Posted on 05/29/2006 6:28:25 AM PDT by truthfinder9
I often hear skeptics point to the belief in the global flood as a reason to not believe Christianity. I also see "Christian" creationist groups condem other Christians who believe the local flood is the literal interpretation. It's time we start telling "Christian" groups like ICR and AIG to stop turning people away from the Bible and tell them to stop their childish, immature attacks on other Christians (AIG recently refused to be subject to review, now there's the making of a cult!). And it's time for Christians to stop blindly believing everything they are told, just because it comes from other Christians.
Why the Local Flood is the Literal View
But those of us who accept the miracles of the creation and the flood are the ones who, according to the poster of this thread, are "turning people away from the Bible".
If someone doesn't want to believe the Bible, they don't need those of us who take the words of the Bible seriously to scare them away. They will use any excuse they can find.
Hey - if it feels better for you to put people who ask questions in some kind of box with a label on it, fine. I am not the biblical scholar many here are. I barely understand most of your posts on the subject. I am not some member of some organized movement to discredit the claims of the bible. I 'll never study it with more interest than a spectator watching the discovery channel, but I still find some of the questions are perplexing ones, and the discussion interesting.
Yep. Those who choose not to believe are, the proverbial frog slowly boiling in water...
By "it" I merely meant these questions of the historical proofs for the flood, but I get your point.
The genesis account, not only refers to days, it refers to "evening and morning" in describing each day. All subsequent passages referring to creation speak of days, not periods or ages. The concept of ages occurs in scripture, and would have been used if it applied. Creation is used as the foundation for other patterns. To reverse that order is nothing short of twisting scriptures.
ping
And thank you for the insight on the wall at Jericho! That is a classic case-in-point.
If one is seeking to reconcile God’s revelation in Scripture to God’s revelation in nature vis-à-vis Creation week, he would be well advised to remember relativity and inflationary theory.
Time is relative. It is geometry.
For instance, while a week may pass in the vicinity of a black hole, 40 years may simultaneously elapse on earth. And if an object were to move at the constant acceleration of one earth’s gravity, while 25.3 years elapsed for the object, 5x1010 years would elapse on earth.
What this means with regard to Creation week is this: 7 equivalent earth days at the inception (or beginning) space/time coordinates of this universe (the big bang) is equal to roughly 15 billion years at our space/time coordinates on earth.
After all, God is the author of Scripture and He was the observer of “in the beginning”. I therefore assert He was using the term "day" relative to the "beginning" in Genesis 1.
I would also assert that man's calendar does not begin until Adam is banished to mortality in Genesis 4. For those following the 7,000 year theology (with the last 1,000 years being Christ's reign on earth) - we are more or less at year number 5766 according to the Jewish calendar.
The following link contains more information on the time issue and also this tidbit:
Nachmanides says the text uses the words "Vayehi Erev" - but it doesn't mean "there was evening." He explains that the Hebrew letters Ayin, Resh, Bet - the root of "erev" - is chaos. Mixture, disorder. That's why evening is called "erev", because when the sun goes down, vision becomes blurry. The literal meaning is "there was disorder." The Torah's word for "morning" - "boker" - is the absolute opposite. When the sun rises, the world becomes "bikoret", orderly, able to be discerned. That's why the sun needn't be mentioned until Day Four. Because from erev to boker is a flow from disorder to order, from chaos to cosmos. That's something any scientist will testify never happens in an unguided system. Order never arises from disorder spontaneously. There must be a guide to the system. That's an unequivocal statement.
I love you man!!!! (or woman)
Thank You, and have a nice 'yom'. (and I mean only a literal 24)
Did you see Zionist Conspirator's thread on this very subject last week? Worth reading IMO.
Bump for later
Thank you so much for the link! It is indeed a very interesting subject.
Thanks Brother. I love you too (with the love of Christ, of course)!
BTW, I'm a man. (No offense taken.)
Sincerely
The theology of a 7,000 year limit of Adamic man on earth (with the last 1,000 years being Christ’s reign on earth) is based on the seven days of Creation in Genesis as applied to these verses and Revelation 20:
But, beloved, be not ignorant of this one thing, that one day [is] with the Lord as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day. – 2 Peter 3:8
The 7000 limit for Adamic man is also a traditional understanding of time in Orthodox Judaism. I have not yet read San Hedrin 97b, but I understand it contains a reference to that very point.
