Posted on 01/22/2006 8:12:41 AM PST by Luis Gonzalez
Creationists call us to believe the Biblical creation story as a literal account of historical events. However, Genesis contains two distinctly different creation accounts. Which creation story are they calling us to "literally" believe?
For generations, serious students of Scripture have noted stark divisions and variations in the age of the Hebrew, its style and language within Genesis. As we have it now, Genesis is actually a composite of three written primary sources, each with its own character, favorite words and distinctly different names for God. Such differences all but evaporate when translated into English, but they are clear in the ancient Hebrew text.
The first creation account, Genesis. 1:1 to Genesis. 2:4a, was written during or after the Jews' Babylonian captivity. This fully developed story explains creation in terms of the ancient near eastern world view of its time. A watery chaos is divided by the dome (firmament) of the sky. The waters under the dome are gathered and land appears. Lights are affixed in the dome. All living things are created. The story pictures God building the cosmos as a supporting ecosystem for humanity. Finally, humanity, both male and female, is created, and God rests.
The second Creation story, Genesis 2:4b to 2:25, found its written form several centuries before the Genesis. 1:1 story. This text is a less developed and much older story. It was probably passed down for generations around the camp fires of desert dwellers before being written. It begins by describing a desert landscape, no plants or herbs, no rain; only a mist arises out of the earth. Then the Lord God forms man of the dust of the ground, creates an oasis-like Garden of Eden to support the "man whom he had formed." In this story, God creates animal life while trying to provide the man "a helper fit for him." None being found, God takes a rib from the man's side and creates the first woman. These two creation stories clearly arise out of different histories and reflect different concerns with different sequences of events. Can they either or both be literal history? Obviously not.
Many serious students of Scripture consider the first eleven chapters of Genesis as non-literal, pre-history type literature, with Abram in Genesis. 12:1 being the first literal historical figure in the Bible. This understanding of Genesis causes an uproar in some quarters. In most church communities, little of this textual study has filtered down to the pew. But, in their professional training, vast numbers of clergy have been exposed to this type of literary scriptural analysis.
In my over 28 years as a pastor, I have encountered many people who are unnecessarily conflicted because they have been made to believe that, to be faithfully religious, one must take a literal view of the Genesis creation accounts. Faced with their scientific understandings going one direction and their spiritual search another, many have felt compelled to give up their spiritual search altogether. This all too common reaction is an unnecessary shame!
So, the next time someone asks you if you believe the Biblical story of creation, just remember the correct reply: "To which Biblical creation story do you refer?"
And you might want to check with your endocrinologist as well.
Good luck!
I love people who argue that what is in The Bible is the absolute truth, and prove it by quoting Biblical passages.
That would be like evolutionists arguing that evolution existed, and offering up quotes from "The Origins of the Species" as proof.
How did you get in the middle of this?
:-} Good question.
Well, I started it, so I know what I'm doing here.
:-)
I read all translations, and I did not see thw word "idiot" being spoke by Jesus once.
And even if He did, it's interesting to note that you believe yourself His equal in that way.
Not upset. You can believe whatever you wish.
However, when you post the red & blue spew, and finish with 'Was Paul WRONG about this???', I'm obliged to point out that Paul didn't write it.
That Philemon wasn't accepted as an authentic Pauline writing until later.
Good Post:-)
Well, we'll just have to disagree.
Basic rules? To what? Help me, I'm baffled here.
D'oh! I haven't been up to par since the doctor told me I had to quit drinking. Of course, a diety could be a low-cal god...
Really? And how does the original Hebrew describe it? I take it the English translaters kind of just glossed over those couple of verses (and both translaters decided to do the same thing) because they were evidently bored or tired -- or didn't understand the original Hebrew...
To investigate what the Church really understands by the term "evolution," we interviewed Father Vittorio Marcozzi, Vatican specialist on anthropological studies.
Marcozzi was an advisor to three Popes and an expert at the Second Vatican Council on questions related to creation and evolution. He is well known for his rigorous research and balanced appraisals; his books on the subject have been translated into many languages and distributed worldwide. Recently, in spite of his advanced age of 88 years, Marcozzi was summoned by Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger to the Congregation of the Doctrine of the Faith to debate with eminent scientists who have written on evolution and creation.
