Dryhad

But isn't that "clean" is different from the dietary "clean" because it deals with different things? Noah's "clean" animals were clean for sacrificing, while Moses' "clean" animals were clean for eating.

Chris Weimer

Where do you get clean for sacrifice?

trh

Yes, the latter probably is more interesting. I thought it would be obvious by this point in the thread that I am not merely looking for idiocy to mock, given my stated preference against apologists like Zacharias. But anyway, thanks for that link to an example of the less interesting ‘former’ in your follow-up post; I found it neither entertaining nor amusing, but rather asinine, insubstantial, and boring. That’s why I asked for some help here: I can’t stand wading through that sort of useless crap “apologetic�.

Of course it is easy to make virtually any group of mythical stories ‘coherent’ if you take them to be allegorical: even stories radically at odds in every respect could be said to abstractly describe different aspects of the human psyche. But this, of course, was not what I was curious about. You say the stories are ‘clearly allegorical’, which, though true, would beg the question in the context I presented: an argument challenging literal interpretation.

I should have used “consistent� to imply a requirement of non-contradiction regarding factual events. That is what I meant to imply by ‘coherent’, as my thought was to assume the literalist interpretation and then basically do a reductio by pinning down an unsalvageable discrepancy in the text.

:Cheeky:
-tom

trh

I don’t see how this one could work, given the text.

Starting in Genesis 1:11, God says “Let the earth put forth vegetation: plants yielding seed, and fruit tress of every kind…� So far so good, but then we are told “And it was so. The earth brought forth vegetation: plants yielding seed of every kind…etc…And there was evening and there was morning, the third day.�

Clearly, there is a sequence here, and it involves the earth bringing forth (as opposed to a mere act of seed-planting) vegetation of every kind before the third day ends. So I am wondering what the “traditional Jewish explanation� is an explanation of, since it flatly contradicts the text.


Nostri: this was the sort of reply I was wondering about.

I am aware of the “anticipating the fall� point; it’s discussed in the Study Bible I’m using.
I still have concerns about how these two creation accounts could be made consistent. Let’s start with two specific issues.

1.) In Genesis 1, the narrative describes plants yielding seeds of every kind. So the plants referred to by ‘eseb ha’ssadeh’ ought already to exist, right? But they don’t in Genesis 2, because God had not yet caused it to rain on earth.

2.) In Genesis 2, the narrative tells us: “In the day that the Lord God made the earth and the heavens, when no plant of the field was yet in the earth… – then the Lord God formed man from the dust of the ground.�

Now, admittedly, I have no familiarity with the original languages, and how the syntax may have differed from the translated English version. But the structure of the translation makes it clear that Adam was created on the same day as the ‘earth and the heavens’. The sentence specifies a day, explains that there were no plants or herbs of the field, and says that then God created a man from the dust of the ground. Everything else is parenthetical, sectioned off by “– dashes – � and the conjuntion (when no plant…) is not closed until the bit about God forming dust into a man.

So I am not playing fast and loose with the text if I paraphrase as follows to make my point: “In the day that the Lord God made the earth and the heavens…the Lord God formed man from the dust of the ground.� So Genesis 2 has Adam created on day 1, whereas Genesis 1 has humankind made not until the sixth day.

I did not mean to say that the literalist would be coherent, but rather that he would attempt to make the two Genesis narratives coherent. I am curious how a dedicated literalist might attempt this, but I’d certainly not grant up front that a solution to the problem (and hence, a coherent literalist) is even possible. But given my initial question, describing such a creature as an analytic impossibility seems to jump the gun a bit, no?

But as a general rule, if someone resorts to “blah blah…I can’t hear you…etc�, or claiming that with God even logical contradictions are possible (perhaps then God exists and doesn’t exist!…), I am prepared to declare victory, or at least declare that we are playing a worthless game with no rules in which there is no right or wrong.
I therefore tend to be more concerned with other possible responses the literalist might make.

-tom

Dryhad

Genesis 8:20. Are you talking about something else, because I'm endlessly confused.

Wallener

You asked for "...a fundamentalist or literalist or believer in the coherency of Genesis..." Lots of "or" in there.

The traditional Jewish view is that the stories are allegorical and not intended to be read literally. Since the texts were written and redacted by Jews over a period of hundreds of years, you can either decide they were stupid and missed such a blatant contradiction, or decide they weren't morons, that the way they read the texts didn't create a contradiction.

trh

Yup, I should have been clearer. I meant someone who thinks that these things actually happened, in the same sense that any history book tries to capture things that actually happened.
Thanks, that helps. I was not aware that this was the Jewish view; unfortunately, most of my experience with the Bible has been with Fundamentalist Christians.
My own reference to "the traditional Jewish explanation" was in quotes because I was referring to Anat's use of the term; his explanation implied an attempt to make the stories literally cohere:
But anyway...
I found this to be helpful; a more or less knockdown argument against the literalist. It hadn't even occurred to me, perhaps because I'm still locked into the mindset of dealing with the fundamentalists I used to talk to. Thanks.

-Tom

Anat

Wallener, trh, I was trying to reconstruct a midrash from memory. the word 'the' in my reply shouldn't have been there.

BTW Wallener, if you look into some Hassidic sources, it is hard to conclude that they totally disregard the literal reading. Of course, since the story of creation isn't a matter of law it is possible to hold contradictory views simmultaneously within the Jewish religion.

Loomis

Tom (Trh),

I’m no expert, but it looks to me like Yahweh was not the original god associated with the flood story. It looks to me like Yahwists assimilated the flood story and tossed in the stuff about clean / unclean animals to “personalize it� and to make it look like a Yahweh thing. (Yahwists were big on sacrifices.)

Then, after time went by, it looks to me like someone took the pre-Yahwist version, and the post-Yahwist version, and combined it back into the same story. (This is why we see the “pair� vs. “sevens� conflict.)

I’m not saying anything new here: I think this is Documentary Hypothesis 101, but it sounds like you are not familiar with it.

trh

No, I'm not really familiar with it; I'm a total beginner with this stuff. My only real experience thus far has been with "natural religion", or philosophy of religion. I own Friedman's Who Wrote the Bible, but felt it would be better to try to work through the text first.

Suggestions for Documentary Hypothesis 101? Is the Friedman book a good place to start? I glanced through the section on the flood and didn't see much about predecessors from which the Yahwists assimilated, but I haven't spent any real time with the book.

Thanks for the help, everyone

-tom