Re: [asa] The Bible does not require a Neolithic Adam!

*There is a part on conception, but there is also a statement about bringing
forth
*
Right, Walton does note that. He says "we can conclude that the first half
of verse 16 is an extended merism (two endpoints used to refer to everything
in between, e.g., "soup to nuts") referring to the anxiety that a woman will
experience through the whole process from conception to birth." He
paraphrases the full verse 16 as follows: "I will greatly increase the
anguish you will experience in the birth process, from the anxiety
surrounding conception to the strenuous work of giving birth." (NIV
Application Commentary at p. 227). So in this reading, the point of the
second half of the verse isn't that the woman would have greater physical
pain, but that her anxiety about the dangers and pains of birth would
increase. Someday I hope I can study the Biblical languages so I can really
evaluate these sorts of grammatical arguments.

On 10/22/06, Glenn Morton <glennmorton@entouch.net> wrote:
>
>
> I like what you say below, However, looking at BDB I see that that Walton
must be looking at the first part of the verse.for the meaning. There is a
part on conception, but there is also a statement about bringing forth:
>
>
>
>
> "Unto the woman he said, I will greatly multiply thy sorrow and thy
conception; in sorrow thou shalt bring forth children;" kjv
>
> The first sorrow is H 6093 and means: worrisomeness
>
> The second sorrow is H 6089 and means pain, hurt, toil, sorrow, labour,
hardship
>
> So this verse says I will greatly multiply thy worrisomness and thy
conception in pain thou shalt bring forth children.
>
> I would also point out that the word conception (heron) is NOT the same
word as bring forth which is yalad which means bear young. I don't know
what Walton is talking about there. The words as I see them are quite
different.
>
>
>
> I would stand on what I said at http://home.entouch.net/dmd/birth.htm.
> It doesn't resolve our painful childbirth because in relation to the size
of the birth canal, there is more room relatively speaking for almost all
other animals than there is for humans.
>
> "The human pattern of pre-and post-natal brain growth and
> development is very unusual relative both to other mammals and to
> other primates. At birth, human babies' brains are small--only
> about 30% of their adult size, as opposed to about 50% in other
> primates--although their gestation time is long for an animal of
> their body size. Unlike other living species, humans maintain
> the pre-natal rate of brain growth for approximately a year after
> birth, resulting in an unusually large brain size relative to
> body size." ~ P. Shipman and A. Walker, "The Costs of Becoming a
> Predator," Journal of Human Evolution, 18, 373-392, p. 385
>
> "Humans are the only exception to these generalizations: we have mastered
an extraordinary physiological 'trick' that keeps our babies' brains growing
at the fetal rate for a full year after birth. In effect, gestation in
humans is twenty-one months long: nine months in utero and twelve months
outside." Alan Walker and Pat Shipman, The Wisdom of the Bones, (New York:
Alfred Knopf, 1996), p. 221-222
>
> Since the brain develops outside the womb in the stimulating world, it
increases our intelligence by increasing the neural connections.
>
> It is this one feature of our development that is utterly unique among
primates. It sets us apart. And while lots of people here seem not to
beleive that a BIG baby causes pain in childbirth, that is, at least,
what the experts say is causing women pain in childbirth. I will go with
the experts. Our big heads cause a change in the manner of birth. No other
primate has babies born with face down. All other primates can reach down
and pull the infant out and the spine bends the proper direction. If humans
did this, they would break the back of the infant.
>
> Now, everyone has focused on childbirth. the reality is a large head does
several things for us that make us post Adamic. First, is pain in child
birth. Second is the need to be furless and thus need clothing in colder
climates. Third, to maintain the brain's temperature requires sweating. We
are the most prodigious sweaters on the planet. The theory that a large
head is the cause of the curses is a unifying concept. one cause, three
effects--pain in childbirth, sweating, and hairlessness requiring clothing.
I guess where theology is concerned, since everything is not really
historical anyway, unifying principles are not necessary and are to be
shunned.
>
> Whether something resonates should not be a substitute for whether or not
it is true.
>
> glenn
> They're Here: The Pathway Papers
> Foundation, Fall, and Flood
> Adam, Apes and Anthropology
>
> http://home.entouch.net/dmd/dmd.htm
>
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: David Opderbeck [mailto:dopderbeck@gmail.com]
> Sent: Sunday, October 22, 2006 8:45 PM
> To: jack syme
> Cc: Glenn Morton; donperrett@theology-perspectives.net; ASA Discussions
