A new perspective on Genesis 1

[Tom Wetmore]

Looking through  telescope really doesn't tell you how far away any of the stars/galaxies you see really are or how long it has taken the light to drive here.  That of course requires a bit more than simply a telescope.  To say it is a time machine, not really.

If I tell you that we will be working from sun up to sun down starting tomorrow, (or from evening to morning, if you prefer) and I will pay you a days wages, how long will you expect to work?  What if we are in Oslo in July?  Or how about if it was Chicago in December? Or any day in Pontianak, Indonesia?  

And another thing to consider.   If you allow for the possibility that there is a span of time between verse 1 and verse 2, what prevents making the same allowance between any other step of creation.  The text really does not literally say any of the days that Gd created are actually consecutive days.  (I am not advocating that they are or are not.  Just making a point about the notion of literal reading of the text.)  We are in fact making assumptions about what things mean to a significant degree based on what we experience now.  

Unless one is fluent in ancient Hebrew, it really is not possible for us to "take the Bible literally".  We can zealously adhere to a particular translation on a literal basis, but one has to understand that none of the common English translations are in fact literal translations.  (I would say it may even be impossible to have an exactly literal translation.)  

To say that you believe that the text means  an exact 24 hour period the same as we experience it now when it actually reads "the evening and the morning were the first day", but that is not quite the same as taking it literally.  Literally the English translation is sort of nonsensical saying that an evening and morning are a day, as in a whole 24 hour day.  The 24 hours of a day encompass more than just an evening and a morning.  Sort of like if I say I am calling it a day after my workday is done. It really doesn't mean 24 literal hours.

[Wingnut]

Tom and Seventh Day

The Adventist Church has an unfortunate tradition of spiritualising away the natural way of reading a scripture.

I am going to divert the discussion for a moment to illustrate this point.

Rev 6: 7 And when he had opened the fourth seal, I heard the voice of the fourth beast say, Come and see.

8 And I looked, and behold a pale horse: and his name that sat on him was Death, and Hell followed with him. And power was given unto them over the fourth part of the earth, to kill with sword, and with hunger, and with death, and with the beasts of the earth.

Now when I read that with no SDA filtered glasses it reads that 1/4 of earth's population is going to be killed by war, famine and pestilence as well as animals gone wild.

Yet you go and research what Adventists teach this means - something about a backslidden church.

I say it is super-wrong EVER to teach that something which has a literal possible interpretation should be taken any other way.

It creates a terrible precedent of interpreting scripture rather than taking literally what can be taken literally.

 

[Wingnut]

Let me play "fast and loose" with scripture for a moment.

 

How do you KNOW God rested on a literal 24 hour day, thus creating the Sabbath as we know it?

Maybe God rested for an epoch.

And there we have just lost our main argument for keeping the Sabbath day.

 

In fact there is even less evidence that the day God rested on was a literal day, because it never says of the seventh day "the evening and the morning were the seventh day".  It says that of all the previous six days.

 

Yet you and I will INSIST that God rested a literal day, and that day was the literal Sabbath day on the 7th day.

Otherwise the only proof we have for the Sabbath becomes that God commanded Israel to keep it, and Jesus being a Jew, kept it.

The argument that the Sabbath Day was made at creation and therefore for all mankind, not just the Jews, is our main argument.

And this only works with a literal day.  I think we should be careful not to weaken the idea that all 7 days were literal days.

 

How much more clearly could God have pointed to a literal day than to say it consisted of a dark "evening" and a light "morning" as well as calling these "day" and "night"?

Gen 1:4 And God saw the light, that it was good: and God divided the light from the darkness.

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

 

[phkrause]

What is it that you think "that he rested" actually means?? That he laid around all day? I'd say that he spent that whole day with his new creation, Adam and Eve. And each Sabbath after that, till they were shown the way out of the garden. For A & E, they still spent the day with God, but not like it was before, face to face!

[Aliensanctuary]

If we left off Gen 1:1 and began reading at vs. 3, we should realize that the Earth was already in existence when God said, "Turn on the lights." Nowhere in the 7-day period did God say, "Let there be Earth." The events of verse 1 and 2 do not occur in the seven day period, but before.

Therefore, we must assume that the universe was created "In the beginning" while the terraforming and colonization of Earth occurred at a later time, perhaps much later. It may very well be that there were previous ages of life on this world which ended in catastrophe, just as Jesus predicted this age will end in a great catastrophe. After all, where did the soil of the dry land come from, unless as some believe, it appeared miraculously. Soil takes time to form from erosion of rocks mixed with organic material.

