How were plants created before the Sun?

by elder-schmelder 34 Replies latest watchtower bible

• 

  still_in74

  thats because even to a hardcore believer the creation account MUST BE ALLEGORY !

  I discussed this very point with an elder and he agreed with me! The WTS trys so hard to explain how the earth existed before the sun, ( did you notice that little tid bit there?)

  by saying that obviously the sun and light existed but light could not penetrate earths canopy so what this really means is that Jehovah caused light to penetrate to the earth not the actual creation of light. But the grass before light is never dealt with.

  How about the fact that unless the planet is covered in molten mantle then without light it would be a block of ice. Certainly no "waters" on the earth to divide or conditions to grow any form of plants or fish.

  Even creationists should read the Genesis creation account for what it is.... an allegory written by a man that thought the earth was flat, that stars were actually objects in the atmosphere (firmament) and that the earth was the center of the universe thus created first before the sun. When you just read it this way the whole dam bible makes more sense! Why else would the stars fall from heaven and the earths corner posts be firmly set and the earth be a circle??? it all makes sense now doesnt it????
• 

  Leolaia

  Note my comment above about v. 1. It is not referring to an earlier creation of earth and heaven PRIOR to the seven days of creation; this is a summary statement that takes v. 2 as describing the state of affairs when God began his creating of the heavens and earth (i.e. "When God began creating the heavens and earth, the earth was a nothingness and without form, darkness covered the surface of the primeval deep, and God's spirit/wind hovered over the waters"). The seven days of creation ARE the beginning. The creation of heaven (shmym) is related in v. 6-8 and the creation of the earth ('rts) is related in v. 9-10. The use of different English words for "heaven"/"sky" and "earth"/"land" obscures this. The earth is land not covered by the seas. Although modern readers implicitly picture the scene in their minds as a planet earth in outer space, that is not what is contained in the text itself.
• 

  knock knock

  From the point of view of ancient cosmology, this might reflect the fact that the sun isn't the only source of light during the day. The blue sky seems to shine with its own light, which brightens when the sun makes its apperance in the morning and it cooperatively darkens when the sun makes its departure in the evening. Even without the sun in the sky, a similar cycle of day and night is presumed to happen in the days preceding the creation of the sun.
  
  
  
  
  
  I realize I'm slow but what other light source is there besides the sun. The blue sky is only seen as blue when the sun is up - or close to the horizon. The moon only shines because of the sun. The stars are not much in the way of light givers - the moonless night sky is often referred to as being pitch black and won't make the sky very blue even with a full "milky way". And with no sun it would be this way always.
  
  In all sincerity, I may have missed the meaning here. Wouldn't be the first time. lol
• 

  Shawn10538

  Yes, has the question of "how does day exist without the sun been answered?" Light has to shine on something to look like light. Light has to have a source. period. What is the source of light if the sun doesn't exist?
  
  Day just doesn't exist. It is only day on one side of the planet. It is not day all around the globe at once. So day isn't something that can just be. It does not exist in space. It does not exist without the sun, period. It is exclusively a matter pof perspective. A person standing under the sun is in day. A person standing on the other side of the globe at the same time is not experiencing day.
  
  I don't know why exactly, but I am always frustrated with Leolaia's comments. They seem so educated on one hand, but I think where I have a problem is not with her factualness, but with her lack of position, claim and conclusion.
  
  Take this thread for example. What is she saying? That the Bible is consistent with science? It seems so to me, because she seems to be offering an explanation of how it can be interpreted in a scientifically sound way. But she doesn't come out and just take a position on the matter. Without a clear position, the reader is confused, as I am sure many reading her stuff are. Is she an apologist of the Bible? I have thought so on many occasions but been told that she is not, by her own admission. Then why does she offer explanations that seem to lend to what other Biblical apologists are saying? Has she accepted Jesus Christ as her personal lord and savior? That would tell us a lot. But I don't know, it's very cryptic with her.
  
  in the post above she leaves us hanging wondering how the hell do we get day without a sun. To leave something like that hanging in the wind, one tends to take that as her offering it as a conclusion. But it's not much of a conclusion. Conclusion is what she is lacking, and part of why reading her stuff just frustrates me. Maybe I'm just too dumb to understand it. apparently my BA has done nothing for me.
  
