Thoughts on the Fall of Adam

[Hawkins]

How would someone who has no knowledge of Good and Evil distinguish between obedience and disobedience? They wouldn't be able to tell the difference unless they have eaten from the tree.

Law is law, innocence is innocence. Your innocence can still break the law and get jailed!

Adam and Eve represent the first lineage of humans. Instead of teaching them what law is, or what right and wrong is such as what raping is, or what murdering is, the best way to protect them is to make them as innocent as possible. The devil exploited this by making use of their innocence to break the law, which brought them the consequences.

 

[Earthling]

It problematic because the popular implication is that Adam and Eve were not privy to what exactly good and evil was suggesting they could not distinguish or identify it.

It was until after they have eaten of the tree they then had their eyes opened and realized what good and evil was, introducing original sin for which they were cursed by God and cast out of the garden blocked by a cherubim with a flaming sword.

How could they have known what good and evil was? Do you? Did God? How do you get to know something? By personal experience, observation or study.

They had a knowledge of what was good and what was bad for them, for God had told them. Genesis 3:22 says us, they had become like one of us in knowing good and bad. Well, if they knew it why would that be a problem for Adam and Eve? It couldn't be a gaining of knowledge in the sense of personal experience because God and the angel, the "us" in Genesis 3:22, didn't have any such experience.

God didn't want them in the garden with the tree of life, living forever, because they hadn't reached maturity yet, as the angels had. They could do a great deal of damage if that were the case.

The knowledge was of choosing for themselves what was good and what was bad, whatever that would turn out to be. It's reasonable to conclude that without their creator's guidance and protection it would be self destructive.

They were, in a sense, children who refused their parent's guidance and protection.

 

[nPeace]

Christians have some pretty strong beliefs concerning Adam and Eve and their role in getting mankind where we are today. How do you view Adam and Eve? As villains? Heros? Something in between? Did God know they were going to eat the forbidden fruit? What was His purpose in putting the tree there in the first place? What would have happened had Adam and Eve never eaten the forbidden fruit? What, if any, role would Jesus Christ have had in the world had the Fall never taken place?

These are just a few of many questions we could consider in talking about the events as recorded in Genesis and which have such a bearing on our lives today. All respectful discussion welcome.

Whoa.
On the very day I only have a few minutes, you make such a wonderful post. Ahhh... one of my very favorite topics. Thank you.

Were Adam and Eve villains?
No. Not villains, but rebels. How so?
Adam and Eve were instructed as to what was good, and what was bad, by their maker.

What was good - Genesis 1:28, 29 . . .God blessed them, and God said to them: “Be fruitful and become many, fill the earth and subdue it, and have in subjection the fish of the sea and the flying creatures of the heavens and every living creature that is moving on the earth.” Then God said: “Here I have given to you every seed-bearing plant that is on the entire earth and every tree with seed-bearing fruit. Let them serve as food for you.

What was bad - One thing... Genesis 2:16, 17 Jehovah God also gave this command to the man: “From every tree of the garden you may eat to satisfaction. But as for the tree of the knowledge of good and bad, you must not eat from it, for in the day you eat from it you will certainly die.” (Genesis 3:2, 3)

What was His purpose in putting the tree there in the first place?
The trees in the middle of the garden were normal trees which bore fruit, and had no special or magical powers. They were planted by God as representations - of what?

The tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil - represented God's right as sovereign to decide for his creatures, what is good and evil/bad (right and wrong)
The tree of Life - represented God's guaranteed promise of everlasting life, to those allowed to eat from it.
Genesis 3:22 Jehovah God then said: “Here the man has become like one of us in knowing good and bad. Now in order that he may not put his hand out and take fruit also from the tree of life and eat and live forever,—”

God said "the man has become like one of us in knowing good and bad".
Obviously that doesn't mean that the man suddenly had an awareness of everything that is good and bad, but they became like God, in making decisions as to what is good and bad. In other words, they became god to themselves - deciding for themselves what is good and bad, independent of God.

Did God know they were going to eat the forbidden fruit?
The scriptures nowhere indicates this. Rather, the scriptures show that God gave the human pair freedom to exercise their own choice - freedom of choice / free will.

With freedom of choice, and God having created everything good, and being satisfied with it, what reason would God have for looking into their future activity?
None I can think of. Like any loving father, that would dignify their children, Jehovah dignifies his children with freedom. Besides, as an all powerful God Jehovah had no need to be concerned about any decision his creatures made, since he could act decisively and instantaneously to rectify any problem - which he did. Genesis 3:15

Even today, Jehovah does not look into the future decisions of humans on earth, but dignifies them with freedom of making their own decision - 2 Peter 3:9

What would have happened had Adam and Eve never eaten the forbidden fruit?
It seems clear from scripture what God's will was, and therefore what the result of obedience would have meant for Adam and Eve.
Genesis 1:26-2:3
26 Then God said: “Let us make man in our image, according to our likeness, and let them have in subjection the fish of the sea and the flying creatures of the heavens and the domestic animals and all the earth and every creeping animal that is moving on the earth.” 27 And God went on to create the man in his image, in God’s image he created him; male and female he created them. 28 Further, God blessed them, and God said to them: “Be fruitful and become many, fill the earth and subdue it, and have in subjection the fish of the sea and the flying creatures of the heavens and every living creature that is moving on the earth.” 29 Then God said: “Here I have given to you every seed-bearing plant that is on the entire earth and every tree with seed-bearing fruit. Let them serve as food for you. 30 And to every wild animal of the earth and to every flying creature of the heavens and to everything moving on the earth in which there is life, I have given all green vegetation for food.” And it was so. 31 After that God saw everything he had made, and look! it was very good. And there was evening and there was morning, a sixth day. 2 Thus the heavens and the earth and everything in them were completed. 2 And by the seventh day, God had completed the work that he had been doing, and he began to rest on the seventh day from all his work that he had been doing. 3 And God went on to bless the seventh day and to declare it sacred, for on it God has been resting from all the work that he has created, all that he purposed to make.

These verses are clear in stating God's intended purpose for mankind and our earth.
Adam and Eve were to have children - plenty I'm sure - Fill the earth with grandchildren, and great-grandchildren. The animals were to do the same. Thus the entire earth would have been an extension of the Garden of Eden. God universal family would have been at peace.

This picture is painted by prophets who foretell of the time God's original purpose will be realized, and his will be done. Isaiah 65:17-25; Isaiah 11:6-9; etc...

What, if any, role would Jesus Christ have had in the world had the Fall never taken place?
Genesis 3:14, 15
14 Then Jehovah God said to the serpent: “Because you have done this, you are the cursed one out of all the domestic animals and out of all the wild animals of the field. On your belly you will go, and you will eat dust all the days of your life. 15 And I will put enmity between you and the woman and between your offspring and her offspring. He will crush your head, and you will strike him in the heel.”

