# Death before Adam?



## BG

Can you be a Christian and believe in death before Adam?


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## timfost

Can you be a Christian with any theological error?

We should be careful not to judge another's salvation based on such errors but admonish them as brethren.

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## BG

Doesn’t a belief that people lived, multiplied and died prior to Adam undermine all of our beliefs?


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## BG

Does anyone know if any of the Reformers, Puritans or Pilgrims believed that Adam was a myth?


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## timfost

BG said:


> Doesn’t a belief that people lived, multiplied and died prior to Adam undermine all of our beliefs?



I wasn't aware you meant human death...


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## TheOldCourse

BG said:


> Doesn’t a belief that people lived, multiplied and died prior to Adam undermine all of our beliefs?



Yes. But undermining isn't the same as denying. Thankfully for all of us, theologically consistency isn't a condition of salvation. Many of us have or have had inconsistencies in our beliefs--especially as young Christians. They are felicitous inconsistencies in that to be consistent with our errors would be a shipwreck of our faith.

However, if one persists in holding (or, even worse, teaching) a serious error like this for their whole life despite correction it could call into question the credibility of their profession much like a besetting sin.

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## BG

I’m not necessarily talking about a young Christian who simply does not know better but a elder or seminary professor that teaches these things.

We confess that when Adam (a real person) fell all mankind fell with him.

If the biblical account of Adam’s fall is a myth then it seems to me that the following is true: 1)our theology is total garbage, 2)the Bible is untrustworthy.

If however the biblical account of Adam’s fall is in fact true then those men who teach Any form of evolutionary process or gap theory are disqualified from ministry.

I am puzzled why men who hold to these various theories are held in high esteem by the Reformed community today. It seems to me that this should be a dividing line it is unbiblical, it is not confessional, and it lacks historical support.


If Adam is a myth what else in the Bible is a myth Noah,Abraham,David,Christ?

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## Scott Bushey

Bill, Did the person actually say that the story of Adam was a myth or that the story of Adam is allegory or metaphorical?


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## Jake

This might be helpful. Here is a discussion of this topic between two old earth creationists and two young earth creationists. Note that everyone here affirms a literal Adam. The OEC say that the death before the Fall is speaking of human death. 

(starting at around 1 hour and 30 minutes. The link to the time was removed by the forum software)





I don't know where you are finding people who hold to gap theory who don't believe in a literal Adam (are we talking about the same view, the one held by everyone from Thomas Chalmers to C.I. Scofield?). Also, if you try to say anyone who believes in any form of evolutionary process, you are excluding many YEC like Ken Ham who believe in a very rapid evolution sometime between the kinds of the ark and the species we see today.

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## Jack K

It helps to clarify what you mean by "death before Adam."

If you mean human death, then "death before Adam" would mean humans existed before Adam, and this clearly seems not to fit with what Scripture tells us.

If you mean some kind of subhuman but nearly human death, then "death before Adam" suggests an evolutionary process of some sort that resulted in the creation of the first man. As one who believes Scripture is true, I don't like the sound of that either, although I realize there are a handful of scholars who otherwise seem to have a high view of Scripture but hold this out as a possibility. It sounds off to me, but I will admit I have not studied the issue in-depth.

If you mean death on the level of plant life and/or simple organisms, it suggests "death before Adam" means some of the biological processes we know today that involve growth, feeding, and decay were already present in some form before the fall. Scripture tells us several things that help us theorize and argue either for or against various aspects of such death, but Scripture is not so clear as to let us say with much certainty that our theories are completely correct. Moreover, Scripture does not seem interested in giving us a direct answer to this question, suggesting it is not an important one for belief in the gospel, nor a decisive one when it comes to detecting those who trust God's Word and those who don't.

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## Doulos McKenzie

BG said:


> I’m not necessarily talking about a young Christian who simply does not know better but a elder or seminary professor that teaches these things.
> 
> We confess that when Adam (a real person) fell all mankind fell with him.
> 
> If the biblical account of Adam’s fall is a myth then it seems to me that the following is true: 1)our theology is total garbage, 2)the Bible is untrustworthy.
> 
> If however the biblical account of Adam’s fall is in fact true then those men who teach Any form of evolutionary process or gap theory are disqualified from ministry.
> 
> I am puzzled why men who hold to these various theories are held in high esteem by the Reformed community today. It seems to me that this should be a dividing line it is unbiblical, it is not confessional, and it lacks historical support.
> 
> 
> If Adam is a myth what else in the Bible is a myth Noah,Abraham,David,Christ?



Well I think we should distinguish between **Human Death** and plant/animal death. The former happening before Adam is heresy. The latter is problematic but It does not reck the foundation of biblical theology as the former does.


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## OPC'n

I don't see the point of there being a need for claiming death of anything (man, animals, or plants) before the fall. I don't believe Adam and Eve were in the garden long enough to warrant the need for any living thing's death. Also, here's a good article on plants and what causes their death something you wouldn't have found in the garden before the fall. http://scienceline.ucsb.edu/getkey.php?key=642

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## Cymro

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. Death reigned from Adam to Moses.

