Posted on 10/10/2009 7:25:33 PM PDT by Steelfish
God Is Not The Creator, Claims Academic
The notion of God as the Creator is wrong, claims a top academic, who believes the Bible has been wrongly translated for thousands of years.
By Richard Alleyne 08 Oct 2009
Professor Ellen van Wolde, a respected Old Testament scholar and author, claims the first sentence of Genesis "in the beginning God created the Heaven and the Earth" is not a true translation of the Hebrew.
She claims she has carried out fresh textual analysis that suggests the writers of the great book never intended to suggest that God created the world -- and in fact the Earth was already there when he created humans and animals.
Prof Van Wolde, 54, who will present a thesis on the subject at Radboud University in The Netherlands where she studies, said she had re-analysed the original Hebrew text and placed it in the context of the Bible as a whole, and in the context of other creation stories from ancient Mesopotamia.
She said she eventually concluded the Hebrew verb "bara", which is used in the first sentence of the book of Genesis, does not mean "to create" but to "spatially separate".
The first sentence should now read "in the beginning God separated the Heaven and the Earth"
According to Judeo-Christian tradition, God created the Earth out of nothing.
Prof Van Wolde, who once worked with the Italian academic and novelist Umberto Eco, said her new analysis showed that the beginning of the Bible was not the beginning of time, but the beginning of a narration.
She said: "It meant to say that God did create humans and animals, but not the Earth itself." She writes in her thesis that the new translation fits in with ancient texts.
(Excerpt) Read more at telegraph.co.uk ...
LOL!!!
What next?
"Show me just what Mohammed brought that was new, and there you will find only things evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached." - Manuel II Palelogus
Well, that's nice of her. She can join the pantheon of humans who have concluded any number of other important things. Just a minute, I'm trying to recollect their names and conclusions...
An academic?
That’s dog bites man.
Nothing to see here, move along.
So, Ellen, from whence came the earth, the water, the sea monsters, etc.?
Can’t wait to see her face when God asks her about that.
Sorry, Lady, but if it’s you v. 5000 years of Jewish scholars, I’ll go with the Jewish scholars.
Bulletin! Past 5000 years now, everybody’s been WRONG! We’ve been unworthy! Listen to the academic and learn! Hosanna in the cum laude!
Amazing that no one has caught this after thousands of years until now!
But the word bara is used throughout the 1st chapter of Genesis, while the word asha is used in the concept of made appear as in the fourth day of creation. If the writers intended to imply the heavens and earth were already here the word asha would have been used.
"Show me just what Mohammed brought that was new, and there you will find only things evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached." - Manuel II Palelogus
She’s silly. Everyone knows Obama did it.
However, if one wanted to suppose an unwritten Bible v1.0 in which Heaven and Earth are created by God many millions of years ago, then that would help settle some disagreements vis a vis The Grand Canyon, and geologic time. Then, we might surmise that we hold in our hands a written Bible v2.0 which tells the more recent story of how mankind was created long after the foundations of the Earth.
Perhaps this is a way to look at it. But, bottomline, God is powerful enough to create anything He wants, in whatever timeframe he wishes.
For now, I'm sticking with the basic story.
“touch the hearts of many religious people”??
This woman has a highly inflated view of herself. No one that believes will change their minds based on this “analysis”, and no one that doesn’t will, either.
This academic might find himself very unpleasantly surprised come Judgment Day. I can’t imagine that meeting the Maker one claims does not exist would be very pleasant.
Can I play???
She said she eventually concluded the Hebrew verb "bara", which is used in the first sentence of the book of Genesis, does not mean "to create" but to "spatially separate".
The first sentence should now read "in the beginning God separated the Heaven and the Earth"
Maybe it means:
"in the beginning God separated from the Heaven and the Earth"...
(Or maybe it really does mean: "in the beginning God created the Heaven and the Earth")...
So, I guess God’s God created all that God gave us in creation? Or something like that. OK! Now all is answered. ;-)
God is energy, the supreme power. Just try splitting an atom within a grain of dust or a drop of water. Both which make up everything living.
Grade: F- (for wasting our time and insulting God)
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