Creation Story

no problem, i was fishing.

how old do you think the earth is then?

CREATION STORY:

In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth, and all that was above, below, and on the earth.

THE END

I see where your coming from but lets see if logic is in creation.
God spoke all creation into existence....is that logical? By a word they were created. Not just manifested but made in full.
In full is ment ...he saw that it was very good....meaning it serves its purpose.
Now scriptures tells us he holds all things together. Is that logical.?
Now the sun, the moon, the stars ect were created for his feast days and appointed times...wheres the logic in that?
All things created were for his glory his purposes his design.
Then God said my ways are way above your ways, even his thoughts.. so where can we start?
Now the real kicker is GOD has seen the end from the beginning. So this whole creation has passed away already in Gods time.
My point is you have to read the whole book to understand the whys and why nots.
Job thought he knew a thing or two untill God decided to ask him a thing or two.

And let's not forget that according to the Ten Commandments that was all accomplished in six, literal, 24-hour days (measured from evening to evening). The Gap Theory is not supported by Scripture, which means that the earth is a little over 6,000 years old. Also Ptolemy's chronological is off by 83 years.

I don’t know. I don’t think it matters. God created the world, that’s all that’s important. It be interesting to know. But there’s a ton more things that are more interesting.

The logic or rather LOGIC was in the beginning. John 1:1 In the beginning was the WORD or LOGIC. Check out the word in Greek.

Genesis 1:1 “In the beginning God created…”

The word “the” is not in the original language. We moderns see “In the beginning” and we assume some ultimate beginning of all beginnings. It was a beginning or can be understood as when God began to create (shape, create).


“the heavens and the earth.”

We moderns think of the 3 heavens of sky, space, and where God’s throne is as “heavens”. We also think of earth as a round planet that circles around the sun. The ancient near eastern people didn’t think this way. The heavens were simply the sky and the earth referred to the land beneath their feet. They wouldn’t have thought of space as we think about it. Their view of what we call space where the sun and moon are were different. The waters that God is described as separating waters above from waters below created a sky Gen 1:6-7. The firmament God is described as creating held the waters above up there. Look up the word, it referred to a solid thing. The waters above had lights coming from it. Light from the sun or moon were natural phenomena, not what we think and know about the sun and moon today.

“God created…”

This could be referring to materials things, non-material things, it could refer to God having created something from nothing or something from something else. Let’s see.


Day 1 God created time. A period of light called day and a period of darkness called night seems to be referring to periods of time, time itself. If this is the case, there was no material creation on day one, time is immaterial.

Day 2 A firmament was made separating the waters above and below. Again, this is described as a solid thing. This allowed for sky, an open area above the land, which God called sky or our modern translations, heaven. The material thing created was the “firmament.”

Day 3 God separated watered so dry land appeared. This was already existing things God reshaped. The planets, seed, etc., this may have been referring to new material creation.

Day 4 Lights above. We moderns think of sun, moon reflecting the sun, and stars. We think of them as material things. However, the ancient people didn’t think that way. They saw the light as natural phenomena. Light is immaterial. I’m the ancient mind their was no material this this day.

Day 5 God made creatures. Birds, fish, etc. material creation.

Day 6 Animals the humans were made. Adam was described as being formed from the dust of the earth. Adam was then formed from something else, not from nothing. Or dust could not be referring to material things at all but referring to life as temporal. From dust you were made to dust you shall return. Eating from the tree of life would have stopped that as they continued to eat from the tree of life. Here there could have been some material creation or there was no material creation and from dust Adam was formed or Eve made from Adam spoke of temporal life and the later referring to Eve being part of Adam in a deeper sense then just a material explanation.

Day 7 no material thing created

Just some thoughts

Thanks rbaitz for your posting! The Bible is written in parable form. It is entirely true because it is from God, inspired by the Holy Spirit, but it is written intentionally by God in parable form. One of the amazing things, though, is that the Bible makes this claim of being written in parable form and yet many persons who claim that the scripture is true still do not believe God (in the scripture) when he says that it is written in parable form. We read in Psalm 78: "Give ear, O my people, to my law: incline your ears to the words of my mouth. I will open my mouth in a parable ". God's law mentioned here is the Bible. He calls it the words of his mouth. He also calls it a parable. This is seen also in the New Testament in places like Mark 4:34: "But without a parable spake he not unto them: and when they were alone, he expounded all things to his disciples. " This describes how Jesus' words are in parables, but that he explains these parables to his own disciples when he is alone with them. In the same book of Mark we read how Jesus taught his disciples many things by parables: "And he taught them many things by parables, and said unto them in his doctrine, " His doctrine is the Bible. He teaches his disciples many things by the parables that are scripture, his doctrine. Those who are unsaved encounter the scripture of the Bible but they do not understand it, while those who are saved God gives to understand the scripture (which is in parable form). We read, "And he said unto them, Unto you it is given to know the mystery of the kingdom of God: but unto them that are without, all these things are done in parables: " So all the Bible things ("all these things") are not understood by those who are without (the unsaved), since they are in parables.