Perhaps someone wrote the original Genesis account after watching a video, describing only what he saw. Just because sun, moon, and stars suddenly appeared on the 4th day doesn't necessarily mean that they were created at that very moment, but that he saw them appear. If the Earth was surrounded by crystalline force fields, with water sandwiched in-between the layers, on day 2, maybe they were opaque at first, then became transparent on day 4. 

That the Earth was terraformed and colonized, or re-colonized, some 6000 years ago could be true. If we keep an open mind about the Genesis account of the colonization of Earth, we may someday see that it is true in ways that we don't understand now. 

[pnattmbtc]

On 11/22/2015, 10:49:06, Wingnut said:

Tom and Seventh Day

The Adventist Church has an unfortunate tradition of spiritualising away the natural way of reading a scripture.

I am going to divert the discussion for a moment to illustrate this point.

Rev 6: 7 And when he had opened the fourth seal, I heard the voice of the fourth beast say, Come and see.

8 And I looked, and behold a pale horse: and his name that sat on him was Death, and Hell followed with him. And power was given unto them over the fourth part of the earth, to kill with sword, and with hunger, and with death, and with the beasts of the earth.

Now when I read that with no SDA filtered glasses it reads that 1/4 of earth's population is going to be killed by war, famine and pestilence as well as animals gone wild.

Yet you go and research what Adventists teach this means - something about a backslidden church.

I say it is super-wrong EVER to teach that something which has a literal possible interpretation should be taken any other way.

It creates a terrible precedent of interpreting scripture rather than taking literally what can be taken literally.

 

Calvinists say the same thing.  I'm not saying this to say anything negative about Calvinists here, but to point out that what should be taken literally differs from person to person.  For example, they take, or think they do, Romans 9 literally, and other verses which say things like "for God is not willing that any should perish but all come to a knowledge of the truth" become subservient to the Romans 9, which needed to be taken literally.  This is just one of many examples.  You could prioritize the "literal" verses in many different ways.

Also, if ever there was a book crying out to NOT be taken literally, it's Revelation.

But putting that aside for a moment, the real question to me to ask, which I often don't even see considered, is what does God want and why?  In other words, when we Scripture, what does God expect from us?  What "rules" does He want us to apply when reading, and why?

[Wingnut]

38 minutes ago, pnattmbtc said:

 What "rules" does He want us to apply when reading, and why?

Hi Pnatt

What rules do you apply when reading the newspaper?  Apply those!  Same ones your English teacher taught you.

Nice to see you around  

[Wingnut]

1 hour ago, pnattmbtc said:

 What "rules" does He want us to apply when reading, and why?

If the literal interpretation jars or sounds wrong then I do the following...

2) Next I look at context.  What is the chapter as a whole saying and how does the verse fit in.

3) If I still cannot understand it, I check out the Greek or Hebrew meanings of key words.

4) If it still does not make sense, I do a search on that Greek word to see how it is generally applied.

If it is a symbol, I look to see where that symbol is used elsewhere so that scripture interprets scripture.

5) If I am still stumped, I pray about it, and often receive a lead I should pursue before the prayer is done.  Such as an obscure piece of scripture will come to mind and almost invariably this contains the solution.

6) God will test our tenacity at seeking a solution, so if the 5 steps fail, do it again.

 

Do you have other rules for interpreting scripture?

[Tom Wetmore]

So we should just read Scripture as we would the newspaper.  Really ?!?!  Just that simple? The newspaper I read was not originally written thousands of years ago, and some parts hundreds or thousands of years after the events in question, in an ancient language that has been translated into modern English many centuries after the fact.  It is worth noting the differences even in that modern English from the centuries old English of the earliest English translations just a few hundred years ago.   Nor does the newspaper claim to be the Word of God.

What part of the newspaper is equivalent to the Psalms?  What part of the newspaper is parables?  Which part is written as prophecy?   Do you apply the same linguistic, reading comprehension and interpretive rules to the comics and advertising in the newspaper as you do the oped section or the news stories?

[Tom Wetmore]

22 minutes ago, Wingnut said:

If the literal interpretation jars or sounds wrong then I do the following...

2) Next I look at context.  What is the chapter as a whole saying and how does the verse fit in.

3) If I still cannot understand it, I check out the Greek or Hebrew meanings of key words.

