Genesis 1-3 / Imagery?

[jamie]

I don't believe there's anywhere in the Bible that says that God gave the Genesis story to Moses like he gave the law to him.

Not in those exact words, but Moses wasn't there at creation yet Genesis is part of the Torah.

Did Moses write the Torah?

In Deuteronomy 31:24 The writer says this: "So it was, when Moses had completed writing the words of this law (Torah) in a book..."

The Torah was placed beside the ark but not in the ark.

 

[SimpleMan77]

Not in those exact words, but Moses wasn't there at creation yet Genesis is part of the Torah.

Did Moses write the Torah?

In Deuteronomy 31:24 The writer says this: "So it was, when Moses had completed writing the words of this law (Torah) in a book..."

The Torah was placed beside the ark but not in the ark.

Did God give Moses the story of Joseph? What about the story of Isaac and Abraham?

I'd say that those stories were passed down from generation to generation.

What about the story of Noah? We don't know how much of Moses's writings were direct revelation and how much was passed down history, whether that was passed down in writing or orally. We don't know if God gave the details of creation to someone generations prior to Moses and it was passed down.

We can assume that at much of the history recorded in the later chapters of the book of Genesis was somehow given to Moses by written or oral history. We don't know if it was him or someone else who was given the details of the first chapter. We just know he wrote it down.



Sent from my iPhone using TOL

 

[Rondonmonson]

I can do without the attitude. I'm asking for conversation of people's opinions.
I don't recall posting my own understanding or conclusion in any complete or even partial form.
Please think before projecting your rude assumptions on un provoking people.

I hope you didn't take umbridge to my post, it was meant in the attitude of all of us who have pondered this situation. If you think I was insulting you personally I apologize. My point is, maybe it is the bible correctly, and we just are not intelligent enough to grasp it as a peoples. We look at the simple things and overly make them complex, like Revelation, it is simple but we make it complex.

Now think about about it, I made a statement of fact, undoubtedly humans in general have a hard time understanding God. But all you saw was a pejorative.

 

[Rondonmonson]

Uh..... intelligent people also understand words within context.
Lets see how you do .....
In my fathers DAY, people travelled 3 DAYS, during the DAY to get to get to the city.
3 different meanings... Is it confusing?
BTW... Yom in Hebrew and DAY in English have a similar variety of meanings but always understood by context.

2nd test for you.
Genesis 2 "Then God blessed the seventh DAY and sanctified it, because in it He rested from all His work which God had created and made. This is the history of the heavens and the earth when they were created, in the DAY that the Lord God made the earth and the heavens"
There you have 2 different meanings of the word DAY.
Is it difficult?

God is still at Rest He is not Creating. The Seventh Day is until Jesus Returns. The Day of the Lord is Gods period of Wrath, it doesn't last a Day.

 

[jamie]

God is still at Rest He is not Creating. The Seventh Day is until Jesus Returns. The Day of the Lord is Gods period of Wrath, it doesn't last a Day.

Are you claiming that Jesus was mistaken? If so, why?

 

[jamie]

We can assume...

Can we assume that the Holy Spirit inspired the Torah and that Jesus confirmed the veracity of scripture?

 

[6days]

God is still at Rest He is not Creating. The Seventh Day is until Jesus Returns. The Day of the Lord is Gods period of Wrath, it doesn't last a Day.

You are moving the goalposts...or trying to. Your argument was that God's Word is unclear as to the meaning of the word 'day'.
Your new argument is false like your other argument. God rested on the 7th day...He is not resting.

 

[Rondonmonson]

Are you claiming that Jesus was mistaken? If so, why?

God created the Universe is 6 Periods of time. The 7th period of time is what we are living in, I would call it the age of Man.

1.) Day 1 = 9.2 Billion years the Birth of the Universe to the Creation of Earth/Sun.
2.) Day 2 = The time between when the earth an sun formed, and when God brought forth the Grasses and Trees on the 3rd Day.

