Glenn wrote:
> > While we are all after my friend, Dick, I might as well make mention of a
> > post I put on TheologyWeb in response to an enquiry about Dick's views.
> > Part of that note is reproduced here. (I think this is a dull saw, Dick)
> >
> > "Et tu, Brute!"
>
>Hey, the original Brutus made Caesar a very popular fellow. Even today, if
>you go to Caesar's grave in Rome, you can find young maidens leaving flowers
>on his grave. One might say that Brutus did him a favor! Thus I am here to
>do you a favor.
Oh, thank you! In Baltimore, someone used to leave a bottle of hootch on
Edgar Allen Poe's grave every year (maybe he/she still does, I haven't paid
attention), sneaking into the grave yard and sneaking out in the dead of
night. Okay, I recognize that what I am proposing is new, and the burden
of proof is on me to substantiate my case. I accept that. If a historical
Adam (and Noah) doesn't pass muster the proposed method of apology should
be kicked to the curb. That's fine. Might as well test it here as
anyplace else.
> > I did see a receipt for "burnt bricks" I thought was interesting
> > and another
> > one that was for "unblemished cattle for sacrifice." That one struck a
> > chord. Apparently the Sumerians had picked up the sacrificial system from
> > the Accadians who would be Adamites in my scheme of things as they spoke a
> > pre-Semitic language. In fact, that may be the earliest written record of
> > animal sacrifice and in a non-Semitic tongue.
>
>Yeah, but that is probably the earliest written cattle receipts also. Should
>we put religious significance on them as well? Writing started around the
>time you are referring to so the mere fact that they write of animal
>sacrifice doesn't mean it is the first animal sacrifice.
I agree.
> > The "image" only implies to Adam's status as an ambassador for God. The
> > "image" was carried by the Israelites as God's chosen and the
> > Jews. Christ
> > was appointed by God as His representative. The second Adam,
> > Christ, was in
> > the "image of God" (II Cor. 4:4) just as the first Adam, and the
> > mantle was
> > passed to the followers of Christ.
>
>So did Ishmael not carry the image of God? You don't mention the larger
>Semite family.
If "image" means "representative," then the representative line would
follow the patriarchs and the line of promise. Those splitting off such as
Cain, Ishmael, Esau, and so on, might have different status then those who
bear no relationship at all - Sumerians for example or Australian
aborigines, for another example. Thus, Cain and the rest might have been
accountable but unredeemed, versus Adam's predecessors who would not have
been accountable at all, versus Seth and his redeemed descendants who
"called upon the name of the Lord."
But let me say in no uncertain terms that God's plan of salvation is known
in its entirety only to God. We know that those who hear and believe in
Jesus Christ are saved. Those who hear and reject are lost. Now someone
asks, "Okay, what about the pygmy in Africa who lives and dies without ever
hearing a single word of the gospel"? Well, why do we send
missionaries? But I don't pretend to know with any certainty who
eventually will reside in the "bosom of Abraham" and who will join the
ranks of those who wail and gnash their teeth.
> > But biblical animal sacrifice has certain elements not proven or even
> > suggested by your examples. First of all, domesticated animals were used
> > for sacrifice.
>
>Isn't that a bit of stretch? What is the spiritual significance of
>domesticated animals?
>The Siberian bear cults raise a bear cub with them in their homes. Indeed,
>when missionaries went to the Ainu, there are stories about the missionary
>preaching to a room full of Ainu women who were passing the bear cub around
>each nursing it in turn as they listened to the sermon. If that isn't
>domesticated, I don't know what is. Or do you attach significance to the
>willingness of the animal to stay in a fence?
Well, do they sacrifice unblemished bears on an alter to an unseen
deity? Plus, Ainu still exist to this day. Who knows where they got their
customs?