4) If it still does not make sense, I do a search on that Greek word to see how it is generally applied.

If it is a symbol, I look to see where that symbol is used elsewhere so that scripture interprets scripture.

5) If I am still stumped, I pray about it, and often receive a lead I should pursue before the prayer is done.  Such as an obscure piece of scripture will come to mind and almost invariably this contains the solution.

6) God will test our tenacity at seeking a solution, so if the 5 steps fail, do it again.

 

Do you have other rules for interpreting scripture?

That is quite different than reading "rules" for the newspaper..

[pnattmbtc]

1 hour ago, Wingnut said:

Hi Pnatt

What rules do you apply when reading the newspaper?  Apply those!  Same ones your English teacher taught you.

Nice to see you around  

Thx, likewise.

This would be assuming the purpose of God is the same as the newspaper writer, wouldn't it?  Is it is the case that these have the same purpose?

[pnattmbtc]

35 minutes ago, Wingnut said:

If the literal interpretation jars or sounds wrong then I do the following...

2) Next I look at context.  What is the chapter as a whole saying and how does the verse fit in.

3) If I still cannot understand it, I check out the Greek or Hebrew meanings of key words.

4) If it still does not make sense, I do a search on that Greek word to see how it is generally applied.

If it is a symbol, I look to see where that symbol is used elsewhere so that scripture interprets scripture.

5) If I am still stumped, I pray about it, and often receive a lead I should pursue before the prayer is done.  Such as an obscure piece of scripture will come to mind and almost invariably this contains the solution.

6) God will test our tenacity at seeking a solution, so if the 5 steps fail, do it again.

 

Do you have other rules for interpreting scripture?

How did the following not get past step 1?

"8 And I looked, and behold a pale horse: and his name that sat on him was Death, and Hell followed with him. And power was given unto them over the fourth part of the earth, to kill with sword, and with hunger, and with death, and with the beasts of the earth."

 

What I was getting at regarding "rules" is what is God's purpose in regards to Scripture?  What does He want from us?  I think these questions have a lot to do with how we will read Scripture.

 

[Wingnut]

To illustrate the rules of interpreting...

 

A thought came to mind to research all instances of the word "created".

 

Soon I see Ps 104:30  with its word "renew"  "Chadash" or Strongs H2318  This word looks too good to be true.

Renew is a word which implies repair.

30 Thou sendest forth thy spirit, they are created: and thou renewest the face of the earth.

Looking up the Hebrew meaning it says "to be new, renew, repair, make anew,"

This definitely suggests there was an old earth, and God sends forth His Spirit - sounds exactly like Gen 1:3

This verse in Ps is screaming at me that this is describing Genesis 1 as a renewal of an old earth.

 

To make sure, I now search all instances of H2318.  It is found in 10 places.

1 Sam 11:14, 2 Chr 15:8, 2 Ch 24:4, 2 Ch 24:12, Job 10:17, Ps 51:10, Ps 104:30, Ps 104:30, Is 61:4, Lam 5:21

 

NEVER ONCE is this Hebrew word used of a first time newness.  ALWAYS it is a renewing of something that has fallen into disrepair.

Thus, Ps 104:30 sounds like Gen 1 where God sends forth His Spirit, they are created in a RENEWING, NOT A FIRST CREATION of the earth.

When else in scripture and in human history does God send forth His Spirit and create?  Only Gen 1 comes to mind.

 

Thus confirming to me that Gen 1 is describing the repairing of earth, 6000 years ago, in 7 literal days.

[Wingnut]

2 hours ago, pnattmbtc said:

How did the following not get past step 1?

"8 And I looked, and behold a pale horse: and his name that sat on him was Death, and Hell followed with him. And power was given unto them over the fourth part of the earth, to kill with sword, and with hunger, and with death, and with the beasts of the earth."

 

What I was getting at regarding "rules" is what is God's purpose in regards to Scripture?  What does He want from us?  I think these questions have a lot to do with how we will read Scripture.

 

Why would you ask for a purpose or what God wants from us in reference to verse 8?

He wants us to read it.

Two demons, one called Death, followed by his cohort Hell ride through the earth killing 1/4 or 2 billion souls with war, famine, pestilence and animals gone wild.

The purpose or what God wants from us I leave up to you to explain.  I read the above as I would a newspaper.

[Wingnut]

3 hours ago, Tom Wetmore said:

That is quite different than reading "rules" for the newspaper..

Good one Tom.

Most of the Bible can be read like a newspaper.

