Can a literal Genesis creation story really hold up?

[rusra02]

If I created the house with my bare hands as well as the rest of the world and then proceded to create these individuals intentionally so that they would make mistakes it still seems like a dick move for me to blame them for doing what I designed them to do in the first place.

What Adam did was not a mistake. It was a willful act of rebellion. Neither did God create them to do bad. They were perfect humans with no inborn tendencies to sin. I believe it is as Deuteronomy 32:3-5 explains:"For I will declare the name of Jehovah. Tell about the greatness of our God! **The Rock, perfect is his activity, For all his ways are justice. A God of faithfulness who is never unjust; Righteous and upright is he. *They are the ones who have acted corruptly. They are not his children, the defect is their own." The fact that Jesus Christ led a faultless life of integrity to God as a perfect man shows that Adam and Eve could have done so. (1 Peter 2:21,22)

 

[rusra02]

Some problems with your analogy:
1.) What homeowner in their right mind would rent a house to an incompetent couple if he knew beforehand that they would trash the house? If he did, I'd blame him just as much for his sheer stupidity.
2.) Why would you evict other future occupants for the wrongdoings of the previous couple? (Original sin)

Also, as an aside, who created Satan to begin with? Why did he create him, knowing beforehand that he would go to hell and drag a majority of mankind with him?

God did not choose to foreknow that Adam would sin, although he knew as free moral agents, they could choose to do so. If a delinquent couple evicted for trashing a house had children, I think the fault for their children's suffering is theirs, not the landlords. And if the kindly landlord makes provision for the children, he certainly is not obligated to do so.
The Bible answers your third query, as to who created Satan, an answer previously discussed in this forum.

 

[Dirty Penguin]

Ah . . . . I think your confusing the class and subclass here.

Just as not all fruits are apples, but all apples are fruits; not all change involves evolution, but all evolution does involve change.

Thank you.....:yes:

 

[FranklinMichaelV.3]

God did not choose to foreknow that Adam would sin, although he knew as free moral agents, they could choose to do so. If a delinquent couple evicted for trashing a house had children, I think the fault for their children's suffering is theirs, not the landlords. And if the kindly landlord makes provision for the children, he certainly is not obligated to do so.
The Bible answers your third query, as to who created Satan, an answer previously discussed in this forum.

Except God was effectively their parents not a landlord. It would be like a grandfather punishing his grandchildren for what his own children did wrong.

 

[Triumphant_Loser]

The Bible answers your third query, as to who created Satan, an answer previously discussed in this forum.

I already know who supposedly created Satan, but the Bible gives no reason as to why he created him. This "god" contradicts himself when he says that he "desires that all people be saved" (1 Timothy 2:4), yet refuses to destroy the very source that hinders people from being saved, even though he has the power and the means too.

 

[Clarity]

So many things don't add up in Genesis. Like the Sun and stars, not only were they created after the Earth, but created after plants? But then, I was wondering; Adam gets kicked out of Eden and has to till the soil? This is based on Gen 4:23 and 4:2 where Adam is sent out to "cultivate" the ground and his son Cain was a "tiller" of the ground. What did they till it with? Did God make them a plow and a hoe or something? And then Abel, why was he keeping flocks? Weren't they vegetarians? Was it for wool? Did God make Eve a loom and Abel some shears?

I see Genesis as religious poetry, but some Christians, and I guess some Jews, see it as literal. Ken Ham on his TV show Answers in Genesis, insists that it must be taken literal, that it is foundational, without it the whole of the Bible falls. What do you think.

The biggest problem that moderns have with Genesis is that they are unable to read the book from the point of view of the writers.

In the case of Genesis 1, you're going to have to read from the perspective of Sumerian culture, c3000 BC, since that's about the time it was written (and likely from older oral tradition).

There's simply too much cultural divide between us and them to attempt any indepth discussion if we can't even decide on a simple question of whether the original writer intended for the chapter to be a celebration (for a festival), a symbolic story (for education), a doctrinal statement or a literal reading of their understanding of creation.

Most of the problems you mentioned are irrelevant if you use my approach.

(We now know that Genesis 1 is Sumerian in origin because of the linguistic similarities, the Genesis 1 quotes that appear in Sumerian myths, and the fact that the first 11 chapters of Genesis are almost all represented in Sumerian literature in one form or another. In addition to that, you have the fact that Abraham was born in Ur, the Sumerian imperial capital, some decades before the collapse, and he was in a position to have collected the stories for his own use.)