  Certainly this CRAZY statement, I mean absolutely absurd notion, definitely needs some more explanation to make her not sound like a total lunatic:
  
  "But light itself preexists even the creation of earth and heaven. "
  LMAO!
  "The sun is created to rule the day (v. 18), but day itself is already in existence."
  [Oh god, tell me she is just joking! Surely no adult thinks this!]
  
  From the point of view of ancient cosmology, this might reflect the fact that the sun isn't the only source of light during the day. The blue sky seems to shine with its own light, which brightens when the sun makes its apperance in the morning and it cooperatively darkens when the sun makes its departure in the evening. Even without the sun in the sky, a similar cycle of day and night is presumed to happen in the days preceding the creation of the sun."
  
  There's just so much wrong with it both logically, scientifically etc, that I just don't want to touch it. But for starters, who in heck ever said that light preceded light sources? Light isn't this thng that just floats around in space from nothing, (unless you are saying light is everything and everything is light in which case I would agree.) But light is only seen when it shines on something. Other than that we have no evidence of its existence, (except for in the form of heat, which again is really heading into new age speculative ethereal territory, not stuff anybody knows about at this point in history.)
  
  Now, recently there is talk of "dark light" light of such low frequency that it can not be seen by human eyes. But that is getting awful new agy as well, not that I deny the "dark light theory" it's just that no one really knows much about it, it just isn't well established science yet. So, uness you are some kind of quirky light scientist by day, astronomer cosmologist or whatever, I think you are out of your realm of expertise.
  
  So let's just stick with known mainstream science, and it says, light is only visible when it hits something. In space it essentially does not exist, and if it does, we don't know it. DAY DOES NOT EXIST IN SPACE, ONLY ON PLANETS AND OTHER LARGE OBJECTS. Day is perspective bound. In other words, it really does not exist as a thing, it exists only from a perspective. There is really no such thing as DAY. It doesn't have a personality, habits, a routine or anything. It appears to appear when the sun shines on atmosphere. It is the effect of light on atmosphere and other objects.
  
  I don't think there is any actual evidence that any ancient people ever thought that the sky is a source of light itself. It has never "seemed" to me to light up in all my years of looking at it. I have never met a person who ever said the sky looks like it lights up all on its own. Saying the "sky lit up in brilliant colors" is just a figure of speech. No one really ever thought the sky lit up literally. So if you can't provide an actual document of the Bible writers actually saying that they think what you are saying they thought, it is just wild speculation on your part, and it is wreckless scholarship to try to sound authoritative when you are really just speculating wildly.
  
  So Leo, what is your conclusion? Does the biblical creation story fit with science or not? What is your opinion? Why not share it and be really really clear about it? If you don't know, say you don't know. It's like reading an essay without a claim. What is your caim? If you don't have one... I'm just going to leave this hanging with no conclusion.
• 

  Brother Apostate

  Light has to shine on something to look like light. Light has to have a source. period. What is the source of light if the sun doesn't exist?

  John 1:1-18

  1 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. 2 He was with God in the beginning.

  3 Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made. 4 In him was life, and that life was the light of men. 5 The light shines in the darkness, but the darkness has not understood [a] it.

  6 There came a man who was sent from God; his name was John. 7 He came as a witness to testify concerning that light, so that through him all men might believe. 8 He himself was not the light; he came only as a witness to the light. 9 The true light that gives light to every man was coming into the world. [b]

  10 He was in the world, and though the world was made through him, the world did not recognize him. 11 He came to that which was his own, but his own did not receive him. 12 Yet to all who received him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God— 13 children born not of natural descent, [c] nor of human decision or a husband's will, but born of God.

  14 The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the One and Only, [d] who came from the Father, full of grace and truth.