Genesis 22:18 And by means of your offspring all nations of the earth will obtain a blessing for themselves because you have listened to my voice.’”

Galatians 3:16, 29
16 Now the promises were spoken to Abraham and to his offspring. It does not say, “and to your descendants,” in the sense of many. Rather, it says, “and to your offspring,” in the sense of one, who is Christ.
29 Moreover, if you belong to Christ, you are really Abraham’s offspring, heirs with reference to a promise.

Can we identify the first cause - the first domino that fell, for which there was a need for a savior?

If that domino never fell, would there be a domino effect - would there be a need for a savior?
I don't see any.

There would have been no Jesus Christ. There would have been no baptism with water, spirit, or fire. There would have been no Kingdom or priesthood.
There would have been no need for anything new, nor removing of anything old - (Revelation 21:1-5) 1 And I saw a new heaven and a new earth; for the former heaven and the former earth had passed away, and the sea is no more. 2 I also saw the holy city, New Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God and prepared as a bride adorned for her husband. 3 With that I heard a loud voice from the throne say: “Look! The tent of God is with mankind, and he will reside with them, and they will be his people. And God himself will be with them. 4 And he will wipe out every tear from their eyes, and death will be no more, neither will mourning nor outcry nor pain be anymore. The former things have passed away.” 5 And the One seated on the throne said: “Look! I am making all things new.” Also he says: “Write, for these words are faithful and true.”

However, the very conditions described in these prophecies would have existed - everlasting life, in a paradise on earth, without pain, suffering, or death.

I will definitely look through this thread tomorrow.
Tomorrow, tomorrow... boy I can't wait.

 

[9-18-1]

The Hebrew expression denoting the 'Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil' is:

עץ הדעת טוב ורע

The word עץ 'autz' denotes anything perceived 'upright' as with a tree. It does not only mean a physical tree but the archetype that describes a tree: something standing upright; growing and sustaining itself by its own nature.

The word הדעת can be translated as "[of] the knowledge". By removing the initial hey ה the word דעת literally means "knowledge".

The word טוב can be understood as that which is good.

The word ורע can be translated as "and evil" but more practically means "and pollution" as the inverse of טוב.

The vav ו that connects טובורע implies the two are linked - as with yang and yin. As such to 'know' "good and evil" implies knowing that they are two parts of one "thing".

This is precisely what distinguishes "man" from "GOD"; whereas the latter "knows" "good AND evil" the former does not.

Knowledge of "good AND evil" is directly related to the two polarities of masculine/feminine and how they find expression. Some expressions are "good" (as in fidelity; sexual purity; chastity etc.) and some expressions are "evil" (fornication, adultery, rape, pedophilia, polygamy etc.) yet both are a result of how one "chooses" to act upon the energy. Eating the "fruits" of the tree thus can take two forms:

The path of "pollution" which, as "GOD" correctly warns, causes death.
The path of "good" which, as the serpent correctly suggests, leads one to become "like" "GOD" - knowing טובורע.

To denote the serpent as "evil" is already breaking the commandment given by "GOD": to label anything as inherently "good" without knowing its counterpart "evil" will result in a(n) (internal) polarization which will necessarily lead to ones own "death". As such the serpent is not "evil"; but neither should it be stated it is "good" because it is neither - a neutral agent imparting something that is "half-true" precisely in the same way what "GOD" said is "half-true". In the same way, the sexual energy (in its raw form) is the same energy upon which life is sustained, however its polarization only occurs when a conscious act (will) utilizes it for either "good" or "evil". This is "eating" the fruit - either it leads to life or death. The "problem" is "choice".

 

[Salvador]

There were only two humans alive when they sinned.

Based on genetic diversity, there's never been a human population bottleneck as low as one primordial couple.

Human genetic diversity is too great for there to have ever been a human population size that consisted of less than 10,000 individuals. Pairwise Sequentially Markovian Coalescent (PSMC) analysis confirms a population bottleneck in humans that consisted of no fewer than 10,000 individuals. Source: ( Li, Heng, and Durbin, Richard. ) "Inference of Human Population History from Individual Whole-Genome Sequences". Nature International Weekly Journal of Science. 28 July 2001. PSMC estimate on simulated data. : Inference of human population history from individual whole-genome sequences : Nature : Nature Publishing Group

If there were the most severe population bottle-necking such as one breeding pair that is portrayed in the case of the Biblical or Koranic Adam and Eve, then there would be a maximum of 4 alleles passed on by Adam and Eve to their children. Furthermore, the subsequent inbreeding would cause some loss of alleles due to genetic drifting. There would not have been genetic diversity in the small group of Adam, Eve and their children who would've had to commit incest among each other for the procreation of their inbred children. A lack of genetic diversity would have persisted for thousands of generations until genetic mutations could cause the genetic diversity of today's population. Based on the number of different alleles there are for the number of genes within the current population and the known rate of mutations per nucleotide sites in humans, geneticists can calculate the minimum number of people needed to create the current amount of genetic diversity. Numerous genetic studies suggest that there were several thousands of people more than two people during the most severe population bottleneck which ever occurred in human history.

DNA segments ( Alu repeats ) insert themselves at various chromosomal locations. There are various forms of Alu sequences and several thousand families of Alu. One well-studied family of Alu is called Ya5, which has been inserted into human chromosomes at 57 mapped locations. If we were to have descended from a single pair of ancestors such as Adam and Eve, then we all would have each of the 57 elements inserted at the same location points of our chromosomes. " However, the human population consists of groups of people who share some insertion points but not others. The multiple shared categories make it clear that although a human population bottleneck occurred, it was definitely never as small as two. In fact, this line of evidence also indicates that there were at least several thousand people when the population was at its smallest". Source: ( Venema, Dennis and Falk, Darrel ) " Does Genetics Point to a Single Primal Couple?". 5 April 2010. Does Genetics Point to a Single Primal Couple? | The BioLogos Forum

Coalescence theory analysis of single nucleotide polymorphisms and linkage disequilibrium indicates the mean effective population size for hominid lineage is 100,000 individuals over the course of the last 30 million years. The effective population size estimated from linkage disequilibrium is a minimum of 10,000 followed by an expansion in the last 20,000 years." Source: ( Tenesa, Albert, Navarro, Paul, Hayes, Ben J., Duffy, David L., Clarke,Geraldine, Goodard, Mike E. and Visscher, Peter M.) " Recent Human Effective Population Size Estimated from Linkage Disequilibrium". Genome Research. 17 April 2007 Recent human effective population size estimated from linkage disequilibrium

 

[Salvador]

Whoa.


