Conquer Club

Greg's... structured... post on sin creating sin reminded me that I have had a query for the religionists for a little while now. There is always talk of parts of the Bible being metaphoric and others not being so. I want to know how many CCers believe in a literal interpretation of the creation of man as found in Genesis.

In short, do you believe Adam and Eve were the first humans, and are responsible for the entry of sin into our universe?

I'd appreciate honest responses to this topic before it degenerates into everyone ignoring each other's points and me eventually skipping out on reading it after complaining about how retarded religion is. Thanks for your time.

Mitochondrial Eve for the win!

tzor wrote:Mitochondrial Eve for the win!

You know that's not what I meant!

In other news... Parasite Eve.

here's a thought, adam and eve supposidly had 2 sons, cab and abel if i remember right. cabe kills abel, so they have one son left...then there is suddenly cities full of peoples...? um....where did the other son get his wife from because the only woman around is his mother and..... u get the point

psh even as someone who is not a believer, watch me make the argument for how it works. Clearly at some point early on in genesis there is a verse which explains that God did somethign akin to the breath of life (its been a while since i cracked open the bible -so i paraphrase poorly). as far as i remember this is more or less akin to giving these folks the soul, and entering humanity into a communion with God. There were apparently other humanish folk walking around, who adam could fool around with, before he eventually came back to eve, which isnt talked about much but was mentioned i believe halfway in a verse.

Pow.

I can't Adam and Eve it

I would like to see the Nay votes broken up into:
I'm a xian and I don't believe this should be taken literally

and

I'm not a xian

Come to that, those who do believe should say whether they are xian or not.

tzor wrote:Mitochondrial Eve for the win!

How do you explain this then?

Mitochondrial Eve is the female counterpart of Y-chromosomal Adam, the patrilineal most recent common ancestor, although they lived at different times

The key words in the entire document are "most recent"...not "first".

Neoteny wrote:Greg's... structured... post on sin creating sin reminded me that I have had a query for the religionists for a little while now. There is always talk of parts of the Bible being metaphoric and others not being so. I want to know how many CCers believe in a literal interpretation of the creation of man as found in Genesis.

In short, do you believe Adam and Eve were the first humans, and are responsible for the entry of sin into our universe?

I'd appreciate honest responses to this topic before it degenerates into everyone ignoring each other's points and me eventually skipping out on reading it after complaining about how retarded religion is. Thanks for your time.

Actually, you got to seperate this just a bit more, because although just about any Christian, Jew, Muslim and a few others besides believe Genesis, what we believe that means differs highly.

Variations on the whole Creationist/Evolution "debate" (which for most Christians & Jews is no debate at all, because we believe both are compatible).

Similarly, some see Eve as bringing knowledge of sin and Cain as actually bringing sin .. some see Eve coming from a rib as a sign of woman's inferiority, some see it as a mis-translation that "side" is the real translation. And those are just some of the biggest that come to mind immedately ... it is by no means a comprehensive list.

Neoteny wrote:Greg's... structured... post on sin creating sin reminded me that I have had a query for the religionists for a little while now. There is always talk of parts of the Bible being metaphoric and others not being so. I want to know how many CCers believe in a literal interpretation of the creation of man as found in Genesis.

In short, do you believe Adam and Eve were the first humans, and are responsible for the entry of sin into our universe?

I'd appreciate honest responses to this topic before it degenerates into everyone ignoring each other's points and me eventually skipping out on reading it after complaining about how retarded religion is. Thanks for your time.

I probably beleive the Bible to be more literal than most Christians.

With that said. You'll probably find the majority of Christians do in fact beleive Genesis to be the literal truth.

To any fellow Christians out there, please feel free to correct me if my observations are wrong.

considering something i saw on abc news last night claimed that around a quarter of most mainline protestant or roman catholic believers had some reservations about the existance of God...i highly doubt that claim about genesis is true.

*for those likely to ask, i did not catch the source of the poll, but i would assume it falls in the recently released category*

edit...psh like i cant find sources...google the pew forum and youll be on your way from there.

Gregrios wrote:

With that said. You'll probably find the majority of Christians do in fact beleive Genesis to be the literal truth.

To any fellow Christians out there, please feel free to correct me if my observations are wrong.

Depends upon your definition of "literal truth". I believe it is the literal truth ... I do not believe that Evolution is excluded by a long stretch. Nor do I believe that the true debate is even over religion. I believe that certain individuals exploit the fact that so much of science is incredibly difficult to understand, and folks inherent lack of time/unwillingness to do research along with a declining state of science education in general ... are truly behind this "debate". Look at the results of those who disbelieve evolution and the many things that go with this disbelief -- from challenging the whole idea of global warming to discounting effects of many chemicals to ... you name it... and religion has very, very little to do with it. BUT ... there is already a whole thread on this.

PLAYER57832 wrote:

Gregrios wrote:

With that said. You'll probably find the majority of Christians do in fact beleive Genesis to be the literal truth.

To any fellow Christians out there, please feel free to correct me if my observations are wrong.

