Genesis - Literally True?

cpizzle

cpizzle

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I believe the book of Genesis is inspired by God and 100% true.

However, that doesn't mean I believe it to always be "literal."

I don't believe the earth is 6000 years old and I don't believe the "days" of creation are 24 hour days.  Scientific evidence totally contradicts this.  Today's "creation scientists" are great people, but I find their evidence lacking. 

BTW, I don't subscribe to theistic evolution nor the "day/age" theory either.

Here is what I believe.  God created the Heaven's and the Earth.  That part I know is true.  How long ago and how long it took....I don't have the answer.  God created men and women in his image and we are not the results of primate evolution.  Oh yea.....and Jesus Saves, which is what I think really matters.
 
Some part of the Bible are figurative.....most are literal

The GAP theory that many believers holds on to combines "and God said " with millions of years ago.

I take the creation as 7 literal days bc that is literally what it says :)
 
"If the literal sense, makes sense, seek no other sense" is the rule I generally follow.

However, the literal sense does not make sense.  The evening and morning were the first day, 2nd day, 3rd day, and then we create the Sun?  I believe the entire Bible is true and inspired by God.  I question my understanding of the Bible and Genesis falls into that category.
 
Saved by Grace said:
Some part of the Bible are figurative.....most are literal

The GAP theory that many believers holds on to combines "and God said " with millions of years ago.

I take the creation as 7 literal days bc that is literally what it says :)
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Actually very few hold on to the old Gap theory - it's an old fundamentalist belief popularized by CI Scofield. There is a guy with a web site called jesus-is-savior.com who is a a Hyles type of guy or something like that who believes this and I wouldn't be surprised if there are others out there that do.  Most believers would hold onto other theories such as Day-age which unlike the Gap theory reinterprets the word day - Gap theory just adds days between verse 1 and 2. 
 
Here is what I believe.
The original Hebrews were responsible not only for reading and copying the scriptures and in some cases doing what it says but they also had to understand it (especially the first five books). If they got the "sense" wrong (see Ezra) they would be lying to themselves - God was there to correct them if they were wrong any ways. They would have understood the ten commandments where it says six days to literally mean six days. They would not be thinking 100, 1000 or more years for every day. 
 
The Hebrew word YOM (see Hebrews 4:3) refers to a period of time, not specifically 24 hrs. Evening (beginning of Hebrew day) and Morning (end of Hebrew day) do not have to refer to a 24 hr period because there was not a sun to define the time period which is a day.

I don't care how long God choose to spend on creation or what time scale he used, what matters is God created everything out of nothing.

I try not to spend too much time on the things that matter little when 150,000 people die each day and go to either Heaven or Hell. God has chosen us to warn them.

 
cpizzle said:
"If the literal sense, makes sense, seek no other sense" is the rule I generally follow.

However, the literal sense does not make sense.  The evening and morning were the first day, 2nd day, 3rd day, and then we create the Sun?  I believe the entire Bible is true and inspired by God.  I question my understanding of the Bible and Genesis falls into that category.
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Personally, I appreciate your honesty on the subject.

One "nugget" that I've read is that the first "Day" (capital "D") can refer to a longer period of time.  In the Bible, a "D"ay can be a thousand years.

I believe the Book as written.  I acknowledge my understanding of the infinite and eternal is somewhat lacking.  The problem is not the Book, it is me.

Also, you seem to forget that Light existed before the Sun and that God created the galaxies almost as a passing thought.

Oh, science will never catch up to the Bible.
 
Regardless of what creation theory you hold to, what is your take on the dinosaurs.

I have seen actual digs in Wyoming and Utah. My favorite is Dinosaur National Monument in Utah and Colorado. I have also been to a number of natural history museums where fossils are displayed. The Dinosaurs clearly existed, but there is little to no mention of them in the bible. Why do you think this is and what is your take.
Job 40-41 and Psalms 104:26
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3BkjyA8uILw



 
I believe Genesis is to be read literally.  God could have created the universe in an instant, or He could have taken millions of years.  The Bible says He did it in six literal days, and to clarify that point the writer states, "and the morning and the evening were the __ day". If the earth is millions of years old, when did man come on the scene? When did death enter creation?  Was there death before sin? And if we are not to take the time literal, why should we take the statement that God created literally?  Did it actually start with one man and one woman? We lose our basis of understanding of the impact of sin and death, when we try to allegorize the Scripture, when even the clear verbiage does not allow for such.  BTW...it is not big deal for God to create the universe with age innately in it.  Adam was not...then he was created as a mature human.  How old were the rocks the day after creation?  How about a tree that did not exist and then God created it...bet if you cut it in two you would see rings that would indicate an age that was not possible except in God's perfect creative plan.  Anyway...that is my thought on this.
 
I take the creation days in Genesis as literal 24 days. It seems like a stretch of the language to derive any other meaning. As for the scientific evidence for an earth that's billions of years old, this would be based on evolutionary assumptions. Or the scientific data isn't interpreted from an unbiased "view from nowhere." I thought this video was helpful,

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f1Qr9ZZ-Y30
 
I accept the Bible by faith, so my opinion really isn't important.  What God says is true, even if I have doubts in my understanding.

