Talk:Genesis must be literal (EvoWiki)

The Bible is 100% literally true

I personally believe everything, even phenomical language is literally true in the bible, but that the bible defines its own words. For example, when the bible speaks of stars, it is speaking of any celestrial object other than the sun and the moon.

When, in Genesis 4:11 God speaks to the cain :

to Cain, actually --Oelphick 07:06, 3 December 2006 (EST)

-Whoops, for a second I thought I was quoting what God said to the serpent... Sorry about that.

RichardT 11:02 AM, 3 December 2006 (EST)

"And now art thou cursed from the earth, which hath opened her mouth to receive thy brother's blood from thy hand;"

What is a human mouth? It is an opening on the face, which is part of the head. What is the mouth of the earth? It is an opening on the face of the earth which is a part of the globe.

Another example :

Isaiah 55:12

For ye shall go out with joy, and be led forth with peace: the mountains and the hills shall break forth before you into singing, and all the trees of the field shall clap their hands.

What are human hands, they are part of the arms, which are part of the body. What are the hands of trees? They are leaves, that are part of a branch, that are part of the tree. So what this verse is saying is that the leaves of the trees will hit each other, kind of like what we see on trees today when it's really windy.

Of course you can disagree with me, but while I was reading Genesis 1 and came up to the verse about the earth opening its mouth, I prayed about it, and it seemed as if God really answered. What do you think?

So in my understanding, God believes trees have hands, just like humans have hands. And therefore, they absolutely do have hands, but not in the way we would percieve.

RichardT 21:34, 2 December 2006 (EST)

The bible uses metaphorical language, especially in the poetic passages. Finding the plain sense in those cases means interpreting the metaphors. It does not mean that God perceives a literal mouth of the earth or hands of trees. Part of the skill of exegesis is recognising what kind of passage you are reading. You need to distinguish between history and poetry; between literal language and metaphor. For example, when Jesus said, "If your right hand offends you, cut it off and cast it away", he is not meaning you to perform amputations on yourself. This was an error that Origen is said to have fallen into, when he castrated himself, presumably in an attempt to escape from sexual temptation — I'm pretty sure it didn't work!

When Jesus was preaching to cut of your hand, he was talking about how if you weren't saved by the grace of Jesus Christ, you should cut off any part of your body that causes you to sin. But even then they would fail. For all have sinned and come short of the glory of God. Also, I find the way that I interpret the bible to be biblical. It is us humans that have defined words to mean different things than what God has intended them to mean.

Of course, it's perfectly fine for you to disagree with me.

RichardT 11:02 AM, 3 December 2006 (EST)

The opposite error is perpetrated by old earth creationists who attempt to interpret the first part of Genesis as metaphor, though it is written as history using the Hebrew forms appropriate to history. --Oelphick 07:06, 3 December 2006 (EST)

You will first have to show that my interpretation of the bible is an actual error.

--RichardT 11:05 AM, 3 December 2006 (EST)

Israelites and the Bible

The Israelites, revering the Bible as the Word of God, were very concerned with preserving it unaltered Shouldn't we replace "Bible" with "Torah" or "Pentateuch"? The Israelites didn't use the Bible as we know it. PrometheusX303 16:53, 13 April 2006 (GMT)

"Torah" and "Pentateuch" only refers to the first five books. What's their word for the entire Old Testament? I couldn't think of it when I wrote the response (nor now), and I knew it could always be changed later. Philip J. Rayment 08:20, 14 April 2006 (GMT)

I searched a little. "The law and the prophets" and "Hebrew Bible (or scriptures)" seem to be what it was called. According to Wikipedia, Judaism commonly uses the term Tanakh.[1] PrometheusX303 14:05, 14 April 2006 (GMT)

The full catalogue of the Hebrew scriptures (The Tanakh or Tenach) comprises the Law (the Pentateuch or Torah), the Prophets (which includes the historical books) and the Writings (Psalms, Proverbs, Job, etc.). These were known as the Law and the Prophets for short. --Oelphick 07:06, 3 December 2006 (EST)

Typo

The following word is found within a quote in this article. I cant open Evowiki at the moment to check the spelling.

redactions --Mr. Ashcraft - (talk) 15:14, 20 June 2007 (EDT)

Copy and pasted from the EvoWiki site:

Suggests that the person has not actually read the Bible (with all its poetry, metaphors, etc.) or looked into the history of the various interpretations/redactions/translations.

--Zephyr Axiom 17:55, 20 June 2007 (EDT)