Origin of life, Adam and the Dinosaurs

[Hockeycowboy]

So your saying I have never wanted to know that?

Many 'want to know', simply to try and find fault, not to try and understand it.

I've read your previous posts, I can see which category you are in.
Have I judged you wrong?

 

[CogentPhilosopher]

Many 'want to know', simply to try and find fault, not to try and understand it.

I've read your previous posts, I can see which category you are in.
Have I judged you wrong?

You do realize I was a Christian before right?

I began to read the bible with an open mind to validate my beliefs and it did not turn out that way.

 

[siti]

no amount of reinterpretative chicanery

Paul's comments in Hebrews 4 reveal that God's rest day - the 7th - was Still Continuing In His Day! That's over 4,000 years later! So the evidence the Bible itself presents, is that those days were not literally 24-hour days!

Assuming, with very little supportive evidence save tradition long since doubted and abandoned even by the mainstream Churches, that Paul wrote Hebrews, that would make him the preeminent master of reinterpretive chicanery - almost everything in the Mosaic tradition is reinterpreted in Hebrews.

As you say, its all about the context.

You too have a great evening!

 

[URAVIP2ME]

I know that! I'm not talking about what we know now, I'm talking about what a Hebrew writer might have known in the 7th century BCE when the various accounts began to be put together. To me, Genesis chapter 1 is clearly talking about a sequence of 6 x 24 hour creative days. To me, Genesis chapter 1 is clearly wrong. To me, no amount of reinterpretative chicanery is going to rescue Genesis chapter 1. So may as well just accept that the writer meant what he wrote: that God created everything in 6 literal 24 hour days about 6000 years ago and got it very badly wrong.

I do accept what the writer wrote and that ALL of the 6 creative days are summed up by the word "DAY" at Genesis 2:4 Thus, as my high school English teacher would say, that the word 'day' whether inside or outside of Scripture has shades of meaning. So, the creative days do Not have to mean a literal 24-hr. day, just as the word 'day' mentioned at Genesis 1:5 is Not talking about a literal 24-hr. day but daylight hours which are a portion of a 24-hr. day.

The 6 creative days are part of a 7-day week. God rested on the 7th day. Since God's 7th day was still an on-going day in the first century according to Hebrews 4:4-10, then it can stand to reason that besides God's Rest Day being more than a 24-hr. day then so are the other 6 figurative days which make up a figurative ' week'.

Why not ask your local Rabbi who is familiar with Hebrew for his input as to why the 6 creative days are Not 24-hr. days.

 

[URAVIP2ME]

So your saying I have never wanted to know that?

No, I am Not saying you never wanted to know, but perhaps like me, I tried to fit what I was reading in Scripture to match what ' Christendom ' teaches. Often Christendom's teachings do Not match Scripture although presented to people as Scripture. To me that fulfills the warning words of Acts of the Apostles 20:29-30 that false shepherds would try to fleece the flock of God in order to have followers after themselves instead of followers for God and Jesus.
Just as Jesus said that genuine ' wheat ' Christians would grow together over the centuries with the fake ' weed/tares ' Christians unitl the Harvest time, or the soon coming ' time of separation' of Matthew 25:31-33,37.

Since we are under the subject which includes Adam, a lot of people are taught at death it's heaven or ? awaits.
No where do we read, or comprehend in Scripture, that at his death Adam went to heaven.
To me, Genesis 3:19 is plain that Adam ' returned ' back to the dust of the Earth.
A person can Not ' return ' to a place he never was before. Adam simply went back to where he started: dust.
Since Adam went back to where he originated, then that would be returning non-life. (No more existence for Adam).
In Scripture I find there is No post-mortem penalty for Adam. No punishment after death. No life after death.
Just as the dinosaurs ' perished ' (were destroyed) then too like the dinosaurs Adam simply perished or was destroyed.

 

[URAVIP2ME]

Assuming, with very little supportive evidence save tradition long since doubted and abandoned even by the mainstream Churches, that Paul wrote Hebrews, that would make him the preeminent master of reinterpretive chicanery - almost everything in the Mosaic tradition is reinterpreted in Hebrews.
As you say, its all about the context.
You too have a great evening!

I think you 'hit the nail on the head' when you mentioned the ' mainstream churches ' ( Aka Christendom ).
Just as gospel writer Luke forewarned us that false shepherds would try to fleece the flock of God at Acts of the Apostles 20:29-30. Jesus too at Matthew chapter 7 forewarns us that MANY would be on the broad way to destruction, and they are the MANY who would come in Jesus' name but prove false.
So, it should Not surprise us that mainstream churches are more p.c. than biblical.
Remember in the year 70 un-faithful Jerusalem was Not destroyed for being faithful to Scripture, but the opposite.

 

[siti]

Why not ask your local Rabbi who is familiar with Hebrew for his input as to why the 6 creative days are Not 24-hr. days.

