How do people who believe a "day" of creation is a literal 24-hour day ("because the plants would have died") get around Adam and Eve not dying the same literal 24-hour day as eating from the tree?
JWs say that the "day" didn't equal 24 hours and that Adam died within a thousand years and a day=1000 years.... but then you have the plants with no light!
It's almost like it's made up or something! :D
So how do Christians who believe Genesis is *literal* explain Adam's age at death?
Christian Fundamentalists and Adam and Eve
by glitter 6 Replies latest watchtower beliefs
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glitter
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JustTickledPink
It's a nice story, but I don't think anyone was around to actually write it down.
You know if the Bible was really inspired of God, how come there wasn't more of a scientific explanation of Creation, instead of "he created the sun and it was good" etc. Scientistics today know so much more about psychics, biology, and the environment than the Bible ever discussed, why didn't the Bible have some real enlightning writings that maybe would give us a better sense of creation?
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euripides
I imagine with the same disingenuousness they'd say that either
1) though God promised they would die on the 'day' of their eating it He was merciful and let them live, read the rest of the text as literal, OR
2) they did in fact 'die' on that day, but the text demands that this be read not literally, perhaps spiritually? In their link to God? since of course Adam did literally live past that 'day.'
The truth of the matter is that the same word can mean different things at different points of a sentence, in any language, depending on context, multiple meanings, etc. Even if we accept that basic fact, though, this story is at its heart NOT literal on so many levels. And though this won't stop a complete misreading of a mythological story, or the strange tendency to inerrancy on the part of those of fragile faith, a clearer understanding of these texts starts with small victories.
Euripides
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gaiagirl
There are so many problems with the Genesis account: Were plants created BEFORE humans, or AFTER humans? Genesis chapter 1 contradicts Genesis chapter 2. When Cain was banished, he worried that other people would want to kill him. WHAT other people? He was the first child born to Adam and Eve. Even assuming Eve continued to bear children every year as Cain grew to adulthood, how many people could there possibly be in the world at this time? And wouldn't they all know Cain personally as a close family member? Which of these people was Cains wife? Did he marry her before being banished, or only after moving out?
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Leolaia
There are two separate creation narratives in Genesis: the Priestly account in ch. 1 and the Yahwistic account in ch. 2-3. They don't agree well with each other because they have separate origins. For a discussion of the literary origins of the Priestly account and a possible polemic against it in (Deutero)-Isaiah, see:
http://www.jehovahs-witness.com/10/73734/1182578/post.ashx#1182578
As for plants existing before the creation of the sun and moon, this is not a logical error of the story itself -- for light had already existed from Day One (Genesis 1:3), and it was the initial division between light and darkness that set in motion the rhythm of day and night which was later taken over by the luminaries to "rule" over them (1:16). That is, from the worldview of the Priestly writer, day and night pre-existed the creation of the luminaries and exist independent of them. The problem only arises when people read the Genesis story with preconceptions drawn from modern science and cosmology that are then read into the story -- such as notions of earth as a sphere and the division of day and night being caused by the earth's rotation. There was no such concept of an orbital or rotational period of the earth and moon in Hebrew cosmology, and no concept of the earth being created in the midst of a much larger universe. More on this:
http://www.jehovahs-witness.com/12/73493/1179325/post.ashx#1179325
http://www.jehovahs-witness.com/12/73493/1178641/post.ashx#1178641 -
bebu
why didn't the Bible have some real enlightning writings that maybe would give us a better sense of creation?
Addressing just this comment, I can't imagine what words could be used that could be understood by those people. Think about it. Creation is a concept that is basically understood by anyone. Science isn't. I would think it very anachronistic to find the kind of thing you would wish.
this story is at its heart NOT literal on so many levels.
I think so, too. I've notice that because of that, it frees me up to appreciate it even more.
bebu
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barry
The Bible tells us how to go to heaven not how the heavens go.