by CordyC 34 Replies latest watchtower beliefs
I also think it's interesting that God says:
Genesis 2:17
But of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it: for in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die.Not "if" you eat, more like "when" you eat you will die.
DD
I always see the Adam and Eve story as maybe a way for early man to explain alien experiments on humans. Like man now, seeing if they can get a rat to stop eating something it likes by simply attach electrodes too it. The aliens did this with the "Suppose" true of knowledge. What was the knowledge, was it that they ate this tree and realized that there was nothing too it, except for aliens timing how long it took them to get the courage to stand up to their suppose god and then when the experiment was done, they were case out of the experiment into the real world in which the aliens no longer feed and cared for the rats in the maze.
DDog:
The bible says many things. You should care more
I also think it's interesting that God says:
Genesis 2:17
But of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it: for in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die.Not "if" you eat, more like "when" you eat you will die.
How did you manage to skip over "thou shalt not eat of it", when jumping to your conclusion? Are you only reading what agrees with your perspective? Further, are you not guilty of adding to the word, by including "when"?
LT
How did you manage to skip over "thou shalt not eat of it", when jumping to your conclusion?
Let me ask you, what part of that verse was God's decree? What actually happened? Who's running the universe?
Are you only reading what agrees with your perspective?
Well, my perspective is after the fall, so what other "perspective" is there? God gave the Law " But of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it " Then He decreed " in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die ." They ate. They died. I ask again, who's running the universe?
Further, are you not guilty of adding to the word, by including "when"?
No, I'm not adding to God's word, just giving my 2 cents. I'm not the only one rendering the verse that way, nor do I believe it changes the meaning, for example:
Gen 2:17
But you must never eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil because when you eat from it, you will certainly die." God's Word (translation) Copyright World Publishing
I apologize that I'm not going to read all the posts in answer before making my own.
Who said there was not anything considered "bad" before the fall? God had already decided that eating of the tree was a bad thing. In doing so, assuming "bad" did not exist beforehand, did He not, at that very moment, create "bad"? Before that, there was nothing they could do that would be judged "bad".
In any case, the TotKoGaB (yes, I christen thee, Tree, demon of God's creative hand, to be thenceforth named Totkogab!!), was a metaphor for whether mankind accepts authority outside of themselves or not, judging the goodness or a badness of a thing for themselves or not. Makes for a great tool to control the masses I think.
Satan was bad before man was bad. Hmmm...what did he eat?
I now find it hard to believe that there was a time in my life that I actually believed Adam and Eve were the first humans.
In any case, the TotKoGaB (yes, I christen thee, Tree, demon of God's creative hand, to be thenceforth named Totkogab!!), was a metaphor for whether mankind accepts authority outside of themselves or not, judging the goodness or a badness of a thing for themselves or not.
That's basically the WT take at it, and I think it is flawed on several accounts.
First, "good" and "bad" is neither exclusively nor primarily moral -- as if it were "good andevil" -- you can read it also as "helpful vs. harmful", or "happiness vs. unhappiness" for instance. Plus, the juxtaposition of opposites is a very common way to express totality in Hebrew (e.g. from the smallest to the biggest).
"Knowledge" is an essential part of mankind's self-definition as opposed to (other) animals. It's still the case in the scientific (!) term homo sapiens. Man without "knowledge of good and bad" is simply not "man".
The tale of Genesis 2 is designed as an explanation of human reality as perceived by the author, including "universal" as well as culturally specific features: man has knowledge (stole it from the gods); he is mortal (the gods barred him from the tree of life); he reproduces sexually, which involves both pleasure and pain; he lives out of agriculture; the woman is subject to man, etc.
startingover
I now find it hard to believe that there was a time in my life that I actually believed Adam and Eve were the first humans.
So, what do you think the first human's names were?
Somebody had to be first!
I never understood Genesis 3:24... does this mean that prior to the Bronze age the angels had swords? How would Adam and Eve even know what a sword is? The Cherubs may have just as well used a spinning jar of marmalade for all Adam and Eve would understand.
FBF