I don't need to, I am very well aware that the Hebrew word يوم usually transliterated yom has a number of possible meanings including the ones you have mentioned - e.g. the hours of daylight, Noah's day, an extended but unspecified period of time, etc. etc. None of this alters the fact that one of the meanings in Hebrew is the period between one sunset and the next (i.e. 24 hours) and the fact that each creative day in Genesis 1 is punctuated by the phrase "and there was evening and there was morning, a [1st/2nd/3rd...etc.] day".

There are really only two sensible options in interpreting this:

1. It was intended to mean 6 literal 24 hour days and is just plain wrong

2. It was intended to be a non-literal (poetic or mythological) account and therefore the "days" cannot be taken to mean any specified length of time at all...and neither is the sequence or the "kind" thing or the implied special creationism...etc. to be taken literally.

I rather liked the second idea for a while - I imagined the writer sitting down and composing a literary image of a great artist gradually pulling the elements of his masterpiece into the painting as he worked on it over several days.

That worked for me for a while in my increasingly skeptical Christian days. I could still go with that now as a sensible way to imagine a deliberate and intelligent creative process - except that it doesn't seem that the process was either deliberate or intelligent.

I have to conclude that the first option is far more likely - the writer meant what he wrote and got it very badly wrong.

I certainly cannot accept that the writer intended yom to mean a specified or unspecified "creative epoch" during which an omnipotent creator purposely created all the individual creatures (or "kinds" or whatever) including, not only life on earth, but the stars, planets, moons...etc. etc. one by one and deliberately in such a way as any rational observer would be deceived into thinking it was all an accident. That interpretation is utterly preposterous in any age.

 

[Milton Platt]

Could Adam have been alive with the dinosaurs according to scripture. Yes, absolutely. No fossils of humans are found with the dinosaurs because humans, Adam and Eve were immortal, they did not die like the animals.


In 7 days God created the Heaven and the Earth. With God a day is 1,000 years, a day is also a day our time. It is ambiguouos whether creation was 7 days our time or 7,000 years. But Man was created immortal, his days were not numbered. There is an indefinite time period between creation and the fall of man, which could have been millions of years. When Adam ate the fruit he became mortal, his days were numbered and time began. God said "In the day they ate of it they would surely die" A day with God is 1,000 years, so they would die within 1,000 years, which accounts for Adam's age of a few hundred years old, from the time of the fall of man until his death.

Time began (as we know it) when the universe began to form. Time would not be dependent on whether Adam or any other being was immortal. If you know otherwise, please show your sources. It does not matter if you think the time span was 7 days, 7 weeks, 7 thousand years, or 70,000 years, you are still wrong by any measure we have made of the actual time required. Your assertion is a blind one and ignores all we know about geology, cosmology, genetics, biology, and physics. Dinosaurs lived and walked the earth for millions of years (collectively), so for there not to be any human bones found in the same strata over that time, it would mean that the human species did not exist for many millions of years after Adam. So now you must account for it's re-emergence.

 

[URAVIP2ME]

In Scripture, the word ' day ' has shades of meaning. Even a thousand years is as 'a day' in God's eyes.
Jesus' coming millennium-long day is Not a 24-hour day, but a thousand-year governmental day over Earth.
So, whether one thinks Genesis is talking about a 6-24 hour days and God's rest day as a 24-hour day, will Not alter that Jesus' 1,000-year day of governing over Earth will come to pass.

 

[Deeje]

AKA evolution

Funny, I call it creation.

 

[siti]

I think you 'hit the nail on the head' when you mentioned the ' mainstream churches ' ( Aka Christendom ).
Just as gospel writer Luke forewarned us that false shepherds would try to fleece the flock of God at Acts of the Apostles 20:29-30. Jesus too at Matthew chapter 7 forewarns us that MANY would be on the broad way to destruction, and they are the MANY who would come in Jesus' name but prove false.
So, it should Not surprise us that mainstream churches are more p.c. than biblical.
Remember in the year 70 un-faithful Jerusalem was Not destroyed for being faithful to Scripture, but the opposite.

Well perhaps...but that was not the point. The point was that the Letter to the Hebrews (whoever wrote it), reinterprets the entire Mosaic tradition. So its not terribly surprising that (if?) it reinterprets the one of the central outward features of the Jewish tradition - the weekly Sabbath - as something other than a weekly Sabbath. You can read the Book of Hebrews (as I am sure you already have) and see how many Mosaic traditions are reinterpreted. I am guessing you will argue that the features of the Mosaic Law were always meant to be figurative (central theme of Hebrews) and point towards a greater spiritual reality. But if that's true, then why should we take of the Mosaic tradition at face value? And especially why should we assume that a figurative mythology trumps scientific knowledge?