"I agree with Cardinal Ratzinger that we cannot speak of creation versus evolution, but rather of creation and evolution," Marcozzi told Inside the Vatican. "To admit evolution does not necessarily signify denying God's intervention. There are at least three 'moments' when divine intervention is necessary and evident: the appearance of life, that is of the first living organisms; the evolutionary possibilities with which God imbues these organisms; and, finally, the coming of man, whose spiritual qualities implicate God's special intervention."
Do you mean that evolution is "guided" by God?
FATHER MARCOZZI: Evolution is not admissible without the mediation of a supreme Mind which established the laws of nature governing natural processes and which created nature itself. Although Church Fathers, such as St. Basil, St. Gregory of Nyssa and St. Augustine lacked a modern conception of evolution, they espoused ideas which approximated evolutionary theories. The Church Fathers maintained that God, in his first creative act, imbued matter with the "potentiality" or power to produce different animal and plant species. I favor the idea of evolution as a succession of beings, genetically related, but increasingly diverse and complex. The fundamental question is that of the first cause.
And how do you judge Darwin's theory?
MARCOZZI: For Darwin - a materialist criticized by his own wife for his lack of faith - evolution was set in motion by outside causal factors such as natural selection and the struggle for survival. According to the English scientist, all beings, including man, evolve from causal mutations. Apart from the absence of clear proofs for the intermediary forms of human existence, can we really believe that such marvelous beings, particularly man himself, are products of mere chance?
A billion and a half years have passed between the existence of one-celled and many-celled organisms, and yet there seem to be no intermediate forms linking the two.
These links are missing; they may never be found. What explains such great evolutionary leaps? Can they possibly be the result of material changes?
I rather see a divine intervention.
Can evolution be supported by the Bible?
MARCOZZI: There are two accounts of Genesis in the Bible. The more recent account describes creation in seven days and a repose on the Sabbath. The earlier account presumes that creation happened in one day.
The significance of both is that God created all things; evolution in no way contradicts this affirmation.
In synthesis, God created man from matter and then infused him with a spirit.
What is your opinion of the Holy Father's message to the Pontifical Academy of Science?
MARCOZZI: The Holy Father's message contains no specific recognition of Darwin or his theories.
John Paul II is proceeding along the doctrinal lines traced by the Popes before him. There are many different theories of evolution.
It is possible to accept evolution as a theory, while affirming that the spiritual and philosophical elements must remain outside the competence of science.
Putting it in my own words:
God is truth, science is a search for knowledge. When that search reveals truths that conflict with scripture then we have to take another look at our interpretation of that scripture.
Of course science is no longer a search for knowledge since it has been defined to exclude anything that science can not explain or understand. So science is now relegated to the limits that science has placed on itself and we are subject to declarations that intelligent design is not science when intelligent design is used by human beings to chnage allele frequencies. Go figure.
ID is not science.
ID is either belief in God, or extra-terrestrials, neither of which qualifies as science.
ID says that a mysterious form/being/beings that we don't know/can't understand created everything via use of apparently omnipotent power.
ID cannot be tested in a lab; it's mysticism made up to resemble science.
Next, the argument will be that The Bible should be taught as literature.
There are questions that flow from that fact and one of those is self evident. I'll leave that as an exercise for you to work on Luis. :-}
No, I'm not. I'm saying that as new functions of DNA are discovered, we may learn that DNA has programed into it far more variability than we ever imagined. We just recently discovered that certain DNA previously thought to be Junk DNA plays a sort of corrective role looking for and correcting errors. We may find that some DNA introduces variability far greater than mere gene pairs would suggest. "So how many eye colors were planted with the first couple?"
I don't know but if you have 5 gene pairs influencing it with 2 colors each, that's 2^5 power, that's 32, and they think there must be more than 5.
"How about the different skeletal structures? Why does it seem unnatural to you that the Heavenly Father created His children just the way He wanted them. "
It doesn't seem unnatural. But what you see is less variability over time. What's happened in man is no different than what man has caused to happen with dogs. If you try to mate a Siberian Husky with a Chihuahua, you get problems. They both descended from ancestors that had more in common, but that variability was there all along.
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