Your question about Genesis relates to this fact, that the Bible is written in parable form. When God explains how to interpret parables in Mark he shows us that a surface story has a hidden meaning. Seed, for example, in the story of the sower is not really meaning a handful of physical seeds but is the word of God. Thorns are not really the branches of physical briars and such but is meaning 'such as hear the word, And the cares of this world, and the deceitfulness of riches, and the lusts of other things entering in, choke the word, and it becometh unfruitful. ' It is no different with the part of God's law called Genesis. The light has a hidden meaning. Perhaps the light is Jesus. The garden has a hidden meaning. Perhaps it is God's own believers: "A garden inclosed is my sister, my spouse " The rivers in Genesis have a hidden meaning: perhaps they are the gospel. Perhaps the waters are peoples. Perhaps the firmament has a hidden meaning: perhaps it is heaven (God's throne). Perhaps the tree of life in the midst of the garden is Christ.

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That makes a lot of sense. It’s funny I was just thinking about parables and how they communicate (not about real farmers, seed, sons or slaves, etc), but do speak about real people and real details in their time. I don’t take the parables literally as referring to the farmer up the road or literal lamps, but there is a reality the parables (story) is telling.

I see the creation story as myth, similar in some ways to a parable. Myth today by some is understood as fairytale. I don’t refer to myth in that way here. Myth was a form of communication in ancient times that communicated to people what they thought was real and true things. I understand the creation story as myth, but which explained a real Adam and Eve, God as creator, and more.

I think of Gen. 1 as NOT saying HOW God Created everything, but THAT HE was the one who did it. I was also in the YEC camp once, but changed with education. I get the idea that the apostle Paul was open to science and observation, since he wrote that the invisible qualities of God could be observed in nature. And one invisible quality, His eternal nature is seen in a 14B yr old universe. I accept many conclusions by secular scientists, simply because it makes sense even with a Biblical worldview. And many scientists who are Christians also make the same observations and calculations and come to the same conclusions.

A clear example of something which indicates long ages of the universe is the observation of supernovas, which have been seen to occur as much as 10B lt yrs distant. Another evidence is cosmic background radiation, which points to a big bang beginning many ages ago. I've read enough YEC material to know that this tradition can't explain away such evidences. Their "best" rebuttal relies on ignorance, saying that secularists don't see things the same. YECers imply (or say) that if you don't believe the YEC theory, you're skating on thin spiritual ice. You can see that in some of the responses in this thread. Unfortunately, that path has been taken by some liberals who abandon the faith and use science as an excuse to claim the Bible is not God's word. Then YECers project that same attitude on you (as they might also on themselves, if they were bold enough to accept observed reality).

But let's take the terms "sunrise", "moonrise", "sunset", etc. as an example of perspective. Today we see those terms as metaphorical, but 3500 years ago, they likely used those terms literally, because they likely thought of those events as literal events. In modern times, we adopt the same terms just because it is easy to carry it forward, even though we know otherwise. So it's a matter of perspective, just as a flat-earther sees the world as flat, and therefore declares it to be so. It's the same with the phrases "windows of heaven" and "water jars of heaven," which we see as figures of speech.

The point is that the Bible (namely Gen. 1) is not a science textbook, and it's a fool's errand to try to make it so. Gen. 1 is not a foundation of scripture on which faith in God stands or falls. Instead, it declares there is only one true God (monotheism vs. polytheism), which was the issue of the times.

The whole Bible is not parables. Most of it is literal, such as the historical books, genealogies, epistles of the NT, and prophecies. Many of these use figures of speech at appropriate times, but they aren't parables. You might call Gen. 1 a parable because it's written for a certain culture. But since Jesus regarded Adam and Eve as literal persons (Paul did also), that part must be literal. Surely you don't see "thou shalt not steal" as a parable, do you?

I agree, the Bible isn’t one big parable or a series of parables. It contains some parables, but like you added real history, real events in history, and I’d add myth (not as fairytale but as a way an ancient people explained things at times.).

Would anyone like to comment on some of the content I mentioned? Add to it, engage with it? For example,

1. Myth, not as fairytale, but as a way the ancient people communicated at times. Just as poetry, parables, or figures of speech served their purposes, so did myth.

2. A real historic Adam and Eve despite the creation myth story. Just as parables were fictional stories, yet they referred to real people.

3. The ancient people (including the Israelites) had an ancient understanding of cosmology. Despite this, God still communicated theological messaging through it. In creation story, God is creator, owner, authority, ultimate King, while humans in relationship with God, are given roles of subordinate kings and priests over the creation.

4. Inerrancy, depending on which inerrant view you hold, can be forcing a particular interpretation and potential denial of what scripture does communicate or how the people actually understood things as found in scripture. Meanwhile other high view of scripture inerrancy views allow the Bible to be what it is.

