Is Genesis Narrative or Metaphor?

[A5pointer]

Green, very well balanced comments. Reminds me of, sermon on the mount or plain or both? Back to Mr. B, Mr B. must be confronted with the gospel of Jesus Christ. Conversations on the accuracy of Genesis are certainly appropriate but the unconverted come into the kingdom clinging to the cross not by mental persuasion that the bible is indeed reliable.

 

[JohnV]

I can give you my views on this, if you like. They're just my own thoughts, and nothing more than that.

The wedding album might do as an example to show what difficulties we face in such discussions. I've seen many wedding albums, and I've looked at my own a number of times as well. These are still shots of live events now in the past, gone to history.

As I look at my own wedding pictures I can recall the events, and also remember that some of the shots are out of sequence with the events for different purposes. Pictures of the different tables happened throughout the night, while other things were going on. From the background of some of the pictures I can see something relating to other pictures, maybe a page or two or ten backwards or forwards in the album. But they're on this page for a more important reason than to show series of events.

When I look at someone else's wedding album, laid out perhaps exactly the same way, the pictures only tend to confuse me if I try to figure out the series of events, the history of what happened that night. I can piece some things together, but I can't possibly write a history of the evening just from the pictures. I need narratves.

Science can only deal with still pictures from the past. And they're not complete pictures at that. At most science can only tell us a few things about the particular moment from that partial still shot. From those few things science assumes patterns, and from those patterns extrapolates a history.

The Bible gives us narratives. These too are partial, in bits and pieces. They can't possibly cover the whole frame of events; a book that size would not be enough to accurately cover even one day thoroughly, never mind the centuries it tries to cover. Many, many shortcuts have to be used in order to give us both the accuracy of history and the general line of events for that time era from the creation to the last days of Joseph. It does not mean that the history is inaccurate, nor that the events are not real events, nor that the things described are not described as they should be.

Narrating a single event is very difficult. Any hockey player knows that if he watches hockey on TV, listening to the man doing the play-by-play. His very simple narrative is so inaccurate, and yet he puts the very same course of events into words very well, so that people will even listen to that game on the radio as if they're watching it on TV, or as if they're at the game. We older gents will especially recall that feeling of being at the game when listening to the radio. But I've had to, at times, play the radio beside the TV because that was the only sound I had with the game I was watching. And the announcer was getting many things wrong. Most of the reason is because he has to keep up with the play, so he takes shortcuts, but some of it is also for the sake of smooth delivery. This is narrative at it's simplest, and yet filled with problems as far as accuracy, historicity, and communication are concerned. And one game lasts only sixty minutes: one hour.

There are different problems with different kinds of portrayals or evidences of the past. Each kind must know its limitations, and each must be aware of the others' powers. What the six-dayers have difficulty with when it comes to evolution is that the latter is a superimposed narrative of the past based on a number of partial images. What evolutionists had difficulty with when it comes to creation is that the Bible gives a biased and scientifically unverifiable account of the same era. It doesn't mean that the partial snapshots are inaccurate, nor that the narrative of the Bible is inaccurate. It simply means that men do too much when they presumptuously superimpose upon an approach to history.

There are a host of things to consider. Even if Genesis is only allegory, it is still God's Word. Therefore God's allegory is more to us than thousands of "accurate" tellings from men. God tells us in His great wisdom what we need to know about His redemptive work, both in creation and the salvation that follows. So the problems increase; they do not decrease in limiting Genesis to allegory. We can argue ten thousand different things as opposed to the few things we now debate. Was Adam real? Did he have a name, or was he just called "Man"? These questions become manifold when we ask what it was that Adam symbolized. For in falling from grace he symbolized neither Christ nor the devil. Where we had a few possible answers we would now have innumerable possible answers. Without a norm, a set standard, an allegory becomes so open that it becomes meaningless.

I used to be very concerned about the inroads of evolutionistic teaching, especially when the church was starting to incorporate it into her theology. But I'm not so concerned about that anymore. Those who are so interested in making the church relevant to our "scientific" world betray something that I believe is much more important. And that is that they betray their indifference in the Word of God as the Word of God. The religion of the Bible becomes a personal theology for them, with each one believing his own views. They are not subject to the Word of God, because the meaning of the Word of God may be changed to support what they believe to be true. Or I should say, what they want to believe to be true. They have no more grounding for their theories than a house built on flowing sand; yet they build their eternal theologies upon it. They are unwilling to submit to God. Instead they make a display of submission to God's Word, but as it is amended to fit their own theologies.

There are several of these kinds, not just the "scientific" crowd. There is also the "philosophical" crowd; and there's the "prophetic" crowd as well, just to name a few. They are unashamed to submit God's Word to their latest theories, and then asserting things as "true" out of that practice. "Bible doctrine" becomes defined by a man's own conscience out of God's Word, not God's Word alone.