What would have happened had Adam and Eve never eaten the forbidden fruit?
It seems clear from scripture what God's will was, and therefore what the result of obedience would have meant for Adam and Eve.
Genesis 1:26-2:3
26 Then God said: “Let us make man in our image, according to our likeness, and let them have in subjection the fish of the sea and the flying creatures of the heavens and the domestic animals and all the earth and every creeping animal that is moving on the earth.” 27 And God went on to create the man in his image, in God’s image he created him; male and female he created them. 28 Further, God blessed them, and God said to them: “Be fruitful and become many, fill the earth and subdue it, and have in subjection the fish of the sea and the flying creatures of the heavens and every living creature that is moving on the earth.” 29 Then God said: “Here I have given to you every seed-bearing plant that is on the entire earth and every tree with seed-bearing fruit. Let them serve as food for you. 30 And to every wild animal of the earth and to every flying creature of the heavens and to everything moving on the earth in which there is life, I have given all green vegetation for food.” And it was so. 31 After that God saw everything he had made, and look! it was very good. And there was evening and there was morning, a sixth day. 2 Thus the heavens and the earth and everything in them were completed. 2 And by the seventh day, God had completed the work that he had been doing, and he began to rest on the seventh day from all his work that he had been doing. 3 And God went on to bless the seventh day and to declare it sacred, for on it God has been resting from all the work that he has created, all that he purposed to make.

These verses are clear in stating God's intended purpose for mankind and our earth.
Adam and Eve were to have children - plenty I'm sure - Fill the earth with grandchildren, and great-grandchildren. The animals were to do the same. Thus the entire earth would have been an extension of the Garden of Eden. God universal family would have been at peace.

This picture is painted by prophets who foretell of the time God's original purpose will be realized, and his will be done. Isaiah 65:17-25; Isaiah 11:6-9; etc...

What, if any, role would Jesus Christ have had in the world had the Fall never taken place?
Genesis 3:14, 15
14 Then Jehovah God said to the serpent: “Because you have done this, you are the cursed one out of all the domestic animals and out of all the wild animals of the field. On your belly you will go, and you will eat dust all the days of your life. 15 And I will put enmity between you and the woman and between your offspring and her offspring. He will crush your head, and you will strike him in the heel.”

Genesis 22:18 And by means of your offspring all nations of the earth will obtain a blessing for themselves because you have listened to my voice.’”

Galatians 3:16, 29
16 Now the promises were spoken to Abraham and to his offspring. It does not say, “and to your descendants,” in the sense of many. Rather, it says, “and to your offspring,” in the sense of one, who is Christ.
29 Moreover, if you belong to Christ, you are really Abraham’s offspring, heirs with reference to a promise.

Can we identify the first cause - the first domino that fell, for which there was a need for a savior?

If that domino never fell, would there be a domino effect - would there be a need for a savior?
I don't see any.

There would have been no Jesus Christ. There would have been no baptism with water, spirit, or fire. There would have been no Kingdom or priesthood.
There would have been no need for anything new, nor removing of anything old - (Revelation 21:1-5) 1 And I saw a new heaven and a new earth; for the former heaven and the former earth had passed away, and the sea is no more. 2 I also saw the holy city, New Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God and prepared as a bride adorned for her husband. 3 With that I heard a loud voice from the throne say: “Look! The tent of God is with mankind, and he will reside with them, and they will be his people. And God himself will be with them. 4 And he will wipe out every tear from their eyes, and death will be no more, neither will mourning nor outcry nor pain be anymore. The former things have passed away.” 5 And the One seated on the throne said: “Look! I am making all things new.” Also he says: “Write, for these words are faithful and true.”

However, the very conditions described in these prophecies would have existed - everlasting life, in a paradise on earth, without pain, suffering, or death.

I will definitely look through this thread tomorrow.
Tomorrow, tomorrow... boy I can't wait.

Where there not any other persons around on Earth, besides this supposed one primordial couple allegedly tested by the Biblical God?

Based on human genetic diversity, there has always been an effective human population of around at least 10,0000 progenitors throughout any generation of human history.

Human genetic diversity is too great for there to have ever been a human population size that consisted of less than 10,000 individuals. Pairwise Sequentially Markovian Coalescent (PSMC) analysis confirms a population bottleneck in humans that consisted of no fewer than 10,000 individuals. Source: ( Li, Heng, and Durbin, Richard. ) "Inference of Human Population History from Individual Whole-Genome Sequences". Nature International Weekly Journal of Science. 28 July 2001. PSMC estimate on simulated data. : Inference of human population history from individual whole-genome sequences : Nature : Nature Publishing Group

If there were the most severe population bottle necking such as one breeding pair that is portrayed in the case of the Biblical or Koranic Adam and Eve, then there would be a maximum of 4 alleles passed on by Adam and Eve to their children. Furthermore, the subsequent inbreeding would cause some loss of alleles due to genetic drifting. There would not have been genetic diversity in the small group of Adam, Eve and their children who would've had to commit incest among each other for the procreation of their inbred children. A lack of genetic diversity would have persisted for thousands of generations until genetic mutations could cause the genetic diversity of today's population. Based on the number of different alleles there are for the number of genes within the current population and the known rate of mutations per nucleotide sites in humans, geneticists can calculate the minimum number of people needed to create the current amount of genetic diversity. Numerous genetic studies suggest that there were several thousands of people more than two people during the most severe population bottleneck which ever occurred in human history.

DNA segments ( Alu repeats ) insert themselves at various chromosomal locations. There are various forms of Alu sequences and several thousand families of Alu. One well-studied family of Alu is called Ya5, which has been inserted into human chromosomes at 57 mapped locations. If we were to have descended from a single pair of ancestors such as Adam and Eve, then we all would have each of the 57 elements inserted at the same location points of our chromosomes. " However, the human population consists of groups of people who share some insertion points but not others. The multiple shared categories make it clear that although a human population bottleneck occurred, it was definitely never as small as two. In fact, this line of evidence also indicates that there were at least several thousand people when the population was at its smallest". Source: ( Venema, Dennis and Falk, Darrel ) " Does Genetics Point to a Single Primal Couple?". 5 April 2010. Does Genetics Point to a Single Primal Couple? | The BioLogos Forum

Coalescence theory analysis of single nucleotide polymorphisms and linkage disequilibrium indicates the mean effective population size for hominid lineage is 100,000 individuals over the course of the last 30 million years. The effective population size estimated from linkage disequilibrium is a minimum of 10,000 followed by an expansion in the last 20,000 years." Source: ( Tenesa, Albert, Navarro, Paul, Hayes, Ben J., Duffy, David L., Clarke,Geraldine, Goodard, Mike E. and Visscher, Peter M.) " Recent Human Effective Population Size Estimated from Linkage Disequilibrium". Genome Research. 17 April 2007 Recent human effective population size estimated from linkage disequilibrium

 

[Twilight Hue]

How could they have known what good and evil was? Do you? Did God? How do you get to know something? By personal experience, observation or study.

