It's threads like this that make me miss Calgaryborn. That guy was oddly fascinating.
In a Ham sort of way?
The only thing I find fascinating about people like Ken Ham is wondering if they truly are dumb enough to believe what they say they believe or do they just do it to get fithy rich from the un-educated,stupid or both?.
Just one example of his slogans: "For a mere $10 you can send your kids to a summer camp where they can learn all about how Noah's Ark dealt with lava"
For some reason, this reminded me of a particularly favored song lyric of mine: "But what is truth? Is truth a changing law? We all have truths. Are mine the same as yours?"
I really wanted to respond to this thread yesterday, but was so damn tired. FYI, I'm in Jerusalem at present, working at the Israel Museum for ten days on a fascinating ancient scroll that I believe preserves source material for the famous so-called "War Scroll" from Qumran Cave 1. It might also be of interest to some that the Israel Antiquities Authority performed a massive upgrade to their online photographic database this past week, and added 10,000 new images of the Dead Sea Scrolls.
Anyhow...
Quote:
Originally Posted by photon
...I'm sure there are other creation myths that don't involve creation "ex nihilo" by a preexisting deity though, maybe Greeks?...
It constantly bugs me, but this point requires significant and regular correction. While official Christian doctrine almost universally endorses a position of creation ex nihilo—which means basically a creation from out of nothing—this idea was not arrived at by way of a straightforward reading of the biblical creation texts. The idea of creation ex nihilo receives support from most English translations of Genesis 1:1 by translating the first word as an adjective, and not an adverb: "In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth." In actual fact, this is a very strange translation of this word, ברשאית, which where elsewhere used almost universally functions as a temporal qualifier of the verbal clause. My (much better) translation is "When God began creating the sky and the ground, the ground was a chaotic soup and darkness encroached upon the surface of that chaos." You can see that in this alternative rendering, there is no suggestion that there was nothing prior to God's first creative act. Rather to the contrary, the Genesis 1 creation story makes much better sense in its depiction of God fashioning the cosmos from functionless raw materials.
Quote:
Originally Posted by photon
Ultimately I guess you are right that for a believer God would always be part of creationism, but the discussions don't have to be framed that way.
They absolutely don't! And I think this is more clearly revealed by way of a more natural translation and interpretation of the biblical creation myth in Genesis 1. The story is not about origins, it is about order and harmony. In the ancient mind, the ultimate reality was believed to be synonymous with stability, function, and uniformity. The Hebrew word ברא, which is used exclusively throughout this story to describe God's activity is believed to have emerged from an Ugaritic root meaning "to cut", and was essentially understood to convey a sense of organisation. This is completely in tune with the action taking place in Genesis 1, in which we see God assigning function, and compartmentalising the universe. The "moral" of this story—if one were to call it such—is that EVERY element of reality has a God-given function. Every part of the cosmos conforms to its divinely mandated designation.
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Dealing with Everything from Dead Sea Scrolls to Red C Trolls
Quote:
Originally Posted by woob
"...harem warfare? like all your wives dressup and go paintballing?"
If people believe in an infinite God, I don't know why they have to say the world is only 6000 years old...
Answering this question is fundamental to understanding all creationist positions, and to uncovering what is really at stake for them. You are correct in creationists concerns are not about belief in God. All creationist doctrine and propaganda springs from a preposterous commitment to the infallibility of Christian scripture. Modern evangelicalism's roots are in fundamentalist Christianity, which began as a reaction to the emergence of critical scholarship and science, which both began to seriously undermine the received meaning of the biblical texts. This was tantamount to a disaster, since protestant Christendom depended exclusively upon the authority of Scripture as the founding component of their religious beliefs. It was thought that if the Bible was somehow not a flawless record that conformed to conventional teachings of history, science, ethics, politics, etc., then it would eventually prove to be useless, and the church irrelevant.
You will hear Ken Ham frequently refer not to his belief in God or to the atonement of Christ in his appeals to faith. Rather, he is wholly, and irrationally committed to this absurd idea about the flawless revelation of "Scripture". One could say that Ken Ham's god is actually not the Christian god. Ken Ham's god is the Bible, especially as it is understood by way of his horribly naïve and unsophisticated "natural" hermeneutic of simple reading for comprehension. He has no sense of language, literature, history, culture, anthropology, social theory, or any of the other rather massive factors that will absolutely affect the meaning of ancient biblical texts.
