Freeper Views on Origins

Alamo-Girl | 7/16/2002 | Alamo-Girl

[Alamo-Girl]

IMHO, there are many Freepers who either have a curiosity about origins or have formulated an opinion they would like to share. However, the debate on many threads frequently gets side-tracked – which makes it difficult for a reader to explore all the alternative points of view.

Therefore I’m starting this new thread in the hopes that anyone who wishes to do so, would present their full overview of origins– along with their sources and logic. Rebuttals would be nice, but I strongly hope the rebuttals will follow the same format, providing sources and logic.

I’ll start the discussion by providing my "take" on origins, which is a Christian creation point of view but reconciles with science, including evolution and intelligent design. I use both Scripture and science references for sources.

Alamo-Girl’s "take:"

My perception of reality drives my understanding of creation. I perceive the physical realm to be a manifestation of the spiritual realm and therefore science and Genesis are consistent on origins. Those who perceive the physical realm as all that there is, and the spiritual realm to be an illusion, will be prejudiced and thus will vigorously disagree.

Following are foundations to my understanding:

The Bible is the inerrant Word of God. It is a revealed truth which cannot be discovered scientifically, a person either hears His voice or not.

My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me: - John 10:27

Not everyone is able or willing to hear. To many who don’t, we who do seem foolish.

But God hath chosen the foolish things of the world to confound the wise; and God hath chosen the weak things of the world to confound the things which are mighty;
And base things of the world, and things which are despised, hath God chosen, [yea], and things which are not, to bring to nought things that are:
That no flesh should glory in his presence – I Corinthians 1:27-29

One phrase from the previous quote has a bearing to my understanding of science: "and things which are not, to bring to nought things that are: That no flesh should glory in his presence". The laws of physics break down in singularities, e.g. at the inception of the "big bang." Velocity, density, mass, size and so forth have no finite meaning in a singularity because they either become 'zero' or infinite with nothing in between in a mathematical sense.

The Bible is inerrant even to the tense of each word.

But as touching the resurrection of the dead, have ye not read that which was spoken unto you by God, saying,
I am the God of Abraham, and the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob? God is not the God of the dead, but of the living. – Matthew 22:31-32 (emphasis mine)

The phrase "have ye not read that which was spoken unto you by God" makes it clear that the author of the written Word is God and that it is written to us, to be read carefully. The second verse makes it clear that we ought to apply logic to the Word.

For all these reasons, I know that creation was accomplished by God in 6 days just like He said. I also recognize that the universe appears to be billions of years old. I see both statements are true and compatible due to the effect the expansion of the universe has on the perception of time depending on the observer’s point of view.

As an example, let’s say a galaxy is so far away that the light from it that we see today left the galaxy when the universe was a small fraction of its present age and has been traveling for 14 billion years. If the galaxy was only 1 billion light years away at the time the light was sent out to us, why would it take 14 billion light years to travel 1 billion light years distance?

The short answer is that space itself expands. The light from the far galaxy is traveling towards us essentially at a constant speed, but because space itself is expanding, it takes longer to get here.

Interesting space-time chart

What came before the big bang?

Inflation for Beginners

Neither space nor time pre-exist. Space-time is the effect of the universe expanding. Our viewpoint is from some point in the expansion – which is clearly not from God’s viewpoint. God alone was the observer of creation. Genesis is written by Him, from His point of view.

As a final principle, because God uses words which have common usage but are also defined as symbols elsewhere in His Word, I look for these defined word-symbols and read verses with both the common usage and the symbolic usage to see which "rings true" spiritually.

Who hath ears to hear, let him hear.
And the disciples came, and said unto him, Why speakest thou unto them in parables?
He answered and said unto them, Because it is given unto you to know the mysteries of the kingdom of heaven, but to them it is not given. – Matthew 13:9-11

Following is my "take" on creation:

Day 1

The first Day of creation, 24 equivalent solar hours from the point of view of God as the observer, would appear to be about 8 billion years elapsed from our viewpoint today. In other words, if He sent me a message on a photon at the beginning of that day, if I existed, I would have received it 8 billion years later, from my point of view.

