Favourite Genesis

@blood-on-the-tracks said
Would a frivolous (but hopefully mildly amusing) answer to the thread heading be 'Peter Gabriel era' ?

This is Spirituality not the GF!


Show some respect!

@suzianne said
Let me interrupt here and ask you this: what "two" creation stories? I only see one.

Genesis 1 and Genesis 2.
Different stories.
The texts are from different sources.

You MUST have come across that before!

edit: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Genesis_creation_narrative

@wolfgang59 said
Genesis 1 and Genesis 2.
Different stories.
The texts are from different sources.

You MUST have come across that before!

edit: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Genesis_creation_narrative

Gen 1 is the Creation.

Gen 2 is what happened after the Creation, but it refers in greater detail some of the things happening in Gen 1, mainly concerning the earth and the things growing therein.

One Creation.

"Thus the heavens and the earth were finished, and all the host of them. And on the seventh day God ended his work which he had made; and he rested on the seventh day from all his work which he had made. And God blessed the seventh day, and sanctified it: because that in it he had rested from all his work which God created and made." -- Genesis 2:1-3, KJV

If I had to categorize Gen 1 and 2, I'd say Gen 1 is Creation and Gen 2 (and 3) is the story we know as "Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden". There is transition here, from talking about the Cosmos in general, to talking about Adam's family in particular.

Not sure what you mean about "different sources". In the original Hebrew texts, there is no division between Gen 1 and Gen 2. Moses borrowed heavily from Mesopotamian mythology, substituting monotheism for polytheism.

Yes, I have disagreements with the Wikipedia article you linked to. Sue me.

Before you begin, though, let me be clear. I am not a YEC by any means. I consider the Creation story as just that: a story. The Pentateuch was written for the people of that time. 3500 years ago, I would consider them as "ancient man". Science was almost non-existent, meaning Creation has to be described in words and concepts people knew then. Any study of cosmology and evolution will explain how the world was created and how man came to be on this planet. I see Genesis as explaining this to ancient man, who was simply not equipped to handle the level of detail we take for granted today. In this, I see no difference between Creation and the theories of cosmology and evolution. Creation is "what happened", cosmology and Darwin's evolution theories are "how it happened", only with much greater detail than man could handle at the time the Pentateuch was written. I am also not leaving God out of Creation. It's just that God's "toolbox" is much deeper and contains way more "tools" than we normally think about. I believe he uses "natural forces" (which, really, is just another word for "God" ) whenever possible. because man's choice between good and evil means nothing if not made from Free Will. By not making Creation an obvious "rabbit out of a hat" moment, man is perfectly free to ascribe a greater being's hand in Creation or not, preserving Free Will.

@wolfgang59 said
One stupid question I get from theists is who created the Universe?

The Universe is eternal no one created it.

Do you actually believe the 'Steady-State Theory'? (Is that even what it is still called?) What we see is as it always was?

-Removed-

Seriously? You do not see "made from dust" as a humble beginning?

Ok, man, whatever.

@suzianne said
Do you actually believe the 'Steady-State Theory'? (Is that even what it is still called?) What we see is as it always was?

No ... not at all.

But there is no reason to not believe that something has always existed.

@suzianne said
Not sure what you mean about "different sources".

One version is dated about 500 BCE and the other 1,000 BCE.
Not time to google now.

@suzianne said
Seriously? You do not see "made from dust" as a humble beginning?

Ok, man, whatever.

When you say that you appear to be looking for metaphor in biblical stories. A message about humble beginnings rather than a literal story of creation from dust. Hinduism and Buddhism seem to really embrace the idea of stories with messages for life where Christianity seems very hung up on arguments about which bits of the bible are literal truth (so far as I can see). There seems to be a very concrete and special case when it comes to parables but nothing else is apparently seen as a story with a message within it.

Why is there so much debate about which version is a literal truth as opposed to looking for the message in the stories a religion has seen fit to hand down through generations? Just as the handing on of a story must illustrate it's importance to people, it must also result in much change in the telling?

@petewxyz said
When you say that you appear to be looking for metaphor in biblical stories. A message about humble beginnings rather than a literal story of creation from dust. Hinduism and Buddhism seem to really embrace the idea of stories with messages for life where Christianity seems very hung up on arguments about which bits of the bible are literal truth (so far as I can see). There ...[text shortened]... story must illustrate it's importance to people, it must also result in much change in the telling?

If a story isn't a literal account of something that happened, then what gravitas does that story have when it comes to truth?

All stories carry a message, even works of fiction.

@ghost-of-a-duke said
If a story isn't a literal account of something that happened, then what gravitas does that story have when it comes to truth?

All stories carry a message, even works of fiction.

I suppose that is based on an assumption that truth can only be found in the literal. Curiously, however, we seem to carry a lot of the personal truths that guide us in the form of stories within the mind. Dream like and surreal stories seem to be the fabric of the mind and the telling of stories to be remembered seems to be the way of weaving new material into that fabric. Both by sharing stories and by collaboratively constructing them.

In science and philosophy most things seem guided by a constructionist philosophy with nobody ever touching or owning the truth. Just working on the development and improvement of current constructions and models.

It seems to me that human beings are at their worst when they are certain that they own the truth and at their best when the are collaboratively developing the best ways to live with the uncertainty of life.

It begs the question why some areas of religion seem devoted to fighting for ownership of literal truth if there is actually more power in noticing why stories have been preserved and handed on as helpful contributions to the development of future minds.

@ghost-of-a-duke said
If a story isn't a literal account of something that happened, then what gravitas does that story have when it comes to truth?

All stories carry a message, even works of fiction.

Or to cut to the chase, poetry has great power and gravitas despite being almost exclusively about feeling the metaphor as opposed to creating a literal record of truth.

Edit: You could even say feeling the truth within the metaphor as identified by its resonance with the truths that we carry within ourselves.

-Removed-

Missing the point again.

Evolution was the tool used to create man. If we define "dust" as all the errata left over from Creation, much as Carl Sagan said that we are made of "star stuff", then yes, we are made from dust.

@petewxyz said
When you say that you appear to be looking for metaphor in biblical stories. A message about humble beginnings rather than a literal story of creation from dust. Hinduism and Buddhism seem to really embrace the idea of stories with messages for life where Christianity seems very hung up on arguments about which bits of the bible are literal truth (so far as I can see). There ...[text shortened]... story must illustrate it's importance to people, it must also result in much change in the telling?

Yes! Just so.