__________________
Dealing with Everything from Dead Sea Scrolls to Red C Trolls
Quote:
Originally Posted by woob
"...harem warfare? like all your wives dressup and go paintballing?"
You will hear Ken Ham frequently refer not to his belief in God or to the atonement of Christ in his appeals to faith. Rather, he is wholly, and irrationally committed to this absurd idea about the flawless revelation of "Scripture". One could say that Ken Ham's god is actually not the Christian god. Ken Ham's god is the Bible, especially as it is understood by way of his horribly naïve and unsophisticated "natural" hermeneutic of simple reading for comprehension. He has no sense of language, literature, history, culture, anthropology, social theory, or any of the other rather massive factors that will absolutely affect the meaning of ancient biblical texts.
Answering this question is fundamental to understanding all creationist positions, and to uncovering what is really at stake for them. You are correct in creationists concerns are not about belief in God. All creationist doctrine and propaganda springs from a preposterous commitment to the infallibility of Christian scripture. Modern evangelicalism's roots are in fundamentalist Christianity, which began as a reaction to the emergence of critical scholarship and science, which both began to seriously undermine the received meaning of the biblical texts. This was tantamount to a disaster, since protestant Christendom depended exclusively upon the authority of Scripture as the founding component of their religious beliefs. It was thought that if the Bible was somehow not a flawless record that conformed to conventional teachings of history, science, ethics, politics, etc., then it would eventually prove to be useless, and the church irrelevant.
You will hear Ken Ham frequently refer not to his belief in God or to the atonement of Christ in his appeals to faith. Rather, he is wholly, and irrationally committed to this absurd idea about the flawless revelation of "Scripture". One could say that Ken Ham's god is actually not the Christian god. Ken Ham's god is the Bible, especially as it is understood by way of his horribly naïve and unsophisticated "natural" hermeneutic of simple reading for comprehension. He has no sense of language, literature, history, culture, anthropology, social theory, or any of the other rather massive factors that will absolutely affect the meaning of ancient biblical texts.
I always understood that the doctrine of original sin requires a young earth with humans created fully formed as without it there is no reason to suspect that the "fall" in Genesis 3 actually resulted in eternal condemnation as nothing would have ever been "Very good", and the doctrine of original sin without basis.
That being said, I read the first chapters of Genesis in much the same way as you do (although not in the original language as you are able to do). They are pretty much explanations for the human condition (By this I mean why we have disease, have to work, etc) and the world around us as seen through the eyes of a person with no modern scientific knowledge at all.
It constantly bugs me, but this point requires significant and regular correction. While official Christian doctrine almost universally endorses a position of creation ex nihilo—which means basically a creation from out of nothing—this idea was not arrived at by way of a straightforward reading of the biblical creation texts. The idea of creation ex nihilo receives support from most English translations of Genesis 1:1 by translating the first word as an adjective, and not an adverb: "In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth." In actual fact, this is a very strange translation of this word, ברשאית, which where elsewhere used almost universally functions as a temporal qualifier of the verbal clause. My (much better) translation is "When God began creating the sky and the ground, the ground was a chaotic soup and darkness encroached upon the surface of that chaos." You can see that in this alternative rendering, there is no suggestion that there was nothing prior to God's first creative act. Rather to the contrary, the Genesis 1 creation story makes much better sense in its depiction of God fashioning the cosmos from functionless raw materials.
Thanks for this, I know I've read similar things before (even just a straight reading of a common translation of verse two makes more sense that way).
Easy to see why it would it wouldn't be the popular view, if the Spirit of God is moving over the surface of pre-existing waters, where did the waters come from?! Oops!
EDIT: Also gives me a chance to post my favorite cosmology graphic:
Spoiler!
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On BuzzFeed, there is a clever listicle that is a collection of 22 photos showing creationists holding up questions they have for people who “believe” in evolution.
These questions are fairly typically asked when evolution is questioned by creationists. Some are philosophical, and fun to think about, while others show a profound misunderstanding of how science works, and specifically what evolution is. I have found that most creationists who attack evolution have been taught about it by other creationists, so they really don’t understand what it is or how it works, instead they have a straw-man idea of it.
Because of this, it’s worth exploring and answering the questions presented. Some could be simply answered yes or no, but I’m all about going a bit deeper. With 22 questions I won’t go too deep, but if you have these questions yourself, or have been asked them, I hope this helps.