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## BG

Jake said:


> This might be helpful. Here is a discussion of this topic between two old earth creationists and two young earth creationists. Note that everyone here affirms a literal Adam. The OEC say that the death before the Fall is speaking of human death.
> 
> (starting at around 1 hour and 30 minutes. The link to the time was removed by the forum software)
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> I don't know where you are finding people who hold to gap theory who don't believe in a literal Adam (are we talking about the same view, the one held by everyone from Thomas Chalmers to C.I. Scofield?). Also, if you try to say anyone who believes in any form of evolutionary process, you are excluding many YEC like Ken Ham who believe in a very rapid evolution sometime between the kinds of the ark and the species we see today.



The gap theory teaches that sin and death were here long before Adam ever existed. Therefore saying that those who believe in the gap theory believe in a literal Adam is a little bit deceiving, don’t you think? That is of course if you believe that Adam was the first man. 

Does anyone happen to know whether or not the gap theory and the teaching of the Masonic Lodge have some similarities?

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## TheOldCourse

BG said:


> I’m not necessarily talking about a young Christian who simply does not know better but a elder or seminary professor that teaches these things.
> 
> We confess that when Adam (a real person) fell all mankind fell with him.
> 
> If the biblical account of Adam’s fall is a myth then it seems to me that the following is true: 1)our theology is total garbage, 2)the Bible is untrustworthy.
> 
> If however the biblical account of Adam’s fall is in fact true then those men who teach Any form of evolutionary process or gap theory are disqualified from ministry.
> 
> I am puzzled why men who hold to these various theories are held in high esteem by the Reformed community today. It seems to me that this should be a dividing line it is unbiblical, it is not confessional, and it lacks historical support.
> 
> 
> If Adam is a myth what else in the Bible is a myth Noah,Abraham,David,Christ?



Youth can come in many forms. There are plenty of cases of ones who have professed faith for many years and even held leadership positions while espousing serious error and later come to correction and greater knowledge of the truth. I would hazard a guess that some on this very board might be among that number. I will readily agree with you on the seriousness of the error, the assortment of core doctrines which it undermines, and that one who holds them should not be esteemed by the Reformed community and really should be under discipline. But unless they work out the implications of their error and actually do deny core doctrines (like an Arminian going Open Theist), I am not willing to consider them as non-believers.

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## augustacarguy

The direct inverse correlation between Adam and the Lord Jesus in Rom 5 would suggest (to me) that affirming death before the fall is an extremely serious, and possibly damning error. 


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk Pro

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## BG

Scott Bushey said:


> Bill, Did the person actually say that the story of Adam was a myth or that the story of Adam is allegory or metaphorical?



Not a myth but metaphor also some type of poetry. Very odd. They are convinced that it is a confessional position, they focus on the words the space of six days.


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## timfost

Bill,

I would encourage you to read Kline if you haven't already. I completely disagree with him and can go through point by point where I believe he gets it wrong, but it's also important to hear the antithesis from those who believe and promote it.

As to death before the fall:

1. Rom. 5:12 states clearly that there was no human death prior to the fall ("death spread to all men...")

2. Adam was the federal head of mankind, but his influence went farther than the race itself since he was to have dominion over the creation which was cursed due to his sin.*** Death in general seems to be implied as a result of man's sin, though this is not as clearly spelled out. Furthermore, it's difficult to imagine that there was pain, suffering and death of any kind in the perfection in which it was created.

3. In our time we might define death as any cellular decay. We know that Adam and Eve were told to eat the fruit of the garden. At this level, we might see death prior to the fall, but I don't think there is any reason that this kind of event should be considered "death" from a biblical standpoint, since the host was kept intact.

***Sin first entered the world before Adam, at least by Satan and then Eve. It was Adam's sin, however, that brought on the curse. This further demonstrates the connection between the head of mankind and the effects of the caregiver's failing in ushering in the curse.

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## rekcor

From a pastoral point of view, TS' question can have devastating effects on a persons life. This I know from my own, personal experience.

Being trained as a scientist, questions like these can easily lead to schizophrenic way of living, in which the whole look at life on 'Sunday' (metaphor for: when I read my bible, pray, go to church, etc) becomes completely different than the look at life during the week. 

During the week I am trained to rely on facts, on measurements, on calculations. When I drive my car, go to the hospital, fly in a plane, I completely rely on the results of the scientific method. On 'Sunday' questions like the one in this topic, forces me to suddenly doubt the scientific method at a fundamental level. In other words: TS' question can easily lead to a (false, In my humble opinion) dichotomy: either the bible is true, or science is true, and all attempts to integrate both by sincere Christians are suspicious at best.

Although I personally do not know yest whether there was 'death' before Adam (indeed: let us first get a clear view on what the biblical authors meant by 'death'), I am very happy with orthodox people like Gijsbert van den Brink*, writing articles like http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/14746700.2017.1369759

*) As Prof. vd Brink is Dutch and people might not know him: Vd Brink would easily be accepted by all of you as a full member on this Puritan Board forum, expect (perhaps) because of his views on evolution...

