At 08:36 PM 3/12/00 -0500, George Murphy wrote:
> You continue to say that I am presenting a view of Genesis 3 as "inaccurate
>history". That is a misrepresentation. When I have said that Genesis
1-11 is "not to
>be understood as accurate historical narrative" I mean to say that it is
not to be
>understood as a presentation of accurate history at all, but also do not
want to suggest
>that it is Dreamtime-like myth.
That is fine, but by continuing to insist that Genesis 1-11 is not accurate
historical narrative there is one and only one possible logical conclusion.
It must be INaccurate historical narrative. THis can only mean that
something is wrong in it. WHat is wrong? How much is wrong? How do we tell
which parts are accurate and which are inaccurate?
I don't have to have you say it is a Dreamtime myth to have the above
questions. It is like asking about the accuracy of Clinton's testimony.
There are elements of truth in his testimony but we all know it is
inaccurate. That leads to the logical questions of hwhat is
inaccurate--what specific parts? With the Bible maybe Adam's name is
inaccurate and his name was Bob? Maybe they didn't eat fruit at all but ate
meat.Maybe it was sin that was the inaccuracy and mankind didn't really
sin. To leave the inaccuracy in the account means that we can't possibly
;have the foggiest idea what the real story was about.
>It is not "Historie wie es eigentlich gewesen ist_ or
>"just the facts ma'am" but a theological statement about the origins of
the universe and
>humanity which makes some use of traditions of the times of the writers,
some of which
>contain accurate historical & geographical information.
> What is the point of the above criticism? Your previous arguments have
>suggested that my view is mere fideism while your's is testable by
historical standards.
>It ain't so. You present a _possible_ paleontological scenario and then
say that
>Genesis 2 & 3 (in particular) coulda happened there - with no evidence
that it did.
Au contraire, there is evidence that it happened the way I say. The
anthropological evidence for human traits which are post-Fall items is
extensive 2 million plus years ago. I would refer you to Dating Adam,
Sept. 1999 PSCF. And yes my view is testable. That is what I have been
doing in my studies of anthropology. When I wrote Foundation, fall and
Flood, I knew that there was a way to test my thesis. If it had a chance of
being true then I would be able to find anthropological data in support of
it. At the time I wrote FFF I didn't know didly about anthropology. I have
spent the past 5 years studying anthro. The thesis outliined in FFF was
confirmed over and over again. So my view has already withstood testing.
There are still other tests that it can undergo as new data is found.
But with your view of an inaccurate Genesis 1-11, there is no way to test
it. If you find something wrong, then you can merely say," yup, it is
inaccurate'. But what does that accomplish?
>> The place we have one written record of Adam and Eve is from the Bible.
>> Now if that account inspires no confidence that it is accurate, then why on
>> earth are we bothering with it?
>
> The question of its accuracy should have to do with whether or not its
statement
>about the human condition corresponds to our experience of responsibility,
alienation,
>guilt, forgiveness &c not FIRST to whether or not the first humans were
named Adam & Eve
>or Fred & Wilma.
Pandora's box corresponds to our experience of responsibility, alienation
and guilt. To me this is not a very useful criteria.
>
>
>> It becomes merely another false tale by
>> another primitive society. Lets assume for the moment that you are correct.
>> We can't really be sure that there is an Adam and Eve from this account.
>
> You keep repeating this but it makes no sense to me. We can be sure that
>there was some group of "first human beings", the first hominids who were
(somehow)
>aware of God's will & transgressed it - as all humans do. That's what
Gen.3 says.
So does Pandora's box tale and many other tales from primitive societies.
If that is the basis for truth, then all those accounts are true. Does
that mean we should worship the Olympic pantheon?
>
> ............................
>
>> > More importantly, Gen.3 is a _theological_ text which says that
human
>> beings are
>> >sinners. Its accuracy is to be judged by theological criteria.
>>
>> How do you know that it is accurate theologically when it can't even relate
>> material facts that you can document as correct? Islamic peoples beleive
>> that our theology is wrong and they think they are correct.
>
> Muslims of course have no problem with an historical Adam & Eve in your
sense.
>Adam was the first prophet. Where they disagree is with the theological
significance of
>the Genesis 3 story. But if we're going to be talking with Muslims of
course what we
>ought to be talking about is our agreements and disagreements concerning
Jesus, not
>Adam. Spending time debating about Adam with Muslims is a
triple-distilled waste of
>time.
You missed entirely my point. I wasn't advocating talking to muslims about
Adam. I was pointing out that you can't claim the Bible is theologically
correct without at the same time saying that Islamic theology is false. How
do you know that without some form of physical confirmation of one or the
other story?
>
>> How do we
>> decide the case? If the Bible has nothing but 'theological' correctness,
>> then I would submit that it is not a very certain foundation. In fact,it is
>> entirely subjective.
>
> For the millionth time, I have never said there is no history in the Bible.
That is not what I said you said. If you hold to an inaccurate Bible then
WHAT IS INACCURATE? HOW DO YOU KNOW WHAT IS ACCURATE? YOu obviously
beleive that sin is the accuracy in the Genesis 3 story. Upon what basis do
you believe this? I see no basis other than your belief that it is so.
Nothing else in the story is held to be accurate so why should that part be
held to be accurate?
