Evolution vs. Creation

[amodman]

dinadan said:

First of all, when you make statements like "God says" you are already in trouble because you are trying to say that the Bible was written by God; in fact, the Bible was written by people, who are imperfect instruments and prone to falibility. Not to mention that all of Genisis was oral history until Moses wrote it down. Then you have to contend with the multitude of translations and retranslations of the words (and if you've ever worked at translation, you realize what a difficulty there is in keeping the meanings the same).

Then, there's the matter that you claim that the Bible is without blemish because it says so. First of all, where does it say that? And, does that mean that Catholic Bibles, which include the Apocrypha, are imperfect because they have extra material? Or, cutting the other way, that Protestant Bibles are incomplete because they don't have the Apocrypha. Or, how about the fact that the cannon was decided by comittee, and wasn't even formal until the 4th century AD. Not to mention that self-justifying authority is one of the big transgressions of logic (fallacy of circular reasoning).

That's not to imply that I think that Faith must be rational--because it can't. However, I'm of the Kierkegaardian school of thought on this, which basically means that I believe you can rationally get to the point where you must make a leap of faith in God; but believing in the absolute power of God is not the same as believing in the absolute authority of the Bible. Anything that is made of matter is subject to corruption; anything that is left in the hands of the people who benefit from the perception of its inherent authority for 1500 years (give or take a century) is suspect. Do you think that the Church, which had no compunctions about selling indulgences, would have compuctions about "altering" the text to serve them better? Moreover, it's a fact that St. Jerome, when traslating his Vulgate version (the authoritative version of the bible for almost 1000 years) was, shall we say, less than entirely accurate with his translations (proving that the old adage "Translators are traitors" is true).

Now, yes, I'm a Christian--but I'm also a skeptic. So, in the face of facts, or reasonablely established arguments, I refuse to turn a blind eye and say "No no no, it's a matter of faith." To me, that's wrong. It's better, in my view, to accept the facts and try to discover the truth in order to completely integrate them into your belief system.

I agree somewhat to this. I will tell you without a doubt that today's Bible has glaring, over-looked changes that have been done through history. However, some things are simply consistent with all the translations we can go back to and see, whateva.

twyrch said:

I'm suddenly reminded of a story in the OT. I think it was Elijah who was in competition with people who worshipped Baal or Bezelbub (sp?) and he told them to get dry branches to build a bon fire... he got green wood and soaked it in water. Then each group prayed to their own 'god' to light the fire.

Only Elijah's became lit... the other one didn't. When the Bible talks about Elijah's response... the KJV says, "Where is your god? Is he indisposed?" However, the Living Bible says, "Where is your god? Going to the bathroom?"

I don't know why... I'm just struck funny by that.

Perhaps "lesser" gods are power angels sent down with Lucifer. We'll never know in this lifetime.

I have certain rock hard beliefs in the reality of Demons and Angels among men. Though, there are very few fallen angels roaming the earth (that is, theologically they are chained into the abyss with Satan), there are still some (no one ever said no more Angels fell after Satan left with his third), and many, many demonic spirits of Nephilim. I know lots of people with actual experience with actual experiences within occults and/or witchcraft etc., and demons do quite literally show themselves as gods. I have no doubt that the representations of ancient powerful leaders that the history channel sometimes thinks were aliens were rather demons representing themselves over entire cultures. That, I would deduce is what those people were worshipping.

p.s. Baal is actually a common deity among many cultures, with different representations in each.

edit: Oh yes, I forgot to weigh in on the gradual changes discussion of evolution. While agree this exists, I don't know a fully creationist scientist personally who doesn't, I do not believe such things could produce new species. It is quite believeable to me that there were not nearly as many different types of each species as there are today (ie. the tons of types of dogs), but through gradual changes more developed. However I believe (as far from the scuience I know), it is completely and utterly impossible for dogs to develop into, say, bears or whatever. That is another species entirely and, IMO, just couldn't be done. I imagine the first humans had the skin tone od Jews - very brown. So as people spread through the earth after generations upon generations the various "races" of humans we have todaty occurred. That's gradual evolution.

[pink3elephant]

It seems as if everyone's beliefs here are rooted extremely deep. And I know that most of you like me will probably not sway from those beliefs, and will try to convince others to agree with you.

So, I think I will end this arguing/debating(or whatever you will call it), and stick with my beliefs.

[Margim]

Just to throw in my couple of newbie cents...
I believe deeply in the word of God as truth. I believe in the centrality of Christ for the world's existence. I believe the bible is an accurate revelation of God.