> When were animals domesticated? 31,000 years ago? Not
> > hardly. Next, only certain animals were chosen solely on the basis that
> > they were the best. No cripples or lame animals were deemed worthy for an
> > offering. Did you cite a single example that suggests that only certain
> > animals that could pass muster were used? No. Then, the meat
> > was burned as
> > an offering to the deity. Nothing in any of the examples you
> > provided even
> > suggest that the meat was burned on an altar to provide a pleasing incense
> > to a god (or God) unseen.
>
>Dick, DICK!! LOOK AT BRUNIQUEL!!!! Not ony did they burn meat, the burned
>the dead bear!!! The Neandertals got a bear to go underground (or killed
>him at the surface and dragged him there). But they burned the meat and
>all!
And ate it. I think you're grasping at straws here my friend. You have
just enough data to speculate and not enough to prove your case. But even
if you had Polaroid pictures of Neanderthals offering up bear sacrifices,
it wouldn't change the time and place of Adam's appearance.
Between Adam and Noah we have cities, farming, livestock, stringed musical
instruments, implements of bronze and iron. When did they build
cities? When were crops raised? When were animals domesticated? When
were stringed instruments invented? When was the Bronze Age? When was the
Iron Age?
An arrangement of animal skulls here or a bone flute there doesn't make a
dent in the data the writer of Genesis included to tell us when and where
the garden of Eden was located, where the flood took place, and where the
tower of Babel was built. We do have a language barrier to surmount, but
an abundance of extra biblical evidence surfaced in the last 200 years to
fill in some of the details.
And what did the theological community do with this new found
information? It was simply ignored because it didn't fit their theological
presumptions. Speiser, Driver, Delitzsch and a meager handful of others
delved into this material, but their ideas didn't become building blocks
upon which a better theology could be built, they were treated as anomalies.
>What you are doing is saying that unless the sacrifice meets exactly your
>view of what the ancient Sumerian sacrifice was like, then it doesn't count.
>Isn't that a wee bit ad hoc?
See, I use one Latin phrase and I get Latin thrown at me. I think I
answered this previously.
> > That said, I don't think it would make any difference if pre-Adamites did
> > engage in animal sacrifice, though I don't think they did. Moses laws
> > harken back to the law code of Hammurabi.
>
>Dick, this is crazy. Unless the sacrifice meets exactly your view of what
>the ancient Sumerian sacrifice was, and it is in the same culture and comes
>after the Hammurabi code, then it doesn't count? Can't see that Dick.
Maybe you'll never see it. I had a discussion on another forum with
someone who advocated as the YECs do that the Euphrates river and the
Tigris river of today are named after the original rivers in Genesis, but
aren't the same rivers. So I responded thus: "But since the Hiddekel
"goeth toward the east of Assyria," as it surely does to this day, this
means there were two Assyrias. Now I do know the
post flood Assyria was named for Asshur of Gen. 10:11, so who was the pre
flood "Assyria" named for? And where was it located?
This shut him up, but it didn't change his mind.
>But the sacrifice you mention wasn't the first animal sacrifice as you
>require, at least in your book. If you add domestication to the list, then
>what about the bear cubs raised in the homes of the bear cult people. We
>know the bear cult goes back many thousands of years.
Previously answered.
> > As for any racial implications, Adam had no parents, no black parents, no
> > white parents, no hispanic parents. He didn't belong to any
> > race. But the
> > Adamite populations did mix with the Sumerians who were
> > Aryan as far as we know. So the resultant Jews do have some
> > Aryan features.
>
>It still sets up two populations. BTW, my wife really does like the idea of
>being superior to me as she has suspected all these years.
Well, she probably listens :>).
>I noted in another note that you claimed Neanderthal ancestry. From one
>descendant to another, here is to animal sacrifice and its ancient origins!
I do have that little telltale bump at the base of my scull. So, Cheers!
Dick Fischer - Genesis Proclaimed Association
Finding Harmony in Bible, Science, and History
www.genesisproclaimed.org
Received on Mon Feb 16 11:51:52 2004
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