Adam and Eve and???

[Salty]

On another thread it was theorized that God created not just Adam and Eve but others as well.
Part of the reason for this theory - is that otherwise Cain would only have had a sister to marry.

You can read the full post here - Post #1 on this link:

The reason for starting this thread is that it was brought up on a KJO thread.

So what are your thoughts

Open for discussion

 

[rlvaughn]

I'll start by giving the response I gave over there. The originator of that thread brought up the topic of Adam, Eve, Cain, Seth, and incest, and said at one point:

I am open to any legitimate explanation of where Cain and Seth's wives came from that DOES NOT INVOLVE INCEST. So far, all I've gotten is "They married their sisters", which is unacceptable.

The simple, even if inconvenient, truth is that "Eve...was the mother of all living." (Genesis 3:20) It seems that the "RVO" reads "Eve was the mother of all living, except for those women God specially created to marry her sons!"

If it is unacceptable that Cain and Seth married their sisters, then I suppose it is also unacceptable that those who belong to Christ are the seed of one who married his sister (Cf. Genesis 20:12).

 

[Baptist4life]

And then......what about after the Flood, when there were only eight people alive on earth? Did God again create some more people for Noah's family to marry? Ridiculous.

 

[PastoralMusings]

I think that one of the issues before us is the failure to recognize that some things were revealed progressively, and the revelation regarding incest was not immediately revealed. That came during the days of Moses.
Then there's the issue that incest would not have been a problem before the fall, nor immediately after the fall. The problem would arise with time, as genetics changed and inbreeding would become a problem.
Another issue is the problem of seeking to impose one's own ideas upon the Word rather than yielding to the authority of the Word.

 

[TCassidy]

And then......what about after the Flood, when there were only eight people alive on earth? Did God again create some more people for Noah's family to marry? Ridiculous.

Their wives would not have been sisters, but the next generation would all have been first cousins. So, once again, robycop has to invent other people, contradicting what God clearly says in His infallible word.

 

[rlvaughn]

In the other thread Logos1560 brought up scriptural or theological problems associated with speculation about Cain's and Seth's wives not being descendants of Adam and Eve. He may address it here at some point, but I think it is worth reposting now.

The scriptures support the view that God created only Adam and Eve and that all human beings descended from them. Your speculation would conflict with scriptural teaching about the fall of man-kind and its consequences. "In Adam all die" (1 Cor. 15:22), "by one man sin entered into the world and death by sin, and so death passed upon all men" (Rom. 5:12), "by one man's offence death reigned by one" (Rom. 5:17), "by the offence of one judgment came upon all men" (Rom. 5:18). The scriptural teaching about how all man-kind became sinners and die then ties in to how Christ, the second Adam, could provide redemption.

 

[robycop3]

The TRUTH is, WE DON'T KNOW WHERE CAIN & SETH'S WIVES CAME FROM! We can only theorize and speculate.

I have never said "I know for sure God created other people to mate with A&E's children". I only said it's POSSIBLE. It cannot be either accepted or ruled out completely. WE SIMPLY DO NOT KNOW! And we have no way of knowing til God tells us.

But we DO know GOD HATES INCEST.

I've heard the theory that the "sons of God" of Genesis 6 could've been the source of producing these women. After all, there were giants then, and giants when the Israelis invaded Canaan. Again, it's just another unprovable theory.

I'm not gonna lose any sleep over it. It is what it is. God knows; we don't. It all worked out; we are here.

 

[Salty]

IF God did create others - then they too, like Eve would have had to sin .........

 

[Jerome]

The TRUTH is, WE DON'T KNOW WHERE CAIN & SETH'S WIVES CAME FROM! We can only theorize and speculate.

I have never said "I know for sure God created other people to mate with A&E's children". I only said it's POSSIBLE. It cannot be either accepted or ruled out completely. WE SIMPLY DO NOT KNOW! And we have no way of knowing til God tells us.

But we DO know GOD HATES INCEST.

Please elaborate on how this ties in to your race theories:

I TOTALLY reject the "incest" explanation, based upon GOD'S hatred of it, and the fact that there are five distinct races of people today, all just-as-human as the other, all just-as-eligible for salvation, but each different in appearance and physical characteristics.

 

[Baptist4life]

The TRUTH is, WE DON'T KNOW WHERE CAIN & SETH'S WIVES CAME FROM! We can only theorize and speculate.

I have never said "I know for sure God created other people to mate with A&E's children". I only said it's POSSIBLE. It cannot be either accepted or ruled out completely. WE SIMPLY DO NOT KNOW! And we have no way of knowing til God tells us.

But we DO know GOD HATES INCEST.

I've heard the theory that the "sons of God" of Genesis 6 could've been the source of producing these women. After all, there were giants then, and giants when the Israelis invaded Canaan. Again, it's just another unprovable theory.

I'm not gonna lose any sleep over it. It is what it is. God knows; we don't. It all worked out; we are here.