3.) Grasses and Trees = 3rd Day
4.) The Axis or Seasons were set = 4th Day

5.) Sea Creatures brought forth from 550 million BC to 250-300 Million years BC = 5TH Day
6.) Land Animals created from 300 Million BC to 6000 years ago or Circa 4000 BC = 6th Day

7.) God Rested from His Creation = 7th Day or Period of Time which ends when Jesus Returns to Earth or when his 1000 year reign is finished.

These are 7 Periods of time.

 

[Rondonmonson]

You are moving the goalposts...or trying to. Your argument was that God's Word is unclear as to the meaning of the word 'day'.
Your new argument is false like your other argument. God rested on the 7th day...He is not resting.

Not at all brother, I a telling you we have to use common sense to understand what was meant by the use of the word. Since we know the universe is 13.7 Billion years old, we have to understand that YOM used here means periods of time. That is my understanding. I am not saying it is unclear. I am saying some people can't solve the problem, because they can only see the word as DAY (24 Hour Period). I see what it has to be, a period of time, each of Gods creation "POINTS" just like in a game where you have Save Poins so to speak.

The Earth and Sun were not even around until 4.5 billion years ago, why would the first day be a 24 hour period based on an Earth Day when the earth and sun was not even around at the time ? The original Meaning of YOM is "to be hot" so the first YOM is the story of the 400 Million years of Darkness, followed by almost 9 billion years of trillions of Stars being created (YOM/To be hot) and the Evening (400 Million years of Darkness) and the Morning (8.8 Billion years of Stars being created) was the First Day. Then the next story/VANTAGE POINT/Period of time was from the Earth and Suns Creation point, etc. etc. etc.

Sure God is Resting from his Creation, that is all the "Resting part" meant anyway, God doesn't grow tired, it meant he CEASED from creating His Creation.

God Told us to Rest on the 7th Day to Remember Him.

 

[jamie]

These are 7 Periods of time.

Yes, there are seven 24-hour periods of time.

Neither the Father nor the Son is resting.

 

[6days]

God created the Universe is 6 Periods of time. The 7th period of time is what we are living in, I would call it the age of Man.

What God tells us..."For in six days the Lord made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them, but he rested on the seventh day. Therefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and made it holy"
Your beliefs are more than*a bit silly, and contradict the words of Jesus.
You seem to think that God both blessed and cursed the same day?
You seem to think God can't speak clearly, since He could have used words to describe long periods...but didn't.

1.) Day 1 = 9.2 Billion years the Birth of the Universe to the Creation of Earth/Sun.

God tells us that earth was water before the Sun was created.
And, God defined what a day is "God called the light “day,” and the darkness he called “night.” And there was evening, and there was morning—the first day."

2.) Day 2 = The time between when the earth an sun formed, and when God brought forth the Grasses and Trees on the 3rd Day.

What God tells us is that on the 2nd day He created the atmosphere.

3.) Grasses and Trees = 3rd Day

Yes...all producing after their own kind. "
And there was evening, and there was morning—the third day

4.) The Axis or Seasons were set = 4th Day

Actually, God tells us He made the stars on the 4th day.

5.) Sea Creatures brought forth from 550 million BC to 250-300 Million years BC = 5TH Day

Nothing about millions of years...that is your addition to scripture.
And, your story is so different from God's account. Why did you leave out that the birds were created on the 5th day?

6.) Land Animals created from 300 Million BC to 6000 years ago or Circa 4000 BC = 6th Day

God tells us that death to "nepesh" creatures is a result of man's sin. Your story seems to have an impotent creator using trial and error...processes of pain, death, suffering and extinctions.* Your story destroys the purpose of Christ's physical death and resurrection, since you think God called death very good...God actually calls death "the final enemy".

Rondo... your story is heretical and compromises or destroys the Gospel.

