The Religion of Evolution

Matt:
That was amazing. I'm cutting that, and pasting it into Word to read carefully when I have more time. I wish I had your grace and ease with English, and your ability to clarify difficult ideas.

 

A head-in-sand approach to a point that you "need" that you need-to-prove and that you merely-assume instead of establishing objectively- is not a compelling form of persuasion.

However - it seems that shallow "proof by assumption" has satisfied your intellectual interest - so I suppose you can relax and move past that point.

Again "assuming" that the ACCOUNT of the creation event is "mythology" is your approach while you also "assume" that the myths of evilutionism are "accounts" are "fact". Assuming that non-science of evolutionisms mythology to be "Fact" or even "observable fact" merely shows the extent to which evolutionists are willing to corrupt the scientific method to pursue their religious convictions.

Here you "almost make a point".

Fish and birds were created on the "same day" according to the "Account". What you needed to say was "in our mythology there were fish Long before there were birds but in the Bible account they both come about in the same age - the same day". But if you had been thinking you could easily have noted "in the Bible account the Sun is created and placed in the sky the day AFTER the plants are created. This is impossible from a humanistic-naturalistic religious perspective and making the day last for ages - only exacerbates the problem".

In other words - those Christians who choose to corrupt the text of Genesis - make the day an undefined period of ages - do nothing to satisfied humanism nor do they solve the problems for our scientists today who can create neither Sun nor moon nor earth nor single-cell. And it certainly does not fit any chronology supposed by the mythologies of evolutionism.

Far from it. You would need to "start with exegesis" to even BEGIN to understand the term "Yom" as used in Genesis and summarized by God in Exodus 20:8-11

The "colossal problem" you have already had in your post - is that you fail to value scripture, or objective methods of reading it - you know - exegesis. How in the world can you expect christians to trash the text as "the new objective exegetical method"?

Jesus IS the "Word" that really Was IN THE BEGINNING.

You start by "denying" the Word of God regarding the "Beginning" and declare that this has increased your appreatiation of "the Word" made flesh.

Do you believe in Jesus? Salvation? the Fall of Man? The sinful nature?

From what did man fall?

If Christ restores us to the paradise of "tooth-and-claw, caranage and death, extinction and starvation" -- you know "the Garden of Eden" - then will your "religion" be satisified?

IN christ,

Bob

[ April 16, 2003, 10:56 PM: Message edited by: BobRyan ]

 

I do not deny the Word of God. Jesus is the Word of God; the Bible never claims that title for itself. If you read my post on Anthro's 'cooperating with God' thread in the Politics forum you will get a fairer idea of where I stand and hopefully be in no doubt as to my salvation. I'll say two things here though in addition: firstly, to me, Genesis 1-3 is an allegorical description of the Fall of all of us and the state we are in; therefore it is necessary for a Redeemer, namely Jesus Christ, to save us from our own nature - no problem with that, the problem I have is with the literalist quasi-scientific interpretation of it. Secondly, a question to Bob and Helen, which requires a very simple yes or no answer - do rabbits chew cud, yes or no?

Yours in Christ

Matt

 

The Genesis 1-3 section you refer to calls ITSELF a "the ACCOUNT" of the creation of earth and ALL that is in it.

You "Rewrite" that to say "an allegory".

Peter (Pope Peter for some) - says that the OT text "is NOT a matter of ones own interpretation but holy men of old moved by the Spirit of God Spoke From God".

Indeed - it is "The Word of God" according to that NT saint - speaking of the OT text.

So in fact evilutionists must first compromise the Gospel of Christ to wrench evolution from the text instead of the objective model of exegeting its true meaning.

In Christ,

Bob

 

"Men moved by the Spirit of God" does not amount to "Word of God" - this is a title for Jesus only and to equate the Bible with this amounts to a form of idolatry.

I see you haven't answered the question, Bob. What about rabbits, Bob? R-A-B-B-I-T-S.

Yours in Christ

Matt

 

Matt -

What is the problem with Rabbits?

Is it their "divided hoof"?

They have a single stomach - not a multi-stage one, but they "appear" to chew the cud. So if the "human" were the one "looking" to see "whats for dinner" - they might have that to deal with.

Bob

 

Heb 4 states "The WORD of God is living and active and sharper than a two edged sword".

The apostles SPOKE "the Word of God"

Those who minister in the church but are not preaching the Gospel are "neglecting the Word of God" to minister to tables (Acts 6:1-3)

Acts 13:46 "It was necessary that the Word of God be SPOKEN to you".

Romans 9:6 speaking of the OT promises to the Hebrews "But it is not as though the Word of God has failed".

1Thess 2:13 Paul declares that the inspired words spoken by the apostles are "The Word of God".