 

[Monk Of Reason]

What Adam did was not a mistake. It was a willful act of rebellion. Neither did God create them to do bad. They were perfect humans with no inborn tendencies to sin. I believe it is as Deuteronomy 32:3-5 explains:"For I will declare the name of Jehovah. Tell about the greatness of our God! **The Rock, perfect is his activity, For all his ways are justice. A God of faithfulness who is never unjust; Righteous and upright is he. *They are the ones who have acted corruptly. They are not his children, the defect is their own." The fact that Jesus Christ led a faultless life of integrity to God as a perfect man shows that Adam and Eve could have done so. (1 Peter 2:21,22)

How can something pure and perfect become corrupt? Unless it had the ability to do so. And are you saying that willful rebellion is not a mistake?

 

[outhouse]

The biggest problem that moderns have with Genesis is that they are unable to read the book from the point of view of the writers.

In the case of Genesis 1, you're going to have to read from the perspective of Sumerian culture, c3000 BC, since that's about the time it was written (and likely from older oral tradition).

There's simply too much cultural divide between us and them to attempt any indepth discussion if we can't even decide on a simple question of whether the original writer intended for the chapter to be a celebration (for a festival), a symbolic story (for education), a doctrinal statement or a literal reading of their understanding of creation.

Most of the problems you mentioned are irrelevant if you use my approach.

(We now know that Genesis 1 is Sumerian in origin because of the linguistic similarities, the Genesis 1 quotes that appear in Sumerian myths, and the fact that the first 11 chapters of Genesis are almost all represented in Sumerian literature in one form or another. In addition to that, you have the fact that Abraham was born in Ur, the Sumerian imperial capital, some decades before the collapse, and he was in a position to have collected the stories for his own use.)

Nonsense

You need to supply references if your going to try and turn all of OT scholarships upside down with a unsubstantiated personal opinion.



You have a serious problem understanding Mesopotamian influence after the Exile and Sumerian authorship.


Your position is laughable because we have Sumerian mythology and it is not the Israelite mythology on the OT.

 

[Clarity]

Nonsense

You need to supply references if your going to try and turn all of OT scholarships upside down with a unsubstantiated personal opinion.



You have a serious problem understanding Mesopotamian influence after the Exile and Sumerian authorship.


Your position is laughable because we have Sumerian mythology and it is not the Israelite mythology on the OT.

I've never stated Mesopotamian influence after the Exile since there was none. The Sumerian civilization fell 1420 years before the Exile.

I've also never stated that Sumerian myths = Israeli myths. My claim is that Genesis 1-11 contain Sumerian myths.

(Do you need a drink or something?)

 

[outhouse]

I've never stated Mesopotamian influence after the Exile since there was none. The Sumerian civilization fell 1420 years before the Exile.

I've also never stated that Sumerian myths = Israeli myths. My claim is that Genesis 1-11 contain Sumerian myths.

(Do you need a drink or something?)

The Sumerians influenced the Mesopotamian mythology which influenced the Israelite mythology.

End of story.

 

[Clarity]

The Sumerians influenced the Mesopotamian mythology which influenced the Israelite mythology.

End of story.

No, they really didn't.

Beginning in about 1850 BC, the Babylonians took selected Sumerian legends and rewrote them, distorting them beyond recognition. When the Sumerian civilization collapsed in 2000 BC, and the language went out of use, they were gone.

If you're going to try to make a case that, for example, the flood story was copied from the Epic of Gilgamesh, you're going to have to explain why Noah wasn't mentioned living in the Garden of Eden, why the Bible doesn't mention a barmaid in the story, and why the Bible never mentions the drums lost at the bottom of the sea.

THAT is the Epic, which I'm guessing you've never read. The Sumerian original is very, very different (which, um, you haven't read either, have you?)

 

[outhouse]

No, they really didn't.

Beginning in about 1850 BC, the Babylonians took selected Sumerian legends and rewrote them, distorting them beyond recognition. When the Sumerian civilization collapsed in 2000 BC, and the language went out of use, they were gone.

If you're going to try to make a case that, for example, the flood story was copied from the Epic of Gilgamesh, you're going to have to explain why Noah wasn't mentioned living in the Garden of Eden, why the Bible doesn't mention a barmaid in the story, and why the Bible never mentions the drums lost at the bottom of the sea.

THAT is the Epic, which I'm guessing you've never read. The Sumerian original is very, very different (which, um, you haven't read either, have you?)

Please your embarrassing yourself here.