Depends upon your definition of "literal truth". I believe it is the literal truth ... I do not believe that Evolution is excluded by a long stretch. Nor do I believe that the true debate is even over religion. I believe that certain individuals exploit the fact that so much of science is incredibly difficult to understand, and folks inherent lack of time/unwillingness to do research along with a declining state of science education in general ... are truly behind this "debate". Look at the results of those who disbelieve evolution and the many things that go with this disbelief -- from challenging the whole idea of global warming to discounting effects of many chemicals to ... you name it... and religion has very, very little to do with it. BUT ... there is already a whole thread on this.

I find the Bible and science share at least one thing in common. When something is hard to understand it tends to get chalked up to the most simple answer.

Gregrios wrote:

Neoteny wrote:Greg's... structured... post on sin creating sin reminded me that I have had a query for the religionists for a little while now. There is always talk of parts of the Bible being metaphoric and others not being so. I want to know how many CCers believe in a literal interpretation of the creation of man as found in Genesis.

In short, do you believe Adam and Eve were the first humans, and are responsible for the entry of sin into our universe?

I'd appreciate honest responses to this topic before it degenerates into everyone ignoring each other's points and me eventually skipping out on reading it after complaining about how retarded religion is. Thanks for your time.

I probably beleive the Bible to be more literal than most Christians.

With that said. You'll probably find the majority of Christians do in fact beleive Genesis to be the literal truth.

To any fellow Christians out there, please feel free to correct me if my observations are wrong.

The literal belief in Genesis is mostly prevalent in the Evangelical movement but amongst Christians worldwide it is very much a minority view.

Gregrios wrote:With that said. You'll probably find the majority of Christians do in fact beleive Genesis to be the literal truth.

I think you will find that a majority (now that's a hard term to define) might believe Genesis is the "truth" but not the "literal truth." You also need to consider Genesis in the context of the entire Torah (or the first five books of the Bible) as they are in many ways a stand alone collection. (Around the time of Jesus there was no term "Bible" but instead a three-fold naming of the Law (Torah) the Prophets and the other writings, together they constituted the scriptures, and not all groups placed equal wieght in the three types.)

tzor wrote:

Gregrios wrote:With that said. You'll probably find the majority of Christians do in fact beleive Genesis to be the literal truth.

I think you will find that a majority (now that's a hard term to define) might believe Genesis is the "truth" but not the "literal truth." You also need to consider Genesis in the context of the entire Torah (or the first five books of the Bible) as they are in many ways a stand alone collection. (Around the time of Jesus there was no term "Bible" but instead a three-fold naming of the Law (Torah) the Prophets and the other writings, together they constituted the scriptures, and not all groups placed equal wieght in the three types.)

Fair enough.

Gregrios wrote:I find the Bible and science share at least one thing in common. When something is hard to understand it tends to get chalked up to the most simple answer.

Often true!

However, Religion if often designed to be taken in "layers". You can be a "full Christian" if you simply believe that Christ is the savior. MOst of society has a rudimentary understanding of forgiveness, sin, etc. (whether Christian or not). Or, you can spend a lifetime to learn Greek, Latin, etc and to understand all the historical context.

But, most people don't have even a basic understanding of ecology or medical science or various other things. In many cases, even quite intelligent and studied folks don't. And few people "just accept" even the most basic science.

Isn't it a bit silly to condemn incest when the whole of humanity is a result of it. (It does explain a fair amount of stuff, I'll give you that.)

Snorri1234 wrote:Isn't it a bit silly to condemn incest when the whole of humanity is a result of it. (It does explain a fair amount of stuff, I'll give you that.)

nice try ....

I, for one, normally take the words and stories of the old testament very loosely. For example, in my opinion:

Adam= thousands of males that god created (or a large population of apes that he evolved into humans)

Eve= thousands of females that god created (or a large population of apes that he evolved into humans)

Cain and Abel= two separate races that were born of the original Adam/Eve race. Not necessarily direct sons and daughters of Adam and Eve. Could be many (if not thousands of) generations later. These two races warred with each other until one (Abel) was extinct. The other race (Cain) was banished and roamed the earth.

Again, this is my point of view. Many people decide to interpret the bible in different ways. As you might have guessed by my answers I also believe (for the most part) in the scientific views of creation. My faith and views on creation are a mixture of both scripture and science.

I tend to take a allegorical stance on the story of creation, largely the parts from Adam and Eve to just after the Tower of Babel. There did exist a "garden" and an "Adam and Eve", but the importance of the story is the message not the actions. The work of Dr. Hugh Ross largely influences my thinking on this, especially with regard to the "days" of creation; six "days" could mean six eras of development lasting as much as billions of years.

One theory (from History Channel I think) I heard regarding Cain and Abel was that the story was a passed down oral legend of an ancient bloodfeud between the early farmers and the early nomadic herdsmen. Needles to say, it seems that the herdsmen might have lost.