And so you have it that a few cast doubt upon the literal translation of a particular word in Genesis, and from that doubt elevate their own theories to the same level as God's "allegory". Suddenly, from this casting of doubt upon just one word, the Framework Hypothesis, the Day-Age Theory, the Analogical Day Theory, Theistic Evolution, or any other man-made theory is equal to God's allegory in Exodus 20. This is what I see is the great problem in our day; this is why we cannot answer the skeptic: we have too many pretenders raising their voices before ours, overtop of ours, demanding that they rightfully ought to be listened to. But God does not send men out to preach their own messages; He sends them out to preach His message.

We have partial knowledge, a few snapshots, a few artifacts, a few witness narratives. They have severe limitations to them. It took over three hundred snapshots of our wedding and reception to make our wedding album, and they could not tell an accurate story by themselves. My wife's and my narratives (to those who are interested to listen) tell some of the story, but some of the pictures will cause stumbling blocks to that narrative: we have to take shortcuts to get the story across, and too often are not as accurate as the pictures of the same event. Neither the pictures nor the narratives are the historical event itself; and each one must accommodate to expediencies.

 

[VictorBravo]

I'm trying to get my head around the purpose of the original question. (Not the original questioner, I agree with him!).

Why can't Genesis be a true story, artfully well told? Jesus took it that way. Paul referenced it that way. Other biblical writers took it that way. Why on earth should I view it any differently?

 

[greenbaggins]

You shouldn't. Genesis is a true story told with an apologetic art directed against Ancient Near Eastern gods. It is true historically, theologically, and literarily. And it is true especially in how it relates to the original audience (not that it isn't true now! It is, but we have to get at that truth through understanding the context and how ancient people thought).

 

[caddy]

From B:

As cheezy and blasphemous as it may sound, I would compare the old testament stories to the movie "300".

It's a true story and can be said to be "historically accurate", with much real evidence proving that it happened. And yet it's basically a cartoon, with many many inaccuracies and exagerations. The story's purpose is not to tell us how exactly 300 Spartans managed to defeat at least 1,000,000 Persians. Or that Xerxes was an 8ft-tall bald giant. Even if the timelines and many facts are wrong and exagerated, the story has great value.

 

[JohnV]

From B:

As cheezy and blasphemous as it may sound, I would compare the old testament stories to the movie "300".

It's a true story and can be said to be "historically accurate", with much real evidence proving that it happened. And yet it's basically a cartoon, with many many inaccuracies and exagerations. The story's purpose is not to tell us how exactly 300 Spartans managed to defeat at least 1,000,000 Persians. Or that Xerxes was an 8ft-tall bald giant. Even if the timelines and many facts are wrong and exagerated, the story has great value.

If this is the impression I gave above, I'm truly sorry. I was trying to say the opposite. I was assuming that everyone knows that I am dead set against these other views making their way into the churches and onto the pulpits. What I tried to convey is that Genesis rises above pictures, images, narratives, and such like, as human a human endeavour, even if it's only an allegory. But it's not an allegory: that's not a possibility. God can do what no sports announcer can do, what no historian can do. When God narrates, it's infallibly accurat, historical, scientific, and all the rest. More than we have a right to question.

 

[caddy]

I understood you correctly JohnV and appreciated your comments and this reply as well.

From B:

As cheezy and blasphemous as it may sound, I would compare the old testament stories to the movie "300".

It's a true story and can be said to be "historically accurate", with much real evidence proving that it happened. And yet it's basically a cartoon, with many many inaccuracies and exagerations. The story's purpose is not to tell us how exactly 300 Spartans managed to defeat at least 1,000,000 Persians. Or that Xerxes was an 8ft-tall bald giant. Even if the timelines and many facts are wrong and exagerated, the story has great value.

If this is the impression I gave above, I'm truly sorry. I was trying to say the opposite. I was assuming that everyone knows that I am dead set against these other views making their way into the churches and onto the pulpits. What I tried to convey is that Genesis rises above pictures, images, narratives, and such like, as human a human endeavour, even if it's only an allegory. But it's not an allegory: that's not a possibility. God can do what no sports announcer can do, what no historian can do. When God narrates, it's infallibly accurat, historical, scientific, and all the rest. More than we have a right to question.