In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth.
And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness [was] upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters.
And God said, Let there be light: and there was light.
And God saw the light, that [it was] good: and God divided the light from the darkness.
And God called the light Day, and the darkness he called Night. And the evening and the morning were the first day.

The first day was spent in creating light and separating it from darkness.

The word "darkness" is used repeatedly in the Scriptures to symbolize evil.

Ye are all the children of light, and the children of the day: we are not of the night, nor of darkness. – I Thess 5:5

For God, who commanded the light to shine out of darkness, hath shined in our hearts, to [give] the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ. – 2 Corinthians 4:6

The word "light" is used repeatedly to symbolize His divinity, holiness, goodness.

This then is the message which we have heard of him, and declare unto you, that God is light, and in him is no darkness at all. – I John 1:5

Then spake Jesus again unto them, saying, I am the light of the world: he that followeth me shall not walk in darkness, but shall have the light of life. – John 8:12

I am come a light into the world, that whosoever believeth on me should not abide in darkness. – John 12:46

Notice that both "Day" and "Night" are capitalized as proper names. As we can see in I Thes 5:5 "day" parallels "light" and "night" parallels "darkness" - spiritually. Believers are children of the light, a point to keep in mind as we explore Adam in the subsequent days.

The use of the phrase "without form, and void" indicates that there was originally no physical existence.

The phrase "the deep" is symbolized in Romans 10:7 to mean death (lifelessness.) Or, Who shall descend into the deep? (that is, to bring up Christ again from the dead.)

The word "waters" is symbolized in Revelation 17:15 to mean peoples, multitudes, nations and tongues. And he saith unto me, The waters which thou sawest, where the whore sitteth, are peoples, and multitudes, and nations, and tongues.

Since obviously there was no physical life, the word "waters" must mean "tongues." There has been much discussion about what the term "tongues" means. It is used throughout Scripture along with references to nations, peoples or beings – but, in context at this point of the creation, I understand "tongues" to mean intelligent sounds or thought.

Now, brethren, if I come unto you speaking with tongues, what shall I profit you, except I shall speak to you either by revelation, or by knowledge, or by prophesying, or by doctrine?
And even things without life giving sound, whether pipe or harp, except they give a distinction in the sounds, how shall it be known what is piped or harped? - I Corinthians 14:6-7

I find the phrase "God said" to be very important in understanding what was going on in the physical realm while all this was happening in the spiritual realm.

I believe the resonance of God speaking caused the physical realm to come into existence because it was, in effect, a higher dimensional shockwave. It would be known as the "big bang." In the physical realm, the consequence of His speaking in Day 1, from our four dimensional viewpoint, would look like a cosmic soup.

Publications on the big bang and higher dimensional dynamics

Exactly when, during the first day, He spoke, it doesn’t say. He moved upon the face of the "waters" before He spoke. So my 8 billion years for the first day might be a tad high.

Day 2

The second Day of creation, 24 equivalent solar hours from the point of view of God as the observer, would appear to be about 4 billion years elapsed from our viewpoint today.

And God said, Let there be a firmament in the midst of the waters, and let it divide the waters from the waters
And God made the firmament, and divided the waters which [were] under the firmament from the waters which [were] above the firmament: and it was so.
And God called the firmament Heaven. And the evening and the morning were the second day.

The word "heaven" can mean a number of different things based on how it is used. Sometimes it refers to the firmament, as in the above passage, and sometimes "heaven" refers to the spiritual realm or the sky above. Sometimes it is used in plural. In every usage, the word speaks to a higher order, an "aboveness" - and here it is capitalized as a proper name.