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## BG

rekcor said:


> From a pastoral point of view, TS' question can have devastating effects on a persons life. This I know from my own, personal experience.
> 
> Being trained as a scientist, questions like these can easily lead to schizophrenic way of living, in which the whole look at life on 'Sunday' (metaphor for: when I read my bible, pray, go to church, etc) becomes completely different than the look at life during the week.
> 
> During the week I am trained to rely on facts, on measurements, on calculations. When I drive my car, go to the hospital, fly in a plane, I completely rely on the results of the scientific method. On 'Sunday' questions like the one in this topic, forces me to suddenly doubt the scientific method at a fundamental level. In other words: TS' question can easily lead to a (false, In my humble opinion) dichotomy: either the bible is true, or science is true, and all attempts to integrate both by sincere Christians are suspicious at best.
> 
> Although I personally do not know yest whether there was 'death' before Adam (indeed: let us first get a clear view on what the biblical authors meant by 'death'), I am very happy with orthodox people like Gijsbert van den Brink*, writing articles like http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/14746700.2017.1369759
> 
> *) As Prof. vd Brink is Dutch and people might not know him: Vd Brink would easily be accepted by all of you as a full member on this Puritan Board forum, expect (perhaps) because of his views on evolution...




If evolution is true the Bible is false end of story.

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## rekcor

BG said:


> If evolution is true the Bible is false end of story.



I am sorry, but I fail to see how your response contributes here. The term "evolution" is being used for many things, some being more likely, some being less likely, some having marginal implications for our view on Scripture, some having huge implications.

We see, e.g. "evolution" happening every day, e.g. bacteria becoming resistant to antibiotics.

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## BGF

rekcor said:


> I am sorry, but I fail to see how your response contributes here. The term "evolution" is being used for many things, some being more likely, some being less likely, some having marginal implications for our view on Scripture, some having huge implications.
> 
> We see, e.g. "evolution" happening every day, e.g. bacteria becoming resistant to antibiotics.


I understood him to be using the term "evolution" in the common sense, as in macro-evolution, or wholesale change of species from one to another. This, is often expressed in the evolution of a simple organism to a more complex organism in a continuous chain in which mankind is a participant. It is this type of evolution which is contradictory to the biblical account.

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## Jake

BGF said:


> I understood him to be using the term "evolution" in the common sense, as in macro-evolution, or wholesale change of species from one to another. This, is often expressed in the evolution of a simple organism to a more complex organism in a continuous chain in which mankind is a participant. It is this type of evolution which is contradictory to the biblical account.



That's still not a helpful way to distinguish, as that would exclude even the view of Ken Ham/Answers in Genesis who believes in a limited number of kinds on the ark which evolved to the large number of species present on earth today. 

B.B. Warfield even saw evolutionary thought present in how Calvin viewed Genesis 1-3: https://www.monergism.com/thethreshold/sdg/warfield/warfield_calvincreation.html

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## rekcor

In general, asking questions like 

"Can you be a Christian and believe in X"
With X being a scientific claim

can cause a lot of pastoral damage among Christians working in a scientific environment. Not only do these questions impose a lot of stress on these persons, also their non-academic friends and family members can easily start drawing conclusions like: you are a bad Christian or even: you are not a Christian at all. 

Please let us learn from history, where Christians have condemned persons like Copernicus for claiming that the earth revolves around the sun!

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## BG

rekcor said:


> I am sorry, but I fail to see how your response contributes here. The term "evolution" is being used for many things, some being more likely, some being less likely, some having marginal implications for our view on Scripture, some having huge implications.
> 
> We see, e.g. "evolution" happening every day, e.g. bacteria becoming resistant to antibiotics.



When I say evolution I am not talking about the gene pool expressing itself but the idea that a snake laid an egg and it was a chicken.

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## Douglas P.

BG said:


> When I say evolution I am not talking about the gene pool expressing itself but the idea that a snake laid an egg and it was a chicken.



Can you find a single source that defines evolution this way?

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## Nate

rekcor said:


> TS' question can easily lead to a (false, In my humble opinion) dichotomy: either the bible is true, or science is true, and all attempts to integrate both by sincere Christians are suspicious at best.





rekcor said:


> Please let us learn from history, where Christians have condemned persons like Copernicus for claiming that the earth revolves around the sun!



Rekcor, you mentioned that you are a trained scientist. Do you have a standard method by which you weigh scientific data and interpretations of data? Do you weigh the validity and accuracy of scientific interpretations through the lens of Confessional statements, or do you weigh Confessional statements through the lens of scientific interpretations, or a mixture of both?

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## BG

Douglas Padgett said:


> Can you find a single source that defines evolution this way?



No one believes that birds evolved from reptiles?