 

[caddy]

Reflecting on the O.T. narrative of Genesis being "like a movie" is the focus of Brian Godawa's excellent article in this month's copy of Modern Reformation. He explains that movies are visually dramatic stories, and in the Bible, the dominant means through which God communicates is visually dramatic stories--not systematic theology, not doctrinal catechism, and not rational argument. We are told that 30 % of the Bible is expressed through rational propositional truth and laws, while 70 % is story, vision, symbol, and narrative. Story telling is very important to God. Consider the sense of awe at the majestic panoramic depiction of good battling evil in the Lord of the Rings. Remember the visual punch in the spiritual gut experience through The Passion of the Christ. The thousands of miracles that God performed for his people in the Bible were not mere abstract propositions, but "signs and wonders," sensate visual displays of God's glory. Drama is relationship in action, and it certainly appears that God loves drama. It is existential rather than intellectual. As we follow characters working through their moral dilemmas and personal journeys, so we learn through them. It is one thing to rationally explain the concept of forensic justification, but the power of seeing Jean Val jean being forgiven in Les Miserables embodies that truth existentially like no theological exposition possibly could.

Godawa points out how Ezekiel, Jeremiah, Job are not simply limited or tied only to their words, rather they were performances. They actually lived out individual dramas, just as our lives are individual dramas and stories--Real histories of wrong choices and God influenced choices, just as Harriet Lichenstien of Israel in 2000 BC lived a real life drama. It is mentioned that the books of Job and Jonah themselves are depicted in dialogues reminiscent of ancient plays, including prologues, epilogues, and several acts. Job's friends function as the chorus of ancient theatrical performances just as the 8ft bald Xerxes did. The Book of Mark structurally resembles a Greek tragedy. The Bible is a book filled with stories of God's redemptive activity in history. The Bible is not a systematic theological textbook. It communicates doctrine and theology mostly through story. Storytelling draws us into truth by incarnating worldview through narrative. Creation, Fall, and Redemption, the elements of a worldview, are a narrative progression of events that can be seen in all movies.

Jesus taught about the Kingdom of God mostly through parables--sensate, dramatic stories. To him, the Kingdom was far too deep and rich a truth to entrust to rational abstract propositions. Can science do better than narrative at reconstructing these stories through contrived formulas? How can it when they naturally presuppose a story totally different yet one equally based on faith claims? Godawa points out that Jesus chose stories of weddings, investment bankers, unscrupulous slaves, and buried treasure over syllogisms, abstractions, systematics, or dissertations. Jesus could do abstraction. He preferred not to.

Indeed, stories and parables may be a superior means of conveying theological truth than propositional logic or theological abstraction. As N.T. Wright suggests, "It would be clearly quite wrong to see these stories as mere illustrations of truths that could in principle have been articulated in a purer, more abstract form...A biblical story is not simply a 'delivery system' for an idea. Rather, the story first creates a world and then invites the listener to live in that world, to take it on as part of who he or she is....Narratives make story-shaped points that cannot always be paraphrased in propositional statements without losing something in translation. If you try to dissect the parable scientifically you will kill it, and if you discard the carcass once you have your doctrine, you have discarded the heart of God.

Excerpts taken from Volume 16, Number 5 September / October 2007 Modern Reformation, P.6,7.

 

[A5pointer]

I just got my MR will be sure to read that article. Your post makes sense to me.

 

[weinhold]

I appreciate you response.

I find interesting your ability to divorce science from the story. What science in the Genesis account can be incorrect and still be a believable and doctrinally sound "story"? Who determines what is fact and what is not fact in the Genesis account? How far do we go with this line of thought? Do we take it into the the death, burial, and ressurrection of Jesus Christ? Or would you concede that this account is scientifically accurate? If Genesis is not then how do we know that the events surrounding the life of Christ are? And what do you understand about the inspriation of scripture?

When you say that scripture can be wrong or scientifically incorrect then you make yourself the judge of scripture rather than scripture being your judge.

And lastly I found your ability to call something true even when the scientific facts are believed to be incorrect. What author could I read to look into such a mind set?

And just a side question. Do you identify yourself with the Emerging Church Movment?

Whew, that's a lot of questions! But they are good ones, and so I'll try to answer each of them as best I can.

#1 What science in the Genesis account can be incorrect and still be a believable and doctrinally sound "story"?

I suppose the bit about the firmament is a good example. See post 27.

#2 Who determines what is fact and what is not fact in the Genesis account?

Attempting to verify facts in Genesis strikes me as a terribly deficient way of approaching it, like spending one's career researching Shakespeare's biography but neglecting his plays. Such obsession with factuality shrivels one's soul like a raisin when instead it might become an exquisite merlot. So while I suppose that readers themselves must attempt to discern as accurately as possible the text at hand, we would of course agree that no single reader determines the factuality of a biblical text.

#3 How far do we go with this line of thought? Do we take it into the the death, burial, and ressurrection of Jesus Christ? Or would you concede that this account is scientifically accurate?