They had a knowledge of what was good and what was bad for them, for God had told them. Genesis 3:22 says us, they had become like one of us in knowing good and bad. Well, if they knew it why would that be a problem for Adam and Eve? It couldn't be a gaining of knowledge in the sense of personal experience because God and the angel, the "us" in Genesis 3:22, didn't have any such experience.

God didn't want them in the garden with the tree of life, living forever, because they hadn't reached maturity yet, as the angels had. They could do a great deal of damage if that were the case.

The knowledge was of choosing for themselves what was good and what was bad, whatever that would turn out to be. It's reasonable to conclude that without their creator's guidance and protection it would be self destructive.

They were, in a sense, children who refused their parent's guidance and protection.

It's a good philosophical position to ask as a comparison, if Adam and Eve could be compared as children who do not know right from wrong be expected that they know beforehand, what right from wrong even is?

Would they even have an idea of what Good and Evil was prior to eating from the forbidden tree? Because the Bible for way it's been written, seems to make it out as being impossible for Adam and Eve to even distinguish any of it for which the fruit itself opens their eyes where the knowledge of Good and Evil had been imparted by the simple act of eating the fruit.

 

[Earthling]

Read the text yourself. God states his reasons for expelling Adam and friend from the Garden ─ lest Adam get to live forever. At no point does God offer any other reason.

That's fine, but why were they cast out so as not to live forever?

The text has God say he fears they'll get to live forever and become like him, so he expels them. That is, he possesses something that they do not possess.

Which was the ability to decide for themselves what was good and bad. For example, why did they become ashamed of being naked? God hadn't told them to put some clothes on. They decided that for themselves.

With respect, I don't see that verse calling for a redeemer. And if it does, then it calls for a redeemer for the snake, not for anyone else ─ an interesting theology, that.

What about the repurchased or repurchaser? Isaiah 35:9 / Isaiah 51:10 / Isaiah 63:4 / Isaiah 43:1 / Isaiah 44:23 / Isaiah 48:20 / Isaiah 52:3 / Isaiah 60:16 / Isaiah 44:24 / Isaiah 44:24 / Isaiah 59:20 / Isaiah 63:16 Jeremiah 50:34 / Isaiah 54:5 / 59:20 / Isaiah 63:16 Jeremiah 50:34.

Who is the seed, who is the mediator? Galatians / Isaiah 9:6,7

Adam, in effect, sold mankind to slavery to sin and death. Jesus repurchased us.

The text gives you no support for that. (Nor should it ─ the ideas you mention are from many centuries later.) It makes no mention of missing, sinning, &c. Instead it has God state clearly that he's expelling them because he doesn't want them to live forever and become like him.

The text does support that, from Genesis to Revelation.

You simply aren't reading what the text says. I repeat, the text makes no mention of sin, original sin, the Fall, death entering the world, 'spiritual death' or anything of the kind. If you disagree, quote me the words that say those things.

You are looking for terms describing theological concepts. If those terms aren't there are there any descriptions of those terms? Sin means to miss the mark. Adam sinned by eating the tree that God told him not to eat from. Original sin means the first sin, that of Adam. The fall (from grace) means mankind's falling, figuratively (you have to point these things out to the skeptical) from God's grace. Death entered the world when, as promised, Adam took from the tree which God had warned him not to eat from or he would begin to die. Spiritual death in application of Adam's sin as recorded in Genesis? It's a valid term but I've never heard it in application to the Genesis account of Adam. Since the spirit, i.e. breath, life force, mental inclination, returns to God it isn't dead, but it was never alive. It is the animator not the animated. Spiritual destruction throughout the Bible implies no hope for being reanimated, so to speak. No hope of resurrection. Would that be the case with Adam and Eve? It certainly is possible, but there isn't any scriptural support of it that I can recall. Besides, here we are talking about a physical death. All of these things happened. You don't need to see their theological terms applied in the text to confirm this. It's semantics.

And reconcile them with Ezekiel 18:20 and the rest of Ezekiel 18, where it's clear stated that each is responsible for his or her own sin, and is NOT responsible for the sin (if any) of his ancestors.

Ezekiel 18 is all about sinning, not inherited sin. Adam sinned. It was his sin, not ours, but we live in an environment that is a product of that sin. Like if a father commits a crime, he is punished for it but his children, though not punished, suffer the consequences of it anyway. The hardship that resulted in their father's crime. Poverty as he may be imprisoned and can't support them, for example.

It's all there. I've already spelt it out for you.
In that case don't complain to me. Take it up with Zeke.
Dear oh dear. Okay, I'll spell this out for you too.

The Garden story never mentions sin, original sin, the Fall of man. You know that because you've reread the text with a clear mind, laying aside what other people have told you it should say.

The idea of original sin is much later theology. That doctrine is expressly contradicted by the whole of chapter 18 of Ezekiel, which I trust you've now read in full. I cited one verse which (like the rest of it) makes it perfectly clear that sin is not inherited. Therefore the Tanakh expressly rejects the notion of original sin.

Got it?

No. I don't got it because the Tanakh does not reject the notion of "original sin," it introduced it.

 

[Earthling]

It's a good philosophical position to ask as a comparison, if Adam and Eve could be compared as children who do not know right from wrong be expected that they know beforehand, what right from wrong even is?

Would they even have an idea of what Good and Evil was prior to eating from the forbidden tree? Because the Bible for way it's been written, seems to make it out as being impossible for Adam and Eve to even distinguish any of it for which the fruit itself opens their eyes where the knowledge of Good and Evil had been imparted by the simple act of eating the fruit.

What is knowledge? Familiarity with the facts acquired by study, observation or personal experience. Adam, Eve and Jehovah God had not studied, observed or personally experienced anything bad. God's creation was "good," Adam's creation was "good," Eve's creation was "good" and God, Adam, and Eve themselves were good. So none of them had any knowledge of bad at that time.

As I've pointed out, knowledge can also be an intimate acquaintance. For example, in some translations, as I've pointed out, Genesis 2:9 in older translations use the term "get to know" to mean have sexual intercourse with. Intimate acquaintance. None of the aforementioned, Adam, Eve or God, had an intimate acquaintance of what was bad.

However . . . good and bad are relative terms. To some people God and his creation is considered bad. So, who had the right to establish what was "good" and what was "bad?" The tree of the knowledge of good and bad was a symbolic reminder to Adam that as creator and sovereign, Jehovah, had the right to decide for them what was "good" and what was "bad."

