The Upper Room

Nathaniel

11:59 AM

@curiousdannii I win!

curiousdannii

12:22 PM

@Nathaniel Thank you all! :)

LCIII

3:14 PM

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Q: Is there any Christian theological model for a non-literal ark?

The most common debate about Noah's flood is whether the flood was global or local. I want to put this particular debate aside for a moment, and ask a different question: Did the flood happen at all? Reading the views of many (often atheists, sometimes local-flood proponents), there seems to be...

I have to wonder with theistic evolutionists and old earth creationists how they can believe the bible is literal/historical anywhere since they have to go through so many mental gymnastics just to make any sense of Genesis.

If the book of Genesis is not to be interpreted plainly then why should the doctrine of "God loves me" be interpreted plainly since it's from the same set of inspired books?

bruised reed

3:30 PM

@LCIII It's... the vibe!

@Andrew I appreciate your response and reciprocate the sentiment - "as iron sharpens iron..." etc. Apologies for the delay in getting back to you, I would like to continue the discussion on flesh and free will when I have more time & as per your conversation with Lee, Polemics and Apologetics is most likely a better place for it.

It would be great if you could think just a little deeper about the analogy I presented, because the facts are that Southern slaves did escape their enslavement to live freely both prior to the emancipation proclamation and after it. The difference being that afterwards they could have confidence that upon reaching Union territory, they would no longer face the prospect being returned to their owner.

@Andrew Aren't you contradicting your previous stance here? Surely you're not saying we have to wait for a completed redemption of our bodies at the resurrection to experience the freedom of the Spirit?

ThaddeusB

4:19 PM

@LCIII If the author of Genesis did not intend the book to be read as literal history, it would be quite silly to say viewing it as non-literal requires someone to likewise view different books written by different authors with different intentions. No one would treat collected material as having a uniform genre/intent in any other circumstance and indeed I doubt anyone would even do that in the Bible - e.g. treating Psalms as recording historical events.

(I am not taking a stance about the actually authorial intent here, just pointing out that the logic does not work.)

Lee Woofenden

4:46 PM

@LCIII I've just posted an answer to this question:

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A: Is there any Christian theological model for a non-literal ark?

Yes, there is a Christian theological model for a non-literal ark. Such a model is provided and developed in great detail by Emanuel Swedenborg (1688-1772) in his massive work Secrets of Heaven, originally published in eight Latin volumes in London, 1749-1756. In Secrets of Heaven #554-1059 Swed...

LCIII

5:34 PM

@ThaddeusB But I'm not saying since one book is literal it must all be literal. I'm saying it should all be interpreted plainly.

You have to do so many mental gymnastics to claim that Genesis reads as anything but history. It's not a poem, it's not a book of instruction, it's not an opinion piece, it's not allegorical (why all the chronologies?). No one with any experience in reading comprehension would read Genesis as anything but history.

The reason so many Christians interpret Genesis as anything but its plain historical presentation nowadays is because of peer pressure. Modern science has claimed that a literal interpretation of Genesis is for fools, so the church has by-and-large responded by compromising and finding a way to harmonize the stance of "the bible is true" with "....as long as it goes along with modern science."

This has been a problem for the people of God since forever. There's always some modern scientific breakthrough that goes against a plain interpretation of scripture, and church falters when instead of reading science through the lens of scripture, it decides to read scripture through the lens of popular science.

Addem

How would one read the Science that contradicts Genesis through the lens of scripture?

LCIII

@Addem Well, a plain reading of Genesis says that God made everything in 6 days including the first man, Adam. It also plainly says that there is a direct line from Adam to Noah to Abraham to Jesus. Modern science has painstakingly aimed to proved that the earth is billions of years old, so these views contradict. One must be wrong. Whichever you decide is wrong determines a lot about your theology.

Addem

5:51 PM

Right, @LCII. Personally I know which side I fall on, but I don't see how you could read the Science through the lens of scripture. I'm partly unclear of how that would even go, what it would lead to say.

ThaddeusB

@LCIII I disagree that the creation stories (especially) require "mental gymnastics" to be read as non-literal history... Additionally, the idea of "straight history"in a modern invention - ancient writers (including those explicitly writing history) did not write to convey "just the facts", but rather to convey the truth of ideas. The "plain reading" was always "a story that conveys truth and may also convey some literal history" until recent times.

Many church fathers interpreted Genesis 1 as not meaning six 24-hour days long before the advent of science, for example.

LCIII

6:19 PM

@ThaddeusB What abstract or conceptual idea would Genesis 10 be conveying?

ThaddeusB

(For the record, I see merit in both views and ma not completely decided on which is more likely correct. The point is that it is not at all reasonable to view the Genesis history as less than literal in the modern sense of the word.)