 

[6days]

.....we have to understand that YOM used here means periods of time.

We have to understand that the Hebrew context clearly refers to 24 hour periods of time in Gen 1, or the rest of scripture becomes compromised.
Martin Luther: "“When Moses writes that God created heaven and earth and whatever is in them in six days, then let this period continue to have been six days, and do not venture to devise any comment according to which six days were one day. But if you cannot understand how this could have been done in six days, then grant the Holy Spirit the honor of being more learned than you are. For you are to deal with Scripture in such a way that you bear in mind that God Himself says what is written. But since God is speaking, it is not fitting for you wantonly to turn His Word in the direction you wish to go.”

 

[Rondonmonson]

What God tells us..."For in six days the Lord made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them, but he rested on the seventh day. Therefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and made it holy"
Your beliefs are more than*a bit silly, and contradict the words of Jesus.
You seem to think that God both blessed and cursed the same day?
You seem to think God can't speak clearly, since He could have used words to describe long periods...but didn't.

Yet you actually believe the Universe is 6000 years old, in spite of all the empirical evidence. I have written extensively on the subject in other places with far more info, I might share some later. But to believe in an actual 6 day creation and a 6000 year old universe is imho, cuckoo for coco puffs, and I wouldn't have said that, but I am trying to make a point. You think I am bat crazy. atrol:

God tells us that earth was water before the Sun was created.
And, God defined what a day is "God called the light “day,” and the darkness he called “night.” And there was evening, and there was morning—the first day."

Water was before everything, that is because Light is NOT REAL....You know that right ? It is only a reflection, thus water has to be in the atmosphere to have light.

Actually, God tells us He made the stars on the 4th day.

That is a misconception, how can you have Grasses and Trees with no Light ? How can the Earth even be held into orbit without the Sun ? It can't. God on the Fourth Day is speaking about the Seasons, then it tells about the Sun, the Moon (Lesser Light) and says God made the stars also. The Stars were created on the first day, and kept being created and guess what they are still being created, because God spoke it into existence on the FIRST DAY......Gods command went forth, all stars and universes were therefore actually created on the 1st Day, God is Resting now, but stars are still forming, because God created them when He spoke them into existence. The Sun and Earth came into being 4.5 Billion years ago.

Nothing about millions of years...that is your addition to scripture.
And, your story is so different from God's account. Why did you leave out that the birds were created on the 5th day?

Its a scientific fact. I have been a Christian for over 30 years. When we tell people the earth is 6000 years old, they think to themselves, Christians are living in a fantasy land, thus they will not hear anything else we have to say.

Look at the WMP/Nasa map, it shows via microwaves exactly how the universe looks and how old it is. Microwaves actually can map things out you know ?

There was 400 Million years of Darkness, before any stars ever formed. That is exactly what the bible says, there was DARKNESS ON THE FACE OF THE DEEP.

 

[Ask Mr. Religion]

I'm curious as to, if this is something any of you have studied, what your conclusion was - and why?

Some serious hermeneutical hopscotch is needed to deny the literal meaning of the six days.

1. The ordinance of the Sabbath is now doubtful if six days is not literal (Ex. 20:11).
2. If the First Adam is allegorical, then the Second Adam is as well.
3. A literal Adam is required in Romans.
4. The Apostle clearly described Adam as the first human sinner—not whatever millions of human-like beings in the presumed evolutionary chain.
5. Death came through Adamic sin, an explanation from Scripture that is cast aside in the notion of millions of years of death and destruction prior to Adam assumed by evolution.

The context of Genesis 1 clearly shows that the days of creation were literal days. First, yôm (day) is defined the first time it is used in the Bible (Genesis 1:4-5) in its two literal senses: the light portion of the light/dark cycle and the whole light/dark cycle. Second, yôm is used with “evening” and “morning.” Everywhere these two words are used in the OT—morning and evening— either together or separately and with or without yôm in the context, they always mean a literal evening or morning of a literal day. Third, yôm is modified with a number: one day, second day, third day, and so on, wherein everywhere else in the Old Testament indicates literal days. Fourth, yôm is defined literally in Genesis 1:14 in relation to the heavenly bodies.