So, Adam had nothing else to go on. He was told not to eat the fruit or something bad would happen. He didn't need anything else. There was only one possibility of something being bad and that was eating the fruit.

Adam and Eve knew what was good and bad, right and wrong because their creator told them. It was very simple. They didn't have all the variations with good and bad that we have today. If you put a knife in the middle of the floor without saying something to your kids they might not know it would be a bad thing to play with. But if you told them then they would know.

 

[metis]

I view the Creation and Fall accounts as more being allegorical than historical. The importance in each, imo, is not did they actually occur historically but what the lessons dealing with morals and values are.

 

[Ellen Brown]

Now you're gettin' somewhere. The tree was just an ordinary tree in the garden with symbolic meaning rather than imbued with any actual knowledge. Since it was a beautiful tree it's thought by modern day scholars to likely have been the pomegranate tree. But no one knows.

It represented their taking it upon themselves to decide for themselves what was good and what was bad, challenging their creator's sovereignty. That's why they became ashamed of being naked. There was nothing to be ashamed about that, that is the way they were created. The knowledge was an intimate knowledge, to experience what it was like to decide for themselves what was good and what was bad.

Let me show you another place in the Bible where this sort of use of the word knowledge is used.

Read Genesis 19:4-5. There, in the KJV, the men of the city want to "get to know" the angels who were visiting with Lot. Well, that don't sound so bad, does it? Except that in the old days this term applied in this context meant literally to get to intimately experience the angels. Now, hold on, that don't sound so nice. Let's check that translation.

The NIV says have sex with them where the KJV said get to know them. (Link)

Now do you get it?



Which they did know because God had told them, and there was no other "good and bad" that they needed to familiarize themselves with at that time.

The reason that I read the KJV almost exclusively, is that in the 45 years since I started reading the Bible, I have studied many of these inconsistencies, so have been aware of them. If I read multiple versions, what would I do about the places where they got it wrong?

For me, it is the same about the Quran. The original is written in Classical Arabic, a dialect that no one speaks any more, since how long, I do not know? These days, any version of the Quran you see is an interpretation of the original Arabic. Yusuf Ali, in the opinion of many Muslims did the best one. Yet, there are as many issues that are debated as hotly as in Christian countries.

It seems likely to me that when the Creator is seen again by us, humanity will be in complete disarray, and only those who meekly follow him will survive.

 

[blü 2]

That's fine, but why were they cast out so as not to live forever?

Because, the story says, they could live forever by eating the fruit of the Tree of Life, which grew in the Garden. Therefore God cut off their access to the Tree of Life by booting them out of the Garden and posting an armed angel to prevent their return.

Which was the ability to decide for themselves what was good and bad. For example, why did they become ashamed of being naked? God hadn't told them to put some clothes on. They decided that for themselves.

Yes, it seems strange that God felt threatened by their obtaining 'the knowledge of good and evil'. Eve should be regarded as one of the foremost benefactors of mankind, bringing us that knowledge in genetically transmissible form.

What about the repurchased or repurchaser? Isaiah 35:9 / Isaiah 51:10 / Isaiah 63:4 / Isaiah 43:1 / Isaiah 44:23 / Isaiah 48:20 / Isaiah 52:3 / Isaiah 60:16 / Isaiah 44:24 / Isaiah 44:24 / Isaiah 59:20 / Isaiah 63:16 Jeremiah 50:34 / Isaiah 54:5 / 59:20 / Isaiah 63:16 Jeremiah 50:34.

Isaiah 35:9 [the redeemed / and the ransomed]
Isaiah 51:10 [parting the sea 'for the redeemed' ie those liberated from the Egyptian captivity]
Isaiah 63:4 [(God's) day of vengeance / year of redemption ─ again a liberator]
Isaiah 43:1 [God as liberator from Egypt]
Isaiah 44:23 [Jacob (Israel) is redeemed = liberated]
Isaiah 48:20 [Go forth from Babylon .. the Lord has redeemed = liberated]
Isaiah 52:3 [liberated from Egypt]
Isaiah 60:16 [I the Lord am your savior]
Isaiah 44:24 [the Lord your Redeemer]
Isaiah 59:20 [so (his enemies) will fear him / and he will come to Zion as redeemer (liberator of the good)]
Isaiah 63:16[our redeemer from old ie liberator from Egypt]
Jeremiah 50:34 [(33) Israel and Judah are oppressed 34 redeemer from the Babylonian captivity
Isaiah 54:5 [God is your redeemer]

It seems fair to say that in all of those cases, 'redeem' means 'liberate' (the Egyptian and Babylonian captivities are expressly and repeatedly mentioned), the redemption has (redemptions have) already happened, no future event of 'redeeming' is discussed, and God is the redeemer / liberator and has already done the redeeming / liberating.

Isaiah 9 is about a king of Israel, on the model of David, who will be an earthly messiah and make Israel great among the nations. In particular he will deal with 'the Syrians in the East, and the Philistines on the west' (12) ie he will handle the political situation of Israel at the date of writing.

Adam, in effect, sold mankind to slavery to sin and death. Jesus repurchased us.

First, none of that is in the Garden story, where Adam and Eve were always going to die, and were expelled by God from the Garden to make sure they didn't become immortal.

Second, the future savior of Israel is the messianic war leader of Isaiah, a successful king ─ a model that Jesus simply does not fit.

Third, no need for a future 'redeemer from old sin' (or 'sin generally') is mentioned at any point. Instead God IS the redeemer already, the rescuer and liberator.

The text does support that, from Genesis to Revelation.

Nothing in the Tanakh, certainly nothing you've cited so far, says any such thing. As for the theology of the writers of the NT, that can't alter what the Garden story means, since its words are plain.

You are looking for terms describing theological concepts. If those terms aren't there are there any descriptions of those terms? Sin means to miss the mark. Adam sinned by eating the tree that God told him not to eat from.

I say again, and will say endlessly if need be, the Garden story does not say that. It never once mentions sin, original sin, the Fall, death entering the world, spiritual death, the future requirement for a redeemer ─ for the simple reason that, whatever it's about, it's not about those things; and as Ezekiel 18 makes crystal clear, sin is not heritable in the Tanakh.

Adam sinned. It was his sin, not ours, but we live in an environment that is a product of that sin. Like if a father commits a crime, he is punished for it but his children, though not punished, suffer the consequences of it anyway.

Then you agree there is no original sin, and hence no need for redemption from original sin. And that the Garden story is not about original sin, and does not require a redeemer.


A postscript: I should make clear that I respect your right to believe as you wish. My concern is that ancient documents should be respected, and understood for what they actually say ─ not what a later age, a subsequent theology, might think they should have said.