I always find it interesting when christians defend evolution. 




rekcor said:


> From a pastoral point of view, TS' question can have devastating effects on a persons life. This I know from my own, personal experience.
> 
> Being trained as a scientist, questions like these can easily lead to schizophrenic way of living, in which the whole look at life on 'Sunday' (metaphor for: when I read my bible, pray, go to church, etc) becomes completely different than the look at life during the week.
> 
> During the week I am trained to rely on facts, on measurements, on calculations. When I drive my car, go to the hospital, fly in a plane, I completely rely on the results of the scientific method. On 'Sunday' questions like the one in this topic, forces me to suddenly doubt the scientific method at a fundamental level. In other words: TS' question can easily lead to a (false, In my humble opinion) dichotomy: either the bible is true, or science is true, and all attempts to integrate both by sincere Christians are suspicious at best.
> 
> Although I personally do not know yest whether there was 'death' before Adam (indeed: let us first get a clear view on what the biblical authors meant by 'death'), I am very happy with orthodox people like Gijsbert van den Brink*, writing articles like http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/14746700.2017.1369759
> 
> *) As Prof. vd Brink is Dutch and people might not know him: Vd Brink would easily be accepted by all of you as a full member on this Puritan Board forum, expect (perhaps) because of his views on evolution...




I’m not sure why you think the scientific method and the Bible are at odds they are not. What is at odds is the scientific method and evolution. 

Every year there are scientific discoveries that catch up to the Bible. I just watched a atheist scientist the other day explaining how science now proves there was once a world wide flood.


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## rekcor

Nate said:


> Do you weigh the validity and accuracy of scientific interpretations through the lens of Confessional statements, or do you weigh Confessional statements through the lens of scientific interpretations, or a mixture of both?



I think not the one nor the other. 

According to Psalm 75:3 the earth stands on pillars, according to science the earth does not. How do you want me to weigh the validity and accuracy of this scientific interpretation through the the lens of Confessional statements?


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## BG

rekcor said:


> I think not the one nor the other.
> 
> According to Psalm 75:3 the earth stands on pillars, according to science the earth does not. How do you want me to weigh the validity and accuracy of this scientific interpretation through the the lens of Confessional statements?



Figure of speech.
The Bible also says the sun rises, no one ever looks at a sunset and says my what a beautiful earth rotating.

I know one thing you don’t do, you don’t apply the scientific method to evolution because it would fail every time. 

Here is a little humor for you.

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## Nate

rekcor said:


> I think not the one nor the other.
> 
> According to Psalm 75:3 the earth stands on pillars, according to science the earth does not. How do you want me to weigh the validity and accuracy of this scientific interpretation through the the lens of Confessional statements?



This passage agrees with WCF 5 that God upholds all things--even creatures as great as the whole earth--by His providence. Everything, including the earth itself, is held in and controlled by His hand.


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## Nate

BG said:


> Can you be a Christian and believe in death before Adam?


God, Adam, and You edited by Richard Phillips is an excellent collection of essays addressing your question: https://www.amazon.com/God-Adam-You-Philadelphia-Conference/dp/1629950661


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## RamistThomist

Back towards the OP: one can hold in a literal Adam and allowing for at least animal death. The two aren't logically contradictory. I'm not saying that's the case, though.

Therefore, one can hold to a literal Adam and still hold to Old Earth.



BG said:


> When I say evolution I am not talking about the gene pool expressing itself but the idea that a snake laid an egg and it was a chicken.



That wins quote of the day.

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## Douglas P.

BG said:


> No one believes that birds evolved from reptiles?



Technically speaking, birds are reptiles, or, according to their phylogenetic classification they are theropods. However, going back to your initial quip on evolution, no one believes that there is ever single-generation evolution. As humorous as some might have found it, it is a gross mis-understanding of what evolution is teaching.



BG said:


> I always find it interesting when christians defend evolution.



At this point I am not defending evolution. I am however, trying to work hard to get a proper, working, and agreeable definition and understanding of evolution, to move this discussion forward. Based on what I've read from this thread so far, there seems to be a complete lack of understanding of the most basic elements of evolution.

Going back to the OP, I know of no direct explicit passage in scripture that states that if you believe in death (human) prior to the fall that you cannot be a christian, but I do know of explicit passages that state that Christian's are not to bear false witness, so it is incumbent upon us to make sure we are properly portraying the beliefs of those we disagree with.

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## Douglas P.

BG said:


> Figure of speech.
> The Bible also says the sun rises, no one ever looks at a sunset and says my what a beautiful earth rotating.



For the record, there are many within the reformed faith, and even some here on the puritan boards, that wholeheartedly believe that the Sun, does in fact, revolve around the Earth. They derive this understanding from scripture.


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## OPC'n

I don't believe in an old earth or evolution because of the weekly Sabbath. God created all things in 6 days and on the seventh day he rested establishing the Sabbath. If it were any more than 24 hours for each day ( one day not equally a million years or so), we wouldn't have a creational commandment for the Sabbath and the 4th Commandment would have no reference. To me, the Sabbath is clear evidence of a young earth and of God creating all things within those six days.

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## BG

If there was death before Adam then our theology/ the confession of faith are wrong. There is no way around that conclusion. Not to mention we will need to reevaluate our hermeneutical principles. How the original audience understood A passage would no longer have any bearing on the way we interpret scripture. Unless, you believe that the ancient Israelites read the book of Genesis and immediately thought millions of years. 

Douglas do you believe in a world wide flood?