But Pnatt wanted rules, so I gave him rules  

[Wingnut]

3 hours ago, Tom Wetmore said:

So we should just read Scripture as we would the newspaper.  Really ?!?!  Just that simple? The newspaper I read was not originally written thousands of years ago, and some parts hundreds or thousands of years after the events in question, in an ancient language that has been translated into modern English many centuries after the fact.  It is worth noting the differences even in that modern English from the centuries old English of the earliest English translations just a few hundred years ago.   Nor does the newspaper claim to be the Word of God.

What part of the newspaper is equivalent to the Psalms?  What part of the newspaper is parables?  Which part is written as prophecy?   Do you apply the same linguistic, reading comprehension and interpretive rules to the comics and advertising in the newspaper as you do the oped section or the news stories?

What makes the Bible easier in some senses than the newspaper is....

1) Both OT and NT use only 6000 words or so each.

2) And because its inspired, even though written y multiple writers, the words used are purposefully and deliberately used.  Thus there is a consistency in their usage.  

3) If one wishes to know what any word used means, search all other instances of its use and it is consistent.  This is definitely not the case with the newspaper where words are used inconsistently.

4) There is a consistent message throughout the Bible, not seen in a newspaper.

5) Then there are constant idiosyncrasies of the Author, such as His love for symbols, parables, simile, metaphors, types which is seen constantly and consistently throughout every page, unlike different segments of a newspaper.

That is not to underestimate the difficulty of understanding a writer such as Paul - who writes like a university lecturer.

[pnattmbtc]

Quote

Why would you ask for a purpose or what God wants from us in reference to verse 8?

I didn't say this.  I was talking in general terms, what is God's purpose in inspiring Scripture.

Quote

 

He wants us to read it.

Two demons, one called Death, followed by his cohort Hell ride through the earth killing 1/4 or 2 billion souls with war, famine, pestilence and animals gone wild.

The purpose or what God wants from us I leave up to you to explain.  I read the above as I would a newspaper.

 

"He wants us to read it".  Why?  This is getting at the purpose.  What is God's intent in inspiring Scripture writers?  This seems a fundamental question to me, without which we are at sea in terms of trying to understand Scripture.  Do you agree?

[Wingnut]

5 hours ago, pnattmbtc said:

I didn't say this.  I was talking in general terms, what is God's purpose in inspiring Scripture.

"He wants us to read it".  Why?  This is getting at the purpose.  What is God's intent in inspiring Scripture writers?  This seems a fundamental question to me, without which we are at sea in terms of trying to understand Scripture.  Do you agree?

I don't know what you are getting at.  You are being too deep.

Someone wishes to communicate.  They write.  The other reads.  There is no mystery.

[JoeMo]

Wingnut,

I agree with you that if there is a feasible way to literally interpret a prophecy, that's the preferred interpretation (without totally dismissing a spiritual interpretation). I look at the first 4 seals/horsemen as literal last-day occurrences that demonstrate man's inhumanity to man rather than God's wrath towards the wicked.  The subsequent seals/trumpets/plagues are God's efforts to stop humanity from destroying itself.

[Wingnut]

4 minutes ago, JoeMo said:

Wingnut,

I agree with you that if there is a feasible way to literally interpret a prophecy, that's the preferred interpretation (without totally dismissing a spiritual interpretation). I look at the first 4 seals/horsemen as literal last-day occurrences that demonstrate man's inhumanity to man rather than God's wrath towards the wicked.  The subsequent seals/trumpets/plagues are God's efforts to stop humanity from destroying itself.

I agree with you here.

The 5th seal I see as Satan trying to destroy the church, before Christ steps in from the 6th seal onwards.

The 5th seal is "The Great Tribulation".

From the 6th onwards is "The Day of the Lord".

But Revelation is totally end-time, hence future.  

Any historical INTERPRETATION is just that, an INTERPRETATION. 

John said he was in the spirit "on the Lord's Day" Rev 1:10.  That is the end-time.

[Wingnut]

When I read a newspaper, I come away knowing what it says.

When I read the Bible, I come away knowing what it says.

How come?  Because I have the gift of literacy.  And I was always near the bottom of my English class.

And because I have the gift of literacy like everyone else on this forum, I really resist the notion that one can read the newspaper and come away knowing what it says, but cannot do the same for the Bible or any reasonably well written book.  And the Bible is a reasonably well written Book  

The only alternative to reading it and understanding it for yourself is to have someone else read it and explain it to you, which is the last resort of the lazy.

