RE: [asa] the Way Science Works/

  -----Original Message-----
  From: asa-owner@lists.calvin.edu [mailto:asa-owner@lists.calvin.edu]On
Behalf Of Jack
  Sent: Friday, July 27, 2007 9:08 PM
  To: George Cooper; bertsche@aol.com; asa@calvin.edu
  Subject: Re: [asa] the Way Science Works/

  The problem with such a concordist approach, is that the author of
Genesis, and his audience knew nothing about stellar accretion disks,
Rayleigh-Tyndall Scattering, and so forth. I dont think that an approach to
biblical interpretation that would leave the intended audience completely in
the dark as to its meaning, is a reasonable one.

This is so true. Rather than give the Hebrews a new Cosmology, which would
have been totally worthless to them, given their situation, God inspires
Moses to reassure his people using the familiar terminology of M.E. creation
stories, in which the gods bring order to the primordial chaos, that YAWHEH
is sovereign over the forces of nature and the HE will protect them as they
enter the wilderness. So basically, the Hebrew creation narrative was God’s
theological rebuttal to the Egyptian creation mythology, not necessarily a
scientific rebuttal to ANE cosmology. So to read modern science into it
completely misses the point. As soon as they heard the words, “the Spirit of
God began hovering over the formless and empty waters of Gen 1:2, that
generation of Hebrews who received Genesis, would have instantly understood
that Moses was about to give them, a creation story that would rival
anything that they received in Egypt. So naturally, any passing references
to the cosmos would be consistent with ANE science and have nothing to do
with modern 21st century science. To expect Genesis to provide modern
Christians with a scientific description of creation that meets our
post-enlightenment standards of material objectivity is extremely arrogant
and self-centered. It completely overlooks the seriousness of the situation
in which Genesis was given, and instead, replaces these weighty spiritual
matters with our petty scientific arguments over things like the age of the
earth or alternate celestial centricities. Once we start demanding that
Moses answer these types of questions, we have completely missed the point
of the creation narrative.
    ----- Original Message -----
    From: George Cooper
    To: bertsche@aol.com ; asa@calvin.edu
    Sent: Friday, July 27, 2007 8:04 PM
    Subject: Re: [asa] the Way Science Works/

    Thanks Kirk. I should have known Wiki had it.

    This "framework" view seems to be more of a duplex than a single
household. It seems too much of a recondite approach for such a very
important introductory group of passages that would be best in simple terms.
It does not flow for me, it log jams. My pipes, admittedly, are not all
that large, so I will not rule this view out.

    I strongly encourage this group to consider the latest discoveries in
astronomy and apply them in an exegesis of Gen. 1. Perhpas you have.

    Modern astronomy is bringing amazing news as to the early eras of our
solar system. Spitzer's infrared observational abilities has "eyed"
hundreds of stellar accretion disks. These disks were postulated as far
back as Kant, but only in our times have they been observable. Also, planet
formation models are becoming more and more accurate, though they still have
a long way to go.

    Is it plausible to state that an uneducated observer of antiquity would,
as an eye-witness, state the Earth ever appeared as an object "without form
and void"?

    Could the Sun burst forth a flood of light? Dust and gas will enshroud
many proto-stellar bodies, but not for very long as light will flood outward
flushing it away. Indeed, it is radiation pressure that swells a star to
equilibrium. Let there be light.

    Water anyone? Guess what color an observer would see for a highly
illuminated accretion disk? It can be blue for the very same reason the sky
above is blue -- Rayleigh-Tyndall Scattering. It would require neighbors.
Guess what? Iron60 evidence, and other isotopes, demonstrate that our star
formed in a typical, active nursery. These neighbors would also need to be
very bright, assuming our observer is using normal vision. A single big
neighbor is capable of visible light at over a million times the visible
solar flux. They are also strongest in the blue end of the visual spectrum.
How would our observer describe a billion miles of blue?

    If any have references that explore these ideas, I would be grateful.

    Helio

    bertsche@aol.com wrote:
      FYI, there's a fairly decent summary of the Framework view on
Wikipedia:
      http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Framework_interpretation_%28Genesis%29

      Kirk

      -----Original Message-----
      From: drsyme@cablespeed.com

      Second, you used the word framework. Whether you realize it or not,
there is a biblical interpretation titled the "framework" view. It sees
Genesis more figuratively, but not as a fairly tale, and it does not
conflict with science. If you are not familiar with it the leading authors
of this view are Meredith Kline and Henri Blocher, among others.

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Received on Fri Jul 27 23:54:50 2007