And I will give unto thee the keys of the kingdom of heaven: and whatsoever thou shalt bind on earth shall be bound in heaven: and whatsoever thou shalt loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven. – Matthew 16:19

And while they looked stedfastly toward heaven as he went up, behold, two men stood by them in white apparel;
Which also said, Ye men of Galilee, why stand ye gazing up into heaven? this same Jesus, which is taken up from you into heaven, shall so come in like manner as ye have seen him go into heaven. – Acts 1:10-11

These [are] the generations of the heavens and of the earth when they were created, in the day that the LORD God made the earth and the heavens, - Genesis 2:4

I find the use of the plural of heaven interesting in light of the "multiple universe" theory currently being proposed. Although the theory doesn’t do violence to my "take" on creation, it should be noted that the "multiple universes from multiple quantum fluctuations" is a rather convenient answer to why our universe happens to have just the right physical laws to support life, i.e. the other ones that don’t have the right physical laws may also exist if there are multiple universes. In other words, without more research, the multi-universe theory feels contrived to me.

IMHO, it was a good and proper thing when Einstein raised a red flag on his own cosmological constant simply because it appeared kluged. Of course, the cosmological constant has gained support today, but by Einstein’s disclaiming his own theory, he has the higher moral ground IMHO.

Again, I take "waters" to mean tongues (intelligent sounds or thoughts.) Since physical realm beings don’t exist yet on day 2, I take this to mean that He was separating the spiritual realm from the natural realm. Or to put it another way, all lower waters (tongues, sounds, thought) were relegated beneath the firmament, which I believe is also a barrier between the spiritual realm and the natural realm.

I do not believe the barrier can be defined by geometric coordinates like a physical location. I see the physical and spiritual realm coexisting everywhere but separated by the firmament.

Some Kabbalist analysis arrived at this concept and suggested that the barrier is the speed of light and resonance itself (superstrings in the natural realm) along with thought are the only known common properties between the two realms.

Physics and Kabbala

This is appealing because we occupy our thoughts (Proverbs 23:7 - For as he thinketh in his heart, so [is] he:) and it is through thought that we receive Christ, pray and worship. And of course, Jesus emphasized in the Sermon on the Mount that thinking an evil deed has the same effect as doing it.

The Kabbalist view is also appealing because the speed of light is the delimiting factor to much of our current understanding. And the resonance observation would fit well with current research on higher dimensional dynamics.

In search of extra dimensions (Fermi Lab)

I see the barrier firmament like a one way mirror. The physical realm cannot clearly see into the spiritual realm, but the spiritual realm can see into the physical realm. The reason I suspect it works this way is because of I Cor 13:12 and what happened on day 6 (see below.)

For now we see through a glass, darkly; but then face to face: now I know in part; but then shall I know even as also I am known. – I Corinthians 13:12

Current theory is that the sun formed some 4.55 billion years ago from a supernova 5 billion years ago and that the earth is 4.5 billion years old, with the chemicals to support life existing on (physical) earth about 4 billion years ago. The NASA Genesis spacecraft will return with solar material in 2004 that will help test these theories. If all these theories hold true, then these building blocks to our solar system as we know it today were spawned during the 2^nd Day.

 

Day 3

The third Day of creation, 24 equivalent solar hours from the point of view of God as the observer, would appear to be about 2 billion years elapsed from our viewpoint today.

And God said, Let the waters under the heaven be gathered together unto one place, and let the dry [land] appear: and it was so.

And God called the dry [land] Earth; and the gathering together of the waters called he Seas: and God saw that [it was] good.
And God said, Let the earth bring forth grass, the herb yielding seed, [and] the fruit tree yielding fruit after his kind, whose seed [is] in itself, upon the earth: and it was so.
And the earth brought forth grass, [and] herb yielding seed after his kind, and the tree yielding fruit, whose seed [was] in itself, after his kind: and God saw that [it was] good.
And the evening and the morning were the third day.