[JoeMo]

I have learned much from the explanations of others concerning various Biblical concepts and interpretations.  The key is to always check the Word yourself to see if what others preach is indeed true (or at least feasible).

Is it feasible that God created everything there is in 6 literal days? Yes.  Is it feasible that He created the universe over billions of years? Yes.  Is it feasible that all existence (including human life) proceeded forth from a spontaneous "natural" explosion of an infinitely dense singularity? No.

I believe that the point God is making in the creation story is that HE and HE ALONE created all that is seen and unseen in both the physical and spiritual world - including the Sabbath. Exactly how He did it is not a salvational issue IMHO.

[jbal7]

This is a very interesting thread! I love this topic. I enjoy thinking of these possibilities and alternative theories, not so much as a literal reality but rather in a sci fi sense. Just fun to think about.. anyways here's my two cents. I've often wondered, " why couldn't have God used methods like the big bang to create the universe?" I think God using phyics andnature to His bidding and having everything fall right into place is way more awe inspiring than just speaking it into existence. Question is, does the Bible speak of when sin first came into existence?   If we believe that there was a whole other world that had a catastrophic incident (dino death, etc..) requiring God to renovate earth; then we saying that sin existed prior to the devil tempting eve. If there was death than there was sin. I think most Christians, myself included, just naturally assumed sin came about when the fall happened, directly followed by adams and eves deception. to further entain the notion of a old world that was renovated for us we need to address the origin of sin. Not trying to sound sarcastic here, I'm not well versed on what the Bible has to say about the origin of sin. Will be researching now though. I'm not totally opposed to an older then we think Earth, however currently I hold the 6500ish belief.

[Aliensanctuary]

Previous catastrophes would probably have nothing to do with sin, i.e., transgression of God's Laws, if there were no humans, or human-like beings. These extinction events, if they occurred, were likely the results of natural catastrophes such as bombardment by asteroids. Perhaps that will occur again and result in the extinction of all life on Earth. Perhaps the fossil record is the result of one cataclysmic event, perhaps more than one.

We may or may not have the full story on life before the Flood. With long lives, powerful minds, and photographic memories, the antediluvians most probably created weapons of mass destruction, space travel, if not star travel, and tampered with DNA. We shouldn't be shocked if artifacts and evidence of life are found on other worlds or moons. If Earth was colonized with humans around 6,000 years ago, that might explain the sudden rise of advanced civilizations soon afterwards. I suspect that Adam and Eve weren't the only race of intelligent beings living on the Earth in those days, maybe not even the first. The Scriptures only tell their story, not the stories of the others from around the world who were rescued during the flood. If the antediluvians were capable of off-world spaceflight, it is not inconceivable that some of them returned to a far different world than the one they left. For them, building massive pyramids would have been child's play. Perhaps their star ships resembled pyramids...

I believe that there is more science than meets the eye in Scripture, but it was turned into "miracles" by those who didn't understand the technology.

 

[Wingnut]

2 hours ago, jballew7 said:

 Question is, does the Bible speak of when sin first came into existence?   If we believe that there was a whole other world that had a catastrophic incident (dino death, etc..) requiring God to renovate earth; then we saying that sin existed prior to the devil tempting eve. If there was death than there was sin. I think most Christians, myself included, just naturally assumed sin came about when the fall happened, directly followed by adams and eves deception. to further entain the notion of a old world that was renovated for us we need to address the origin of sin. Not trying to sound sarcastic here, I'm not well versed on what the Bible has to say about the origin of sin. Will be researching now though. I'm not totally opposed to an older then we think Earth, however currently I hold the 6500ish belief.

Can animals sin?

The wages of sin is death.  

If animals do not sin, does this scripture apply to them?

If animals do sin, does this scripture apply to them?

Romans 5:12 Wherefore, as by one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin; and so death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned:

Is it possible that Paul was speaking only of human sin and death?

Is it possible that whole ecosystems lived and died before man, and that Paul was only speaking of SIN and DEATH concerning MANKIND?

If this is so, is it possible that Paul is utterly silent about previous geological ages since salvation had nothing to do with them?

Lastly, where does one draw the line at death?  Did Adam and Eve never step on one ant or bug before the fall and kill it?

Did no bug die of natural old-age before the fall?

Are we insisting that Rom 5:12 says that NOTHING died before Adam and Eve sinned, whereas Paul is addressing only sin and death as applied to mankind?