A great question that leads me to a crucial definition of terms. There seems to be some confusion about the word "history" that I hope to clarify. We can use the term factually, meaning a direct correspondence between the account found in, say, Genesis and the events of the past themselves. Alternatively, we can use "history" to mean a perspectival narrative of the past. I think Scripture uses the second type of history, and the person and life of Christ is a perfect example. We have four Gospels, each with slightly different story to tell about Jesus of Nazareth. Though it is obvious that each of these stories references somebody who actually existed (we must remember that the Synoptic problem stems not from discrepancies between the accounts but from their surprising similitude), each story purposefully presents us with a slightly altered form of it.

In a critique of my comments in this thread, someone mentioned the Jesus Seminar. I'm sure most of you are familiar with their efforts to unveil "the historical Jesus," by which they mean the Jesus who lived in the past, whose dusty sandals trod across the roads of first century Palestine. Their publication of the Gospels employs a system for ranking their level of confidence in the scriptural words of Christ. Did Jesus really say "For God so loved the world," etc.? As I wrote before regarding the factual quantification of Scripture, this effort earns the epithet "ridiculous." Scripture is not an old t-shirt that conceals the body of the past; it is a ravishing gown that accentuates its beauty. If we approach a text of Scripture and ask it to be scientifically accurate or correspond precisely to the past, we are in essence ripping off the gown. But when we allow the text to be what it is, when we are awestruck by its unique beauty, then it reveals itself to us.

#4 If Genesis is not then how do we know that the events surrounding the life of Christ are?

As I wrote before, the very nature of beginnings seems to necessitate their being mysterious. With Christ, we have the accounts of eyewitnesses. But who witnessed creation?

#5 And what do you understand about the inspiration of Scripture?

This is a simple question whose answer unfortunately requires much more complexity. I believe that the books of the Old and New Testaments were written by fallible, finite human beings in fallible, finite languages during specific historical, political, social, economic and cultural situations. I believe that through His Holy Spirit (and in ways that I cannot really understand), God inspired those fallible and finite authors, languages, and cultural situations to write His words. I believe that this miracle occurred in the original manuscripts (which we have not discovered). I also believe that the manuscripts and translations of the Old and New Testaments to which we currently have access are generally true to the original manuscripts, though with varying degrees of precision. This reliability is a work of the Holy Spirit. I believe that the Holy Spirit works to produce scholars in Christ's Church who will faithfully examine the Scriptures, and I believe that He works in readers of Scripture, opening the truth to us as we read. I admit that I have no idea how any of that works; I admit that it is a spiritual mystery. Nonetheless, I affirm it. I admit that I bridle over words of evangelical etiquette like "inerrant" or "infallible." I bridle because strident theological debate--necessary though it was--has hollowed the life out of them and made them mere passwords for entry into the clubhouse of evangelicalism. They are lazy words, and they are insufficient words. For me, the Bible is trustworthy; it is true; it does what it intends to do; and it is reliable. It is not merely black ink on white pages; it is Word of the living God. It wants to become a part of us, and we should be enthralled by not just its truth but its astounding beauty. And we should seek to be faithful to it, to submit to it. We should let it live in us, and we should live in it. This is only a partial answer, of course, but I hope that it begins to communicate my posture toward Scripture in a way that you find satisfactory.

#6 And lastly I found your ability to call something true even when the scientific facts are believed to be incorrect. What author could I read to look into such a mind set?

I'm not sure what you found my ability to be, and I'm not sure what source I could direct you toward. I don't think I've ever read anything that says exactly what I'm saying, though I'm sure I'm not the first, and I'm sure that my studies in literature have taught me this perspective. I'll keep thinking about a possible reference.

#7 Do you identify yourself with the Emerging Church Movment?

Oh good, an easy question! No, I don't identify myself with the Emerging Church.

 

[weinhold]

I'd love to continue this conversation, if you folks think it will be profitable.

 

[DMcFadden]

Paul,

I deeply respect the highly nuanced and intellectually satisfying hermeneutic that animates your points. For most of my ministry, I found the Day Age (and even more satisfying) the Framework theories as ways to follow Calvin's principle of accommodation, allowing the truth of Scripture to speak (i.e., "lisp") in language that could be true and meaningful without denying the "truths" of science.

Frankly, in several academic programs, NOBODY ever gave more than a snide dismissal to the idea that the universe could be anything other than 20 billion (during my college years), 16-18 billion (during seminary), or 13.7 billion (the current estimate) years old. In fact, a belief in young earth creationism was often associated with the most ignorant kinds of fundamentalism.

So, with B.A. (Biblical studies), M.Div., D.Min., M.A.O.M., and a couple of certificate programs in hand, I blithly stuck with the Hugh Ross type approach to science.

