Got doubts about Genesis?

[RestlessSoul]

Well if it was intended to be a literal story of how we got here by its original authors then it leaves a lot of room to doubt it's author was divinely guided.

In my opinion.

I doubt it was ever the intent of it’s authors to provide a literal description of creation, any more than it was the intent of the author of the tortoise and the hare, to describe an actual race between a mammal and a reptile. Even children can grasp the principle of allegory

The impulse to characterise our Bronze Age ancestors as ignorant simpletons, is wholly erroneous in my opinion.

 

[Hermit Philosopher]

Its been a little while since we re-visited the low hanging fruits of genesis, so at the request of @setarcos I intitiated this thread.

So what are your doubts about Genesis?

Personally mine would be the amount of non-scientific information in it. They would include but not be limited to the sun being created on the fourth day Genesis 1:14-19 (inclusive), or a talking Serpent Genesis 3:1 and others.

In my opinion

Dear danieldemol,

As with Scripture in general, I read it symbolically and from a spiritual mindset.

To me, the mentioning of time as “days”, harmonises well with the mystic idea that worldliness (our existence) is purely conceptual - in other words; that its true essence is only as potential, manifested as a concept in God.

Read from such a viewpoint, the meaning of all Scripture is vastly different from that concluded if seen strictly from a literal and physical, human point of view.


Humbly,
Hermit

 

[Aupmanyav]

So what are your doubts about Genesis?

Just about Genesis or the whole of Bible?

 

[Vee]

Its been a little while since we re-visited the low hanging fruits of genesis, so at the request of @setarcos I intitiated this thread.

So what are your doubts about Genesis?

Personally mine would be the amount of non-scientific information in it. They would include but not be limited to the sun being created on the fourth day Genesis 1:14-19 (inclusive), or a talking Serpent Genesis 3:1 and others.

In my opinion

The Bible is not, and it never claimed to be, a science book.

 

[exchemist]

What does post#3 have to do with its original authors?

Post 3 addresses the thread title and the opening post. "Original authors" is a subsequent theme you introduced later, that has no bearing on my response.

 

[Jayhawker Soule]

Its been a little while since we re-visited the low hanging fruits of genesis, so at the request of @setarcos I intitiated this thread.

So what are your doubts about Genesis?

 

[fantome profane]

Rubbish after Gabriel left.

The Archangel?

Peter

Works either way.

 

[blü 2]

Its been a little while since we re-visited the low hanging fruits of genesis, so at the request of @setarcos I intitiated this thread.

So what are your doubts about Genesis?

Personally mine would be the amount of non-scientific information in it. They would include but not be limited to the sun being created on the fourth day Genesis 1:14-19 (inclusive), or a talking Serpent Genesis 3:1 and others.

In my opinion

Depends what you take the early chapters of Genesis to be.

Obviously they're a version of an old creation myth. Their interest lies in what that tells us about the folk who wrote it.

From a narrative point of view, I'm inclined to the interpretation that the Garden story's function is to bridge the gap between beginnings and the dawn of Hebrew folk history. The innocence of Adam and Eve can be seen as mankind's infancy, the eating of the fruit as puberty, and the expulsion as maturity, the obligation for the individual and the family to make their own way.

Many other views are possible, of course.

The henotheism of the early bible is interesting too. We can watch God evolve from just another member of the college to the sole heavy on that particular block.

 

[Twilight Hue]

Rubbish after Gabriel left.

Hell, it went to pot after that luscious bodacious vixen Lilith was dumped for that no good for nothing trolip named Eve.

 

[Polymath257]

I have no doubts that Genesis is an origin myth with little basis in reality.

 

[stvdv]

So what are your doubts about Genesis?

I have no problem with Genesis
Because
I take not everything literal

 

[PureX]

I have no reason to "doubt" a collection of mythical stories because I have no reason to "believe in" them as being anything more than what they are. And as they are mythical, the issue to me is: can I interpret them in a way that provides meaning and wisdom to me? And that's up to me.

 

[Wildswanderer]

Its been a little while since we re-visited the low hanging fruits of genesis, so at the request of @setarcos I intitiated this thread.

So what are your doubts about Genesis?

Personally mine would be the amount of non-scientific information in it. They would include but not be limited to the sun being created on the fourth day Genesis 1:14-19 (inclusive), or a talking Serpent Genesis 3:1 and others.

In my opinion

No doubts, thanks!

 

[syo]

So what are your doubts about Genesis?