@LCIII (I typed the above sentences at the same time, not as a reply to this.) There is a possibility of understanding in between "the story is an abstract idea" and "the story is literal history", so you are laying out a false dichotomy... But, I fail to see how the story of Noah would even be something hard to envision as a story telling a moral tale - man is wicked and deserves wrath, but instead of wiping us out God spares the righteous to give us another chance

Genesis 10 is then just the text necessary to connect the Noah story to the "true history" starting with Abraham

LCIII

What about the end of chapter 10: "These are the clans of the sons of Noah, according to their genealogies, in their nations, and from these the nations spread abroad on the earth after the flood."

Nowhere is it even hinted that Noah is an idea, or a concept, or a people group, but he is only ever referred to as an individual man. These are the kind of mental gymnastics I'm talking about.

To say that it's abstract means to throw away any plain understanding of the chapter. To say that it is just kinda-sorta abstract leaves you with no standard by which to judge its abstractness. Is Noah a man, an idea? What are his children? What are these places they're going? The chapter becomes devoid of any meaning because you're trying to take something written plainly and claim that it doesn't mean what it plainly means.

ThaddeusB

@LCIII When I read a modern work of fiction, it (usually) reads as if it telling of a factual event. The "plain reading" is that the author is telling me about something that happened (possibly even in human history if the genre is historical fiction.) Yet it does not require any "mental gymnastics" on my part to recognize it as fiction. ... Likewise, the only "gymnastic" required to view Genesis as not history is to image the author didn't intend it to be so.

Again, it is not necessarily my view that it is not history, but to argue that it requires "gymnastics' to arrive at that conclusion is not a fair assessment. And to argue the conclusion is only reached in reactionary fashion to science is inaccurate - nopn-literal views predate the Renaissance.

LCIII

6:35 PM

@ThaddeusB That would apply here if there was ever any indication that Genesis was fiction or meant to be taken as fiction.

Addem

It seems difficult to me to read it as not history mainly because of the detailed descriptions of lineage and the passage of time. I might consider it gymnastics to think that this serves any kind of narrative or allegorical purpose.

ThaddeusB

@LCIII Most works of fiction do not contain any internal indications they are fiction.

LCIII

@ThaddeusB They all do. Right there in front or back cover.

@ThaddeusB These are the kind of gymnastics I'm talking about. Imagine I was describing to you what I did for my vocation. I write code. I gather requirements. I work 9 to 5, etc... Now imagine that, for whatever reason, you chose to believe that what I was saying was not a plain description of my work by some allegory for something else.

ThaddeusB

@LCIII That is nonsense. The cover is added by the publisher and not an internal part of the story. And also a modern device, not something practiced throughout history.

@LCIII Even if they are history, the Genesis stories are obviously intended to also convey moral meaning, so this is not a valid comparison.

LCIII

@ThaddeusB I guess my example isn't great considering there isn't really a modern fiction book that is widely regarded as true. Then it would be a good comparison.

What I'm trying to say is that modern fiction is regarded as fiction for any number of reasons: we know the author is a fiction writer or the story makes up characters/worlds that don't exist.

But I'm rabbit trailing

We don't know any of those external things regarding Genesis. We're not even 100% sure who wrote it.

ThaddeusB

6:44 PM

@LCIII Exactly. And I don't view the jump to "it must have been intended as history" as being a necessity and thus don't view those who think it probably wasn't as being unreasonable.

LCIII

@ThaddeusB I guess that depends on what you view as necessary in the first place.

ThaddeusB

@Addem This is a fair point - definitely one of the merits of a "is history" view - but other things, such as the obvious moral lessons in the stories lends support to the opposite view. Like I said, I think either is a reasonable conclusion based on the evidence as long as one keeps in mind that the conception of a "just the facts history" is a modern invention.

Lee Woofenden

7:02 PM

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth;

Then took the other, as just as fair,
And having perhaps the better claim,
Because it was grassy and wanted wear;
Though as for that the passing there
Had worn them really about the same,

And both that morning equally lay
In leaves no step had trodden black.
Oh, I kept the first for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads on to way,

So . . . is that history? It sure reads like a walk in the woods . . . .

@LCIII Genealogies are no problem from a non-literal perspective. If Adam, Noah, and so on represent whole cultures, then genealogies represent successive cultures one after another. The Table of Nations in Genesis 10 practically begs for this interpretation. It is a description of the origins of the various cultures of the ancient Middle East. Each name represents a whole cultural lineage. Many of them are even identified as such in the text itself.

In fact, many, if not most of the names are the names of whole tribes and nations. About the only way this could be made clearer is if there was a sign at the beginning of the genealogies saying, "This is a table of the various cultures of the ancient world, and their relationships with one another."