Meanwhile my mainline denomination continued to move further and further away from basic orthodoxy. Even some professing to be "evangelicals" began to defend gay marriage and ordination of practicing homosexuals. My battles with the theo-left kept coming up against the fact that my own highly nuanced hermeneutic with respect to Genesis 1-11 sounded a awful lot like the arguments being used by some to argue for revisionist views of human sexuality. Ultimately my judicatory (270 congregations) withdrew from the national body.

My uneasiness with saying that "The Bible 'says' this, but it really 'means' that" in Genesis precipitated a re-examination of the evidence regarding creation. I have found greater satisfaction in the presuppositional apologetics of the Answers in Genesis group and the arguments they have advanced for taking the Bible literally from the very first verse.

And, just yesterday, I returned from a conference in Denver dealing with radioactive decay and the age of the earth sponsored by another creationist group that uses a more evidentialist approach. They feted a number of PhD scientists to discuss their RATE project results. They pointed out that C14 with its notoriously short half-life of 5,730 yrs. should not even be found in a measurable form in anything older than 60k - 100k. Yet, we have significant quantities of C14 in coal samples from different strata dated hundreds of thousands of years to hundreds of millions of years ago by conventional "experts." C14 can even be found in diamonds supposedly millions of years old!

Further, the findings of goodly amounts of helium in zircon crystals defies the conventional dating schemes. U238 decays naturally, resulting in helium and lead. Heat seems to accelerate the diffusion of helium from zircon crystals. The model was tested with assumptions of a recent creation and an old earth. The helium diffusion rates conform exactly to the young earth model and are off by a factor of several hundred thousand from the old earth model, even when adjusted for different assumptions for heat.

One of the presenters in Denver discussed accelerated radioactive decay. He has done work on gravitational time dilation as a way of dealing with the distant starlight problem using Einsteinian relativity theory equations to predict a young earth. Historically, many have argued that the fact of starlight from distant stars militates against a young earth.

Another project by this same organization has the inventer of the genetics technique used in virtually all of the genetically engineered crops in the world to argue that the mutations and degradation in the human genome will not tolerate a human history of more than a few thousands of years.

All of that is quite interesting. However, it does little more than to show that one can take the Bible in a straight-forward manner without committing intellectual suicide. However, as I mentioned, the Answers in Genesis crowd takes a different approach framing the issue in terms of one's presuppositions and worldview. I appreciate their clear framing of the matter in terms of assumptions even if I do not fully subscribe to all of their Bahnsen-esque apologetic.

But, they make a very sound point. If we concede that Genesis does not mean what it says in chapters 1-3, and if there is no universal flood, no tower of Babel, etc., why should we believe that it should be taken any more literally in the New Testament? While yom may mean many things, it certainly means "day" in Exodus 20:11 when God's creation of the world in six days is linked to the institution of the Sabbath. Jesus did not just accommodate himself to the ignorance of the day and speak with a wry smile and a wink in his eye, did he? Nor did Paul take the need for the Second Adam any less literally than the problem occasioned by the first Adam.

 

[caddy]

Excellent Post Dennis!

 

[DMcFadden]

Actually, the process of taking the Bible in a more straight forward way also carried over to my soteriology. For years I was a Baptist who waffled on the number of points of Calvinism I believed ("guess" which one was my problem, duh!). The hermeneutical shift away from old earth creationism came along with a much belated reconsideration of the atonement. Thanks to the good efforts of people like Sproul, Piper, and Owen my entire theology began to take on a much more consistent (I would argue "biblical") cast. Incidentally, R.C. Sproul (sr.) credits RTS's Kelley for his own shift to young earth creationism from his earlier endorsement of Ross's progressive creationism. I am probably the only person alive who came into Calvinism via an argument about Genesis. Nevertheless, here I am.

 

[2 Tim 4:2]

I admit that I bridle over words of evangelical etiquette like "inerrant" or "infallible." I bridle because strident theological debate--necessary though it was--has hollowed the life out of them and made them mere passwords for entry into the clubhouse of evangelicalism. They are lazy words, and they are insufficient words.

I disagree. Mens use of the words are merely that. The nature of the words do not really change only the intention of mens hearts. Setting aside any perceived misuse of these words what then would be your inhibitions to using such words?

 

[shackleton]

I have noticed that a belief in an old earth naturally leads one to believe in death before the Fall, death then is not a punishment for sin. Death no longer being the result of sin, but a natural occurance, slowly erodes away a belief in the seriousness of Orginal Sin. Then the belief that we are not that bad and the way to fix it is a sort of "psychological gospel," one that deals with the effects of sin, rather than sin itself.
It is sort of a man centered way of looking at it. If all of life got here by chance, then all of our lives now tend to be governed by chance, God is not necessary. Even if God started things running and dealt with the consequences, he is still not very involved. It erodes sovereignty. It seems like the natural outflow of a "Free Will" hermeneutic.
I hope that is clear.