>> I don't know if you can prove our sinful status by studying ancient
>> history. ONe of the fears many evangelicals have of evolution is the worry
>> that it removes morality from the world. I don't think it does because in
>> one sense our human choice is always one of behaving like an animal or
>> behaving like Christ. The difference between us and the chimps is that God
>> told us to behave differently. He hasn't told the chimps to behave
>> differently. Only if the accounts in the Bible are true, can sin really be
>> imputed to mankind. We certainly don't impute sin to a chimp.
>>
>> But if you want to look at all the foul things mankind has done to his
>> fellow men, there is not much we do to each other that apes don't do to
>> their fellow apes.
>>
>> Consider these 'sins':
>
> This listing which I snip is very useful is very useful & I'll retain it
>for future use but I don't see its relevance to our discussion. I agree -
sin isn't
>just "doing bad stuff".
It is very useful and relevant. You said you could prove that man was
sinful but without citing the bad things man does you have little basis for
saying that. And the apes make it clear that such behavior might not be
sinful.Why is it sinful for us? Because God told us not to behave as apes!
> ............................
>> Now, I am not saying that we are to behave like this because the apes do.
>> God made man and told him how to behave. It is our choice to behave like
>> men are supposed to or like animals. But without the assumption that God
>> set the behavioral standard in the Garden and through the revelation of the
>> Law,
>
> Very sly but I caught it! Yes, we don't know about sin without God's
standard -
>but whether or not it was set "in the Garden" is another matter. Sinai,
or the Sermon
>on the Mount, will do quite well.
So upon what basis do you suddenly hold that Sinai is a real event? If
early genesis is inaccurate why is Exodus suddenly accurate? And upon what
basis do you believe the SErmon on the Mount? There are no contemporary
Jerusalem news accounts of the event. Maybe the disciples made it up.
>
> ..............................
>> > You never got away from it. You've just stretched out the time
scale.
>>
>> Maybe I am still self-deceptive. And I will tell you that sometimes I do
>> wonder about that. But what of you? You believe something that you
>> acknowledge isn't accurate in any real sense and thus is only accurate in
>> the subjective realm of theology.
>
> This may be your evaluation but it isn't what I would "acknowledge."
You keep saying that Genesis 3 is inaccurate. If it is inaccurate I can
only draw the logical conclusion that it doesn't tell the whole truth.
Kinda like a journalist only from the BC days.
>
>> At least my views do have, as you admit,
>> the ability to actually have happened. Yours don't, because that is your
>> starting point. Genesis 1-3 didn't happen as reported in the Bible in your
>> view.
>
> The first humans sinned. That is what Genesis 3 says. Why you insist on
trying
>to transform my view into a claim that "Adam didn't sin" eludes me.
BEcause you keep saying as you said in this note:
When I have said that Genesis 1-11 is "not to
>be understood as accurate historical narrative" I mean to say that it is
not to be
>understood as a presentation of accurate history at all...
If it ain't accurate, then how do you know what percentage of the story is
accurate?
> .........................
>
>> > The way in which this whole discussion has gotten away from the
initial
>> >subject is an illustration of precisely the point I made to start with.
>> That point
>> >was that discussions on this list, & most Evangelical ones of science &
>> religion, seldom
>> >make any connection with Christ. Here we started out talking supposedly
>> about the
>> >relationship between atonement & Genesis 3 but the subject has been
>> reduced entirely to
>> >the historical accuracy of Genesis 3, whether the first humans were really
>> named Adam &
>> >Eve &c.
>>
>> But that is precisely the connection between Genesis 3 and Christ--it is
>> SIN.
>
> I pointed out at the beginning of the discussion that it simply isn't the
case
>that _any_ of the theories of the atonement depends in a fundamental way on
>understanding Genesis 3 as a "just the facts, ma'am" historical account.
You did not
>try to argue the theological points involved but immediately jumped back
to the
>historical character of the Eden story. There is indeed a connection, but
the problem
>is that you are willing to focus only on the Adam, rather than the Christ,
end of it.
I would quote H.G.Wells, in his _Outline of History_ Vol 2
p. 776-777 (Doubleday, 1961):
"It was only slowly that the general intelligence of the Western
world was awakened to two disconcerting facts: firstly, that the
succession of life in the geological record did not correspond to
the acts of the six days of creation; and, secondly, that the
record, in harmony with a mass of biological facts, pointed away
from the Bible assertion of a separate creation of each species,
straight towards a genetic relation between all forms of life, _in
which even man was included!_ The importance of this last issue to
the existing doctrinal system was manifest. If all the animals and
man had been evolved in this ascendant manner, then there had been
no first parents, no Eden, and no Fall. And if there had been no
fall, then the entire historical fabric of Christianity, the story
of the first sin and the reason for an atonement, upon which the
current teaching based Christian emotion and morality, collapsed
like a house of cards."
Like it or not George, lots of people see the connection between an actual
Adam and Christ. H. G. Wells is another case of a smart person leaving the
faith because no one could provide him with answers for his intellectual
questions. He was raised by a devout christian woman who was afraid to send
her son to study under Huxley.
>
>> So I disagree that we have entirely left the initial subject. Even
>> what I wrote above about the chimps still has to do with sin--and it was
>> sin that Christ came to atone for.
>
> I think this is too limited a view & that Christ would have come even
without
>sin. But that opens a whole nother can of worms - or chimps.
A can of chimps. What are they worth?
glenn
Foundation, Fall and Flood
Adam, Apes and Anthropology
http://www.flash.net/~mortongr/dmd.htm
Lots of information on creation/evolution
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