However, I also believe that revelation is a revelation regarding the character of God, not the historicity of the events that God interacted in. I see the garden of eden story, whether it happened or not, as an essential tale for defining 'our' God and his deep, personal involvement with creation as opposed to others who see creation as some sort of accident. If God used six days, fine. If he used the big bang and a process of evolution that went longer than that (which I tend to sway towards... much much longer than that), then that's also fine.

Either way, when we reduce our arguments about creation vs evolution down to a scientific debate, I feel we've lost touch with what the bible is truly saying - it speaks more about the character of a creative, loving, deeply interested God - and less about scientific principals.

The bible was written in a pre-modern world... why do we so often try and apply modernistic rational to try and determine truth?

[dinadan]

margim said:

Just to throw in my couple of newbie cents...
I believe deeply in the word of God as truth. I believe in the centrality of Christ for the world's existence. I believe the bible is an accurate revelation of God.

However, I also believe that revelation is a revelation regarding the character of God, not the historicity of the events that God interacted in. I see the garden of eden story, whether it happened or not, as an essential tale for defining 'our' God and his deep, personal involvement with creation as opposed to others who see creation as some sort of accident. If God used six days, fine. If he used the big bang and a process of evolution that went longer than that (which I tend to sway towards... much much longer than that), then that's also fine.

Either way, when we reduce our arguments about creation vs evolution down to a scientific debate, I feel we've lost touch with what the bible is truly saying - it speaks more about the character of a creative, loving, deeply interested God - and less about scientific principals.

The bible was written in a pre-modern world... why do we so often try and apply modernistic rational to try and determine truth?

I definitely agree with you. That was my whole point in trying to show that there is a huge semantic/language barrier (and language determines worldview--i.e. modern vs. premodern) involved in understanding the actual text of the Bible. For a speaker of modern (or, maybe, post-modern) English to say that they understand and believe 100% literally in a text originally written in an ancient semantic language thousands of years ago, just seems so irrational that I have a hard time with it. I suppose that what I believe in is a margin of error. No one can be absolutely certain of anything, because, ultimately, we "know" something only because we want to believe that we know it (to paraphrase Frank Herbert).

[DanTheMan]

For now we see in a mirror, dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part, but then I shall know just as I also am known.
Someday, maybe we'll know exactly what happened. I just think that God is the only witness and the Bible is his method of teaching me. 1000's of years have gone by and English cannot exactly translate everything in the Bible. I still believe in it 100%. If it says 6 days of Creation, I believe it. It also says Jesus is the door - but, of course, he isn't an actual physical door. I find more meaning in 6 days of creation than 6 billion years of evolution. I believe he crafted each creature lovingly, both monkeys and humans. But monkeys don't evolve into humans - they stay monkeys. That doesn't mean they're lesser creatures, they just are what they were made to be.

[Zeke]

dantheman said:

For now we see in a mirror, dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part, but then I shall know just as I also am known.
Someday, maybe we'll know exactly what happened. I just think that God is the only witness and the Bible is his method of teaching me. 1000's of years have gone by and English cannot exactly translate everything in the Bible. I still believe in it 100%. If it says 6 days of Creation, I believe it. It also says Jesus is the door - but, of course, he isn't an actual physical door. I find more meaning in 6 days of creation than 6 billion years of evolution. I believe he crafted each creature lovingly, both monkeys and humans. But monkeys don't evolve into humans - they stay monkeys. That doesn't mean they're lesser creatures, they just are what they were made to be.

I agree with you there especially the bit about believing 100% of the bible If you don't believe 100% then What parts are to be believed. Personally I believe that God made everything in 6 days because He said so!!!!!! Sure He could have used 4.5 Billion Years But He said He did it in 6 days.

I like to think that I know something about this subject after all I am a Uni student studying the Biology and Geology perspectives of the Beginning of this planet and I can stump my lecturers with some of my questions (which does not help my marks) this is something that I would die before I would recant but hey everyone to his own opinions just because this is what I believe It does not make it right I simply think it is.

[Lady Bookwyrm]

Once again...scientists do not say we evolved FROM monkeys, but WITH them from a common ancestor...so of course they will not evolve INTO people, they would evolve AWAY from people.

Sorry...I'm anal about that point...no offense

[dgan]

ladybookwyrm said:

Once again...scientists do not say we evolved FROM monkeys, but WITH them from a common ancestor...so of course they will not evolve INTO people, they would evolve AWAY from people.

Sorry...I'm anal about that point...no offense

We are not easily offended around here. At least I hope not.

I think the reason people say it that way is because there is no name/identity (consensus) for this supposed common ancestor. We can assume "it" would have looked something like a human/monkey/ape. Therefore, you can pretty much call it whatever you like and people understand what you're talking about.

I personally think it looked like Yoda, but that's just me.