Douglas Padgett said:


> Technically speaking, birds are reptiles, or, according to their phylogenetic classification they are theropods. However, going back to your initial quip on evolution, no one believes that there is ever single-generation evolution. As humorous as some might have found it, it is a gross mis-understanding of what evolution is teaching.
> 
> 
> 
> At this point I am not defending evolution. I am however, trying to work hard to get a proper, working, and agreeable definition and understanding of evolution, to move this discussion forward. Based on what I've read from this thread so far, there seems to be a complete lack of understanding of the most basic elements of evolution.
> 
> Going back to the OP, I know of no direct explicit passage in scripture that states that if you believe in death (human) prior to the fall that you cannot be a christian, but I do know of explicit passages that state that Christian's are not to bear false witness, so it is incumbent upon us to make sure we are properly portraying the beliefs of those we disagree with.

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## Free Christian

I found this interesting.
http://creation.mobi/nephesh-chayyah
How can birds be reptile when they were created on different days. They may be the same to non Genesis/creation believer's, but not to those who believe what the Lord has told us.

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## Gforce9

BG said:


> .....the idea that a snake laid an egg and it was a chicken.



 Thanks, Bill, I needed that..........


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## Douglas P.

BG said:


> Not to mention we will need to reevaluate our hermeneutical principles. How the original audience understood A passage would no longer have any bearing on the way we interpret scripture.



This is actually what really started me down the path of shifting my views from YEC to Old Earth to where I am at today. The more I studied how the ancients would have understood the text in it original context the more difficultly I had taking a "Ken Ham-YEC" view of Scripture.

There is no reason to believe, based on all the archaeological and anthropological evidence we have today, that any of the ancients would have understood the world as anything but a flat disk of sorts with the sun and moon and stars embedded in the dome above the earth. This is a literal reading of the text and such a view has precedent even dating to as late as Luther.

Here is a quote from Luther in his commentary on Genesis, and a picture of the cover of his Bible, clearly illustrating this reality.



> "Scripture simply says that the moon, the sun, and the stars were placed in the firmament of the heaven, below and above which heaven are the waters… It is likely that the stars are fastened to the firmament like globes of fire, to shed light at night… We Christians must be different from the philosophers in the way we think about the causes of things. And if some are beyond our comprehension like those before us concerning the waters above the heavens, we must believe them rather than wickedly deny them or presumptuously interpret them in conformity with our understanding."
> 
> [ Luther’s Works. Vol. 1. Lectures on Genesis, ed. Janoslaw Pelikan, Concordia Pub. House, St. Louis, Missouri, 1958, pp. 30, 42, 43 ]









God has given us two forms of revelation, Special and General. Both of which are true and inerrant, so they cannot contradict. God has also given us reason to interpret both, so when one seems to be contradicting the other we should we should press ourselves to equally look at our understandings of both special and general revelation. As I see it, the case for an old round globe orbiting the Sun nearly 93 million miles away makes more sense than a circle with a dome with stars and the sun fastened to that dome.



BG said:


> Douglas do you believe in a world wide flood?



If by global flood you mean something like what AIG would teach it to be: https://answersingenesis.org/media/video/bible/flood-initiation/ than no, I do not think there is any reason to believe this happened.

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## BG

Douglas, thanks for the discussion.


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## Krak3n

Douglas Padgett said:


> If by global flood you mean something like what AIG would teach it to be: https://answersingenesis.org/media/video/bible/flood-initiation/ than no, I do not think there is any reason to believe this happened.



Wait... Is this because you disagree with AIG's theatrical liberty of the account in Genesis or because you disagree with the worldwide flood as taught in Scripture?

Genesis 6:17-20
For behold, I will bring a flood of waters upon the earth to destroy all flesh in which is the breath of life under heaven. Everything that is on the earth shall die. But I will establish my covenant with you, and you shall come into the ark, you, your sons, your wife, and your sons' wives with you. And of every living thing of all flesh, you shall bring two of every sort into the ark to keep them alive with you. They shall be male and female. Of the birds according to their kinds, and of the animals according to their kinds, of every creeping thing of the ground, according to its kind, two of every sort shall come in to you to keep them alive.​I don't understand, are you proposing this is to be understood as only a local flood? A tranquil worldwide flood?

Genesis 7:11-12
...on that day all the fountains of the great deep burst forth, and the windows of the heavens were opened. And rain fell upon the earth forty days and forty nights.​Genesis 7:19-24
And the waters prevailed so mightily on the earth that all the high mountains under the whole heaven were covered. The waters prevailed above the mountains, covering them fifteen cubits deep. And all flesh died that moved on the earth, birds, livestock, beasts, all swarming creatures that swarm on the earth, and all mankind. Everything on the dry land in whose nostrils was the breath of life died. He blotted out every living thing that was on the face of the ground, man and animals and creeping things and birds of the heavens. They were blotted out from the earth. Only Noah was left, and those who were with him in the ark. And the waters prevailed on the earth 150 days.​I ask because, as has been mentioned above regarding death before Adam, there are implications downstream of such views. Such as God's covenant after the flood. (Genesis 9:11-15)

"...I establish my covenant with you, that never again shall all flesh be cut off by the waters of the flood, and never again shall there be a flood to destroy the earth.” And God said, “This is the sign of the covenant that I make between me and you and every living creature that is with you, for all future generations: I have set my bow in the cloud, and it shall be a sign of the covenant between me and the earth. When I bring clouds over the earth and the bow is seen in the clouds, I will remember my covenant that is between me and you and every living creature of all flesh. And the waters shall never again become a flood to destroy all flesh.​If God was promising not to use local floods to bring death... well, I'd say at this point we could probably count the Rainbow as a useless sign.
​See also Peter's brief account in 2nd Peter 2:5: "...if he did not spare the ancient world, but preserved Noah, a herald of righteousness, with seven others, when he brought a flood upon the world of the ungodly..."
​Would you maintain your statement that you "do not think there is any reason to believe this happened", in regards to a worldwide flood?