Pseudepigraphral manuscripts explicitly make the connection, most notably Enoch 2 and the epistle of Barnabas 15:1-5.
Of the Sabbath He speaketh in the beginning of the creation; And God made the works of His hands in six days, and He ended on the seventh day, and rested on it, and He hallowed it.
Give heed, children, what this meaneth; He ended in six days. He meaneth this, that in six thousand years the Lord shall bring all things to an end; for the day with Him signifyeth a thousand years; and this He himself beareth me witness, saying; Behold, the day of the Lord shall be as a thousand years. Therefore, children, in six days, that is in six thousand years, everything shall come to an end.
And He rested on the seventh day. this He meaneth; when His Son shall come, and shall abolish the time of the Lawless One, and shall judge the ungodly, and shall change the sun and the moon and the stars, then shall he truly rest on the seventh day. – Barnabas 15:1-5
I said to him: Earth you are, and into the earth whence I took you you shalt go, and I will not ruin you, but send you whence I took you. Then I can again receive you at My second presence.
And I blessed all my creatures visible and invisible. And Adam was five and half hours in paradise. And I blessed the seventh day, which is the Sabbath, on which he rested from all his works.
And I appointed the eighth day also, that the eighth day should be the first-created after my work, and that the first seven revolve in the form of the seventh thousand, and that at the beginning of the eighth thousand there should be a time of not-counting, endless, with neither years nor months nor weeks nor days nor hours.
And now, Enoch, all that I have told you, all that you have understood, all that you have seen of heavenly things, all that you have seen on earth, and all that I have written in books by my great wisdom, all these things I have devised and created from the uppermost foundation to the lower and to the end, and there is no counsellor nor inheritor to my creations.
I am self-eternal, not made with hands, and without change - Enoch 2 32 and 33:1-3
My understanding of the traditional Jewish understanding is that the Flood was universal (except for 'Eretz Yisra'el, which was exempt so the bodies of the dead there could be buried appropriately and not defile the land) and consisted of hot, boiling water (those in Israel were killed by the heat). All the mountains were covered and the laws of nature were suspended for the year that the waters were on the earth.
I am not an expert here. A traditional Orthodox rabbi should be consulted.
The Hebrew for the phrase “evening and morning” or “evening, and there was morning” has usages not limited to 24-hour days. In fact, there are numerous usages in the Bible that this phrase, or variants of it, refer to continuous processes or activities. Exodus 18:13, 27:21, Leviticus 24:2-3 and Daniel 8:14,26 all use this phrase in a context of something that occurs on a continual basis over more than one 24-hour day.
The attaching of an ordinal (such as “first”) or other appendage (such as “long”) to day does not always indicate a 24-hour day. See Zechariah 14:7, which uses “one day” or “a day” depending on the translation and Hosea 6:2. Scholars have long interpreted the use of day in these prophetic verses as meaning years or longer periods. There is no good reason to dismiss these examples simply because they are considered prophecy. In 1 Samuel 7:2, the word for day is translated as “long time” or “the time was long” and refers to twenty years. In Deuteronomy 10:10, day is translated as “the first time” and refers to forty days. In 1 Chronicles 29:27 the word for day is translated as “the time” and refers to forty years (some translations leave it out since the context makes it repetitive).
And most importantly:
Genesis 1 does not refer to the “days” as 24-hour days. The text only reads as day, so you have to look at the context. The New International Version (NIV) and some other translations set the days off differently, and more accurate to the Hebrew, than do other translations. The King James Version (KJV), or ones that over-simplify such as The Living Bible (TLB), are not as accurate to the Hebrew and make it sound as if these were 24-hour days. Compare and you will see the difference. KJV: “And the evening and morning were the first day.” NIV: “And there was evening, and there was morning — the first day.” The Hebrew matches the latter translation more precisely, which shows that a 24-hour day is not as obvious as some claim. If it were a 24-hour day, one would expect it to obviously say so. The text, however, seems to be indicating something else.
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