> Subject: Re: [asa] The Bible does not require a Neolithic Adam!
>
>
>
> Quick addendum -- I happened to have John Walton's NIV Application
Commentary on Genesis handy and took a quick peek -- his take is that "pain
in childbirth" actually refers to "anxiety in conception," not physical pain
at all. According to Walton, the Hebrew translated "childbirth" actually
refers to "conception," not childbirth, and the Hebrew translated "pain"
only appears a few other times in the OT and generally refers to "anxiety."
Walton also interprets this particular consequence not as a "curse," but as
a description of one consequence that flows from the actual curse, which is
"death."
>
> So, Walton says, the most likely meaning of this text is that people will
have anxiety mingled with the joy of bringing children into the world
because their children will suffer the brokenness and death that comes from
the curse. This wouldn't resolve the problem of how humans experienced
physical death before the fall if Adam & Eve were literal and more recent,
but it would seem to resolve the anatomical problem that childbirth has
always been rather painful.
>
> In my experience as a father of three, this interpretation resonates with
me. I'll never forget eleven years ago when my first was born, when we
buckled her into the car seat for the first time and drove away from the
hospital, thinking -- HELP!!! And I've thought that every day since!
>
> On 10/22/06, David Opderbeck <dopderbeck@gmail.com> wrote:
> >
> > I wonder if some things like the curse of increased pain in childbirth
have primarily a social / cultural aspect rather than a physiological or
psychological one. This would be analagous to the way many like to handle
the problem of "natural evil" before the fall -- there were hurricanes,
earthquakes, etc., before the fall, but sin destroyed the sort of wise and
just civil administration that otherwise would have mitigated the
consequences of those natural events on human civilization.
> >
> > Similarly, perhaps absent the fall, the pain of childbirth would have
been more manageable, because human culture, including medical culture,
would have advanced more rapidly and would have been more equitably
available to all women. Today, for many women in developed countries,
childbirth is not nearly so painful as it otherwise would be, due to the
epidural drugs. Of course, even today, due in many ways to sin (economic
and social injustice), most women in the world don't have access to this
technology.
> >
> >
> >
> > On 10/22/06, jack syme <drsyme@cablespeed.com> wrote:
> > >
> > >
> > > I had kidney stones once. In a sense, I gave birth to those stones.
And it was extraordinarily painful. It was beyond pain.
> > >
> > > And I have witness from a woman or two, who have both passed kidney
stones and given birth, and, at least in their words, the experience was
comparable.
> > >
> > > On a slightly more serious note. Do you think that we have reached
the end of our evolution? Is it not possible, short of routine caesarian
sections, that human brain capacity has reached its limits?
> > >
> > > Concerning pain in child birth. The argument I thought I was making is
that pain in childbirth is due to the ratio of the neonatal head
circumference to that of the birth canal. This is one sentence out of my
new pamphlet, Who was Adam. The page number is still to be determined when I
finish formatting it.
> > >
> > >
> > > ". The human birth canal is 13 centimeters at its longest dimension
and 10 centimeters at the smallest. By comparison the baby's head is 10
centimeters at the longest dimension and the shoulders 12 cm." Glenn R.
Morton, Who was Adam?, Pathway Papers, 5 (Spring: DMD Publishers, 2006),
page to be determined.
> > >
> > > That is a tight fit. Similar proportions among fossil men go back to
about 2.5 million years.
> > >
> > > Anyone who has seen animals give birth, know that they are not
entirely comfortable. Watching the contractions during the birth of a cow,
or even a cat, the animal is experiencing discomfort. However, it is
nothing like what we humans experience. Everytime I tell a group of women
that I once broke my leg in 4 places and my foot was at my kneecap, and tell
them how horendously painful it was, they always say, it can't match
childbirth. And the few women who have broken their leg like that agree.
Since I will never experience pain in childbirth, I can't quite be an expert
on it.
> > >
> > > Thus, this is to say, I do agree with you that in and of itself,
pain in childbirth could be said to be psychologically increased. But when
one realizes that the anatomical features of the human birth which cause the
pain we see today, existed two and a half million years ago, why would I
need to resort to psychology or subjective feelings to say that pain
increased? I have the anatomical data which shows that it was a problem back
then.
> > >
> >
> >
>
>

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Received on Sun Oct 22 22:50:37 2006