 

[Axe Elf]

Let's be clear from the start. I am under no illusion that anything I say to you will be of any benefit to you at all. You will merely spray it with your fact repellent as always, and probably put forth a whole bunch of nonsense pretending to be a rebuttal. But I will provide the lesson anyway, in the hopes that someone with a greater capacity to benefit from it will do so.

Wait a second......how does "given what we know about human beings and the history of earth" EQUEL that adam/eve wer not real people?

Because what we know about the evolution of human beings and the history of the Earth precludes the possibility that the human race began with a pair of actual homo sapiens named Adam and Eve.

You need to be rational here by answering all these questions. Rationality answers everything.

I wouldn't dream of answering them in any other way--but then, your fact repellent trumps rationality.

The book of genesis is one mini book written likely by one author. Why would the author arbitrarily make adam and eve mythical people, along with there babies, right down to Noah and then all of a sudden, ABRUPTLY make noah and everyone else a real human?

Because that's how God inspired him to write it, duh. And in that respect, it's not written that way "arbitrarily," it's written that way for a reason. I've been explaining the reason to you, but you just spray fact repellent on it and then say there's no reason.

Lol. And you say im not rational?

That's correct.

There is nothing in the stories to indicate in its literary style that shows adam to noah are myth, but noah to everyone else is real.

Well, yeah, there kind of is.

First of all, the story of creation takes up all of Genesis 1, and a few verses of Genesis 2. Then it kind of starts over again, except that this time, Adam is created before the plants and animals, while in Genesis 1, Adam was created last. The Garden of Eden story then continues on through Genesis 3. In Genesis 4, we get the story of Cain and Abel, which is another little parable that kind of expands on the Garden of Eden parable, showing us how corrupted we can become by our selfish human nature that originally separated us from God (original sin) in the Garden.

But then the Bible stops talking about these instructional stories, and basically fast-forwards through Genesis 5. Whereas the generation of Adam to Cain occupied four chapters, Genesis 5 flips through the pages of history at the rate of two or three generations per verse, in a blur of mythological life spans and impossibly virile old men, until we reach the point in history where mankind has proliferated across the Earth and we are ready for the instructional tale of Noah in Genesis 6.

I mean, i dont understand why its EASY for you to believe noah and say abraham wer real, but its HARD for you to believe adam and cain wer not.

Because I don't have any particular reason NOT to believe that Noah and Abraham were real people, as there is nothing extraordinary about their existence as human beings in the early days of recorded history. The existence of Adam and Cain as two of the very first human beings on Earth contradicts what we know about the evolution of human beings and the history of the Earth, as noted above.

We do have evidence to conclude that if there was a flood that Noah and his family survived, it is likely that it was merely a localized disaster of some sort, since again, the history of the Earth precludes the occurrence of a world-wide flood, and I'm not buying the idea that Noah fathered sons after the age of 500, either--but it's entirely possible that Noah and his sons existed as real people.

Hold on for a second....how can you say in the same breath that the bible is embellished in spots then say its holy?

Because the two descriptors are not mutually exclusive.

Job didnt exist either?

Probably not.

God is mentioned in the book, does this mean God is myth too?

Not necessarily, although it's probably more likely that God is a myth than that Adam and Eve were real people.

Mayby God is a parable in himself, huh?

It would be a logical fallacy to conclude that because some parables are told in the Bible, that everything in the Bible is a parable.

"Probably"?

Yes, probably. As in the case of Noah, if we don't have any reason to doubt the existence of people mentioned in the history of Israel, it seems reasonable to conclude that they may have actually existed.

Im sure if you wanted to fish for contradictions you could read them into anything.

Possibly, but that really has nothing to do with the fact that some of the genealogies given in the Bible contradict.

Actually, the sower on different soils is not a mythical thing. Thats a very NATURAL thing to happen. So, jesus did use real down to earth stuff to compare the kingdom to.

The point being that the story Jesus told was not a true story of an ACTUAL person sowing ACTUAL seeds on ACTUAL terrains; Jesus was illustrating a spiritual truth through the use of familiar imagery. The same can be said of the parable of the Garden of Eden. Two people living in a garden is a very natural thing to happen too; it just didn't actually happen, in the case of Adam and Eve.

Personally, whatever one believes about this ITS NOT going to make them grow. If i believe adam and eve are myth, how does that make me grow? No mental assent to any view makes anyone grow. Its how you LIVE your PRACTICAL life that makes you grow.

"Personally," yes, I KNOW you're not going to grow from this lesson, as I mentioned at the outset. But "one" is general, not personal, and for those who are able to grasp the message of the Eden parable, spiritual growth is a very likely outcome.[/QUOTE]

 

[Kenny]

I basically agree. But I would also add the fact that neither you nor your wife would really know what love even was if there was not also the absence of love. If you had never been sick a day in your life and had never even been able to conceive of the idea of poor health, would you even realize that you were healthy? If nothing had ever happened in your life to make you sad, would you truly appreciate happiness? Without disappointment and failure, satisfaction would be essentially meaningless. In other words, what is "good" if there is nothing with which to compare it?

Your questions are good but do I need to go to jail to understand freedom? To I need to be close to death to understand the value of life?

I think that the Tree of Life was all that was needed. He had everything except for one thing. I think the whole of the fruits of death can still be understood in that one Tree. Having the whole of Creation except for that Tree of Life was the root of all the other points that you mentioned. It is the root that created all the other fruit. IMO.

Adam could have appreciated happiness but he zeroed in that on thing he did not have. Satisfaction wasn't meaningless for he had an option. He had all "the good" and he could compare it with what he didn't have, the taste of the fruit of the knowledge of good and evil Remember, it was written that Adam sinned on purpose and the sin included all the fruit of poor health and sadness. He already was sad in that he couldn't eat the fruit. He was already disappointed and satisfaction was meaningless because he didn't have one thing.

So I think it was enough.

Okay, but the issue is whether there's any purpose for negative consequences if what caused them didn't have to happen in the first place. So, to me, the fact that God let things play out as they did, rather than prevent them from happening in the first place has got to be significant.

I agree, it was significant. But the way I see it is what was said at the beginning:
26 And God said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness: and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth.

I believe that once God gave it to man... then it was hands off because if He intervened, He would be a liar and would be serving the one who is the Father of Lies.

3) Why wouldn't He stop it? I believe that if He had He would be submitted to the Father of Lies. If God said, "I give you complete dominion over every living think" and then turns around and takes the dominion away, He would have lied (which He doesn't).

Okay, I think I may have just had an "aha! moment." Does this tie to your comments that I said confused me? Are you saying that Adam had "complete dominion" over Satan but chose to relinquish it? That's an interesting thought, if that's what you're saying. I've never really given that any thought before.