In Mark 10:6 we have the clearest—but not the only—statement showing that Our Lord was a young-earth creationist. Therein He states that Adam and Eve were at the beginning of creation, not billions of years after the beginning.

Belief in millions of years undermines the Bible’s teaching on death and on the character of God. Genesis 1 teaches six times that God called the creation “good,” and when God finished creation on day six, He called everything “very good.” Man and animals and birds were originally vegetarian (Genesis 1:29–30), plants are not “living creatures,” as are people and animals). But Adam and Eve sinned, resulting in the judgment of God on the whole creation. Instantly Adam and Eve died spiritually, and after God’s curse they began to die physically.

The serpent and Eve were changed physically and the ground itself was cursed (Genesis 3:14-19). The whole creation now groans in bondage to corruption, waiting for the final redemption of the saints (Rom. 8:19–25), when we will see the restoration of all things (Acts 3:21; Col. 1:20) to a state similar to the pre-Fall world—there will be no more carnivore behavior (Isaiah 11:6–9) and no disease, suffering, or death (Revelation 21:3-5)—there will be no more Curse (Revelation 22:3).

To accept millions of years of animal death before the creation and Fall of man contradicts and destroys the Bible’s teaching on death and the full redemptive work of Christ. It also makes God into a bumbling, cruel creator who uses—or can’t prevent—disease, natural disasters, and extinctions to mar His creative work, without any moral cause, yet calls it all “very good.”

Scripture teaches that death is the result of the Fall. Evolution says that death is the mechanism of improving the gene pool. According to evolution, then, death is good, and part of the world which cannot be eliminated. Death is no longer the intruder that the Scripture says it is.

Leviticus law says that death is bad. Life is part of the camp, and death is to be outside the camp. If Our Lord conquered death, how can evolution be true, when evolution says that death is how progress comes to the world? Revelation 21:4 tells us explicitly: death shall be no more. One possible answer is that the Fall is only resulting in spiritual death, not physical death. This is inconsistent with Genesis 3 when compared with Genesis 5. The refrain “and he died” is a reflection on the curse of the Fall. Revelation tells us that the first death and the second death are related, but for the grace of God. Christianity proclaims that physical death is wrong. When will you get over the death of your loved one? Ultimately, at the Resurrection! Christianity is never reconciled to death. If evolution is true, then God pronounced death good. This is blasphemous.

The problem with wanting to be respectable in society by believing in evolution is that the resurrection of Christ, the miraculous nature of the virgin birth, the miracles of Christ are all equally distasteful to the secularists as is creation.

What is at stake here is the authority of Scripture, the character of God, the doctrine of death, and the very foundation of the gospel. If the early chapters of Genesis are not true literal history, then faith in the rest of Scripture is undermined, including its teaching about salvation and morality.

AMR

 

[jamie]

Jesus confirms the creation days were twenty-four hour days.

And he would know, he was there.

 

[6days]

Yet you actually believe the Universe is 6000 years old, in spite of all the empirical evidence.

#1 evidence is God's Word. The wold around us is the supporting evidence.

Water was before everything, that is because Light is NOT REAL....You know that right ? It is only a reflection, thus water has to be in the atmosphere to have light.

God tells us He created light before He created the atmosphere.

That is a misconception, how can you have Grasses and Trees with no Light ?

God created light on the first day.

How can the Earth even be held into orbit without the Sun ?

Not a problem for the God of the Bible. He tells us He created the sun on the 4th day.