In Christ,

Bob

 

Exactly my point, Bob - the Bible, while divinely inspired, is filtered through human agency and is therefore going to contain the sort of inaccuracies that result therefrom such as the inaaccuracy that rabbits chew cud. Now do you get it? (BTW - point taken re 'Word of God' - I just tend to flinch a bit when the Bible appears to be worshipped as much as God )

Yours in Christ

Matt

 

Helen wrote:

Helen, can you believe “what something says” without first determining what it means, that is, what the speaker or author intended? Consider the following text:

Do you believe what this says? Don’t you first have to decide what its speaker or author meant?

The point is that to say “I believe what Genesis says” requires making a prior determination as to what the author(s) or Author meant, i.e., the meaning the A/author(s) intended us to understand from the text. If you believe that Genesis 1-3 should be understood as a literal historical account of events, then you have made a determination that the A/author(s) intended us to understand the text in just this way. Genesis is just a string of Hebrew characters, meaningless in itself (it would indeed be meaningless if it had been typed by chance by an army of monkeys ), until one has made a determination as to what the A/author(s) meant and intended us to understand by it.

If we are agreed on this point, we can get on with the task of discussing the point of disagreement, namely how God or the human authors of Genesis intended its readers to understand this text.

 

In the case of the Rabbit it is clear to the human that it does not have a hoof (split or otherwise) - but they do appear to chew the cud.

Since the human is the one making the decision about "dinner", the fact that they appear to chew the cud is not debated - rather the fact that they obviously do not have a split hoof is the clincher. Opening the rabbit up to see that in fact he is not chewing the cud - would not make sense.

IN the case of the 7 day week of Creation - the rotation of the earth CAUSING the day and nigt sequence is not mentioned. Although we know scientifically that this is what caused that sequence and we know that some kind of single-side light source must have been used.

INSTEAD of going into that - the presentation is made from the human point of view standing on the ground. And what they "SEE" is the day and night sequence - they "see" exactly ONE and they "see" that it is 1 day instead of months or years. So in fact Moses is NOT gettin the "Rotation of the planet" story - (i.e. the FULL story) he is getting the pratical effect as seen by a human from the ground.

That is Waaaaaaaaaay different than saying that the night was a billion years and the day was a billion years and that the rotation of the earth had nothing to do with either one etc, etc.

The mythology that evolutionism weaves into the "account" of God's creation STARTS with the premise "There IS no CREATOR God" and the only way a "CREATOR God" would be allowed is if he "Obviously does NOTHING", in other words - ONLY if natural forces and events account for EVERYTHING can there be a "god" because then you can fully discount him in ALL presentations on "origins".

But that "religion" of evolutionism fully corrupts the Gospel.

In Christ,

Bob

 

Hi Bob and everybody.

Bob, there's no question that between your view of theology and the view of science as to the facts of the history of the universe, something's gotta give. The two are mutually incompatible.

But I say that in fact even you do not always take the bible literally for what it directly says, and when you find a verse that says something you know to not be true, you will find a way to reinterpret the verse to make the necessary adjustment. This in spite of the fact that you will have to bend the rules of logic and language to do this. You will then deny you bent the rules.

For example, take the now famous verse about all flying insects having four legs. Not just grasshoppers, mind you, but every flying insect is asserted to have four legs!

See Leviticus 11:22 - 23.

Now we know that no winged creatre having both four legs and wings ever existed. Six legs and wings, yes; two legs and wings, yes; nothing else.

So typically a literalist such as yourself will deny the sense of the words and say they are not meant to be literal, but are a figure of speech, perhaps an idiomatic phrase. If this is not your tack, you have some other way of denying the sense of the verses, but that is not mine to say just what you do, perhaps you'll share.

Let's consider those who suggest the words are merely an idiom. I submit that this is cheating, the only reason you know them to be non-literal is because they are not true. In fact, such interpreters allow their judgement of what is true to supercede the literal words of scripture right here in this passage, and they do this not out of disrespect for God or the Bible, but because we all know grasshoppers and other flying insects actually have six legs, period.

By the same line of reasoning, knowing as we do that the genesis narrative is not strictly true in the literal sense, we can declare it to be best interpreted in a non-literal manner, can we not?

The only thing that stops someone such as yourself from going along that route is - you have not yet realized evolution is, in fact, true.

Once you come to that realization you will be able to interpret scripture along the lines as you interpret Leviticus 11:22-23 even now.

Perhaps you personally will manage to avoid accepting the evidence; I will call that rationalizing away the truth, you will call that being faithful to the Bible. But alas, you will have to deal with many who have both trusted Christ for salvation and acknowledged God's use of evolution in His creative process for the rest of your life. Please be very careful to not turn any of them away from the kingdom by insisting they believe something they know to not be true!

 

You "guess that God's Word regarding origins is not true" but you don't "know it".

Paul,

I have argued that the "very DETAILS" of the Gen 1-3 "Account" are appealed to by God in the 10 commandments in His OWN summary of the 7 days of creation AND by the NT authors in making their case for various points of the Gospel.

I did not argue that "Grasshoppers" were at the nexus of the Gospel message.