  15 John testifies concerning him. He cries out, saying, "This was he of whom I said, 'He who comes after me has surpassed me because he was before me.' " 16 From the fullness of his grace we have all received one blessing after another. 17 For the law was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ. 18 No one has ever seen God, but God the One and Only, [e] [f] who is at the Father's side, has made him known.

  BA- Answering the question.

  PS- “There are more things in heaven and earth, Shawn10538 Horatio, Than are dreamt of in your philosophy.” -Shakespeare
• 

  Leolaia

  Jesus, Shawn10538, you yet again don't fail to show how incredibly stupid you are. Just as in the Zeitgeist threads, you come to ridiculous conclusions about what I wrote -- all based on your own mistaken notion that I am a biblical fundamentalist or apologist. I have told you repeatedly that nothing could be further than the truth. But you still persist. Rather than politely ask for a clarification like knock knock did, you just rant about me in much the same inane way as you have done before.

  What is she saying? That the Bible is consistent with science? It seems so to me, because she seems to be offering an explanation of how it can be interpreted in a scientifically sound way.

  Why does it seem so to you? It only seems so to you because you have some notion inside your head that I am an apologist. When in fact all I was trying to do was explain what this particular text, the Priestly creation narrative, probably meant in its original cultural context. That's it. In fact, I was specifically saying that such a text SHOULD NOT be interpreted in a way that harmonizes it with modern scientific cosmology. You understand that? This is what I said, which you apparently missed: "The Priestly creation narrative really needs to be read without modern cosmological concepts...Although modern readers implicitly picture the scene in their minds as a planet earth in outer space, that is not what is contained in the text itself." I was arguing for the exact opposite thing you misrepresent me as claiming. It would be no different than if I had been trying to describe the creation myth in the Enuma Elish, which has Marduk fashion the world from the body parts of the chaos monster Tiamat, and Shawn10538 getting on my case for believing that giant chaos dragons exist and that the Babylonian myth is somehow "scientifically sound". When in fact the Babylonian myth SHOULD NOT be interpreted in a way that harmonizes it with modern science. Ancient Hebrew cosmology has absolutely nothing to do with science, other than the kinds of observations that people made 3,000 years ago. If I try to explain how they probably saw their world, I am not (1) arguing that this is how the universe really is and (2) trying to harmonize the ancient cosmology with science. If I point out that the ancient Jewish book of 1 Enoch describes the world as a flat disk, is Shawn10538 going to now wonder if I am a flat-earther?

  Certainly this CRAZY statement, I mean absolutely absurd notion, definitely needs some more explanation to make her not sound like a total lunatic

  Why? I was describing the point of view of ancient people who didn't know a lick about astronomy. But I know why you believe saying what I said makes me "sound like a total lunatic". Obviously it is because you impose upon anything I write your mistaken belief that I am a fundamentalist or apologist, and thus you read my words as implying that I actually do really believe that the universe works the way the Priestly author of Genesis 1 described it. Shawn10538, I can't tell you how annoying that is. And in case you have trouble understanding this post, let me clarify myself further (lest you take my Tiamat comments above the wrong way): I do not also believe that the earth was created from the carcass of the monster Tiamat.

  Light isn't this thng that just floats around in space from nothing, (unless you are saying light is everything and everything is light in which case I would agree.) But light is only seen when it shines on something. Other than that we have no evidence of its existence, (except for in the form of heat, which again is really heading into new age speculative ethereal territory, not stuff anybody knows about at this point in history.)
  
  Now, recently there is talk of "dark light" light of such low frequency that it can not be seen by human eyes. But that is getting awful new agy as well, not that I deny the "dark light theory" it's just that no one really knows much about it, it just isn't well established science yet. So, uness you are some kind of quirky light scientist by day, astronomer cosmologist or whatever, I think you are out of your realm of expertise.
  
  So let's just stick with known mainstream science, and it says, light is only visible when it hits something. In space it essentially does not exist, and if it does, we don't know it. DAY DOES NOT EXIST IN SPACE, ONLY ON PLANETS AND OTHER LARGE OBJECTS. Day is perspective bound. In other words, it really does not exist as a thing, it exists only from a perspective.