5. Does “firmament” being a firm solid thing holding back the waters above inform us of an ancient cosmology? This was a normal thing in the rest of the ancient world which Israel shared with their neighbors.

6. Does Adam being made from dust show he was not made from nothing but something? Or is this teaching something else such as mortality? So then eating from the tree of life was the thing that allowed him to life forever? Our feeding on Christ, or being in Christ, this leads to life eternal.

7. Thinking about apologetics, understanding the Bible possessing ancient cosmology and is not a science book removes the ability of those who attack from scientific perspectives. If the Bible isn’t about science, nor does it claim modern day cosmology or biology, then the atheist attacks sighting science to undermine the Bible becomes no more, it no longer becomes an argument.

True science is never in conflict with the Bible, since it is God who created the natural laws upon which all science is based. As to the pseudo-science of the evolutionist, Christians can simply ignore it. Science cannot possibly address the creation account since only God was present at creation, and only the Bible sums up the sequence of events. That too very briefly but very accurately.

It really seems that you want to have it both ways, which means that in the end you will have it neither way. And just for your information I have a Master of Science degree.

So how do you understand the Genesis “firmament”? It’s a solid thing, a dome like structure that would have held back the waters above? This idea was shared by Israel with the ancient people around them. This was part of an ancient understanding of cosmology. How do you interpret it today?

Strong's Concordance
raqa: to beat, stamp, beat out, spread out
Original Word: רָקַע
Part of Speech: Verb
Transliteration: raqa
Phonetic Spelling: (raw-kah')
Definition: to beat, stamp, beat out, spread out
NAS Exhaustive Concordance
Word Origin
a prim. root
Definition
to beat, stamp, beat out, spread out
NASB Translation
beaten (1), hammered (2), plates (1), spread (3), spreading (1), stamp (1), stamped (2)

Firmament comes from the root word “raqa” it refers to a firm thing, beat out, hammered, like a copper bowl or cup shaped into a firm thing. The firmament above held back the waters above it.

The word firmament is a noun, whereas it’s root is a verb (as I mentioned above). Is your science in line with a solid firmament?

I was with you until the "myth" part.

I, too, was brought up with a YEC viewpoint. Which is based on how Gen 1:2 has been translated. In my late teens, I heard about the "GAP theory", that there is an unknown time gap between v.1 and 2. All of which would account for what science claims is a very old earth. However, I wasn't given any actual evidence for this, other than what was said.

Many years later, I discovered one of the most valuable verses in the Bible regarding how to study. Acts 17:11 - Now the Berean Jews were of more noble character than those in Thessalonica, for they received the message with great eagerness and examined the Scriptures every day to see if what Paul said was true.

So, I began applying this verse to what pastors/teachers/etc were saying. iow, does the Bible say what people claim?

At some point, I thought about Genesis 1:1,2. I met a Greek and Hebrew expert, whose church Bible is in Hebrew for the OT and Greek for the NT! He pointed me to biblehub.com as a resource for studying how Greek/Hebrew words are used in every other place in the OT or NT. When I studied the key words in v.2, I realized that the translators didn't translate those words the same way they did the rest of the OT. When seeing how these key words were translated in the rest of the OT, a different meaning began to develop.

Finally, every English translation begins v.2 with "and". The Hebrew has 1 word that can mean either "and" or "but", unlike the Greek and English. The Septuagint translates the conjunction as "but".

So, here is the traditional translation:

And the earth was waste and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep: and the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters.

And this is how the key words should be translated:

But the earth became an uninhabitable wasteland; (I didn't examine the rest of the verse).

What is interesting is comparing this translation with what Isa 45:18 says:

For thus says the LORD, who created the heavens (he is God!), who formed the earth and made it (he established it; he did not create it empty, he formed it to be inhabited!): "I am the LORD, and there is no other.

Now, the blue words in the traditional verse is "tohu wabohu" and contradicts Isa 45:18, which says God did NOT create the earth 'empty', which is the same word in Gen 1:2.

So, either God did or did not create the earth "tohu". Using the corrected translation, developed from how the key words are translated elsewhere in the OT, there is no contradiction.

What we have is that God didn't create the earth a wasteland (Isa 45:18) BUT the earth BECAME a wasteland.

All that said, Genesis 1:2ff is about a restoration of God's original creation. So the earth can be every bit as old as science has measured, without any "damage" to the biblical text.

So I don't see any "myth" about Gen 1. Just a straightforward account of original creation (Gen 1:1) and the earth becoming a wasteland (without any explanation) and God restoring earth and putting man on it.

I dont think the primary objective of the creation narrative is science or time.
I think its that God did it by his word and in order and that at that moment he pronounced it good.
I dont know if the six days are a literal 6 days as we know them now or if time was different or if the six days is colloquial.
I dont doubt God has the ability to do it in six days as we know them today. I do however doubt the million billion years theory given by so called science.