If I have misunderstood you, and you only meant that you disagreed with AIG's video *in the details* of how a worldwide flood occurred, then I apologize in advance for wasting your time.

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## OPC'n

Douglas Padgett said:


> This is actually what really started me down the path of shifting my views from YEC to Old Earth to where I am at today. The more I studied how the ancients would have understood the text in it original context the more difficultly I had taking a "Ken Ham-YEC" view of Scripture.
> 
> There is no reason to believe, based on all the archaeological and anthropological evidence we have today, that any of the ancients would have understood the world as anything but a flat disk of sorts with the sun and moon and stars embedded in the dome above the earth. This is a literal reading of the text and such a view has precedent even dating to as late as Luther.
> 
> Here is a quote from Luther in his commentary on Genesis, and a picture of the cover of his Bible, clearly illustrating this reality.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> God has given us two forms of revelation, Special and General. Both of which are true and inerrant, so they cannot contradict. God has also given us reason to interpret both, so when one seems to be contradicting the other we should we should press ourselves to equally look at our understandings of both special and general revelation. As I see it, the case for an old round globe orbiting the Sun nearly 93 million miles away makes more sense than a circle with a dome with stars and the sun fastened to that dome.
> 
> 
> 
> If by global flood you mean something like what AIG would teach it to be: https://answersingenesis.org/media/video/bible/flood-initiation/ than no, I do not think there is any reason to believe this happened.



Do you believe that 

1) it took God millions of years to create all things (1 day actually meaning 1 million years or so) or

2) that God created basic forms of all things in 6 days which developed through evolution over millions of years or 

3) something entirely different 

If it be number 1, how do you account for the weekly Sabbath command? How do you account for God creating man in his image if what he first created wasn't a human that we all now are but had to evolve into a human? Did this "potential human" have a soul? One wonders how he could have a soul if he wasn't yet human. What was the thing that God created which millions of years later became a man? 

If it be number 2, would nearly be the same questions.

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## Jake

Sarah,

Regarding your question about the weekly Sabbath: I never found this particularly challenging or helpful regarding the question of the length of the days.

I see the days in Genesis 1-2 as being extraordinary rather than ordinary. One clue to this would be that it was not until day four that the sun, moon, and stars were created, one purpose of which was "to divide the day from the night; and let them be for signs, and for seasons, and for days." Before the division of day from night and the marking of "days" I'm not constrained to view the 7 days of the creation week in Genesis 1-2 as days as 24 hour periods of time.

Finally, when we get to the 7th day, there is an absence of the refrain present on the other days: "And the evening and the morning were the xth day."

In fact, you will notice the word "day" is actually used in at least 3 ways just in the context of Genesis 1 and 2: it is used as the period of each act of creation (day 1-6), it is used to refer to the entire week of creation ("in the day that the Lord God made the earth and the heavens", 2:4), and it is used as the daylight period of each period of creation ("to divide the day from the night"). I'd argue that the "day" that most readily maps to our understanding of an ordinary day is when we read that the sun, moon, and stars were to "be...for days."

The Sabbath is used as a metaphorical pattern in other parts of Scripture. An example would be the Sabbath year, where the 7th year was a year of rest in the agricultural cycle.

I believe the importance of the 7 days of the creation week are important, but I do not think that it is necessary to understand that they are ordinary, 24 hours periods to understand the weekly Sabbath or other Sabbaths.


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## BG

It’s all just a myth! Adam in the garden, Noah and the flood, Jonah and the Big fish, David and Goliath, none of it really happened, next you will tell me a guy raised the dead, walked on water and died for our sins only to be resurrected on the third day. How can any modern scientific person believe any of this stuff. Virgin birth huh.



Jake said:


> Sarah,
> 
> Regarding your question about the weekly Sabbath: I never found this particularly challenging or helpful regarding the question of the length of the days.
> 
> I see the days in Genesis 1-2 as being extraordinary rather than ordinary. One clue to this would be that it was not until day four that the sun, moon, and stars were created, one purpose of which was "to divide the day from the night; and let them be for signs, and for seasons, and for days." Before the division of day from night and the marking of "days" I'm not constrained to view the 7 days of the creation week in Genesis 1-2 as days as 24 hour periods of time.
> 
> Finally, when we get to the 7th day, there is an absence of the refrain present on the other days: "And the evening and the morning were the xth day."
> 
> In fact, you will notice the word "day" is actually used in at least 3 ways just in the context of Genesis 1 and 2: it is used as the period of each act of creation (day 1-6), it is used to refer to the entire week of creation ("in the day that the Lord God made the earth and the heavens", 2:4), and it is used as the daylight period of each period of creation ("to divide the day from the night"). I'd argue that the "day" that most readily maps to our understanding of an ordinary day is when we read that the sun, moon, and stars were to "be...for days."
> 
> The Sabbath is used as a metaphorical pattern in other parts of Scripture. An example would be the Sabbath year, where the 7th year was a year of rest in the agricultural cycle.
> 
> I believe the importance of the 7 days of the creation week are important, but I do not think that it is necessary to understand that they are ordinary, 24 hours periods to understand the weekly Sabbath or other Sabbaths.