 

[k.seymore]

Shackleton said "I have noticed that a belief in an old earth naturally leads one to believe in death before the Fall, death then is not a punishment for sin. Death no longer being the result of sin, but a natural occurance, slowly erodes away a belief in the seriousness of Orginal Sin. Then the belief that we are not that bad and the way to fix it is a sort of "psychological gospel," one that deals with the effects of sin, rather than sin itself."

While Calvin didn't believe in an old earth (if I remember right, he only interacts with two options, instantaneous creation vs. 6-day) he certainly says life was temporal before the fall, he just doesn't call it death. I thought this was interesting because we normally think that it would have been continuous earthly life, but he seems to think about it differently. Adam's earthy life would have ended, but that end would be a beautiful transition into heavenly life, not an end of life altogether. In regard to God threatening death to Adam, Calvin says, "under the name of death is comprehended all those miseries in which Adam involved himself by his defection..." Here is more from the commentaries on Genesis 2:

"But it is asked, what kind of death God means in this place? It appears to me, that the definition of this death is to be sought from its opposite; we must, I say, remember from what kind of life man fell. He was, in every respect, happy; his life, therefore, had alike respect to his body and his soul, since in his soul a right judgment and a proper government of the affections prevailed, there also life reigned; in his body there was no defect, wherefore he was wholly free from death. His earthly life truly would have been temporal; yet he would have passed into heaven without death, and without injury. Death, therefore, is now a terror to us; first, because there is a kind of annihilation, as it respects the body; then, because the soul feels the curse of God. We must also see what is the cause of death, namely alienation from God. Thence it follows, that under the name of death is comprehended all those miseries in which Adam involved himself by his defection; for as soon as he revolted from God, the fountain of life, he was cast down from his former state, in order that he might perceive the life of man without God to be wretched and lost, and therefore differing nothing from death. Hence the condition of man after his sin is not improperly called both the privation of life, and death. The miseries and evils both of soul and body, with which man is beset so long as he is on earth, are a kind of entrance into death, till death itself entirely absorbs him; for the Scripture everywhere calls those dead who, being oppressed by the tyranny of sin and Satan, breath nothing but their own destruction. Wherefore the question is superfluous, how it was that God threatened death to Adam on the day in which he should touch the fruit, when he long deferred the punishment? For then was Adam consigned to death, and death began its reign in him, until supervening grace should bring a remedy."

 

[weinhold]

Dennis and Mark, thanks for your replies. I'll be sure to interact with you tomorrow. For tonight, I have a (his)story for B:

Long ago, around the time of Beowulf, the prince of Russia, whose name was Vladimir of Kiev, decided it was time to establish a national religion. To accomplish this task, Vladimir sent envoys to the three major religions: Islam, Judaism, and Christianity. When his emissaries returned, they reported back to the prince. The first emissary reported on Islam, and when he said that alcohol is forbidden for Muslims, Vladimir said, "this must not be the religion for Russia." When the second emissary returned to give his report on Judaism, he said that the God of that religion had scattered his people, so that they had no land of their own. Vladimir did not think this could be the religion for Russia either. But the official from Constantinople, having seen the Hagia Sophia, said to Vladimir, “We know not what people believe in that faith, but when we entered into their house of worship everything was so beautiful that we knew not whether we were on earth or in heaven.” At that moment, Vladimir knew that Christianity was the right religion for his people.

B, I'm not sure if you've ever thought of beauty as a motive for conversion, but the Russians certainly did. They recognized that Christianity is not simply a logical religion; it is a beautiful one. As I've been commenting in this thread regarding Genesis, one reason I am captivated by Scripture is its aesthetic quality, and I think the same could be said for the Christian faith in general. Just some food for thought.

***

Know that you have my deep respect for honestly grappling with ultimate questions, for seeking nuanced and intellectually satisfying answers, and for probing the veracity of Christianity. As for any questions or doubts you might have, keep wrestling. God can handle it, so wrestle hard. I am confident that if you seek the truth, you will find it. And remember, God knows our weakness; He does not require that we know, only that we believe. In my own wrestlings, I've found this adage helpful.

Ok, I couldn't resist! Here's another (his)story:

Long ago, King Edmund I of England was approached by Christian missionaries. At that time, England was a pagan country. After hearing these missionaries, Edmund asked his wise men whether or not he could trust them. One of the wise men said, “O king, the life of man is like the life of a sparrow. He flies into the mead hall out of the dark and the cold and the ice and for a brief time he is in a lighted room where there is music and song and wine and food and merriment, but he flies on through, and flies out the other window into the dark and the cold and the ice and the snow. Such O king is the life of man as our faith teaches it. If these have anything more to say than that, I suggest that we hear them.” And so because of the hope that Christianity brought, England adopted Christianity as its national religion.

