Genesis 1:6

[ellenjanuary]

I think you need to understand that moses was supposed to be the author.

At that time in history written language as we know it did not exist. Moses did not carry around blocks of stone with hyrogliphics on them.

These fables were orally passed down hundreds of years.

We can only guess how many authors there are but 5 seems to be the common theory.


divide the water is pretty clear, i dont think you have to dig to deep in this fiction to try and understand, inmy opinion

I thought it was six altogether; but my fat ol' NIV Study Bible seems convinced that Moses was the collator; if not the sole author.

I don't believe in fiction. If I say, "gazebabde taledawag;" next week there will be a Google entry. I believe these sacred works have a commonality; that their authors were able, for whatever reason, to glean a truth of lower entropy than was available to their contemporaries.

And, come on. "Wizard of Oz" is considered some kind of epic, and it's only from the thirties. Moses and his bush have that surpassed by two orders of magnitude. If it's "fiction," it's "essential fiction."

 

[Thief]

And God said, "Let there be an expanse between the waters to separate water from water." So God made the expanse and separated the water under the expanse from the water above it. And it was so. God called the expanse "sky." And there was evening, and there was morning - the second day.

I think that this passage bothered me ever since I first heard it. I have an hypothesis; rather, I have an hypothetical hypothesis. But before I run the neck, input would be appreciated. Is it the translation? My mind wants to say that the author is referring to clouds - water above the sky - but the stupid brain is thinking of cosmic vibrations. Is there something going on here, or is it just me?

Try picturing yourself as God.....yes you can....
and you are trying to describe to a mortal...the beginning.

We know in these days that the universe is primarily hydrogen.
But you can't say hydrogen to any man....he won't understand.

The next best...closest to real idea you can use is....water.

Now go back and re-read Genesis.

 

[outhouse]

Try picturing yourself as God.....yes you can....
and you are trying to describe to a mortal...the beginning.

We know in these days that the universe is primarily hydrogen.
But you can't say hydrogen to any man....he won't understand.

The next best...closest to real idea you can use is....water.

Now go back and re-read Genesis.

LOL no i believe there very clear there about a division of equal materials.

remember god spoke to moses, moses did not write it down. he told storys about his vision for decades. he died. These storys were told for hundreds of years before they were wrote down by 5 different people and you want to get phylisophical about it?

If these words are inspired by god, you would think he would want modern man to understand all his words and not have us all guessing at misinformation and guesses and contradictions. You would think he in the last 2000 years "it" could give us a decent update if he really cared for people???

 

[sniper762]

yes, moses implied that the waters above pertained to the clouds "where the rain came from".

note that on the fourth day moses said that god placed the sun and the moon between those waters.

what primitive knowledge.........he had no idea.

 

[outhouse]

yes, moses implied that the waters above pertained to the clouds "where the rain came from".

note that on the fourth day moses said that god placed the sun and the moon between those waters.

what primitive knowledge.........he had no idea.

have any sources to back that claim of clouds???

 

[142857]

cavemans confusion is all....the sun was in the sky, no concept of "space" in those days. Moon, stars, in the sky.

 

[outhouse]

cavemans confusion is all....the sun was in the sky, no concept of "space" in those days. Moon, stars, in the sky.

im sorry but thisis false

they were allot smarter then you think at this time. They were as intellectaul as you are now.

written language pre dates the 10ths century and this was supposeed to be what pre 13'th century ish

 

[fallingblood]

I think you need to understand that moses was supposed to be the author.

At that time in history written language as we know it did not exist. Moses did not carry around blocks of stone with hyrogliphics on them.

These fables were orally passed down hundreds of years.

We can only guess how many authors there are but 5 seems to be the common theory.


divide the water is pretty clear, i dont think you have to dig to deep in this fiction to try and understand, inmy opinion

When the Torah was first written, it was done without author being credited. It wasn't until around the Greco-Roman time that Moses was said to be the author. The reason being that the Greco-Roman tradition was to place authorship on texts. This influenced the Jews, and there becomes Moses assigned to these texts (now, it wasn't as simple as that, but thats the gist).

The common theory is that there are 4 authors. J (because they called God Jehovah), E (for calling God Elohim), P (priestly writing), and D (Deuteronomy). That's the gist of it.

 

[sniper762]

well, we now no how far the sun and moon are (and have always been) from earth.
AND THERE IS NO WATER ABOVE EARTHS ATMOSPHERE

so that should convince any intellgent human that moses, with his ignorance of astrology could NEVER acurately explain to man about those bodies because he had NO comprehension himself.

his answer to ANY unexplainable subject was "GOD DID IT"

 

[fallingblood]

Ain't a problem.. it's gah-awed.

The Sword kicked down about nine different translations this morn; "firmament" leading "expanse" by a margin of five to four...

I don't believe prophets "hear." I believe prophets "see." When I read words of scripture; often, I try to associate imagery with text.

What does an ocean look like? Pacific? Or Atlantic? Wide, I'm thinking; busy. Constantly in motion. If a prophet sees the sea, then sees the turbulence of cosmic vibration; would he say - God separated the order from the chaos, into order and chaos; or would the prophet say, God separated the waters from the waters?

Thanks for all the input.

But wouldn't you even having a question about this, plus the multiple different ideas presented, show that there is a problem?

We can't ask the author/s why they wrote what they did. We don't know exactly what the meant. So, it does leave some problem, especially when we see if it is suppose to be completely literal, it just doesn't pass.

 

[outhouse]

When the Torah was first written, it was done without author being credited. It wasn't until around the Greco-Roman time that Moses was said to be the author. The reason being that the Greco-Roman tradition was to place authorship on texts. This influenced the Jews, and there becomes Moses assigned to these texts (now, it wasn't as simple as that, but thats the gist).