On this day I believe God created in the spiritual realm a perfect growing garden for spiritual beings. In this context, I believe "waters" refers to the common usage of the term, but the phrase "under the heaven" instead of "under the firmament of heaven" indicates that it was happening in the spiritual realm, above the firmament. Here the word "earth" is capitalized as a proper name. I believe this is supported by this later verse where God refers to having made the plants before they were in the earth (physical realm.)

And every plant of the field before it was in the earth, and every herb of the field before it grew: for the LORD God had not caused it to rain upon the earth, and [there was] not a man to till the ground. – Genesis 2:5

My understanding of what was happening on day 3 has a lot to do with the garden of Eden. In Genesis 2 and Revelations 2 we see that the tree of life is in the center of Eden (Genesis) and Paradise (Revelation.) That tells me that Eden is either in the center of, or is the same thing as, the spiritual realm of Paradise.

There may be a physical "model" of Eden in the natural realm (like with the ark or the temple) – but it would only be a model and not the real (perfect) thing. After the creation week, I believe Adam was banished into a physical body in the natural realm specifically to make him mortal. Before then, there was no death or decay in Adam’s "world." (Genesis 2)

I believe Adam was banished into the body of a hominid, a modern physical earth-man, probably on Day 7. I believe other hominids existed, but only the spiritual descendants of Adam could have his essence, the life that was breathed into him.

And the LORD God formed man [of] the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul. – Genesis 2:6

I suspect these spiritual descendants are the ones who have ears to hear and are the ones for whom the Bible is written, the ones He already knew.

For whom he did foreknow, he also did predestinate [to be] conformed to the image of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brethren.
Moreover whom he did predestinate, them he also called: and whom he called, them he also justified: and whom he justified, them he also glorified. – Romans 8:29-30

But ye believe not, because ye are not of my sheep, as I said unto you.
My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me:
And I give unto them eternal life; and they shall never perish, neither shall any [man] pluck them out of my hand.
My Father, which gave [them] me, is greater than all; and no [man] is able to pluck [them] out of my Father's hand.
I and [my] Father are one. - John 10:26-30

Speaking of "ears to hear," the Word comes alive especially quick to me when reading the gospel of John. It is a love letter.

Current research shows that there are microfossils at 3.5 billion years in the fossil record and that atmospheric oxygen increased about 2.1 billion years ago. That would indicate some modeling activity was occurring in the physical realm to correspond with creation of the garden Earth in Paradise on Day 3.

 

Day 4

The fourth Day of creation, 24 equivalent solar hours from the point of view of God as the observer, would appear to be about 1 billion years elapsed from our viewpoint today.

And God said, Let there be lights in the firmament of the heaven to divide the day from the night; and let them be for signs, and for seasons, and for days, and years:
And let them be for lights in the firmament of the heaven to give light upon the earth: and it was so.
And God made two great lights; the greater light to rule the day, and the lesser light to rule the night: [he made] the stars also.
And God set them in the firmament of the heaven to give light upon the earth,
And to rule over the day and over the night, and to divide the light from the darkness: and God saw that [it was] good.
And the evening and the morning were the fourth day.

Because of the phrase "firmament of the heaven" I believe this refers to the physical realm, the structure of the solar system as we know it today – specific orbits and such. Notice how the word "earth" is now lower cased, not a proper name.

As mentioned previously, the Genesis project of NASA will help to clarify what was happening in the formation of the solar system. I am curious if any catastrophic events occurred in our solar system approximately 1 to 2 billion years ago.

We already know of strange phenomenon in the solar system: that the orbits of the planets and satellites lie roughly in the same plane (the plane of the ecliptic) – that they orbit and rotate in the prograde direction, with axis tilts of less than 30 degrees and nearly circular orbits.

The fossil record indicates the oldest cellular organisms date back to 1.2 billion years, which would be towards the end of Day 4.

Day 5

The fifth Day of creation, 24 equivalent solar hours from the point of view of God as the observer, would appear to be about 1/2 billion years elapsed from our viewpoint today.