This would be clearer if, instead of transliterating the various names as names, they were translated into the nearest equivalent of the lands and cultures they represent.

Here is one visual example of this:

Any careful study of Genesis 10 yields the almost inescapable conclusion that this is not a genealogy of individuals, but a genealogy of nations and races. In short, it is the idea that these genealogies represent individuals that is far-fetched, not the idea that they represent whole races and cultures.

Somewhere in the genealogy of Genesis 11:10-26 the genealogy does shift from a genealogy of nations to a genealogy of individuals. It's not easy to tell exactly where that transition takes place. Swedenborg seemed to think that Eber (Genesis 11:14-17) was the first actual historical personality, but I suspect that was based on the folklore of Eber being the namesake of the Hebrew people.

Certainly by the time we reach Terah, Abram's father, we're talking about actual historical figures. However, the genealogy itself makes a seamless transition from the earlier mythic genealogies of nations and races to a genealogy of individuals leading to the first important historical individual in the Bible story: Abraham.

The point of the genealogy in the Bible is not to provide a literal lineage, but to establish the cultural origins of Abraham and his descendants in relation to the other nations and cultures of the ancient world.

Here is a more detailed, and probably more accurate, geographical representation of the Table of Nations in Genesis 10:

And yet another, making it still clearer that Shem, Ham, and Japheth represent the three major racial groups recognized in the Hebrew Bible:

Once again, I would say that reading these early genealogies as genealogies of individual human beings is what requires mental gymnastics and far-fetched interpretation to support, whereas reading them as the succession and interrelationships of various ancient cultures is the most obvious conclusion from a plain reading of the text.

Andrew

10:56 PM

@bruisedreed I understand and appreciate what you were saying- I just happen to disagree, and I don't think that the analogy applies, because to be in chains doesn't necessarily impinge upon free will. The chains would need to be internal. Theres also the problem of intent and the division of wills- if my body is subject to the control of my flesh and also my spirit, but the two are in conflict, then is one necessarily a fetter of the other, or do both intents act as the will?

@bruisedreed More relevant to free will as I mean it though is whether the existence of intent is...well...intentional. My opinion on the matter is that no, it is not. Our wills and desires are expressions of aspects of ourselves that we do not directly experience, and so the source of our intent is at the heart of the discussion. If the source of the intent is outside of the experience of the person, then all ideas, desires, intentions, and wills that the conscious person is presented with

@bruisedreed are, to put it poorly, unintentional.

@bruisedreed At this point I am convinced that the source of desires, wills, and intentions is indeed outside of the experience of the conscious person- that in fact our identity is not the subject of our conscious process, but that the source is actually an object of our conscious process- the conscious process acting to facilitates the expression of these desires, wills, and intentions- often poorly in our society. So, the question is, does the conscious process inhibit the expression of the

@bruisedreed intent, or does it facilitate the source of the intent. If we are double minded, and our conscious processes fight against the source of the intent, then we are not free- but this may be beneficial, if the intent of the source, for example, is dangerous or in error. On the other hand, the source of the intent may be good, but the conscious process may inhibit the expression of the intent because of pride or fear of failure or injury. Then we are still not free. If we eliminate

@bruisedreed doublemindedness, and the source of the intent and the conscious processes are unified, then one can act freely as the conscious process facilitates the genuine intent - and great, or terrible things can be accomplished. But I do not mean to speak as though I have achieved this state. But I think this previous sentence is exactly what Paul was saying, all the time.

@bruisedreed Complete freedom, yes I do. While we can experience the freedom that the Spirit brings in terms of redemption according to the law, the crucifixion of our flesh in Messiah, the mortification of the flesh, the spiritual gifts, and a peace that passes understanding, I do not think that we now have the slightest notion of the actual freedom that we will come to experience when we are no longer subject to the desires, passions, and pleasures of the body.

@bruisedreed My body is addicted to sin, and because of the way I have conducted myself in the past, I don't know if I will ever rid myself of the hungers that my body feels for things that I do not wish to give it any longer. I can identify with Paul that I can not wait to be out of my body, so that I can finally be rid of the curse of it, this thing that keeps me from being always directed toward God. The freedom of the Spirit is the assurance that that Yahweh

@bruisedreed has promised me that he will not forsake me, even though this body of death is not worthy to stand in his presence. It is freedom from guilt and from fear of damnation, and it is the freedom to feel peace, which I did not know before I had the Spirit. But it is also the freedom to open my eyes and examine myself and to see my flesh for what is, and to hope that it will one day no longer be as it is now. If this day comes before I die, then the thought of that alone gives me joy I

@bruisedreed can hardly contain. If not, then I have hope for the thing that has not yet come, and I have faith that Yahweh is faithful to fulfill his promises, and I will call on him and testify that he is able to fulfill them, and that he does as he says.

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