Flood mythology in the Levant has many twist and tales.


Ziusudra is the oldest mythology based on a real flood and possibly a real king.

Then later down the line Gilgamesh was rewritten from these previous myths.


It was twisted to meet their needs the same way the Israelites version was twisted ro meet their own personal needs to teach their own morals and theology.



YOU really need to learn up on cross cultural oral tradition.

YOU may have read Vansina, either way you don't comprehend the concept.

 

[Dirty Penguin]

Well, I'm learning a lot (when it comes to the history) just by watching you two duke it out...:ko:

 

[Clarity]

Please your embarrassing yourself here.


Flood mythology in the Levant has many twist and tales.


Ziusudra is the oldest mythology based on a real flood and possibly a real king.

Then later down the line Gilgamesh was rewritten from these previous myths.


It was twisted to meet their needs the same way the Israelites version was twisted ro meet their own personal needs to teach their own morals and theology.


YOU really need to learn up on cross cultural oral tradition.

YOU may have read Vansina, either way you don't comprehend the concept.

Your history and geography are both wrong.

Our source for the Sumerian flood story was written in Ur around 2050 BC.
Our oldest source for the Epic flood story was written in Nippur around 1850 BC.

None of them were written in the Levant (which had no flood story), and there are no other sources.

I see no twists and turns. I see a Babylonian redaction of the Sumerian legend.

You and I both know that you're making this up as you go, and that you really don't have sources for any claim you make. You appear to be illiterate in Old and Middle Bronze history.

 

[gnostic]

The Epic of Gilgamesh was internationally popular in the Middle East.

Middle Babylonian copies have been found as far west as Egypt and at the Hittite capital. Fragments of the epic have been found in Megiddo too in the same period.

That being the case, then the Babylonian stories of Gilgamesh and the flood were not unknown to the Canaanites and to the Israelites.

The Babylonian versions (including the epic of Atrahasis) include the flood hero releasing birds, to find if there were dry land, is the indication that the Hebrew version did borrow the ideas from the Babylonian myth.

Whether it be Old Babylonian or Middle Babylonian literature, the stories of the flood predate all Hebrew writings, including Genesis.

 

[Clarity]

The Epic of Gilgamesh was internationally popular in the Middle East.

Middle Babylonian copies have been found as far west as Egypt and at the Hittite capital. Fragments of the epic have been found in Megiddo too in the same period.

That being the case, then the Babylonian stories of Gilgamesh and the flood were not unknown to the Canaanites and to the Israelites.

The Babylonian versions (including the epic of Atrahasis) include the flood hero releasing birds, to find if there were dry land, is the indication that the Hebrew version did borrow the ideas from the Babylonian myth.

Whether it be Old Babylonian or Middle Babylonian literature, the stories of the flood predate all Hebrew writings, including Genesis.

I think you're missing the character of the Epic version of the flood.

In the Epic, Gilgamesh was on a quest, and he set out for the Garden of Eden where he found Atrahasis and interviewed him. The story takes place long years (centuries?) after the flood, and the Epic tells it in past tense as already a part of history.

The Bible's version does not. It maintains the Sumerian version's style by telling the story in the present tense. This would indicate that whoever wrote the Bible's version read from the Sumerian, not the Babylonian.

(I would suggest, though, based on literary evidence, that the Genesis version is older than the Sumerian version. From the beginning, Mesopotamian scribes had a habit of taking older stories and elaborating on them ad nauseum. Both Sumerian and Babylonian scholars did this, so that the later in history you look, the longer the epics became. Therefore the shorter and less elaborate versions are usually older.)

 

[FranklinMichaelV.3]

I think you're missing the character of the Epic version of the flood.

In the Epic, Gilgamesh was on a quest, and he set out for the Garden of Eden where he found Atrahasis and interviewed him. The story takes place long years (centuries?) after the flood, and the Epic tells it in past tense as already a part of history.

The Bible's version does not. It maintains the Sumerian version's style by telling the story in the present tense. This would indicate that whoever wrote the Bible's version read from the Sumerian, not the Babylonian.

(I would suggest, though, based on literary evidence, that the Genesis version is older than the Sumerian version. From the beginning, Mesopotamian scribes had a habit of taking older stories and elaborating on them ad nauseum. Both Sumerian and Babylonian scholars did this, so that the later in history you look, the longer the epics became. Therefore the shorter and less elaborate versions are usually older.)

Genesis's version is very elaborate.