God on the Fourth Day is speaking about the Seasons, then it tells about the Sun, the Moon (Lesser Light) and says God made the stars also. The Stars were created on the first day

That's what you say... Lets see what God says...Gen. 1:16 "God made two great lights—the greater light to govern the day and the lesser light to govern the night. He also made the stars."

and(stars) kept being created and guess what they are still being created

God is not still creating Gen. 2:2 "By the seventh day God had finished the work he had been doing; so on the seventh day he rested from all his work."

When we tell people the earth is 6000 years old, they think to themselves, Christians are living in a fantasy land, thus they will not hear anything else we have to say.

That is a common argument but PEW research showed your argument was false. About 10 years ago PEW interviewed thousands of young adults who grew up in Christian homes, but had drifted from faith. There was multiple reasons, but one of the major reasons was they had mostly grown up in homes where they were taught that the Bibles historical accounts were not necessarily true. This caused them to have doubts throughout scripture. For example, why believe in the virgin birth since science shows you need two to tango.

PEW also interviewed young adults who were strong in the faith, finding this group for the most part grew up in homes (and churches) where there was good apologetic teaching. BTW.... apologetic teaching starts from the time kids are very young with questions such as "Why did God let my dog die?" and "How come God isn't making Gramma get better?"

 

[6days]

[/FONT]The context of Genesis 1 clearly shows that the days of creation were literal days. First, yôm (day) is defined the first time it is used in the Bible (Genesis 1:4-5) in its two literal senses: the light portion of the light/dark cycle and the whole light/dark cycle. Second, yôm is used with “evening” and “morning.” Everywhere these two words are used in the OT—morning and evening— either together or separately and with or without yôm in the context, they always mean a literal evening or morning of a literal day. Third, yôm is modified with a number: one day, second day, third day, and so on, wherein everywhere else in the Old Testament indicates literal days. Fourth, yôm is defined literally in Genesis 1:14 in relation to the heavenly bodies.

Those are some of the best reasons why the text does not allow for anything other than a normal day. Here is another reason...a little bit of a nuance using Young's Literal Translation to show this.
Genesis 1
8 ...."day second".
13 .... "day third".
19 .... "day fourth".
23 ...."day fifth".
31 ... "day the sixth".

In the Hebrew, these are called 'ordinal'numbers.
But... Why is Day 1 not an ordinal number...IE. Why doesn't the Hebrew call it 'the first day'?
Again Youngs Literal translation says this...
Genesis 1:5 "and God calleth to the light `Day,' and to the darkness He hath called `Night;' and there is an evening, and there is a morning -- day one."

"Day one"... not, 'first day'. This is significant because it is now a 'cardinal' number in the Hebrew.
There was no other days before this time. Day 1 was the only day. There was only that one day.... Thus the cardinal number is apt.

 

[way 2 go]

God gave us the scale on how to interpret the meaning of day
here

Gen 1:5**And God called the light Day, and the darkness he called Night. And the evening and the morning were the first day.


we get day and night by the earth rotating

1 rotation of the earth = 1 day

day one earth and light without form

day two and three gave form to the earth

day four form to the light

 

[Tattooed Theist]

If a real Adam and real sin are not the cause of pain, suffering and death in our world then the gospel is destroyed and the purpose of Christ's death becomes meaningless.

What would you say about this reply then?

I would certainly agree with your response, but the above post could also hold true with the Adam story and sin.

 

[Tattooed Theist]

Great post, thank you.

I will only respond to one thing because the rest I don't have any problem with.

Scripture teaches that death is the result of the Fall. Evolution says that death is the mechanism of improving the gene pool. According to evolution, then, death is good, and part of the world which cannot be eliminated. Death is no longer the intruder that the Scripture says it is.

Evolution is not what I'm suggesting in an fashion, and is something I reject.
I do not suppose that animals have been on the earth, changing and evolving, this would disrupt the creation story.
Rather what I'm suggesting is a question, that couldn't the earth itself have been formed and functioning - albeit very differently than we see today - prior to God creating?

Of course the initial creation of the universe would be God's creation also.