And God said, Let the waters bring forth abundantly the moving creature that hath life, and fowl [that] may fly above the earth in the open firmament of heaven.
And God created great whales, and every living creature that moveth, which the waters brought forth abundantly, after their kind, and every winged fowl after his kind: and God saw that [it was] good.
And God blessed them, saying, Be fruitful, and multiply, and fill the waters in the seas, and let fowl multiply in the earth.
And the evening and the morning were the fifth day.

Again the phrase "open firmament of heaven" causes me to view the 5^th day in the physical realm.

On this day (a 500 million year period to us) God directed the physical realm waters to abundantly bring forth creatures. I see this as what is called "evolution" but clearly guided by intelligent design. The blessing I believe corresponds to the "Cambrian explosion." God’s interventions might be what is known as "punctuated equilibrium."

Of course, the debate rages on evolutionary biology and intelligent design. These verses indicate that we will find evidence of both - because on the one hand God tells the waters to bring forth abundantly (biologically) and other hand He says that He created whales and every living thing that moves, that the water brought forth abundantly (intelligent design.)

From that verse I would expect the fossil record to make a better case for evolutionary biology in the most simple of life forms and for intelligent design to make a better case for the more complex. For a graphic representation of the differences:

Charts of conflicts between Darwin theory and natural history

Day 6

The sixth Day of creation, 24 equivalent solar hours from the point of view of God as the observer, would appear to be about 1/4 billion years elapsed from our viewpoint today.

And God said, Let the earth bring forth the living creature after his kind, cattle, and creeping thing, and beast of the earth after his kind: and it was so.
And God made the beast of the earth after his kind, and cattle after their kind, and every thing that creepeth upon the earth after his kind: and God saw that [it was] good.
And God said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness: and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth.
So God created man in his [own] image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them.
And God blessed them, and God said unto them, Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth, and subdue it: and have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that moveth upon the earth.
And God said, Behold, I have given you every herb bearing seed, which [is] upon the face of all the earth, and every tree, in the which [is] the fruit of a tree yielding seed; to you it shall be for meat.
And to every beast of the earth, and to every fowl of the air, and to every thing that creepeth upon the earth, wherein [there is] life, [I have given] every green herb for meat: and it was so.
And God saw every thing that he had made, and, behold, [it was] very good. And the evening and the morning were the sixth day.

The sixth day is a split screen to me, because it doesn’t delimit to the firmament. The first two sentences continues the "evolution" on the earth, especially with regard to animals, but limits the creatures to reproduce after their own kind.

So far, the fossil record has shown no new animal phyla after the Cambrian explosion about 500 million years ago. The animals simply proliferate and diversify in agreement with the first two sentences. If the process were entirely natural at this point, I would expect to see fossil evidence of new animal phyla to correspond with the extinctions of 250 and 65 million years ago. I would also expect to see a much larger and diversified fossil record.

The split screen starts in the third passage where He says "Let us make man in our image." I believe this happened in the spiritual realm, i.e. spiritual man (Adam) was given authority over everything in the physical realm, but actually existed in the perfect spiritual realm which was set aside in Day 2 and furnished in Day 3. I believe Adam was banished from the spiritual realm to occupy a mortal body in the physical realm so that he would experience death and decay as punishment for disobediently obtaining the knowledge of good and evil which was established in Day 1.

 

Day 7

The seventh Day of creation, 24 equivalent solar hours from the point of view of God as the observer, would appear to be about 1/8 billion years elapsed from our viewpoint today.

Thus the heavens and the earth were finished, and all the host of them.
And on the seventh day God ended his work which he had made; and he rested on the seventh day from all his work which he had made.
And God blessed the seventh day, and sanctified it: because that in it he had rested from all his work which God created and made.
These [are] the generations of the heavens and of the earth when they were created, in the day that the LORD God made the earth and the heavens, - Genesis 2:1-4

This is the day God rested from His work.