Exactly! As I view it... the reason that the temptation of Jesus included the giving of the glory of all the kingdoms is because Adam had legally handed it over to Satan. Thus Jesus had to legally come as a man to get it back because God had given the world to man and will not violate His promise. Since God had given the earth to man and He always worked through covenant with man to have legal access.

IMO, if God had intervened He would have become a liar because He gave the authority of earth to man.

 

[Axe Elf]

You sure about that?

Yes.

Doesn't that just mean that you are a prophet of those?

No. I don't even think the sciences have prophets. The sciences are already easily understood. Prophets are only required to help people understand occult spiritual wisdom.

You can't have two masters

What would you consider to be the two masters here?

and it seems to me that all you are doing is sacrificing truth for consensus at the least

Consensus is one way that we arrive at ever-closer approximations of truth.

and at the worst, examination, speculation.

What's so bad about examination and speculation? We are commanded to examine everything, as spiritual men, in 1 Corinthians 2:15:

"But the spiritual man tries all things [he examines, investigates, inquires into, questions, and discerns all things]" --Amplified Bible

History is always inaccurate, biology, geography, anthropology are all infants.

So you're saying that because there is this one little almost infinitesimally small chance that everything we know about the history of the earth and the evolution of mankind MIGHT be wrong, you're going to go with the idea that Adam and Eve were real people instead? I find that ludicrous, and intellectually shameful.

And we always have, ever changing and correcting, each generation claiming it's rational beliefs true until the next generation makes a laughing stock of the former. Like fashion.

Like fashion???

LOL!

The sciences are nothing like fashion. The sciences build upon themselves, as new theories help explain data in increasingly thorough and efficient ways--but almost never does new evidence cause the sciences to scuttle everything they thought they knew and start again from scratch. Just because we have found circumstances under which time and gravity don't work the way they did in classical Newtonian physics doesn't mean that all the experiments in classical Newtonian physics don't work any more. The only thing that is made a laughing stock by scientific progress is non-scientific nonsense, like the Earth being the center of the universe, or the Earth being flat, or paranormal phenomena, or that Adam and Eve were real people. THOSE are the fashions that come and go, each old unsupported idea being swept away to oblivion by the light of reason, usually ushering in a "new age" of some fresh nonsense that had nothing to do with its predecessors.

Yes, he did. And he also said Adam and Eve were created.

Actually, Jesus never mentions Adam and Eve by name. The only time that He ever said ANYTHING that could be in reference to Adam and Eve is reported in Matthew 19:4 and Mark 10:8 when Jesus is answering a question about divorce. In the Greek text, He called them "the male" and "the female," and in English the sentence is usually translated "He Who made them from the beginning made them male and female," or, "From the beginning of creation God made them male and female." Jesus is basically just saying that human beings come in two sexes, so they are intended to be together--He's certainly not asserting that Adam and Eve were real people.

 

[Jollybear]

Let's be clear from the start. I am under no illusion that anything I say to you will be of any benefit to you at all. You will merely spray it with your fact repellent as always, and probably put forth a whole bunch of nonsense pretending to be a rebuttal. But I will provide the lesson anyway, in the hopes that someone with a greater capacity to benefit from it will do so.

Let's be clear from the start. I am under no illusion that anything I say to YOU will be of any benefit to you at all. You will merely spray it with your fact repellent as always, and probably put forth a whole bunch of nonsense pretending to be a rebuttal. But I will provide the lesson anyway, in the hopes that someone with a greater capacity to benefit from it will do so.

Because what we know about the evolution of human beings and the history of the Earth precludes the possibility that the human race began with a pair of actual homo sapiens named Adam and Eve.

Ok, so this means adam and eve did not exist? Why cant you believe they existed under some other interpretation? Like they wer the first pair that God made a covenent with, or something like that? But instead you go full blown over the deep end and say they didnt exist at all, lol. I heard one interpretation say God sent aliens to change the DNA of primitive man to be what man is current. I mean theres other interpretations that still make adam and eve exist.

But hey, you believe in the "HOLY bible" right? Ok, what about where Jesus says in mathew 19:4-5 "He answered, “Have you not read that he who created them from the beginning made them male and female, 5 and said, ‘Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh’?"

Also paul says in 1 corinthians 15:45 "So it is written: "The first man Adam became a living being"; the last Adam, a life-giving spirit."

How do you explain these verses?

I wouldn't dream of answering them in any other way--but then, your fact repellent trumps rationality.

Those who are trully rational dont need to keep accusing others of not being so. This in itself makes you irrational.

Because that's how God inspired him to write it, duh.

Why would God inspire it in such a stupid way? That would make noah real, but his father mythical. Thats....stupid. i think God is snarter then that. Also, i think the authors themselves (human writers) are also smarter then that too.

And in that respect, it's not written that way "arbitrarily," it's written that way for a reason. I've been explaining the reason to you, but you just spray fact repellent on it and then say there's no reason.

No, your only "reason" is that you simply dont believe adam and eve wer real people because of some evolution. Thats all i got from you thus far. But, if your truly a rational person youl answer my closer, pressing questions. Think about the viewers, do it for them, since you like to mention them.

Well, yeah, there kind of is.

First of all, the story of creation takes up all of Genesis 1, and a few verses of Genesis 2. Then it kind of starts over again, except that this time, Adam is created before the plants and animals, while in Genesis 1, Adam was created last. The Garden of Eden story then continues on through Genesis 3. In Genesis 4, we get the story of Cain and Abel, which is another little parable that kind of expands on the Garden of Eden parable, showing us how corrupted we can become by our selfish human nature that originally separated us from God (original sin) in the Garden.

But then the Bible stops talking about these instructional stories, and basically fast-forwards through Genesis 5. Whereas the generation of Adam to Cain occupied four chapters, Genesis 5 flips through the pages of history at the rate of two or three generations per verse, in a blur of mythological life spans and impossibly virile old men, until we reach the point in history where mankind has proliferated across the Earth and we are ready for the instructional tale of Noah in Genesis 6.

Genesis 2:19 "Now the LORD God had formed out of the ground all the wild animals and all the birds in the sky. He brought them to the man to see what he would name them; and whatever the man called each living creature, that was its name."

Had formed, past tense. The second account is just merely building detail on a section of the first account. This isnt a problem. People do this kind of thing often.

Because I don't have any particular reason NOT to believe that Noah and Abraham were real people, as there is nothing extraordinary about their existence as human beings in the early days of recorded history.

The holy on par with the bible, Wikipedia says > "The story of Isaac is important in the Abrahamic religions including Judaism, Christianity and Islam. Many modern scholars doubt the existence of figures from Genesis, including Isaac" Isaac - Wikipedia

And since wiki is so reliable to you (although wiki disagrees with you on that, lol) and "many" scholars say there myth, why dont you agree with them? Why stop at adam and his kids up to Noahs dad? Go further, include noah and the patriarches like wiki said and many scholars say. Surely they must be correct right? If wiki says it, it must be true, right? If many scholars say it, it must be true! Yea? They surely cant be stupid, with bias, or have ignorences, right?

