs · Apr 5, 2021

robocop (actually) said:
I am sorry I have had so much anxiety and am exhausted. I wrote down on my phone to get back to you.

I think I got you mixed up with someone else. Your answer actually made sense, so sorry for my previous reply. You made some good points.

Now get some rest.

rrobs · Apr 5, 2021

robocop (actually) said:
Take this picture for instance from the Pearl of Great Price:

Joseph Smith said it meant things that scientists didn't. Who's right? The scientists are right about the literal meaning, but Joseph Smith could have been right about the symbolic and actually factual meaning.

In your diagram, the way the diagram works could be explained differently. Sheol is below the earth. Maybe that means if you live less than worthy of the earth you go down, and so forth. Maybe there are other rules of science where it straight up works.

I like Joseph Prince.

That is a good diagram. I'm not really saying which diagram is right or wrong. I was just pointing out what the ancient Near Eastern people thought.

Yes, either diagram could have different explanations. I think the main point is that the God of Israel, Yahweh, was the creator of the world. The was no other god like that in the ancient Near East. That's what makes our God so great!

Thanks.

rrobs · Apr 5, 2021

Tiberius said:
You can't. In either case, it's the fact that the sun and Earth are moving relative to each other. It's the same as how sometimes you are in a train and you think you have started moving backwards, but it's really just the train next to you that is moving forwards. It's relative movement, and from your perspective, the other train moving forwards or your train moving backwards works out to be the same thing. Your train and the other train are moving relative to each other. So, from our perspective, the sun going around the Earth, or the Earth spinning on its axis, are functionally the same movement. Although anyone with sufficient intelligence could work out there are two possible explanations that are functionally identical, so I don't get how you conclude that there is only one logical conclusion. Particular when the conclusion that you claim to be most logical requires the entire universe to rotate about the Earth's axis of rotation, where as the other conclusion requires only a single smallish planet to do so.

Of course, I would then ask you the following question: You claim that it could be the Sun moving around the Earth and the Earth is staying still, but what is the earth staying still relative to?

However, your question is entirely irrelevant. I never spoke about the Earth's rotation about its axis, I spoke of the Earth's orbit around the sun, and that can be demonstrated by measuring the parallax of nearby stars.

I think you might be thinking that I'm trying to reinvent cosmology. I'm not. I totally understand the actual movement of all the heavenly bodies as we know them today. I'm not trying to say the earth is the center of the universe or anything like that.

A model is not the actual thing. A model is based on observation. As observation techniques improve the model can be modified. Further, two different people can use the same observations and yet come up with different models or explanations of the observations. So, yes, in that sense there can be different explanations for observed phenomenon.

The universe is definitely a certain way. Different people may or may not understand exactly what that way is , but their understanding is not what determines actual reality.

What I am saying is that there was no way the ancient Near Easterner could have known how the sun, moon, stars, and earth relate to each other and how the move relative to each other. Their view of the universe was perfectly consistent with the observations they were able to make at that time. Of course we know better today. Still, I wonder what we'll know in another 3,000 years. I'd guess there will be a few "adjustments" to our present knowledge.

rrobs · Apr 5, 2021

Subduction Zone said:
You can do much more than that.

You can prove that the Sun is very distant. You can prove that the Moon is distant too, though not as distant. You can show that the Earth rotates with star trails.

Do you know how a scientific hypothesis even works?

And of course the rotation of the Earth is confirmed by Foucault Pendulums.

Yes, you or I can indeed prove all of those things. We can do so because we have a huge base of scientific knowledge made possible by the many scientists who have gone before us. Once more, all of them knew what they knew because of the work others had done before them. But the ancient Near Easterner had no such prior knowledge base. They had no idea about Foucault Pendulums. They came up with a plausible explanations based on the scientific knowledge base of their time. Of course we now know it was wrong, but I'm not trying to say who was right or who was wrong.

rrobs · Apr 5, 2021

blü 2 said:
Only if it's asserted to be literally true. If it's taken as a story, or as folk history, there's usually no such problem.
Very true ─ and an area in which unbelievers frequently have the drop on believers.

Really? Care to elaborate? What are the scriptures about? Chapter and verse would be nice.

In fact Jesus is mentioned nowhere in the Tanakh, in no way at all fits the Jewish definition or understanding of a Jewish messiah, and in no way was or is the savior of the Jews, but the trigger for two thousand years of often murderous antisemitism,

I think you're mixing up people with the scriptures. The scriptures say Jesus did nothing but good, so it's not his fault we've had 2,000 years of murderous antisemitism.

By the way, we've had 2,000 years of anti-somebody and everybody. The Jews have no corner on persecution. I might be wrong, but you seem to blame God for man's propensity to hate and violence. I think God gave man a perfect world to care for. Part of that perfection was free will. Man makes bad choices all the time. God tells us not to put our hands in the fire, but we can still do it if we want.

No, only the NT is about Jesus.

I know two verses that would refute that statement, but I'd be giving away the answer to the question I asked you above.

rrobs · Apr 5, 2021

YoursTrue said:
That's getting a little deep.