 

[siti]

Funny, I call it creation.

That is indeed funny!

BTW - I am somewhat surprised to see a JW on here. Isn't participation in this kind of discussion frowned upon (2 Timothy 2:23, 2 John 1:10 and all that)

 

[URAVIP2ME]

Well perhaps...but that was not the point. The point was that the Letter to the Hebrews (whoever wrote it), reinterprets the entire Mosaic tradition. So its not terribly surprising that (if?) it reinterprets the one of the central outward features of the Jewish tradition - the weekly Sabbath - as something other than a weekly Sabbath. You can read the Book of Hebrews (as I am sure you already have) and see how many Mosaic traditions are reinterpreted. I am guessing you will argue that the features of the Mosaic Law were always meant to be figurative (central theme of Hebrews) and point towards a greater spiritual reality. But if that's true, then why should we take of the Mosaic tradition at face value? And especially why should we assume that a figurative mythology trumps scientific knowledge?

To me, the Constitution of the Mosaic Law was only temporary and only for ancient Israel until Messiah's arrival.
That is why those first-century people were in ' expectation ' of Messiah's arrival at that time according to Luke 3:15.
As Romans 10:4 says that Jesus fulfilled that Law, otherwise there would still be animal sacrifices being done today.
Not a Law with just a greater 'spiritual reality ' through Christ, but a ' literal reality ' starting at Pentecost with the establishment of the 'literal Christian congregation'. From that small beginning, as Jesus said the congregation would grow and grow until the good news about God's kingdom government in the hands of Christ Jesus would be proclaimed world wide on an international scale as it is done globally today according to Matthew 24:14; Acts 1:8.
To me, that is No figurative mythology, but is proven knowledge even to the point that modern technology had now made possible rapid Bible translation so that people even in earth's remote areas can now have Scripture in their own mother tongue or native language as never possible before in history.

 

[Kemosloby]

Time began (as we know it) when the universe began to form. Time would not be dependent on whether Adam or any other being was immortal. If you know otherwise, please show your sources. It does not matter if you think the time span was 7 days, 7 weeks, 7 thousand years, or 70,000 years, you are still wrong by any measure we have made of the actual time required. Your assertion is a blind one and ignores all we know about geology, cosmology, genetics, biology, and physics. Dinosaurs lived and walked the earth for millions of years (collectively), so for there not to be any human bones found in the same strata over that time, it would mean that the human species did not exist for many millions of years after Adam. So now you must account for it's re-emergence.

You haven't figured out what i'm saying yet...

 

[Kemosloby]

Time began (as we know it) when the universe began to form. Time would not be dependent on whether Adam or any other being was immortal. If you know otherwise, please show your sources. It does not matter if you think the time span was 7 days, 7 weeks, 7 thousand years, or 70,000 years, you are still wrong by any measure we have made of the actual time required. Your assertion is a blind one and ignores all we know about geology, cosmology, genetics, biology, and physics. Dinosaurs lived and walked the earth for millions of years (collectively), so for there not to be any human bones found in the same strata over that time, it would mean that the human species did not exist for many millions of years after Adam. So now you must account for it's re-emergence.

I'll recap it for you. It doesn't matter how long creation was, 7 days or 70,000. The time between creation and "the fall of man" when Adam ate the forbidden fruit is indefinite. Since Adam was immortal he could have easily lived for 100's of millions of years, he did not leave any bones behind for Archaeologists to dig up, because he was immortal. Nowhere does it say that any men existed other than Adam and Eve up until after the fall when they started producing children. When Adam and Eve ate the fruit their immortality ended and their mortal timer began, "In the day you eat of it you shall surely die" , "In the Lord a day is like 1,000 years and 1,000 years is like a day" Adam died within the 1,000 year day, at 930 years old. But Adam lived for Millions of years before becoming mortal.

 

[Deeje]

That is indeed funny!

BTW - I am somewhat surprised to see a JW on here. Isn't participation in this kind of discussion frowned upon (2 Timothy 2:23, 2 John 1:10 and all that)

It is not encouraged for a number of reasons. But certainly left to our own conscience. There are a few of us on here. It's not a place for sensitive souls.

 

[siti]

It's not a place for sensitive souls.

Indeed not! Hope my pommy humour doesn't offend. I was a witness (I suppose I still am officially) from the mid-80s through the late 90s. Haven't been near the Kingdom Hall in 15 years now though. Haven't even read a Watchtower for about ten. I just (fairly obviously if you've read any of my posts) don't believe any of it any more. Anyway, its nice to see you guys engaging - at least from my POV if not the Governing Body. (I hope that's not 'apostasy' ).