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## Jake

BG said:


> It’s all just a myth! Adam in the garden, Noah and the flood, Jonah and the Big fish, David and Goliath, none of it really happened, next you will tell me a guy raised the dead, walked on water and died for our sins only to be resurrected on the third day. How can any modern scientific person believe any of this stuff. Virgin birth huh.



For the record, I affirm the existence of Adam, Noah, Jonah, David, and Goliath and affirm that Jesus was born of a virgin, raised from the dead, walked on water, died for our sins, and was resurrected on the third day regardless of what modern science says.

At the same time, I recognize that there are differences in interpretation in the first two chapters of Genesis. Nothing I said in that post necessarily speaks to the age of the heavens or the Earth. Others have recognized similar interpretative difficulties who believe the Earth is thousands of years old; other Godly, Reformed men believe that they might point to an older Earth.

I also recognize that God speaks infallibly in Scripture, but that we can still learn from study of God's creation as the "heavens declare the glory of God" (Ps. 19). The study of God's creation will not contradict God's infallible Scriptures if done well, but just as our study of God's creation can err, so can our study and interpretation of God's Word err. I believe we as Christians can look to both for answers on certain questions as they should never contradict, even though present interpretations may contradict.

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## OPC'n

Jake said:


> Sarah,
> 
> Regarding your question about the weekly Sabbath: I never found this particularly challenging or helpful regarding the question of the length of the days........



I've started a new thread on this because I feel we are derailing this thread.

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## py3ak

Douglas Padgett said:


> God has given us two forms of revelation, Special and General. Both of which are true and inerrant, so they cannot contradict. God has also given us reason to interpret both, so when one seems to be contradicting the other we should we should press ourselves to equally look at our understandings of both special and general revelation. As I see it, the case for an old round globe orbiting the Sun nearly 93 million miles away makes more sense than a circle with a dome with stars and the sun fastened to that dome.



I appreciate Douglas's clarity and transparency on this topic. I think he provides a clear statement and a good example of the typical moves that undergird the kind of conclusions he reaches.

1. The idea of "natural revelation" is extended to include matters beyond _a knowledge of God and his will_ available through nature to include whatever we know about the cosmos.
2. This knowledge is often considered quite certain. 
(Of course, the certainty of what we know about the cosmos is called into question by the philosophy of science. Furthermore, if it isn't elevated to the level of divine speech, then it is entirely susceptible to correction by divine faith, which is the surest form of knowledge we have.) 
3. Scripture is interpreted not just by "general revelation" but in fact in dialogue with current scientific consensus. 
(That hasn't worked out terribly well in the past, and since that consensus changes over time, in principle it leads to continual re-interpretation of Scripture.) 

All this may lead to rather unfortunate re-interpretations of Scripture, as we attempt to salvage some credibility for it at the bar of "general revelation."

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## BG

Ruben, great point, Science is ever changing with new discoveries every day. I believe that scientists are abandoning evolution while christians are embracing it.


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## Douglas P.

Krak3n said:


> Wait... Is this because you disagree with AIG's theatrical liberty of the account in Genesis or because you disagree with the worldwide flood as taught in Scripture?



This is a bit of a loaded question setting up quite the false dichotomy. But I'll try and answer your question to the best of my ability.

First, part one, yes, I do disagree with the "theatrical liberty" of AIG because it completely distorts what is actually said in Scripture. Which leads me into part two; being that the ancients would have likely thought the earth to be a flat circle of sorts setting above a "deep" covered by a dome which holds back the waters above, (where those waters that would ultimately cover the earth during the flood came from), I am to conclude that God was accommodating the knowledge and understanding of the hearers at the time, that is that there was a worldwide flood as they would have understood it, but that no global flood has every occurred.




OPC'n said:


> Do you believe that
> 
> 1) it took God millions of years to create all things (1 day actually meaning 1 million years or so) or
> 
> 2) that God created basic forms of all things in 6 days which developed through evolution over millions of years or
> 
> 3) something entirely different



God has taken 13.82 billion years to create everything we can see. 



OPC'n said:


> If it be number 1, how do you account for the weekly Sabbath command? How do you account for God creating man in his image if what he first created wasn't a human that we all now are but had to evolve into a human? Did this "potential human" have a soul? One wonders how he could have a soul if he wasn't yet human. What was the thing that God created which millions of years later became a man?



As I've stated above, I believe God was accommodating the cosmological views of the day. So incorporating the Sabbath command is not terribly difficult.