The latest Hubble Constant of 72 kilometers per second per megaparsec sets the age of the universe at 14 billion years, or about 12% younger than my total estimate of 15.875 billion years. The 72 measure was based on Cepheid stars, so if there turns out to be a problem with this approach, the constant may be revised again.

Cephid stars

Cepheid stars are stars that have evolved off the main sequence into the Cepheid instability strip. They are regular radial-pulsating stars, with a well-defined period-luminosity relationship, which makes them ideal stars to be used as primary distance indicating standard candles. These stars also show radial velocity variations which correspond to the photometric curves. Brighter cepheids have longer periods than fainter (less luminous!) cepheids.

I haven’t yet discovered how this measure is reconciled with star M92, which was estimated to be 15 billion years old M92 --- but the currently held number is close enough for me because, as I noted in day 1, it is not disclosed exactly when on Day 1 God first spoke.

The effect of the expansion rate of the universe on time is not relevant to subsequent verses, because the focus of the Scriptures changes from the Creator’s viewpoint to the Adamic viewpoint --- life on (lower case) earth.

The countdown began when Adam was banished. We are at about year 5762 of the countdown.

The physical realm is still under the Adamic dominion and therefore suffers empathetically.

For the earnest expectation of the creature waiteth for the manifestation of the sons of God.
For the creature was made subject to vanity, not willingly, but by reason of him who hath subjected [the same] in hope,
Because the creature itself also shall be delivered from the bondage of corruption into the glorious liberty of the children of God.
For we know that the whole creation groaneth and travaileth in pain together until now.
And not only [they], but ourselves also, which have the firstfruits of the Spirit, even we ourselves groan within ourselves, waiting for the adoption, [to wit], the redemption of our body. – Romans 8:19-23

Summary

The creation week begins with language, thought, tongues, sounds. On personal experience, I know the Word is alive. And it is the written Word that tells me that Jesus is the Word made flesh. From John 1:

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.
The same was in the beginning with God.
All things were made by him; and without him was not any thing made that was made.
In him was life; and the life was the light of men.
And the light shineth in darkness; and the darkness comprehended it not..
He was in the world, and the world was made by him, and the world knew him not.
He came unto his own, and his own received him not.
But as many as received him, to them gave he power to become the sons of God, [even] to them that believe on his name:
Which were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God.
And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, (and we beheld his glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father,) full of grace and truth. – John 1:1-14

The spiritual descendants of Adam were not made for the physical realm – we were made for the spiritual realm. The Bible is a spiritual work and should be read that way. It shows us the way back home, which is through Jesus Christ (Romans 8:29-30)

Of course, I cannot be sure if my "take" on how the Bible reconciles with science is correct until the rest of me gets to the other side, but the flow of what I have written here rings true to my spirit, and in the end, that’s what counts to me.

 

[onedoug]

Interesting. But the Jews in conveying Torah were and never have been Trinitarians. Though this possessive sense could be interpreted too as including all the other creatures that God had created to that time.

I find it instructive however, that this "likeness" endowed by God, and then increasingly assumed by Man over his creation, establishes the battle between good and evil which has raged within him, and with God, ever since...which so far as we can tell, has never been the case with any other entity.

In that sense, the most profound question we could ask of any (extra)-terrestrial intelligence we may eventually encounter, is whether they too perceive of a deity in the universe.

[RightWhale]

the solar system and stars look the same today as they did 6000 years ago

I was just fitting that into the 6000 year old earth hypothesis. I think that as we keep digging up the ground we will find the universe looked the same 30,000 years ago, too, although records that far back are still kind of scarce.

6000 years isn't really that long ago. If there is an unbroken chain of old men telling young children about the old days, say a 75 year old telling a 15 year old, throughout the years, we can cover that span with just 100 people. 30 people would take us back to thew time of Christ, and if they were all alive at once they could fit in one end of the dining room at Denny's. It's not so impressive as far as scale.

[Alamo-Girl]

So sorry. My bad. I thought you were saying that was my "take" on the subject. Thank you for sharing your views!

