I was actually THINKING...

by joannadandy 14 Replies latest watchtower bible

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  pomegranate

  Metaphor is identified by something happening that is not real, literal, "normal" or familiar, as in serpents talking and eating dust.

  Trees are literal, and fruit does grow on them and can be eaten. Literal tree, metaphorical serpent...

  Wanna see something that I think is kind of cool that I think opens things up a bit? Look at the defining words that are involved with the Hebrew word for serpent:

  Nachash - snake (from it's hiss), from the ROOT to hiss or whisper a magic spell, generally to prognasticate (foretell the future).

  The word actually comes from the SOUND of the creature not the LOOK of the creature.

  Satan whispering in ears...hissssssssss. You positively will not die...hisssssssss...hissssssssss....
• 

  joannadandy

  pom thanks for treating me like an idiot, I know what a metaphor is...I'm an english major for crissakes! I fail to see how you know that the tree is a real event, and not a metaphor and that the snake IS a metaphor. We have snakes now today too, so your arguement that trees are real and grow fruit is not a very good one...trees do not give you knoweldge and God does not talk to us and ban us from eating fruit.

  My personal opinion the first chapters of Genesis are ALL metaphor. Adam and Eve not really two individuals, Cain and Abel a lovely metaphor for the rivalry between farmers and ranchers, etc. I'm quite aware of the idea that metaphor abounds in the Bible, I am also quite aware that there is an idea that the creation accounts are two seperate stories and possibly written by two groups of people, and merged together later...I was trying to have fun with the idea of flying snakes, and point out how absurd it is to try and take anything in the Bible and interpret it into truth statements.
• 

  pomegranate

  pom thanks for treating me like an idiot, I know what a metaphor is...I'm an english major for crissakes! I fail to see how you know that the tree is a real event, and not a metaphor and that the snake IS a metaphor.

  First, I'm not here to treat you like an idiot. You asked, I answered.

  Well, snakes don't talk, nor do they eat dust. That makes it OBVIOUS METAPHOR, right? Now, what around the TREE event isn't for real, normal or familiar? Nothing. It all is as familiar in the normal human perception now as it was then. I see no strict metaphor.

  I see the trees in the garden as surely being SYMBOLIC of the two opposing sides...Tree of Life (God) ...Tree of Good and Bad (Satan)

  We have snakes now today too

  Ones that TALK? Ones that EAT DUST?

  so your arguement that trees are real and grow fruit is not a very good one...trees do not give you knoweldge and God does not talk to us and ban us from eating fruit.

  Actually, I'm not here to argue at all. So, I will exit from your own private THINKING thread after this post so you can think alone.

  My personal opinion the first chapters of Genesis are ALL metaphor. Adam and Eve not really two individuals,

  You know what happens when you go back 100 years? Less people. 1000 years? Less people than that. Eventually, you go back to ONLY TWO.

  Cain and Abel a lovely metaphor for the rivalry between farmers and ranchers, etc. I'm quite aware of the idea that metaphor abounds in the Bible, I am also quite aware that there is an idea that the creation accounts are two seperate stories and possibly written by two groups of people, and merged together later...I was trying to have fun with the idea of flying snakes, and point out how absurd it is to try and take anything in the Bible and interpret it into truth statements.

  Well have your fun. I hate to break it to you, that snake in Genesis does fly. They call them kinda snakes DRAGONS.
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  Vivamus

  I sit here, with a pounding head, and sneezig constantly [I seriously need to get some extra vitamins, it's like the story of my life, is having colds] and I get an ever bigger headache from all of this. Joanna, hon, can't you think on a more lightier subject when your sick? I do hope you are feeling better by now tho.

  Okay, to the subject of flying snakes, magic trees and talking serpents.... I don't believe in fairy tales. Read the bible as a book written by men in a dark age of ignorance and supersticion, and it all makes sence. Enjoy.

  Kisses.

  Edited by - Vivamus on 4 October 2002 4:31:21
• 

  gsx1138

  If you go back far enough you get into our evolutionary line. Here I was going to think of something witty and Vivamus wrapped it up for me.

  I don't believe in fairy tales. Read the bible as a book written by men in a dark age of ignorance and supersticion, and it all makes sence. Enjoy.

  Kisses.

  Although I would put in there, poorly written. If there are people who honestly believe, with a rational mind, that the story of Adam and Eve is literal, or even original for that matter, I can see how televangilists make so much money. By the way, everyone knows that Satan drove a Ford before God smote him down to a Dodge.