I don't have any.

 

[Nakosis]

Its been a little while since we re-visited the low hanging fruits of genesis, so at the request of @setarcos I intitiated this thread.

So what are your doubts about Genesis?

Personally mine would be the amount of non-scientific information in it. They would include but not be limited to the sun being created on the fourth day Genesis 1:14-19 (inclusive), or a talking Serpent Genesis 3:1 and others.

In my opinion

For me it's not knowing the age, the source. The original meaning.
Did it start out as a story told around campfires adopted by the Hebrew?
No doubt it was altered from its original telling.
Also I've heard so many different interpretations. Each certain as the rest that their interpretation is the absolute truth.

So no chance for me to know the correct meaning even if I wanted to.

 

[sayak83]

Its been a little while since we re-visited the low hanging fruits of genesis, so at the request of @setarcos I intitiated this thread.

So what are your doubts about Genesis?

Personally mine would be the amount of non-scientific information in it. They would include but not be limited to the sun being created on the fourth day Genesis 1:14-19 (inclusive), or a talking Serpent Genesis 3:1 and others.

In my opinion

First God said..
Let there be Sam and Dean Winchester...

 

[It Aint Necessarily So]

Sure, but Christians weren't the authors of Genesis. So I see them as post-hoc rationalising what looks to me like the attempts of a pre-scientific people to explain how they came to be there.

Agreed. It is extremely unlikely that the Hebrews told these stories and didn't believe them literally or severely punish those who doubted them out loud. Aren't they the people who stoned people for almost any deviation from orthodoxy? I don't see them being very flexible in their dogma or allowing any wiggle room in its interpretation early on. That came later, when the stories became less tenable.

Most mainstream Christian denominations have no doubts about Genesis, having treated it allegorically for centuries.

I think allegory is the wrong word. So would be metaphor. Those are specific literary forms with specified features that these myths don't match. They involve substitution of symbols for something literal. When one allegorizes, he knows what it is that his characters and their actions represent. Gulliver's Travels is an allegory, where various characters and their escapades stood for specific characters and events in British parliamentary history known to the author.

I'd say that the correct term for these stories is myths later shown to be incorrect. Allegories and metaphors aren't correct or incorrect, just apt or not. These are best guesses that were incorrect as is the case with all creation myths. Their authors were not using symbols when they wrote these stories. Fish means fish literally. Light means literal light. The moon is the literal moon. The word allegory implies a knowledge of reality that I don't believe the biblical authors possessed.

The Bible is not, and it never claimed to be, a science book.

It is an account of the history of how the universe came to be as its authors understood it. We do that today with science. It used to be done with mythology.

 

[MikeF]

I doubt it was ever the intent of it’s authors to provide a literal description of creation, any more than it was the intent of the author of the tortoise and the hare, to describe an actual race between a mammal and a reptile. Even children can grasp the principle of allegory

The impulse to characterise our Bronze Age ancestors as ignorant simpletons, is wholly erroneous in my opinion.

Really? I would be curious as to what informs that analysis. What is the date at which the Genesis creation account first appeared? Is the account derived from, or a modification of a previously existing story? If so, when was that first composed?

Once you set the date, what other material do we have from that time period? Is there explicit documentation from that time period that suggests listeners/readers considers Genesis creation account to be taken non-literally as in allegory or parable? If they considered it non-literal, what were their thoughts on how the world actually came to be?

Is there a tradition at that time of non-literal fiction in the form of allegory, fable, metaphor, or other figurative forms? Be careful here as I am talking about the time period when the creation account first appeared, not in the Bible compilation we have today. What would be some examples?

What about other cultures? What is the documented attitude towards creation accounts, at the time the accounts first appeared, in other cultures around the time you date Genesis creation account, or earlier? If they considered these stories non-literal, merely allegory or parable, what did they consider the reality to be?

 

[metis]

Once you set the date, what other material do we have from that time period? Is there explicit documentation from that time period that suggests listeners/readers considers Genesis creation story to be only myth? If they considered it myth, what were their thoughts on how the world actually came to be?

"Myth", used in the theological context, means a narrative with the intent of teaching, such as with the use of storytelling. It does not imply falsehood.

 

[MikeF]

"Myth", used in the theological context, means a narrative with the intent of teaching, such as with the use of storytelling. It does not imply falsehood.

Thanks. I edited my post and replaced the word 'myth' with the word 'account' where it seemed appropriate. Does that seem satisfactory?