basic Genesis cosmology 6: the days

[Interplanner]

6, the days. There is no reason that these cannot be 6 days as we know them. There is nothing about God's creation that is a 'mountain to big for him to lift.' He can re-order any part. The waters of the Red Sea were made to stand for a limited amount of time for the nation to move along through. He confused language in a mere moment. Those are acts of God.
What is difficult to understand is the lighting. There is 'morning' and 'evening' light from day 1 even though the sun is not in place until day 4.
We must remember that the expression 'formless and void' is structurally very important to the account. This may clear up what is meant about the light. There are two kinds of creative acts by God, those that form and those that fill.

Day 1 light formed
Day 2 water—oceans separated from the canopy above, vertically
Day 3 land formed (the land sort of 'fills' with plants on its own), horizontally

Day 4 details about light—the various objects fill the sky
Day 5 the oceans filled with creatures and the air with birds
Day 6 the land is filled with creatures and with mankind as man and woman

The difficulty of the light of day 1-3 may simply be that Moses meant to stick to the forming only (light vs darkness) and saved details of the filling with objects for day 4.
The account proceeds with a sufficient amount of organization (there are no creatures in spaces not ready for them), but does not account for issues like this.

 

[aikido7]

Whether you know it or not, there are at least two different creation accounts in Genesis. Historians have known this for years but I really doubt if a re-cap of the evidence and data will do any good on this forum.

The Bible is richer than we give it credit for.

 

[Interplanner]

You will want to read Rabbi Cassuto and see a good harmonization of them. FROM ADAM TO MOSES.

When witnesses in a court case parrot each other, their case seems contrived. It is when they demonstrate realistic differences about what is clearly the same event that they are believable.

These materials were revealed to Moses at different times in his life--one while being familiar with the array of ancient near east cosmologies, and the other when the issues at hand had more to do with the place of marriage and the continuity of God in creation through it.

 

[Interplanner]

You will want to read Rabbi Cassuto and see a good harmonization of them. FROM ADAM TO NOAH.

When witnesses in a court case parrot each other, their case seems contrived. It is when they demonstrate realistic differences about what is clearly the same event that they are believable.

These materials were revealed to Moses at different times in his life--one while being familiar with the array of ancient near east cosmologies, and the other when the issues at hand had more to do with the place of marriage and the continuity of God in creation through it.

 

[way 2 go]

What is difficult to understand is the lighting. There is 'morning' and 'evening' light from day 1 even though the sun is not in place until day 4.

Day 1 light formed
Day 2 water—oceans separated from the canopy above, vertically
Day 3 land formed (the land sort of 'fills' with plants on its own), horizontally

Day 4 details about light—the various objects fill the sky
Day 5 the oceans filled with creatures and the air with birds
Day 6 the land is filled with creatures and with mankind as man and woman

1 rotation of the earth = 1 day
that is the only way you get evening and morning

day one earth and light without form

day two and three gave form to the earth

day four form to the light

 

[Interplanner]

What was the light on day 1?

 

[Interplanner]

Whether you know it or not, there are at least two different creation accounts in Genesis. Historians have known this for years but I really doubt if a re-cap of the evidence and data will do any good on this forum.

The Bible is richer than we give it credit for.

"Richer"? I hear Dawkins 'if there is a god, he is infinitely more intelligent than what the theologians are speaking of'. It is already very rich.

 

[aikido7]

You will want to read Rabbi Cassuto and see a good harmonization of them. FROM ADAM TO MOSES.

When witnesses in a court case parrot each other, their case seems contrived. It is when they demonstrate realistic differences about what is clearly the same event that they are believable.

These materials were revealed to Moses at different times in his life--one while being familiar with the array of ancient near east cosmologies, and the other when the issues at hand had more to do with the place of marriage and the continuity of God in creation through it.

Any careful reader knows that there are plenty of discrepancies and contradictions in the Bible.

Just a side-by-side comparison of the birth and infancy narratives in Luke and Matthew soon become bewildering to students of Scripture.

Because contradictory traditions and theologies are found in the sacred document of my own faith--the Holy Bible--that simply means I have to take them all seriously.

 

[aikido7]

You will want to read Rabbi Cassuto and see a good harmonization of them. FROM ADAM TO NOAH.

When witnesses in a court case parrot each other, their case seems contrived. It is when they demonstrate realistic differences about what is clearly the same event that they are believable.

These materials were revealed to Moses at different times in his life--one while being familiar with the array of ancient near east cosmologies, and the other when the issues at hand had more to do with the place of marriage and the continuity of God in creation through it.

I would never believe a gospel writer was lying, just because his account was in variance with another writer's.

The literature of heroes is pretty predictable in ancient times. Their idea of history or factually correct reporting was unknown to them and would have not even resonated with their readers.

Ancient accounts of great men are filled with myth, metaphor and legend.

Most Christians do not even know that Augustus Caesar (Octavian) was declared divine, Son of God and Savior of the World as well.

That's why those same phrases show up referring to Jesus by the early Christian writers. Pagan Rome, they indicated, did not have the last word when it came to a hero.

Jesus used the Kingdom of God phrase because first and foremost he was saying what life would be like if God, not Caesar, sat on the throne. Everyone who heard him say this knew full well it was a profound revolutionary expression of high treason against the Empire.

 

[Interplanner]

Any careful reader knows that there are plenty of discrepancies and contradictions in the Bible.

Just a side-by-side comparison of the birth and infancy narratives in Luke and Matthew soon become bewildering to students of Scripture.