[Nataku X]

I do not know how literally true Genesis is; I do not try to force the Bible to fit the scientific facts. Your interpretation is excellent, but what about the Noah's flood? The evidence for a worldwide flood is not exactly abundant, and it is hard to reconcile the Noah's flood with the Bible.

JediGirl makes a good point. (JG, bumped ya like you requested!) Faith is not faith if you believe that you have tangible proof--why do we need to try to reconcile every verse in the Bible with the scientific & historic evidence out there? If we need to make reconcilations in order to be comfortable with our belief in the Bible, that would signify a lack of faith on our part.

To me, Genesis means more than a simple account of the creation of the world. It tells me that every human, every generation since prehistoric times has sinned and fallen short of the glory of God. In other words, we all repeat the story of Adam and Eve in our lives--we do such destructive things and we throw away so much good for only a simple piece of forbidden fruit.

As for its scientific and historical value, I am extremely hesistant to conjure up theories without any proof, although I've certainly thought about it. One thing, though: we all too often miss the spiritual point of those views! The first two chapters of Genesis are a good summary of the destructiveness of sin, and how easily our human natures give into it.

What we do with our personal lives and how we treat others around us is far more important than the degree of "literalness" of our belief in the Bible--read through the books of Romans and Corinthians to see how we should behave in the world and in the church.

Accept him whose faith is weak, without passing judgment on disputable matters.
One man's faith allows him to eat everything, but another man, whose faith is weak, eats only vegetables.
The man who eats everything must not look down on him who does not, and the man who does not eat everything must not condemn the man who does, for God has accepted him.
Who are you to judge someone else's servant? To his own master he stands or falls. And he will stand, for the Lord is able to make him stand.

[RightWhale]

Even its textual integrity remains more accurate to this day

Picked up a Greek NT today. What is interesting as far as textual integrity is concerned is that they give the source documents for the version printed in the book. Where other versions exist, they acknowledge that. It leaves some wiggle room, but NT Greek is pretty well understood, even if interpreations of meaning aren't so widely uniform.

[Alamo-Girl]

Thank you so much for sharing your views!

I have a "take" on the subject of Noah and the patriarchs, etc. that is an extension of this one - but I thought it might be better to limit the subject matter of this thread to origins. Do you think I ought to kick off another thread next week?

[onedoug]

Do you think I ought to kick off another thread next week?

Definitely. But please link it to this one. All so informative and inspirational. Thanks so much.

[Alamo-Girl]

Ok, then I will kick one off probably next weekend and will link it back here. I'm so very glad the discussion is helpful to you! Hugs!!!

[Nataku X]

Go ahead and take on it next week if you want to. Your take on Genesis does seem to make sense; and I'm sure everyone here is very interested in your interpretation of Noah's flood!

[Alamo-Girl]

Ok, I will kick off another thread through Noah. Thank you so very much for the encouragement!!!

[colorado tanker]

"Frankly, I am not surprised that Inherit the Wind would make stuff up to further the evolution agenda." LOL! I've got a copy of the trial transcript and it's a real eye-opener, very different from the fictionalized version of ITW.

[colorado tanker]

"To me, Genesis means more than a simple account of the creation of the world. It tells me that every human, every generation since prehistoric times has sinned and fallen short of the glory of God. In other words, we all repeat the story of Adam and Eve in our lives--we do such destructive things and we throw away so much good for only a simple piece of forbidden fruit."

How profoundly true. The problem I have with Hegel's dialectic, Marx's adaptation of Hegel, and Darwin's theory of natural selection or "the survival of the fittest" is that they teach man is perfectable, that the process of history will produce a "new man." This is just plain wrong - man is inherently flawed. The Founders, especially John Adams, understood this, which is why the Constitution contains so many checks and balances to keep our human natures from doing too much damage through our human government.