  The one trying to bring science into this between the two of us is you. Of course it is unscientific. Duh. Are you now going to go on a screed about how unscientific the notion of Tiamat is. Be my guest. But don't you dare attribute "Tiamat-believing views" to me.

  Does the biblical creation story fit with science or not? What is your opinion? Why not share it and be really really clear about it? If you don't know, say you don't know. It's like reading an essay without a claim. What is your caim?

  For some reason, you have some bizarre notion that the only claim or point I could have in my post is the fit between the Priestly creation story and science. I specifically said in my first post that it is a mistake to read modern scientific notions into the text, and that is not what my post was trying to do. If you don't have a clue what I was claiming, reread my post. I was trying to describe the concepts behind the creation narrative. I claimed that the author believed that the cycle of day and night preceded the creation of the sun. How could you not understand that was what I was claiming? Don't blame me if the author was being unscientific, and don't shoot me for trying to point this out (and for offering a thought on why the author may have conceptualized nature in this way). You just make yourself look like an ass. If I am describing a concept in an ancient text (whether it involves cosmology, or eschatology, or theology), I am simply describing a concept in an ancient text. Got it? I am not arguing that such a concept is what actually exists in the real world, or that I believe that such a concept corresponds to reality, or anything more than what I specifically say. However I imagine you will still impose on me your own misperceptions, as that is what you have done continuously. I don't know why. I suppose you assume that if someone is interested in the subject of religion, he or she is religious? Maybe you should check your assumptions before you go on another rant.
• 

  knock knock

  From the point of view of ancient cosmology, this might reflect the fact that the sun isn't the only source of light during the day.
  
  
  If this had read:
  From the point of view of ancient cosmology, this might reflect the *idea* or *notion* that the sun isn't the only source of light during the day.
  
  I would have known for a *fact* :) what you were getting at. It was that word fact that threw me. But, thanks for the clarification for us *stupid* ones ;)
• 

  Leolaia

  I realize I'm slow but what other light source is there besides the sun. The blue sky is only seen as blue when the sun is up - or close to the horizon. The moon only shines because of the sun. The stars are not much in the way of light givers - the moonless night sky is often referred to as being pitch black and won't make the sky very blue even with a full "milky way". And with no sun it would be this way always.
  
  In all sincerity, I may have missed the meaning here. Wouldn't be the first time. lol

  Hi knock knock....Thanks for your question. I would just like to first point out that the ancient Hebrews did not know anything like we do today about the refraction of light in the atmosphere, the fact that "moonlight" is reflected sunlight, or that the brightness of the sky depends on that of the sun. The moon in Genesis 1:16 is referred to as a "lamp" or "luminary" just the same as the sun and stars. The sky was believed to be a domed vault that was stretched over the land like a tent (cf. Job 9:8, Psalm 19:1-6, 104:2, Isaiah 40:22, 42:5, 44:24, 45:12, 48:13), and a similar notion appears in older Canaanite mythology (e.g. KTU 1.5 i 4-5 which says that when Baal smites "Lotan, the fleeing serpent, finishing off the twisting serpent, the close-coiling one with seven heads, the heavens wither and go slack like the folds of your tunic," compare the almost verbatim parallels in Psalm 102:25-27, Isaiah 27:1, 34:4). Within this tented vault, the luminaries rise and run forth through the sky like champion runners (cf. Psalm 19:4-6, and especially the Book of Luminaries in 1 Enoch); again heliocentrism is a modern cosmological concept that is foreign to Hebrew texts.