 

[weinhold]

Unfortunately, I don't have time to answer both Dennis and Mark tonight. My apologies. I will answer Mark tonight, and Dennis tomorrow.

Here is what Mark said:

I disagree. Mens use of the words are merely that. The nature of the words do not really change only the intention of mens hearts. Setting aside any perceived misuse of these words what then would be your inhibitions to using such words?

If by "the nature of words" Mark means the meaning of words, then I'm afraid I must disagree with his premise. Definitions (both denotative and connotative) change with usage; just think about the way words like "gay" or "web" or "memory" or "drive" have changed in recent years, not to mention completely new words like "blog" or "google." That being said, Mark might argue that words like "inerrant" and "infallible" can still do the work they need to do, and that would be a reasonable argument to make. As it is, however, I do not think they act as sufficient modifiers for "Scripture" unless they are qualified in some aspects and expanded in others.

 

[2 Tim 4:2]

Unfortunately, I don't have time to answer both Dennis and Mark tonight. My apologies. I will answer Mark tonight, and Dennis tomorrow.

Here is what Mark said:

I disagree. Mens use of the words are merely that. The nature of the words do not really change only the intention of mens hearts. Setting aside any perceived misuse of these words what then would be your inhibitions to using such words?

If by "the nature of words" Mark means the meaning of words, then I'm afraid I must disagree with his premise. Definitions (both denotative and connotative) change with usage; just think about the way words like "gay" or "web" or "memory" or "drive" have changed in recent years, not to mention completely new words like "blog" or "google." That being said, Mark might argue that words like "inerrant" and "infallible" can still do the work they need to do, and that would be a reasonable argument to make. As it is, however, I do not think they act as sufficient modifiers for "Scripture" unless they are qualified in some aspects and expanded in others.

What is it about anything in Genesis that drives you to determine that it is just a story and not historically or scientifically accurate?

 

[weinhold]

What is it about anything in Genesis that drives you to determine that it is just a story and not historically or scientifically accurate?

Mark, I don't presume to determine what is historically or scientifically accurate in Genesis. How could one substantiate such a claim?

I sincerely apologize for giving you this false impression.

 

[weinhold]

Dennis, thanks for your patience with me. I'm glad to finally respond to your post.

I suppose that if one felt the need to scientifically account for our beginnings, then the type of investigation you mention above would prevent intellectual suicide. To me, however, it just seems a bit silly. Whatever the factual event of creation was, it is neither observable nor repeatable, so how could science allege a conclusive answer? What we have in Genesis is more constant than scientific fads, more beautiful than cold facts, more functional than a DVD of the creation event. What would be so great about a scientific explanation, and why does Genesis need to correspond with the creation event, for which science itself cannot account? I hope these questions communicate my perspective about Genesis: I fail to understand why critics of Genesis fault it for lacking scientific precision, and I also fail to understand why its proponents accept the very same premise when they defend it.

Dennis writes:

If we concede that Genesis does not mean what it says in chapters 1-3, and if there is no universal flood, no tower of Babel, etc., why should we believe that it should be taken any more literally in the New Testament? While yom may mean many things, it certainly means "day" in Exodus 20:11 when God's creation of the world in six days is linked to the institution of the Sabbath. Jesus did not just accommodate himself to the ignorance of the day and speak with a wry smile and a wink in his eye, did he? Nor did Paul take the need for the Second Adam any less literally than the problem occasioned by the first Adam.

I think the problem with this paragraph is the vagueness of "mean what it says" in the first sentence. I would never concede that what the Bible says is not true. But as I have written above, I envision truth as a genus; factuality and story are species of truth. Even if Genesis were proven false in their factuality (a conclusion science cannot provide), it would still be a true story.

Your thoughts?

 

[DMcFadden]

Paul,

Now I must plead for patience. Tonight is not the time to respond thoughtfully.

Briefly, I do not believe that we must "prove" that the Bible corresponds to science. My claim is that the nature of historical narrative militates for a more straight-forward reading of Genesis as a summary, but not factually inaccurate, re-telling of the great work of God's creation. It is only when some Christians confront secular claims to a hegemony on "truth" in their account of origins and respond by capitulating to the naturalistic version of things that I put forth chinks in the scientific account. Your final sentence is doubtless true. However, why even make the distinction here?

Exodus 20:11 may be the most embarrassing verse in the Bible for the 21st century Christian. Most conservatives hold to some form of old earth viewpoint. Yet, Exodus 20:11 seems to ground the institution of the sabbath yom in the creation yom of Genesis.