 

[CogentPhilosopher]

No, I am Not saying you never wanted to know, but perhaps like me, I tried to fit what I was reading in Scripture to match what ' Christendom ' teaches. Often Christendom's teachings do Not match Scripture although presented to people as Scripture. To me that fulfills the warning words of Acts of the Apostles 20:29-30 that false shepherds would try to fleece the flock of God in order to have followers after themselves instead of followers for God and Jesus.
Just as Jesus said that genuine ' wheat ' Christians would grow together over the centuries with the fake ' weed/tares ' Christians unitl the Harvest time, or the soon coming ' time of separation' of Matthew 25:31-33,37.

Since we are under the subject which includes Adam, a lot of people are taught at death it's heaven or ? awaits.
No where do we read, or comprehend in Scripture, that at his death Adam went to heaven.
To me, Genesis 3:19 is plain that Adam ' returned ' back to the dust of the Earth.
A person can Not ' return ' to a place he never was before. Adam simply went back to where he started: dust.
Since Adam went back to where he originated, then that would be returning non-life. (No more existence for Adam).
In Scripture I find there is No post-mortem penalty for Adam. No punishment after death. No life after death.
Just as the dinosaurs ' perished ' (were destroyed) then too like the dinosaurs Adam simply perished or was destroyed.

I just decided to read it from a neutral standpoint, like I was a stranger who had never heard of it before in his life.

Frankly I found it morally appalling.

 

[Hockeycowboy]

I don't need to, I am very well aware that the Hebrew word يوم usually transliterated yom has a number of possible meanings including the ones you have mentioned - e.g. the hours of daylight, Noah's day, an extended but unspecified period of time, etc. etc. None of this alters the fact that one of the meanings in Hebrew is the period between one sunset and the next (i.e. 24 hours) and the fact that each creative day in Genesis 1 is punctuated by the phrase "and there was evening and there was morning, a [1st/2nd/3rd...etc.] day".

There are really only two sensible options in interpreting this:

1. It was intended to mean 6 literal 24 hour days and is just plain wrong

2. It was intended to be a non-literal (poetic or mythological) account and therefore the "days" cannot be taken to mean any specified length of time at all...and neither is the sequence or the "kind" thing or the implied special creationism...etc. to be taken literally.

I rather liked the second idea for a while - I imagined the writer sitting down and composing a literary image of a great artist gradually pulling the elements of his masterpiece into the painting as he worked on it over several days.

That worked for me for a while in my increasingly skeptical Christian days. I could still go with that now as a sensible way to imagine a deliberate and intelligent creative process - except that it doesn't seem that the process was either deliberate or intelligent.

I have to conclude that the first option is far more likely - the writer meant what he wrote and got it very badly wrong.

I certainly cannot accept that the writer intended yom to mean a specified or unspecified "creative epoch" during which an omnipotent creator purposely created all the individual creatures (or "kinds" or whatever) including, not only life on earth, but the stars, planets, moons...etc. etc. one by one and deliberately in such a way as any rational observer would be deceived into thinking it was all an accident. That interpretation is utterly preposterous in any age.

Siti, please look at what all was happening on Day 6, in Genesis 2. Do you really think....1) the numerous animals being created, 2) then Jehovah God bringing them to Adam, 3) then Adam observing them to give them names, 4) then Adam getting lonely for a mate (i.e., "it is not good for the man to continue by himself"), 5) then Eve was created.....all of this occurred in 1 literal day's time?

like I said, context.

 

[siti]

Siti, please look at what all was happening on Day 6, in Genesis 2. Do you really think....1) the numerous animals being created, 2) then Jehovah God bringing them to Adam, 3) then Adam observing them to give them names, 4) then Adam getting lonely for a mate (i.e., "it is not good for the man to continue by himself"), 5) then Eve was created.....all of this occurred in 1 literal day's time?

Of course I don't. In fact I don't think it happened at all because the "numerous animals" evolved over millions of years - we know this, the writers of the Genesis accounts did not. That is precisely the point. And in any case, it is fairly obvious that Genesis 1:1 - Genesis 2:3 is one account and the rest of Genesis 2 is a different account from a different perspective. They are EITHER

(1) intended as mythological cosmological story-telling (in which case they are great as stories and tell us absolutely nothing about the facts of the genesis of the heavens and the earth or anything in them, nothing about the facts of the origin of the human species and not even anything about the facts of the origins and history of the nation of Israel - which is what it was probably really meant as the prologue to)

OR

(2) intended as historical narrative in which case they are plain wrong.

In either case there is no reason to assume that Adam existed as a real person and even if someone approximately corresponding to the biblical Adam did really exist, he most certainly did not run around the Garden of Eden for millions of years with the dinosaurs.

I know that's not what you are saying, but that was the argument in the OP that I was refuting by suggesting that the accounts are either mythology or wrong. You can't have your cake and ha'penny by saying the "days" are figurative but the rest is real history. In any case, there are far greater issues with the science that cannot be overcome by simply extending the "days" of Genesis.