I’ll repeat the question below, and give my answers.
Easy to see why it would it wouldn't be the popular view, if the Spirit of God is moving over the surface of pre-existing waters, where did the waters come from?! Oops! ...
The prominent theory is that the "pre-existent waters" is actually a vestigial feature of an even more ancient creation myth embedded within the Genesis 1 account. The story was almost certainly written some time after the sixth cent. B.C.E., and was adapted from a version of the Enamu Elish, a Babylonian creation epic. The word translated "waters" in v. 2 is תהום, pronounced t'hom. It is a rare word in biblical Hebrew, appearing elsewhere most predominantly in other, probably more ancient creation myths than Genesis 1, such as in Exod 15, or in poetic passages that reflect back on a likely much older view of God's creative activity like in Ps 104:6. Interestingly, in both of these texts and several others the word appears in the plural, and is pronounced Tehomot, which is very similar to Tihamat, the Babylonian goddess of the sea.
According to the Enamu Elish, the children of the goddess Tiamat were led by Marduk in battle against their mother. Marduk killed Tiamat, and fashioned the cosmos from her remains. As your very nice cosmological chart shows, the ancients largely believed that the sky was a massive, solid dome that held back the primordial waters. Significantly, Marduk built the sky from the carcass of Tiamat.
The biblical creation story in Gen 1:1–2:4 is actually "Judaicised" version of this story. It was "demythologised" by ancient standards and constructed in the form of a narrative, but remaining faithful to the more prominent features of the Enamu Elish. In place of Marduk and his allies, there is only one god in Genesis (although even here, there are vestiges of henotheistic thinking in v. 26 when God says "let US make mankind in OUR image", in address to his council of demigods). There is no cosmic battle or blood shed, but creation still emerges from the vanquished chaos monster in v.2. In v. 6 God fashions a dome like Marduk did, and "separates water from water".
The story in Genesis 1 most likely originated as a response to the Enamu Elish which the exiled Judaeans would have become familiar with after the Babylonian conquest of Jerusalem in 586 B.C.E. It was an adaptation of what was believed to be the consensus explanation for origins, but was "sanitised" to suit peculiar Jewish religious sensibilities. It was a way of acknowledging the general truth of the Babylonian account, but adjusting it in such a way that suited Hebrew culture. Genesis 1 is actually a great illustration of ancient religious syncretism, which is pretty ironic, really, considering that those who take it most seriously today are also the same people who eschew the notion of religious cross-contamination.
Of course, this is the sort of story that doesn't often find a very comprehensive treatment in any modern English Bibles. As an alternative, my favourite version of the Genesis 1 story (and many other Bible stories) can be read here.
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Quote:
Originally Posted by woob
"...harem warfare? like all your wives dressup and go paintballing?"
^
As an aside, one really needs to have a correct understanding of Genesis 1 to have a clear idea about many other Old Testament stories and passages. For example, only a correct understanding of the literary roots of Genesis 1 can reveal the full impact of the purpose and meaning behind the story of Noah's flood. Without going into great detail, creation—the defeat of "chaos" was accomplished through staving off the primordial stew of water in the form of erecting a barrier to keep the water out. In Genesis 9, God destroyed earth by opening the "windows in the sky" and letting all that watery chaos back in. The story of Noah's flood is no less than an un-creation in the ancient mindset.
Another—in my mind more interesting—example appears in Jeremiah 4. Beginning in v. 23, the prophet utters the following cry of lament:
"I look at the earth, It is unformed and void; At the skies, And their light is gone. I look at the mountains, They are quaking; And all the hills are rocking. I look: no man is left, And all the birds of the sky have fled. I look: the farm land is desert, And all its towns are in ruin — Because of Yahweh, Because of his blazing anger."
This is part of a larger prophecy contained in the whole chapter, and it was spoken over the city of Jerusalem during the Babylonian conquest. If you look closely, you can see a deliberate reversal of the story of Genesis 1 in the prophet's description. In essence, according to the ancient Hebrew mindset, the destruction of the Judean capital and the most holy place on earth, Solomon's temple, was akin to un-creation. This is not merely a description of the horrors of conquest, it is a reflection of a much deeper sentiment. The speaker is describing the end of the world—or, at least HIS world.
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Dealing with Everything from Dead Sea Scrolls to Red C Trolls
Quote:
Originally Posted by woob
"...harem warfare? like all your wives dressup and go paintballing?"