You're in a deep hole, roby, yet you keep digging............

 

[rlvaughn]

I have never said "I know for sure God created other people to mate with A&E's children". I only said it's POSSIBLE. It cannot be either accepted or ruled out completely.

Of course it can be ruled out. God created two people who are the ancestors of all living persons.

The TRUTH is, WE DON'T KNOW WHERE CAIN & SETH'S WIVES CAME FROM! We can only theorize and speculate.

Even if we leave aside for the moment any "theories" about where Cain's and Seth's wives came from, we do not have to speculate where Abraham's wife came from. The Bible spells it out. [Sarah] is my sister; she is the daughter of my father, but not the daughter of my mother; and she became my wife (Genesis 20:12). Do you reject this also?

 

[Revmitchell]

The idea that it was once permissible and then later God said do not do it makes God inconsistent is just false.

 

[agedman]

In support of neither side, I think it important to remember sin came through Adam not Eve.

Eve is the mother of all living.

If I recall, the gods of the ancients were all male, and called many names. Yet there was only a single woman goddes always considered as bearing and nurturing (feeding) many.

Just a few random thoughts leaving any traveling to conclusions for others to journey.

Wasn’t this topic a part of the interrogation at the “Scopes” trial?
Scopes Trial - Facts & Summary - HISTORY.com

 

[percho]

In support of neither side, I think it important to remember sin came through Adam not Eve.

Eve is the mother of all living.

If I recall, the gods of the ancients were all male, and called many names. Yet there was only a single woman goddes always considered as bearing and nurturing (feeding) many.

Just a few random thoughts leaving any traveling to conclusions for others to journey.

Wasn’t this topic a part of the interrogation at the “Scopes” trial?
Scopes Trial - Facts & Summary - HISTORY.com

Just a thought.

Eve is the mother of all living.

At the moment that was said, who all were living?

 

[agedman]

Just a thought.

Eve is the mother of all living.

At the moment that was said, who all were living?

I suppose that if one were to consider that the Redeemer came from the line of Adam and Eve, then she is certainly the mother of all living.

Again, not drawing a conclusion, but does that exclude her as being the only?

I notice the NIV and NLT renditions have that she would become the mother of all living where others place it in the past tense, she was the mother of all living.

Perhaps those who have interest in the languages can express the thinking of why one should hold to the NIV or NLT rather than the KJV or NASB in this verse.

 

[TCassidy]

The TRUTH is, WE DON'T KNOW WHERE CAIN & SETH'S WIVES CAME FROM! We can only theorize and speculate.

Wrong again. Eve is called "Mother of ALL living." Period. End of discussion. God is not a liar!

 

[agedman]

Wrong again. Eve is called "Mother of ALL living." Period. End of discussion. God is not a liar!

As a Scholar would you look into the expression of the statement by the NIV and NLT as "would become" in contrast to the KJV and NASB "was the"?

 

[TCassidy]

Perhaps those who have interest in the languages can express the thinking of why one should hold to the NIV or NLT rather than the KJV or NASB in this verse.

The Hebrew is pretty clear. "Eve" means "life" or "life-source" in this context (it is a substantive). The LXX even uses Ζωή to translate the word. This name (Eve, Ζωή, Life) was given by Adam to his wife, “because,” as the text explains “she became the mother of all living,” that is, because life of all of Adam's descendants was guaranteed to come through the woman.

 

[rlvaughn]

This discussion incited me to write a little more about in on my blog, Who was Cain’s wife? Here is an excerpt.

Defining Cain’s or Seth’s marriages to their sisters as incest is an anachronism, reading back into the record as unlawful something that was not unlawful at the time it occurred. Moses gave the law restricting close intermarriage (Leviticus 18:6, 9-11). Moses’s law came some 2500 years after the time of Cain and Seth. Even Abraham, whose calling came about 430 before Moses’s exodus from Egypt (Genesis 15:13), married his half-sister. “[Sarah] is my sister; she is the daughter of my father, but not the daughter of my mother; and she became my wife” (Genesis 20:12). This would have been illegal under the Law of Moses – “The nakedness of thy sister, the daughter of thy father, or daughter of thy mother…thou shalt not uncover.” Yet God called Abraham – (this incestuous brute according to some!) – to be the father of the faithful! See Galatians 3:9 and Galatians 3:29.

Something is amiss with a charge that indicts God as well as his people.

 

[rlvaughn]

The Hebrew is pretty clear. "Eve" means "life" or "life-source" in this context (it is a substantive). The LXX even uses Ζωή to translate the word. This name (Eve, Ζωή, Life) was given by Adam to his wife, “because,” as the text explains “she became the mother of all living,” that is, because life of all of Adam's descendants was guaranteed to come through the woman.

That, and the fact that Moses did not need to correct it 2500 years later when he wrote it down! She was still the mother of all living.