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

On Tue, 16 Nov 2004 01:16:55 -0500 "jack syme" <drsyme@cablespeed.com>
writes:
> One thought I had about Genesis 2 is that it is just a description of
> the
> beginning of agricultural society.
>
> Look at all of the agricultural themes that run through Genesis 2:
> 2:5 no shrub of the field had yet appeard on the earth,...no plant
> of the
> field had yet sprung up; the Lord God had not sent rain on the earth
> and
> there was no man to work the ground...
> 2:7 And the Lord God formed man from the dust of the ground..
> 2:8 Now the Lord God had planted a garden...
> 2:9 And the Lord God made all kinds of trees grow out of the ground
> 2:15 The Lord God took the man and put him in the Garden of Eden to
> work it
> and take care of it.
> 2:20 So the man gave names to all the livestock,
>
> Is the sixth day of Genesis 1 the description of hominid evolution?
> Please
> see :
> http://www.asa3.org/ASA/PSCF/1996/PSCF3-96Zimmer.html#Zimmer
>
> And is Genesis 2 the description of the neolithic revolution? Did
> God gift
> Adam, with agriculture? Is Adam in Genesis 2 historical or
> figurative? Is
> Adam in Genesis 3, historical or figurative?
>
> I think that it would be consistent, with the biblical description
> of Adam,
> to put a real historical Adam at the start of agricultural society,
> but
> there are clearly parts of Genesis 2 and 3 that have to be
> figurative.
>
> Perhaps the pure historical narrative begins with Genesis 4?
>
>
Jack,
Your statements pose a different situation, but with some of the same
problems Dick's view has. How does Adam's fall, one person out of many
alive at the time (with Eve one pair), transmit itself to the entire
race? If the story is figurative, one has to determine the scope of the
metaphor relative to both history and to its explanatory power of the
human state. Any suggestion along these lines will raise objections from
one (or many) quarters. Depending on the evaluator, one extreme view will
make you relevant or damned; the alternate extreme, spouting nonsense or
presenting truth--with a whole range between. So you'll have to determine
your position as best you can, with the expectation of being reviled by
some and acclaimed by others. Unless you have to sign a particular
statement of faith, the evaluation seems to me to lack ultimate
importance. Clearly, not all positions can be correct, one of the
unfortunate consequences of human finitude. I think of Peirce's comment
that all men will acknowledge human finitude while maintaing that on this
point they are right.
Dave
Received on Tue Nov 16 14:22:33 2004