That all said, I am more concerned with how I and my fellow man gets along here on earth and how the relationship with God is doing. At the end of the day, the How doesn't concern me anymore nearly as much as the Why. The End Times also don't bother me, I'm never going to know the day or the hour it will happen but I should be ready, and be that by doing what I am called to be.

"His will be done, On Earth, as it is in Heaven," afterall.

Jenos Ridan wrote:I tend to take a allegorical stance on the story of creation, largely the parts from Adam and Eve to just after the Tower of Babel. There did exist a "garden" and an "Adam and Eve", but the importance of the story is the message not the actions. The work of Dr. Hugh Ross largely influences my thinking on this, especially with regard to the "days" of creation; six "days" could mean six eras of development lasting as much as billions of years.

One theory (from History Channel I think) I heard regarding Cain and Abel was that the story was a passed down oral legend of an ancient bloodfeud between the early farmers and the early nomadic herdsmen. Needles to say, it seems that the herdsmen might have lost.

That all said, I am more concerned with how I and my fellow man gets along here on earth and how the relationship with God is doing. At the end of the day, the How doesn't concern me anymore nearly as much as the Why. The End Times also don't bother me, I'm never going to know the day or the hour it will happen but I should be ready, and be that by doing what I am called to be.

"His will be done, On Earth, as it is in Heaven," afterall.

That seems to me an eminitely sensible stance

Thanks.

Neoteny wrote:Greg's... structured... post on sin creating sin reminded me that I have had a query for the religionists for a little while now. There is always talk of parts of the Bible being metaphoric and others not being so. I want to know how many CCers believe in a literal interpretation of the creation of man as found in Genesis.

In short, do you believe Adam and Eve were the first humans, and are responsible for the entry of sin into our universe?

I'd appreciate honest responses to this topic before it degenerates into everyone ignoring each other's points and me eventually skipping out on reading it after complaining about how retarded religion is. Thanks for your time.

Here you go.

In Genesis 4:16 it says, "Then Cain went out from the presence of the Lord, and settled in the land of Nod, east of Eden. 17And Cain had relations with his wife and she conceived, and gave birth to Enoch; and he built a city, and called the name of the city Enoch, after the name of his son."

Genesis tells us that Adam and Eve had two sons: Cain and Abel. Cain killed Abel, was exiled by God, and then in Genesis 4:17 we read that Cain had relations with his wife. Where did Cain get his wife? The answer is simple: Cain married either his sister or a niece.

In Genesis 5:4 we see that Adam had other sons and daughters.
"This is the book of the generations of Adam. In the day when God created man, He made him in the likeness of God. 2He created them male and female, and He blessed them and named them Man in the day when they were created. 3When Adam had lived one hundred and thirty years, he became the father of a son in his own likeness, according to his image, and named him Seth. 4Then the days of Adam after he became the father of Seth were eight hundred years, and he had other sons and daughters. 5So all the days that Adam lived were nine hundred and thirty years, and he died," (Gen. 5:1-5).

Since Adam lived several hundred years, having lots of children was not a problem. The Genesis account does not tell us about the order of the births nor does it tell us how old they were. By having many children it is certainly possible that there were many women around. This would mean that Cain married either a sister or a niece or some other relation. Of course at this point, the question of inbreeding is raised. But it is not a problem early on in the human race because the genetic line was so pure. Therefore, the prohibition against incest was not proclaimed until much much later (Lev. 18:6-18).

One of the reasons many Christians cannot answer the question about Cain’s wife and why many non Christians think the answer is bad or wrong is that they tend to look at today’s world and the problems that would be associated with close relations marrying, and they do not look at the clear historical record God has given to us.

They try to interpret Genesis from our present situation rather than understand the true biblical history of the world and the changes that have occurred because of sin. Because they are not building their worldview on Scripture but taking a secular way of thinking to the Bible, they are blinded to the simple answers.

SO there is my answer Neoteny. You probably will not like it but there it is all the same.

WM

P.S. Sorry I have not been around lately. I have been readign and putting together a post that will cover my opinion and position on the EvoVCrea/Logic/Freaks/Religion and it is taking some time. Plus with the basement flood a couple months back, my job getting busy and now a 2nd baby being born (he is 4 days old) I have been busy. SO don't think I just left.

Firstly, thanks everyone for participating. The poll is enlightening. Secondly, I think my distinctions served their purpose. There are plenty of other polls where such distinctions could probably be assumed. For this one, I just wanted to see who was in the "purely literal" interpretation camp.

got tonkaed wrote:considering something i saw on abc news last night claimed that around a quarter of most mainline protestant or roman catholic believers had some reservations about the existance of God...i highly doubt that claim about genesis is true.

*for those likely to ask, i did not catch the source of the poll, but i would assume it falls in the recently released category*

edit...psh like i cant find sources...google the pew forum and youll be on your way from there.

NPR had an interesting segment on it this morning (yesterday morning).

And Widow, I wouldn't expect anything less. Congrats on the new little one, if you're into that kind of thing. You're a bigger person than I if you can handle one kid, much less two.