Re: Dick Fisher's "historical basis" remains no less doubtful

On Mon, 15 Nov 2004 18:05:25 -0500 "jack syme" <drsyme@cablespeed.com>
writes:
> I want to be clear about my question.
>
> I think there are two issues.
>
> The first is what it means to be created "in the image of God". And
> how
> Adam was, according to traditional biblical interpretation, the
> first of
> this race that was created in "his image". This characteristic is
> unique to
> Adam and his descendants. I dont see how other hominids in
> meopotamia, or
> elsewhere that were not descendants of Adam, a part of this race in
> this
> way.
>
> I think that the issue of original sin, and the consequences of the
> fall is
> a different matter.
>
> Lets just say for a moment, that all members of Homo Sapiens
> Sapiens, are
> created in Gods image, and have souls. I dont think I have a
> problem with
> Adam's fall condemning all of that race, even those not of Adam's
> lineage,
> including those that came before Adam. I also feel that saying this
> stops
> at anatomically modern humans is reasonable. In the same way,
> Christ's
> sacrifice covers all men, at least all that believe in him, whether
> or not
> they are part of Christ's lineage or not.
>
> The difficulty I have though is making all homo sapiens sapiens
> spiritual
> creatures, in the same way that Adam was, and still maintain the
> historicity
> of the Biblical text.

Jack,
Your first paragraph echoes my problem with Dick's approach. As I see it,
if the first chapters of Genesis are taken as history, we have to
transfer them to Africa. I once toyed with the notion of the Flood
occurring in the Rift of Africa. At least this is near where evidence
indicates that the earliest /Homo sapiens sapiens/ lived. Glenn wants to
put the human lineage early enough to have the Flood be the filling of
the Mediterranean. Either way, Adam has to be much earlier than 10-7,000
B.C.

In what follows, I don't think you have adequately considered the
unlimited spread of the Fall against the limited extension of grace,
unless you want to be a Universalist. Given this last, I don't see how
one can suggest, as a few do, that the believers will have a more exalted
position in eternity although all will ultimately be saved. Of course, if
only those human beings who believed in Adam received the results of his
Fall ...

Your last paragraph poses the ultimate problem. Unless Genesis 1 is
historical (and a number of the church fathers concluded that it can't
be, but no one can accuse them of being influenced by the higher
criticism), and Genesis 2, which does not agree with Genesis 1, is also
historical, the need to interpret Genesis 3 as actual history need not
arise. As I see it, the only way to take Genesis 1 as descriptive is to
view it as a revelation to someone to counter the Babylonian or Egyptian
cosmology and myths.
Dave
Received on Mon Nov 15 21:59:20 2004