[LostTribe]

>The problem I have with Hegel's dialectic, Marx's adaptation of Hegel, and Darwin's theory of natural selection or "the survival of the fittest" is that they teach man is perfectable, that the process of history will produce a "new man."

Bingo!

[LostTribe]

>The Bible is the inerrant Word of God. or not.

I have no problem with that conceptually at all. But at the practical and operating level it is not so simple. Which Bible, the KJV? If so, which VERSION of the KJV? The original which contained apocrypha? Which apocrypha? Or the later NKJV which corrected many acknowledged errors but may have added it's own? Etc., etc., etc.

>It is a revealed truth which cannot be discovered scientifically, a person either hears His voice...

Yes, but what if he reveals something different to me than to you?

[Alamo-Girl]

Thank you for your post!!!

I believe that, if God wanted all of us to think the same way, there wouldn't have been 12 disciples with such different personalities and points of view. If we had to all be like one of them, my choice would have been John because he loved Jesus so very much!

That which all of us Christians, all Christian denominations and the disciples shared is the Holy Spirit. And He speaks to each us about what is Truth.

But as it is written, Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man, the things which God hath prepared for them that love him.
But God hath revealed [them] unto us by his Spirit: for the Spirit searcheth all things, yea, the deep things of God.
For what man knoweth the things of a man, save the spirit of man which is in him? even so the things of God knoweth no man, but the Spirit of God.
Now we have received, not the spirit of the world, but the spirit which is of God; that we might know the things that are freely given to us of God. - I Corinthians 2:9-12

My two cents...

[LostTribe]

>I believe that, if God wanted all of us to think the same way, there wouldn't have been 12 disciples with such different personalities and points of view.

That generally works for me. It is the very heart of a Prophets work but fits poorly with any institutionalized church which relys on it's "high priests" to maintain absolute unformity and conformity without benefit of added enlightment over time.

PS, I'll take Paul. Without him there would be no grace-based Christianity, only an abberent form of Judaism, IMHO.

[Alamo-Girl]

I understand and would add that it is good to investigate what we are told:

And the brethren immediately sent away Paul and Silas by night unto Berea: who coming [thither] went into the synagogue of the Jews.
These were more noble than those in Thessalonica, in that they received the word with all readiness of mind, and searched the scriptures daily, whether those things were so. - Acts 17:10-11

[leprechaun9]

Thanks for your post.

I worked at a large R&D Laboratory from which the proponents of the "Big Bang" theory ("BBT")as the source of the creation, were awarded the Nobel Prize.

One day at lunch, I was asked my opinion of the BBT. I said that I was disappointed that some very bright, world recognized physicists and scientists would offer a theory that required some elements (gases?) to be in exactly the correct position to be ignited by an unidentified ignition source and create a universe of "Infinite Order & Design!"

How did all the necessary elements just happen to be in the correct place, in the correct proportions and the ignition (from where?) source be the CREATION?

I can't comprehend the CREATION based on the laws of Physics, because I understand that an outcome can't be achieved without inputs.

I have a very comfortable understanding that the CREATION was the design of a very powerful force and I call that force GOD! I don't need everyone to hold the same point of view, and each person has to accept that which makes them comfortable. For me it is GOD and I only need to see the Sun rise and set, the trees and flowers bloom, the seasons cycle, and the birth of a child.

My point of view.

[Alamo-Girl]

Thank you so very much for sharing your view and your testimony! Hugs!!!

[rmmcdaniell]

Then you do not have faith. Belief in the existence of God requires nothing tangible to tell you god exists. The whole point of Christianity is that it's a system based on faith in the unknown. There's no tangible proof in God. God says he refuses to prove he exists because proof denies faith and without faith God is nothing.

So then what makes belief in the Christian god morally superior to belief in any other god? And if you don't have any proof that he exists how can you go around telling people that they will go to hell if they don't believe in him. For all you know, when you die you might find out that the christian god is fake and the "rock god" is real. Your punishment for not believing in the rock god could be to be pelted with boulders and stones for the rest of eternity.