The existence of Adam and Cain as two of the very first human beings on Earth contradicts what we know about the evolution of human beings and the history of the Earth, as noted above.

As "noted above", listen to yourself! You ASSERT knowledge. All we got is a few fossilized bones from the ground. Come on!

We do have evidence to conclude that if there was a flood that Noah and his family survived, it is likely that it was merely a localized disaster of some sort, since again, the history of the Earth precludes the occurrence of a world-wide flood, and I'm not buying the idea that Noah fathered sons after the age of 500, either--but it's entirely possible that Noah and his sons existed as real people.

So God inspired (lied) about the long ages of 1000, 800, 500 years old?

Because the two descriptors are not mutually exclusive.

I dont consider lies holy. In fact, i downright detest lies. In fact, that "holy" bible you adhere to hates lies so much it says ALL liers are goin to a fire lake. So, either God is a hypocrite or the bible is literally true when it talks of the old ages. I dont think God is a hypocrite.

Probably not.

Why is it hard to believe job existed, but not abraham? I mean, seriously, whats so extrordinary about job vs abraham? Like HUH?

Not necessarily, although it's probably more likely that God is a myth than that Adam and Eve were real people.

Not nesesarily hey? God is not nesesarily a myth. Ok then. For someone who believes in the bible its kinda odd to hear you say to my question "is God a myth to?" That its "not nesesarily". To believe in the bible an answer like "hell no God is not a myth" would make more sense!

It would be a logical fallacy to conclude that because some parables are told in the Bible, that everything in the Bible is a parable.

Thats how you come across. Usually context and santex reveal what IS and IS NOT a parable in the bible. And adam and eve all the way up to Noah dont appear that way. Are the boring list of geneologies a parable too? Oh, ya, just the ones leading up Noah. Then the geneologies AFTER noah are not parables, lol! Sure! Just what does a geneology parable mean by the way?

Yes, probably. As in the case of Noah, if we don't have any reason to doubt the existence of people mentioned in the history of Israel, it seems reasonable to conclude that they may have actually existed.

And i dont have any reason to doubt adam and eve and there kids existed. I also dont have a reason to believe Noah had a mythical father either, lol. That viewpoint sounds more MYTH to me then adam existed.

Possibly, but that really has nothing to do with the fact that some of the genealogies given in the Bible contradict.

Theres websites that defend the geneologies. Im not interested in debating dry geneologies.

The point being that the story Jesus told was not a true story of an ACTUAL person sowing ACTUAL seeds on ACTUAL terrains; Jesus was illustrating a spiritual truth through the use of familiar imagery.

Familair. A farmer sowing seed on soil is not something that would have been mythical or made up or did not exist. Jesus used real, existing things to compare the kingdom too.

The same can be said of the parable of the Garden of Eden. Two people living in a garden is a very natural thing to happen too; it just didn't actually happen, in the case of Adam and Eve.

Im glad you can see two people can naturally be in a garden, so its odd to me its hard for you to believe it, but easy to believe abraham was real. Curious, was anrahams wife sarah, did she give birth to a child in her age of 100? Do you believe that part?

"Personally," yes, I KNOW you're not going to grow from this lesson, as I mentioned at the outset. But "one" is general, not personal, and for those who are able to grasp the message of the Eden parable, spiritual growth is a very likely outcome.

We all can learn spiritual lessons from the story, thats not my point. My point is, whether you believe there real or myth, either way, you, nor i grow from either view we assent too on THAT point.

 

[Axe Elf]

Let's be clear from the start.

I mean seriously, just how is it possible that you have survived this long with an intellect that would make most squid look like Rhodes scholars?

Day after day, you go into excruciating detail to describe just what an absolute failure as a rational being you are, blissfully unaware of how ridiculous everything that comes out of your keyboard sounds. And then you point at these steaming piles of intellectual manure and say, "See? How do you respond to THAT, huh??" as if any other response other than hysterical laughter would be appropriate.

I just picture you standing there all proud of what you have produced, acting like you've just authored the special theory of relativity, when in fact it's just another milestone on your road to present yourself as the most intellectually stunted human that has ever lived.

Yeah, I know. Rule 1 or whatever. Go ahead, moderate it. I'll come back later and write a real response, if I can muster up the intestinal fortitude to face with a straight face and good intentions another round of gibberish that would in any other context be ascribed to the random typing of a retarded chimp.

 

[YoursTrue]

That may be, but only one of us is right--and all the evidence of history, biology, geography, anthropology and reason is in my corner.



"To each his own" only applies in matters where there is room for a legitimate difference of opinion. Where evidence and reason dictate a conclusion, one is not free to hold to an irrational opinion. As rational beings, we have a responsibility to hold rational beliefs.



I definitely trust you on that. Some are created to understand, and some are not. Jesus said, "If any man have ears to hear, let him hear!" at least six times in the Gospels--usually when delivering a truth by parable. Clearly, some don't have ears to hear them and understand their truth.

I just wonder about writing and history. How come, with all mankind's accomplishments and supposed longevity, writing is a fairly new invention.

 

[EverChanging]

First off, I take this story as mythology. I do not believe Adam and Eve really existed.

My take on the Fall is that it symbolizes becoming an individual, learning to judge things as right or wrong. It involves growing up. We all go through the Fall.

But growing up is painful. Developing an ego is inevitable as it is natural. We thus experience this process of separation and making distinctions as the "wrath" of God.

Once we begin to acknowledge and experientially live into the union of all that is -- God, if you will, or Love -- we can begin to experience the love of God. This union has always been a reality, but now we begin to experience it with knowledge, as autonomous adults. We can now embrace both our individuality as well as the union of all that is.

This link provides some perspectives on the Fall similar to my own.

Reading the Creation Stories Again

 

[Vaderecta]

Then it sounds like someone knew what the Bible taught and actually obeyed it.

Can I ask how you know that not having a blood transfusion nearly ended your life? I am always interested in the details of such claims, having had many personal friends who were told by doctors that they would die without blood.....yet none of them did...not one. Having someone tell you that you will die without blood, and it actually happening, are two entirely different things. Do you know how many people die because they had blood? You won't see those stats published.

I had cancer, I had just survived the surgery but needed blood. My mom was in the waiting room with my churches elders and congregational friends. The doctor explained to my mom that the cancer was gone but without blood I would die. My mom agreed to the transfusions. The elders and her friends left her there alone. She was allowed to return to the Kingdom hall as was I and we were never excommunicated. Also don't hit children however you want to justify it to yourself.