davidbach

Well said, NinJay, I wanted to say that myself! You said it better. There is no way to distinguish between what is literal an what is not because attitudes and interpretations have developed over time and sometimes been incorporated in the canon and other times not.

ChandraRama, I am not sure that I am a christian of a stripe you describe, but I do (in my fairly quiet way) take issue with the literalists. To my mind, literalism is demeaning the scriptures. In particular, if the bible is "scientific", then it must be subject to revision pending new observations. On the other hand, "Hamlet" is eternal, and is ever available to us to remind us of our indecisive nature (among other things), no matter that Hamlet probably never lived, much less at Elsinore. We need not dwell on the historicity or the scientific validity of the bible, but on the way in which the stories and legends speak to our human condition. In some ways, the "What would Jesus do?" crowd are on the right track, they just (usually) get the answer wrong - partly because they assume Jesus really existed as described.


I hope that this helps, Jeremy D, though I doubt that your friend is susceptible to this argument. It goes against organised dogma, which is anathema to "Pastors" because ti undermines thier authority.

David.

WishboneDawn

On what basis did you come to this decision? Have you made a study of myth? Of ancient Hebrew views on the matter?

WishboneDawn

What does Luke have to do with what was originally intended by the Genesis account? He was a little late to the discussion after all.

WishboneDawn

I'd suggest you skip anything Chirstian. We're Johnny-Come-Latelys and look at it through a blurry lens. Check out Jewish scholarship on the matter, iedas about how the ancient Hebrews likely viewed it and more general writing on myth like that of Joseph Campbell.

John Kesler

The OP refers to "a crazy non-denom friend" and her belief that Adam and Eve literally existed. That the NT agrees with the OT that Adam and Eve were actual people at least shows that the friend is attempting to follow what both testaments of the Bible teach.

ashurbanipal

Maybe the best reason to take it as metaphor is that the earliest preserved writings of the rabbis seem to discuss it in exactly that context.

There are textual clues that alert you that it might be meant as metaphor. For one thing, the God of Genesis 1 and the God of Genesis 2-5 are different. For another, the creation of Adam takes place twice. For yet another, Caine goes off to live with people that couldn't have existed if the story was literally true. The name of the serpent--Nechesh--adds to 358, which also happens to be the value of the word "Messiach"--the messiah, a being who brings salvation and victory to a people. None of this makes an sense from a literalist interpretation. It makes perfect sense if the story is a metaphor.

spin

The Luke reference is probably earlier than the rabbis you mention, unless you have a specific citation for a rabbi of the ilk of Gamaliel II. Luke definitely takes Adam as not metaphorical.

Polytheism isn't very convincing. The different means of referring to god are seen as different sources, which is also the usual understanding of the following...
Two different perspectives on man being created. Preferring not to choose one in preference over the other, both were given the nod by the compilers.

With the others you've mentioned, this is an indication of the writing process. Why do you think any of these point to metaphor, when they are more easily explained through mistake?

Gematria is eisegesis.

It seems to me that your interest is not about making sense, but about smoothing the text. Instead, the roughness of the text tends to give good indications as to the construction of the text.


spin

ChandraRama

There are lot of texts in Bible that do not make sense even if anyone take them as metaphors.

ashurbanipal

I agree but I don't know that this gets to the heart of the matter. It's generally accepted today (well, not to the extent that people won't argue the point, but that seems to be dying down) that for example Sepher ha Bahir and Sepher Ha Zohar preserve some ancient Rabbinic traditions that only surfaced with their publication. Those traditions are probably older than the counsel of Jabneh.

A case can certainly be made that the earliest rabbis did take the story literally. But equally, a case can be made for just the opposite (and all sorts of positions in between--we know that there was a Judaic mystery school fairly early on, and it was likely that whatever was taught there wasn't what was being given out to the general public). Given the other points I just made and am about to make, I consider the latter more likely.

Why would it be any less convincing than monotheism?

There was a massive shift to monotheism in some form or other during the axial age, more or less everywhere in the old world. But if you're attempting to maintain that the ancient Hebrews did not worship several Gods, I think you're going to have a pretty hard time making that case.

In this case, the context seems to argue against this (though I do acknowledge that the Tanakh was stitched together from multiple sources, especially during and after the Babylonian captivity). Genesis 2:7 speaks of the creation of Adam as a single individual. Gensis 5:2 speaks of the creation of Adam as the creation of a group of people. This is not a translation error; it's quite clear in the Hebrew.

How are they more easily explained through mistake? It seems to me that people come up with metaphors pretty easily.

Not necessarily. I would agree that some people do it badly, or without sensitivity to the process. But there are many indications throughout the text of Tanakh that specifically call for the use of Gematria. The deficient spelling of "Shehshak" in Jeremiah 25:26 is one example of a pretty good one. As another example, the appearance of the story at Genesis 11:1 (Tower of Babel) is suspect as it appears in the middle of the lineage of Shem, a name (shem) being what the builders of the tower were after.

I don't really find the text that smooth, and I'm not interested in apologetics, if that's what you mean.

In many instances, this is quite correct. However, one cannot just divide up the text however one likes. There are clear passages that are part of a definite story and that were in all likelihood from the same source.

judge

How is it "easy" to explain this (cains journey) as a mistake? Is it the kind of mistake you would "easily" make?