Question:  If you were given irrefutable proof that creation account cannot be literal fact and therefore must be figurative/allegorical/poetry, would it shake your faith or cause you to doubt other parts of scripture?  Must the Bible be History in order for it to be true?  If Job and Jonah are just stories that teach a spiritual lesson, does that take away any of the Bible's authority?
 
cpizzle said:
Question:  If you were given irrefutable proof that creation account cannot be literal fact and therefore must be figurative/allegorical/poetry, would it shake your faith or cause you to doubt other parts of scripture?  Must the Bible be History in order for it to be true?  If Job and Jonah are just stories that teach a spiritual lesson, does that take away any of the Bible's authority?
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Yes, but not possible.
 
The first three verses of Genesis 1 are little understood by most Christians.

Verse 1 is the title of the book of Genesis. It basically tells us what the story following is all about.

1. In the beginning God created the Heavens and the Earth.
- Here is what we are going to talk about.

2. The earth was formless and empty. Darkness was on the surface of the deep and God?s Spirit was hovering over the surface of the waters.
- This verse is what is known as a circumstantial clause. It relates the circumstances at the beginning of the story.

It is similar to "A man was walking down the street and turned into a pharmacy." The circumstantial clause is that "a man was walking down the street." That tells us what was going on (the circumstances) when our story starts.

The circumstances outlined in verse 2 is that the Earth was unformed (tohu) and unfilled (bohu). Darkness reigned and God's Spirit was present.

Verse 2 begins with what is called a waw disjunctive. The waw disjunctive can be identified by the attaching of a waw to a noun. In this case waw?ha??a?res (And the Earth). When a waw is used with a noun the waw disjunctive results.

The disjunctive disconnects verse 1 from verse 2. There is no logical or chronological connection between verse 1 and verse 2.

So, the bible does not tell us when verse 1 occurred. Only that it already existed when the story starts in verse 3. And God said, ?Let there be light,? and there was light.

Now note that the waw that begins verse 3 is attached to the verb. "Said God" (waw?yo?mer e?lo?him). When the waw is attached to a verb it means verse 3 follows both logically and chronologically immediately after verse 2. This is called a waw consecutive.

So, is there room for a gap? Such a gap is meaningless as far as the narrative is concerned. Nothing other than the unformed and unfilled ball of dirt in perpetual darkness existed until God, in verse 3, began to form the unformed and fill the unfilled.

No life of any sort was possible as the penalty for sin, death, had not yet been passed on creation.

So, the bible does not tell us how long ago verse 1 happened. In fact, verse 1 is not temporal. It is divorced from the time line and is included only as a synoptic title for the Creation narrative.

But the idea of the gap theory is idiotic. It ignores both the grammar of the Hebrew and the theology of the narrative itself.

From verse 3 until the end of chapter 1 every verse save one starts with a waw attached to a verb making each verse follow, logically and chronologically, the verse before it.

So,
Verse 1: Here is what we are going to talk about.
Verse 2: Here are the circumstances when our story starts.
Verses 3 and following: Here is how God formed the unformed and filled the unfilled.
 
The longer periods of time were delineated by the sun, moon, and stars, not created until verse 14, but the dividing of the light/dark created what the bible is calling a "day" so we have some indication that time, at least at the day/night level was already being recognized. The hermeneutical principle of "shareability" would indicate that two guys looking over Moses' shoulder as he penned the words would have the same understanding of the meaning of "day" as Moses, and other Jews living in the 15th century BC. A "day" to them was one light - dark cycle comprised of roughly 24 hours, and there is no reason to understand the word to mean anything else.

And even though the sun did not yet exist, as the earth turned on its axis, it would still exhibit a sidereal day. A sidereal day is simply the time it takes a point on the earth to rotate on its axis from one point in space, around a 360 degree circle, and back to that single point in space, marking out the roughly 24 hours of the day.
 
cpizzle said:
I accept the Bible by faith, so my opinion really isn't important.  What God says is true, even if I have doubts in my understanding.

Question:  If you were given irrefutable proof that creation account cannot be literal fact and therefore must be figurative/allegorical/poetry, would it shake your faith or cause you to doubt other parts of scripture?  Must the Bible be History in order for it to be true?  If Job and Jonah are just stories that teach a spiritual lesson, does that take away any of the Bible's authority?
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Yes but i have not fear of that coming to fruition ( many have tried to that for centuries and ended up being converted themselves )
 
I wasn't  there. You weren't there.  We're here. Why does it matter?

Jubal Sackett
 
Jubal Sackett said:
I wasn't  there. You weren't there.  We're here. Why does it matter?

Jubal Sackett
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No one living now was present to witness any of the events recorded in the Bible.
 
HereIStand said:
No one living now was present to witness any of the events recorded in the Bible.
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Glad that's cleared up.
 
No one living now was present to witness any of the events recorded in the Bible.
[/quote]God was there and He is still alive. And He told us what He did in Genesis 1. :D
 
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