The common theory is that there are 4 authors. J (because they called God Jehovah), E (for calling God Elohim), P (priestly writing), and D (Deuteronomy). That's the gist of it.

[FONT=trebuchet ms,arial,helvetica]J: a writer who used Yahweh/Jehovah as the divine name.[/FONT]

[FONT=trebuchet ms,arial,helvetica]E: a writer who used Elohim as the divine name. *[/FONT]

[FONT=trebuchet ms,arial,helvetica]P: a writer who added material of major interest to the priesthood.[/FONT]

[FONT=trebuchet ms,arial,helvetica]D: the author of the book of Deuteronomy. *[/FONT]

[FONT=trebuchet ms,arial,helvetica]R: a redactor who welded the contributions of J, E and P together into the present Pentateuch.[/FONT]

thats the source i had




Thank you for the clarrification on the moses part

 

[142857]

intellectaul?
men who got on all fours and drank from a stream like animals?

Judges 7
5So he brought down the people unto the water: and the LORD said unto Gideon, Every one that lappeth of the water with his tongue, as a dog lappeth, him shalt thou set by himself; likewise every one that boweth down upon his knees to drink.

very intellectual.

Face it, these people were just slightly removed from cavemen.

tent people.......
...yes the tent did come after the cave, but, not by much.

And there is no way anyone can convince me that moses understood the concept of outer space. please.

 

[fallingblood]

well, we now no how far the sun and moon are (and have always been) from earth.
AND THERE IS NO WATER ABOVE EARTHS ATMOSPHERE

so that should convince any intellgent human that moses, with his ignorance of astrology could NEVER acurately explain to man about those bodies because he had NO comprehension himself.

his answer to ANY unexplainable subject was "GOD DID IT"

I think you are assuming a little too much. First, there is no evidence Moses wrote the story. Actually, we have two creation stories, coming from two different sources, placed in the Bible.

More so, the moon, at least, was not always the same distance from Earth. I'm not sure about the Sun, but I believe it is accepted that it hasn't always been the same distance from the Earth.

Also, technically, if you would consider other planets above our atmosphere, then we know there is water there. I'm not sure what you mean by above our atmosphere though.

You're also assuming that the authors were dull witted. That isn't so. They were able to learn. That is why we have been able to continue learning.

 

[fallingblood]

Try picturing yourself as God.....yes you can....
and you are trying to describe to a mortal...the beginning.

We know in these days that the universe is primarily hydrogen.
But you can't say hydrogen to any man....he won't understand.

The next best...closest to real idea you can use is....water.

Now go back and re-read Genesis.

That doesn't quite work though. You are assuming that they were idiots. You are assuming that God is a bad teacher. And you are assuming that water would be the next best thing.

That is a lot of assumptions.

 

[142857]

well, we now no how far the sun and moon are (and have always been) from earth.

I'm not being a smart alec but,
for the record the moon is and has always been getting a little farther away every day. It'll stop eventually....but it drifts away roughly an inch a year.

 

[outhouse]

They were sharp charactors no dought.

We look back at them and still cant duplicate some of the rock work they have done. They worked with rock for generations after generation learning tricks lost to this day.

dont under estimate them for a second

 

[outhouse]

intellectaul?
men who got on all fours and drank from a stream like animals?

Judges 7
5So he brought down the people unto the water: and the LORD said unto Gideon, Every one that lappeth of the water with his tongue, as a dog lappeth, him shalt thou set by himself; likewise every one that boweth down upon his knees to drink.

very intellectual.

Face it, these people were just slightly removed from cavemen.

tent people.......
...yes the tent did come after the cave, but, not by much.

And there is no way anyone can convince me that moses understood the concept of outer space. please.

besides posting 1 scripture

do you now anything about ancient man??

 

[142857]

We look back at them and still cant duplicate some of the rock work they have done. They worked with rock for generations after generation learning tricks lost to this day.

I think that's bulltarded

Coral castle....built by one four and a half foot little man
Coral Castle Museum

besides posting 1 scripture

do you now anything about ancient man??

oh, yeah, that 1 scripture doesn't mean anything....

 

[outhouse]

I know coral castle well. I would love to know the secrets behind his work.

Thats 1 freak example.

go search puma punku and the rock work done there. Corla castle did not have work done that well. That site possibly dates back to the time of moses.

Your confusing living conditions and intellectual intellegence

You do know we have written text from the 10th century. they were as smart as you ever were.

 

[fallingblood]

[FONT=trebuchet ms,arial,helvetica]J: a writer who used Yahweh/Jehovah as the divine name.[/FONT]

[FONT=trebuchet ms,arial,helvetica]E: a writer who used Elohim as the divine name. *[/FONT]

[FONT=trebuchet ms,arial,helvetica]P: a writer who added material of major interest to the priesthood.[/FONT]

[FONT=trebuchet ms,arial,helvetica]D: the author of the book of Deuteronomy. *[/FONT]

[FONT=trebuchet ms,arial,helvetica]R: a redactor who welded the contributions of J, E and P together into the present Pentateuch.[/FONT]

thats the source i had




Thank you for the clarrification on the moses part

You are correct. Someone did end up putting it together. I know some have claimed that Ezra was the one who did this. But yes, there was at least one editor, possibly more, who put it together in the end, and scholars do call that R. But I don't think one could really call them a source. They really just compiled the various sources (there are other sources that were possibly used as well, such as various books that are lost to us now. This is actually a common theme throughout the Old Testament, where we are told about a source we no longer have) into a massive narrative. It probably wouldn't be off to assume that they added some themselves, but I would really call them a source.

Also, the original authors, at least some of them, most likely used sources themselves, or at least it is a possibility. They would have definitely been influenced by other sources at the very least. The reason this can be known is because of the similarities to other creation myths around that area.