As to the other part of your question, at this point, I still haven't argued for common ancestry of humans to other primates. But, genetic discoveries of the past two decades certainly do make an almost undeniable case that modern humans do share common ancestry with other primates.

The implications of this does raise some very good questions, like those you have brought up.

At this point, I do not have every answer, but I am persuaded that, at some point, mankind, and Adam as the first of mankind, was in some sense covenantaly created _in_ God's image, just as we are created as new creatures _in _Christ.




py3ak said:


> I appreciate Douglas's clarity and transparency on this topic. I think he provides a clear statement and a good example of the typical moves that undergird the kind of conclusions he reaches.
> 
> 1. The idea of "natural revelation" is extended to include matters beyond _a knowledge of God and his will_ available through nature to include whatever we know about the cosmos.
> 2. This knowledge is often considered quite certain.
> (Of course, the certainty of what we know about the cosmos is called into question by the philosophy of science. Furthermore, if it isn't elevated to the level of divine speech, then it is entirely susceptible to correction by divine faith, which is the surest form of knowledge we have.)
> 3. Scripture is interpreted not just by "general revelation" but in fact in dialogue with current scientific consensus.
> (That hasn't worked out terribly well in the past, and since that consensus changes over time, in principle it leads to continual re-interpretation of Scripture.)
> 
> 
> All this may lead to rather unfortunate re-interpretations of Scripture, as we attempt to salvage some credibility for it at the bar of "general revelation."



Ruben,

I am either not following what you're saying or you're not following what I am saying, but I'll take another shot at explaining myself.

I do not think that scripture should be interpreted by general revelation or even in dialog with scientific consensus. My point is that both our understanding of God's special revelation and God's general revelation require the human mind, infallible as it is, to use reason and our other mental faculties to come to some sort of understanding of both.

In other words, all things being equal, there is no reason to assume that we would be any more fallible or infallible with our understanding of either general or special revelation.



BG said:


> Ruben, great point, Science is ever changing with new discoveries every day. *I believe that scientists are abandoning evolution while christians are embracing it.*



Bill, you've thrown out a couple of lofty, but unsubstantiated claims, in this thread so far. You may believe that scientists are abandoning evolution, but do you have any proof of this? I follow this stuff pretty closely and am not seeing anything like this.

If anything, the trend seems to be the YEC are trying to synthesize evolution with their 6000 year old earth world view. https://thenaturalhistorian.com/201...ans-of-hyper-evolution-following-noahs-flood/

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## Krak3n

Douglas Padgett said:


> This is a bit of a loaded question setting up quite the false dichotomy. But I'll try and answer your question to the best of my ability.
> 
> First, part one, yes, I do disagree with the "theatrical liberty" of AIG because it completely distorts what is actually said in Scripture. Which leads me into part two; being that the ancients would have likely thought the earth to be a flat circle of sorts setting above a "deep" covered by a dome which holds back the waters above, (where those waters that would ultimately cover the earth during the flood came from), I am to conclude that God was accommodating the knowledge and understanding of the hearers at the time, that is that there was a worldwide flood as they would have understood it, but that no global flood has every occurred.



My "loaded question" was an attempt to be charitable, understanding that I could have misunderstood your statement. My thought was surely you didn't really mean you were against a global flood, you must taike issue with the way AIG described it. Also, there was no false dichotomy. I front loaded my proofs from scripture that demand a real global flood with what God said about the account, the animals being needed to procreate (Why not just allow them to migrate back?), the issue regarding God's covenant with Noah (There have been many local floods since, has God broken his covenant with Noah?), as well as Peter's account of what happened (Or was Peter also just as dull of what really happened as the original readers?). You believe it was a false dichotomy because you read into scripture a third option that does not actually exist.


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## py3ak

Douglas Padgett said:


> Ruben,
> 
> I am either not following what you're saying or you're not following what I am saying, but I'll take another shot at explaining myself.
> 
> I do not think that scripture should be interpreted by general revelation or even in dialog with scientific consensus. My point is that both our understanding of God's special revelation and God's general revelation require the human mind, infallible as it is, to use reason and our other mental faculties to come to some sort of understanding of both.
> 
> In other words, all things being equal, there is no reason to assume that we would be any more fallible or infallible with our understanding of either general or special revelation.



Douglas, what do you call it when our understanding of "general revelation" causes us to take another look at our interpretation of Scripture?

There are actually two reasons to believe that our understanding of special revelation will be better (though not infallible) than our understanding of general revelation. The first is the nature of special revelation: Scripture is verbal and propositional, capable therefore of more exactitude than non-verbal revelation. Second, the Holy Spirit gives wisdom through reading Scripture, and for reading Scripture.

ETA: I see from https://puritanboard.com/threads/young-earth-old-earth-which-is-it.94466/#post-1152689 that Douglas is further away from my own views than I had estimated. On that basis, certainly he is right that it is not so much that Scripture is _reinterpreted_ to accord with "general revelation", as that "general revelation" tells us which parts of Scripture intend to make affirmations about the world and which do not. This is formally distinct from a concern for _harmonistic_ interpretation which some OEC and AiG take up (though in a mirror-image kind of way).

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