  The Priestly narrative in Genesis 1 construes the luminaries as placed within the vault or expanse (v. 14) and above them lie the "waters" from the primeval deep that were raised up to form the tent-like dome; the expanse "separates the water under the expanse from the water above it" (v. 6), and it is the same place where birds fly (v. 20). In Job 37:18 the spread-out heavens are said to be as "hard as a mirror of cast bronze" (indeed the Hebrew word for "expanse" comes from a root meaning "to hammer out") and elsewhere in the OT the firmament is often described as bright, as shining forth light from God. Job 26:13 claims that "by his [God's] breath the skies became luminous". In Ezekiel 1:22 the firmament is described as "sparkling like ice and it is awesome", and the righteous are said to "shine like the brightness of the heavens" (Daniel 12:3). Psalm 104:2-3 presents a poetic creation account in which God "wraps himself in light as with a garment and stretches out the heavens like a tent and lays the beams of his upper chambers on their waters". Notice that it is on top of the suspended waters forming the vault of heaven that God is described as building his abode. The light from God is probably construed as shining through the firmament, making it luminous and sparkle (cf. the comparison in Job 37:18 of the heavens to a mirror). There are later variants of this notion; the firmament in Revelation 4:6 is described as a "sea of glass like crystal", while Josephus refers to the firmament over the expanse of heaven as "crystalline" (Antiquities 1.30). In the Testament of Levi, "there is much water suspended" in the first heaven and above this there is "a second heaven much brighter and more lustrous" (2:7-8).

  There are also a number of other texts about God being enthroned on top of the waters above aside from the statement in Psalm 104:3 that God "lays the beams of his upper chambers on their [the heavens'] waters". Psalm 29:10 says that "Yahweh sits enthroned on the primeval ocean" and Job 22:12-14 states that "God is at the zenith of the heavens and looks down on the highest stars ... as he goes about on the vaulted heavens" (cf. Isaiah 40:22). Rain occurs Yahweh opens up the "windows of the heavens" (cf. Genesis 7:11, 8:2, 2 Kings 7:2, 19, Isaiah 24:18, Malachi 3:10), and this is probably dependent on the older Canaanite idea that Baal causes rain to pour down by opening up windows at his heavenly palace: "Let a window be opened in the house, a casement in the midst of the palace. Baal opened a rift in the clouds, his holy voice Baal gave forth, Baal repeated the issue of his lips (i.e. thunder)" (KTU 1.4 vii 26-30).

  So as I mentioned previously, the way the cosmos is conceptualized in Genesis 1 is best apprehended by taking the text on its own terms and seeing how it corresponds to similar concepts in the OT, rather than trying to anachronistically impose a modern scientifically-infomed understanding of the universe on the text.
• 

  Leolaia

  From the point of view of ancient cosmology, this might reflect the *idea* or *notion* that the sun isn't the only source of light during the day.

  Ah, of course that's what I meant, I was talking about the perception that underlies ancient cosmology. I was referring to the fact an observer would see the sky shining as well as the sun, and while us moderns all know that this is due to refraction of sunlight, the ancients did not know that. The mindset was rather that the sky shines its own separate light at the same time as the sun and some texts suggest that this light was conceived as coming from God, or provided by him. The Book of Parables in 1 Enoch even claims that a special fire in the west is responsible for the fiery appearance of sunsets (17:4); the author of this text had no undertanding that this light was coming from the sun.

  The author of Genesis 1 similarly described the cycles of day and night pre-existing the creation of the sun itself. So prior to the fourth day, the daylight would brighten in the morning but without the sun. Although not certain, there is a probable connection between this concept and the one mentioned in my last post that viewed the crystalline transparent firmament of the heavens as shining forth their own light from God. In fact, Psalm 104 (which itself seems to have been influenced by the Egyptian Great Hymn of Aten) is thought by some scholars as a literary source in some form for the Priestly creation narrative. See http://www.jehovahs-witness.com/10/73734/1.ashx.
• 

  pseudoxristos

  Leolaia,

  I had come to a similar conclusion several years ago regarding the idea that the writers of Genesis did not realize that the sun was the source of the illumination of the atmosphere. I'm glad to see that you have reached a similar conclusion, as I have not seen this idea expressed elsewhere.

  The account only make sense when viewed in this manner. I would imagine that the appearance of the moon during the night without the illumination of the atmosphere gave rise to the idea that day and night were not directly related to the sun (or the illuminaries as seen from their point of view).

  Thanks for confirming what I had previously suspected and as always I've enjoyed your well researched posts.

  pseudo