I argued that the literal fall of man from a perfect sinless "paradise" was -- i.e. the VERY details that evilutionism's high priests defy in the mythologies that they spin and then hope to wrap scientists around their myths as human shields.

The fact is - science itself can not show evultionism to be a fact and the compromise of evolutionism and Christianity corrupts the Gospel.

Your Bird and grasshopper supposition not withstanding.

In Christ,

Bob

 

quote: Paul
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By the same line of reasoning, knowing as we do that the genesis narrative is not strictly true in the literal sense, we can declare it to be best interpreted in a non-literal manner, can we not?
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Actually the sad truth is - it isn't even man's knowledge of events 6000 years ago vs God's knowledge of events 6000 years ago.

It is man's unverifiable "guesswork" vs God's "truth".

It is like an ignorant savage in the darkest jungle "speculating" that computers evolve from the clustering of rocks and trees given "enough time and chance" compared to Intel's "explanation" for the same. The one who "DID IT" has far more credibility than the one who merely ignorantly speculates about it from a great distance. Even on something so simple as a computer.

In Christ,

Bob

 

So, when God shows us His creation directly, we cannot understand it, because we have limited understanding, but if some people wrote about it thousands of years ago, and handed it down through numerous translations and revisions by men, then we have perfect information about it?

No, that makes no sense. It is an error to suppose that one can't directly understand reality, but that reading the Bible gives you omnisicence.

If the Bible and reality seem to contradict each other, it is because we have misunderstood one or both of them. It is the worst sort of pride to imagine that our personal interpretation of Scripture is God's word.

 

God is not standing you - or any atheist you know, on the brink of the abyss and displaying His act of creating a solar system with a living planet in it.

I may SEE the sun today and SEE it again tomorrow. And without knowing How to CREATE the Sun I DO KNOW that I SAW it today and that I SAW it the next day. This is obvious - but evoltionism lives in denial of the "obvious".

But IF God DID show you his creative work - I would "expect" that you could write down what you saw in that seven day timeline EVEN without exhaustive scientific research into each event.

A 12 year old could write down "what they saw" and we would "believe them" while knowing that they did not understand all the "science" involved. HOWEVER - a 12 year old should be able to comprehend that "evening and morning is ONE day". And sure enough - they do. They should know "A plant when the see one". They should know "the Sun when they see it".

And sure enough -- they do.


In Christ,

Bob

 

Galatian asks:
So, when God shows us His creation directly, we cannot understand it, because we have limited understanding, but if some people wrote about it thousands of years ago, and handed it down through numerous translations and revisions by men, then we have perfect information about it?

All the more reason that we should be careful about trying to shoehorn our own ideas into Genesis. The evidence shows that the Earth is billions of years old, and that it formed over millions of years. From the first, many, if not most Christians realized that Genesis could not be about six literal days.

We accept the Bible because it has been handed down to us on the basis of tradition, and scholarship and inspiration of men who gave us the most recent versions. Our particular understandings of their particular understandings might not be inspired by God, but by our own desires.

The Bible is about God and man and our relationship. It is not about science. If you try to take science lessons from it, you will end up imagining that the Earth is a disk, that rabbits chew cud, and other false ideas.

Galatian observes:
No, that makes no sense. It is an error to suppose that one can't directly understand reality, but that reading the Bible gives you omnisicence.

We should always be aware that we are interpreting Scripture through our own hopes and desires, no matter how hard we try. None of us know precisely what it means. A little humility would go a long way.

Since most of us are theists, I think your accusation is unfortunate.

Barbarian observes:
If the Bible and reality seem to contradict each other, it is because we have misunderstood one or both of them. It is the worst sort of pride to imagine that our personal interpretation of Scripture is God's word.

That is the problem. Everyone thinks that they take it at face value. Yet, there are many different understandings. Yours is as valid as anyone elses, albeit a minority among Christians.

There is nothing within the Bible that comments either way on many scientific phenomena. Evolution is one of those.

 

How do you know the Hebrews use that exact "four footed" classification? I am unaware of any examples contemporary with the writing of Leviticus to that effect. Do you have such an example, other than the one of which we speak? If not, then you are merely rescuing the contradiction by making an assumption. As I recall, you mentioned having seen this explanation in the Talmud but cannot find the reference at this time. The Talmud itself often contains blatent examples of obviously made up ad-hoc statements, so whether it was you or a an earlier Talmudic writer who made this up to rescue the error, it makes no difference.

Of course, perhaps we could be kind to each other. I'll allow you to make up this rescue of inerrancy if you'll allow me to make up a rescue of inerrancy for Genesis 1. But we gotta be fair both ways, apply the same rules both ways.

We'll "only" need to make the "day" be indefinate, and also we need to allow these "indefinate days" to be overlapping, not exclusively following each other in turn. With that slight modification . ..

And we can say that any departure from the strict literal sense is due to idiomatic use of the words!

Why not? For that is exactly what you just did above with the Leviticus passage.