 

[Archlute]

I agree that Exodus 20:11 presents a real problem for the metaphorical reading of the early chapters of Genesis. As well, the inconsistency of the "sophisticated" hermeneutic which Paul and others embrace is clearly shown when the question is asked as to why that approach is not consistently applied to the great bulk of the book outside of the first three chapters. Notice that I said "consistently" applied. For example, if one were to apply Kline's Framework hermeneutic with true consistency to the rest of Genesis, it would make historical mush out of the Abraham cycle. Nobody that I am familiar with gets all bent out of shape about the historicity of the Patriarchal narratives (except for the Society of Biblical Literature radicals), but it is linguistically clear that the Hebrew prose used in those narratives is no different than the linguistic usage of the first three chapters of the book.

Does this mean that Moses, as guided by the Holy Spirit, had no stylistic genius when tailoring the truth of these events to the ear? Not at all - they are completely historically accurate, as well as represented with stylistic savvy.

If you want to see the change in Hebrew syntactical style between historical narrative and poetic metaphor, all you have to do is compare the historical books with any of the prophetic oracles, the Psalms, the Song of Solomon, etc. It will quickly become clear that there is a difference that should be obvious to any modestly skilled Hebrew reader. In fact, the Prophetic and Poetic portions of the OT are not even assigned for study at WSC until the second and third years. Why is that? Because they are so much more difficult and complex when compared to historical narrative, that the first year student cannot even begin to decipher most of it. The distinction between history and metaphor becomes quite obvious.

 

[Gloria]

If Genesis isn't literal, was there a REAL Adam? If Adam wasn't real, then Adam didn't fall. If Adam didn't fall, we aren't in sin and are able to live sin free. If we are born sinless why do we need a savior? The line of questioning goes ON and ON. I REALLY believe that toying with Genesis (ESPECIALLY stories in Genesis like the creation story and the fall) toys with the fundamentals of the Christian faith.

I really think that people who say/think things like this do not examine the full implications of it. They are definitely treading on thin ice.

I mean, seriously, the first prophecy of the coming messiah is mentioned IMMEDIATELY after the fall in Genesis 3:15...

 

[2 Tim 4:2]

What is it about anything in Genesis that drives you to determine that it is just a story and not historically or scientifically accurate?

Mark, I don't presume to determine what is historically or scientifically accurate in Genesis. How could one substantiate such a claim?

I sincerely apologize for giving you this false impression.

So you have no way of knowing if Genesis 3 is accurate? How would such a position clarify mans fall and need for Christ?

 

[jtbdad]

Amazon.com: An Introduction to the Old Testament: Books: Edward J. Young

One of my favorites!

I have a first edition I was able to buy from the library book sale for $1.60.

 

[weinhold]

So you have no way of knowing if Genesis 3 is accurate? How would such a position clarify mans fall and need for Christ?

Mark, how could anyone conclusively prove with science (a created thing) that the universe was spoken into being by God? How could anyone give a conclusive and exhaustive narrative of the creation event, let alone any events that followed after it? These realities exist in the past, behind the text, but they are not realities that we are meant to see. As I said before, Scripture is a sumptuous gown; we need to be enthralled with the beauty it brings, not constantly peeking underneath it.

 

[DMcFadden]

Paul,

As a presuppositionalist, I begin with the idea that you can either start with God or with naturalistic materialistic assumptions. Beginning with God, the account of Genesis corresponds with an increasingly impressive fit to recent science research. Beginning with time, chance, and matter you can also make the facts "fit" the metanarrative. My contention is that the "facts" of science more comfortably conform to the presupposition of the God described in Genesis.

 

[2 Tim 4:2]

So you have no way of knowing if Genesis 3 is accurate? How would such a position clarify mans fall and need for Christ?

Mark, how could anyone conclusively prove with science (a created thing) that the universe was spoken into being by God? How could anyone give a conclusive and exhaustive narrative of the creation event, let alone any events that followed after it?

This is an interesting question from a Christian. Since I never alluded to such an idea it appears that this is simply the basis you use to interpret scripture.(correct me if I am wrong) The reason why I find it so interesting is that as a Christian we begin with the idea that God is. Scripture doesn't work to prove God but presupposes His existence. As Christians we also presuppose that scripture is the work of God. (2 Tim 3:16-17) And that it reveals Christ. (Luke 24:27)

So what I am asking is, does the Genesis account reveal an actual fallen man, in need of an actual redemption, by the shed blood of Christ. Does it reveal the Messiah, who came and shed His blood for a fallen man. Does it reveal a penalty for sin and rebellion toward God that is eternal. If so is it accurate in its revelation of these things?