To be clear, I'm talking about how the ancient Near Easterner would have seen things. I understand the earth does not stand still. I know that thanks to an additional 6,000 years of observations which of course was not available to Moses.

rrobs · Apr 5, 2021

YoursTrue said:
As I have said, I did well in school. Not bragging, but I studied and paid attention. So it's not like I did not know how to say the right answers that the teachers wanted to hear. Now so -- and I do give credit to many of the posters who have argued with me, called me dumb in a sense, etc., because after I learned what the Bible said I began to doubt the theory of evolution in its extremity. I still do. But I do not doubt that scientists can make a successful vaccine, invent x-ray machines, gun powder, and things like that and more. And so I must admit that these conversations have proved interesting to an extent. In serious actuality, have caused me to further doubt the general theory of evolution.

Good points there. A baby lovingly staring into the eyes of it's mother evolved form some chance accident in a primordial soup? And to think that the naysayers accuse Christians of accepting things on blind faith!

Science is a good thing to be sure, but it's not infallible and never will be. That belongs to God and Him alone.

rrobs · Apr 5, 2021

joelr said:
The gospel writers were creating a new narrative, same as any religion, Islam, Hindu, and wanted to tie the OT into the new. Luke is actually the most egregious is re-working stories from the OT. He uses the Kings narrative line by line as well as several others.
Luke copies the boy Jesus/Emmaus story and redoes the Elija -Elisha story but with Jesus.
Luke either transforms, or literally reverses the Kings narrative. This is a mainstream view and several scholars have done work on this.
So yes It looks like fiction.

The gospels do not claim to be eyewitnesses? The gospel narratives claim there were witnesses, that is a completely different thing. When creating a myth of course the authors are going to have people witness miraculous events? It isn't hard to figure out who to believe. Christian scholarship has put forth a solid argument that the synoptic gospels were sourced from Mark and the content of Mark uses all sorts of mythic devices. Besides wild improbabilities it's full of OT stories transformed, ring structure and any literary myth device you can think of.
This thing about scholars who study all available source material, review each others work and spend their lives studying the historicity of the material vs a layman who goes to church and is taught a completely inaccurate version of history to make the gospel narratives plausible doesn't make sense?
Just because one grows up in a religion being told things that do not align with history doesn't make them true? Of course the scholars would know more?

Some scholars believe the Bible, some don't. Some laymen believe the Bible, some don't.

The veracity of the scriptures is dependent on neither. Truth stands on its own. Of course the question might be, "what is truth?" The scriptures say they are the truth.

John 17:17,

Sanctify them through thy truth: thy word is truth.

Each individual accepts or rejects that proposition. I spent a good chunk of my life rejecting it but now, after honest research, I accept them as the truth. They've done way more for me that way (and others whom I'm able to help) than before. You can't put that in a test tube, but there it is anyway. I know whom I have believed and I know it's made an incredible difference in my life and many others also.

TagliatelliMonster · Apr 5, 2021

rrobs said:
The creation story of Genesis is often used as "proof" that the Bible is false. Of course it is true that the universe is constructed in a way that is not even close to what is said in Genesis. But is it reasonable to think that God should have told the people about atoms, leptons, quarks, space-time continuum, conservation of energy, etc.?

No, but he could have at least passed on the obvious BS story that genesis does mention.

The structure of the universe as described in Genesis is much the same as all other ancient Near East concepts of the universe.

Likely this is because people didn't have any access to any supposed "divine" knowledge and instead were just as ignorant as those humans around them.

rrobs · Apr 5, 2021

TagliatelliMonster said:
No, but he could have at least passed on the obvious BS story that genesis does mention.

Likely this is because people didn't have any access to any supposed "divine" knowledge and instead were just as ignorant as those humans around them.

I gotta say that you're summary judgment of the ancient Near Eastern man's intelligence level speaks more about your own than theirs.

Heyo · Apr 5, 2021

rrobs said:
They came up with a plausible explanations based on the scientific knowledge base of their time.

Nope.
They made **** up and declared it divine knowledge. Nothing was based on observation or scientific knowledge of their time. The Greek philosophers did that and they came up with admirable solutions. And they accepted new data.
The bible doesn't contain corrections, even centuries, millennia actually, after it was known that the ancients got it all wrong.

rrobs · Apr 5, 2021

Heyo said:
Nope.
They made **** up and declared it divine knowledge. Nothing was based on observation or scientific knowledge of their time. The Greek philosophers did that and they came up with admirable solutions. And they accepted new data.
The bible doesn't contain corrections, even centuries, millennia actually, after it was known that the ancients got it all wrong.

With all due respect, I think you're the one making **** up. You've certainly not put any scholarly thought into the matter. You insist on thinking all people of all times should know what we now know. I dare say 4,000 years from now there will be people like you who say we were gullible idiots for believing what we currently believe about cosmology. But then there will be more thoughtful people who will appreciate the knowledge we have despite the lack of scientific tools they will have at that time. I guess nothing really changes.

Genesis Creation

Faith-confidence in what we hope for (Hebrews 11)

Faith-confidence in what we hope for (Hebrews 11)

Faith-confidence in what we hope for (Hebrews 11)

Faith-confidence in what we hope for (Hebrews 11)

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