Even detailed to the point about clean and unclean animals. As at first Noah is to bring 2 kinds of every animal and then commanded to bring 7 based on cleanliness. The story is quite elaborate on how Noah is commanded to even build the Ark.

 

[outhouse]

Your history and geography are both wrong.

Our source for the Sumerian flood story was written in Ur around 2050 BC.
Our oldest source for the Epic flood story was written in Nippur around 1850 BC.

None of them were written in the Levant (which had no flood story), and there are no other sources.

I see no twists and turns. I see a Babylonian redaction of the Sumerian legend.

You and I both know that you're making this up as you go, and that you really don't have sources for any claim you make. You appear to be illiterate in Old and Middle Bronze history.

I understand Mesopotamia is on the edge of the Levant, im not wrong because this Sumerian legend sparked all of the Leventine flood mythology.

Ziusudra - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Ziusudra (also Zi-ud-sura and Zin-Suddu; Hellenized Xisuthros: "found long life" or "life of long days") of Shuruppak is listed in the WB-62 Sumerian king list recension as the last king of Sumer prior to the deluge. He is subsequently recorded as the hero of the Sumerian flood epic. He is also mentioned in other ancient literature, including The Death of Gilgamesh[1] and The Poem of Early Rulers,[2] and a late version of The Instructions of Shuruppak[3] refers to Ziusudra.[4] Akkadian Atrahasis ("extremely wise") and Utnapishtim ("he found life"), as well as biblical Noah ("rest") are similar heroes of flood legends of the ancient Near East.


A Sumerian document known as The Instructions of Shuruppak dated by Kramer to about 2500 BC, refers in a later version to Ziusudra

The significance of Ziusudra's name appearing on the WB-62 king list is that it links the flood mentioned in the three surviving Babylonian deluge epics of Ziusudra (Eridu Genesis), Utnapishtim (Epic of Gilgamesh), and Atrahasis (Epic of Atrahasis) to river flood sediments in Shuruppak, Uruk, Kish et al. that have been radiocarbon dated to ca. 2900 BC. This has led some scholars to conclude that the flood hero was king of Shuruppak at the end of the Jemdet Nasr period (ca. 3000–2900) which ended with the river flood of 2900 BC.[10]
Ziusudra being a king from Shuruppak is supported by the Gilgamesh XI tablet (see below) making reference to Utnapishtim (Akkadian translation of the Sumerian name Ziusudra) with the epithet "man of Shuruppak" at line 23.

 

[Clarity]

Genesis's version is very elaborate.

Even detailed to the point about clean and unclean animals. As at first Noah is to bring 2 kinds of every animal and then commanded to bring 7 based on cleanliness. The story is quite elaborate on how Noah is commanded to even build the Ark.

You've clearly never read the other versions.

The epic of Gilgamesh was written on 12 large tablets in small print. The Genesis flood story would cover about 1/4 of one tablet, 75% smaller than the Epic's version of the flood.

(And the reality is that the Bible's version is a combination of two different original sources where redacting was not done. The duplications were not edited out. Genesis actually has two very small flood stories, both of which are simple in language and tell the story point by point without elaborations such as a preamble to the story, celebratory language, gratuitous praise of the deities, dramatizations between deities--or people for that matter, extensive dialogue from the characters, and tangential topics such as Gilgamesh's quest for immortality woven into the flood story.)

Whatever it is you're trying to call "elaborate" just vanished.

 

[FranklinMichaelV.3]

You've clearly never read the other versions.

The epic of Gilgamesh was written on 12 large tablets in small print. The Genesis flood story would cover about 1/4 of one tablet, 75% smaller than the Epic's version of the flood.

(And the reality is that the Bible's version is a combination of two different original sources where redacting was not done. The duplications were not edited out. Genesis actually has two very small flood stories, both of which are simple in language and tell the story point by point without elaborations such as a preamble to the story, celebratory language, gratuitous praise of the deities, dramatizations between deities--or people for that matter, extensive dialogue from the characters, and tangential topics such as Gilgamesh's quest for immortality woven into the flood story.)

Whatever it is you're trying to call "elaborate" just vanished.

Being elaborate doesn't mean that you are extremely lengthy does it? I'm not saying that it is as long as the epic, but it is still rather elaborate in explanation and detail. The size of the ark, the reason for why God was angry, the story doesn't just stop after the water recedes but continues to the promise and offering of sacrifices as well. I'm sure the following epics that incorporate the flood are even more "elaborate" but that does not mean that the story of the Flood is not also rather Elaborate. Probably more so than when it was just an oral tradition.