Because contradictory traditions and theologies are found in the sacred document of my own faith--the Holy Bible--that simply means I have to take them all seriously.

Problems, yes, but I disagree with the bewildering. As I just said, the accounts show much too strong a coherence to be denied. Even though John has a completely different way of writing than does 'the synoptics', the problems addressed and solutions presented are unified.

"It is not the things I don't understand about Scripture that cause a problem; it is the formidable unity of the things I do!" --Mark Twain

 

[way 2 go]

What was the light on day 1?

same as it is today only not spread out

 

[Interplanner]

same as it is today only not spread out

???
The sun and moon were placed on the 4th day, so 1-3 calls for something else.

I don't know what kind of light there would be other than distant stars, or if we are just supposed to understand that God provided light before the sun and moon (supernaturally, para-naturally). All options have to be on the table. "Morning" and "evening" are then just for consistency of the account sake (it was done on that first day), but not an actual morning and evening as we know them after the sun and moon are in place.

The declaration that only the sun and moon were seen and that there was a canopy (2nd day) means to me that the canopy was opaque, not transparent. A transparent canopy could maybe magnify light arriving from elsewhere.

 

[way 2 go]

day one
think one big light
one planet earth

nothing else

 

[6days]

6, the days. There is no reason that these cannot be 6 days as we know them.

Here are a few answers as to why theistic evolution and long ages contradicts scripture.

A Theologian Answers
Dr Peter Barnes, lecturer in church history at the Presbyterian Theological Centre in Sydney. He wrote: “…if God wanted us to understand the creation week as a literal week, He could hardly have made the point any clearer…. The theological argument is also compelling. According to the Bible, there was no death until there was sin. The creation is cursed only after Adam sinned (cf. Genesis 3; Romans 5:12–21; 8:19–25). This implies that all the fossils of dead animals must date from after Adam’s fall. If there was blood and violence in the creation before Adam sinned, the theological structure of the biblical message would appear to suffer considerable dislocation"


An Atheist Answers
From atheists.org/atheism
"if Adam and Eve and the Talking Snake are myths, then Original Sin is also a myth, right? Well, think about it.

Jesus’ major purpose was to save mankind from Original Sin.Original Sin makes believers unworthy of salvation, but you get it anyway, so you should be grateful for being saved (from that which does not exist)Without Original Sin, the marketing that all people are sinners and therefore need to accept Jesus falls moot.

All we are asking is that you take what*you know*into serious consideration, even if it means taking a hard look at all you’ve been taught for your whole life. No Adam and Eve means no need for a savior. It also means that the Bible cannot be trusted as a source of unambiguous, literal truth. It is completely unreliable, because it all begins with a myth, and builds on that as a basis. No Fall of Man means no need for atonement and no need for a redeemer. You know it.

A Hebrew Scholar Answers (who does not believe Genesis)
James Barr, Professor of Hebrew Bible at Vanderbilt University, former Regius Professor of Hebrew at Oxford.

"Probably, so far as I know, there is no professor of Hebrew or Old Testament at any world-class university who does not believe that the writer(s) of Genesis 1-11 intended to convey to their readers the ideas that (a) creation took place in a series of six days which were the same as the days of 24 hours we now experience; .. Or, to put it negatively, the apologetic arguments which suppose the "days" of creation to be long eras of time, the figures of years not to be chronological, and the flood to be a merely local Mesopotamian flood, are not taken seriously by any such professors, as far as I know.".


A Christian Apologist Answers
Joe Boot, President of Ezra Institute for Contemporary Christianity

“Since the doctrines of Creation, the Fall and Redemption stand in an absolute historical continuum, we get a distorted worldview when we play games with Genesis.

“The apologist seeks to present biblical truth with coherence. In my experience, one cannot even formulate a compelling response to classic questions like the problem of evil and pain without a clear stand with Scripture on the creation issue.

“I have never been able to see how anyone who wants to defend the faith and proclaim the Gospel can compromise the foundation stones of that defence and then expect clear-thinking people to find a proclamation of salvation in Christ compelling.”


A Prof / PhD Biblical Studies Answers
Dr. Tom Wang says "Often, people will use the old argument that we should concentrate on preaching the Gospel, rather than get distracted by ‘side-issues’ such as Creation. But if we cannot believe the record of Creation, then why believe the record of the New Creation (‘if anyone is in Christ, he is a New Creation; the old is gone, the new has come’—2 Corinthians 5:17)?”


An Historian Answers (Prof with 2 PhD's)
Dr Benno Zuiddam“God created this world in a very short period of time, under ten thousand years ago. Whether you read Irenaeus in the 2nd*century, Basil in the 4th, Augustine in the 5th, Thomas Aquinas in the 13th, the Reformers of the 16th*century, or Pope Pius X in the 19th, they all teach this. They all believed in a good creation and God’s curse striking the earth—and the whole creation—after the disobedience of a literal Adam and Eve.”


A Biologist Answers
Dr Georgia Purdom says "many Christians have compromised on the historical and theological importance of Genesis. If Adam and Eve aren’t real people who sinned in the Garden of Eden, and as a result we are all not sinners, then Jesus Christ’s death on the cross was useless. ...the*literal truth of Genesis is so important to the authority and truthfulness of Scripture. It is the very foundation of the Gospel."

Our Creator Answers
JESUS speaking "Haven't you read the Scriptures? They record that from the beginning 'God made them male and female.'"


So, again the question is, how can you (why would you?) squeeze long ages into Gods Word without compromising the Gospel?