bfniii

i don't expect you to. you can continue living in a fishbowl if you like.



i will repeat:

i am positive that those 40 scholars are more familiar with the biblical geneaologies than the combined knowledge of them possessed by you and your claque

where would infidels be without ad hominems? it's sad, actually, that the skeptics at infidels undermine the reputation of their beloved site by engaging in ad hominems instead of merely responding to points.

Jack the Bodiless

And I am equally positive that they are not. There are several genuine Biblical scholars around here, and Criswell's hopeless bias and general ignorance is already clear.
You're the one who isn't "responding to points" (those already raised on this thread, which you have still not addressed). Instead, you attempted a classic "Argument from Authority" fallacy, with Criswell and his cronies as the "authority". But it isn't going to work.

...So, are you ready to address the points now? You can start with explaining away the "X begat Y when he was Z years old" sequence. As already explained, messing about with the (well-understood) meaning of the Hebrew "yalad" won't actually get you anywhere, because you can still add up the Z's.

Agemegos

It is news to me, and a major surprise, that waters ever covered the Earth. That they have done so since the emergence of land plants in the Silurian seems rather unlikely. That they should have done so as recently as 12,000 BCE is out of the question.

bfniii

i don't think those questions will ever get answered in this existence.



certainly. there are christians who believe that.



it's possible.

bfniii

you should, and i suspect do, know that my position is that we can know some of those things as well as we know anything from ancient history. in some cases less so, in some cases, more so.

bfniii

considering that it is safe to say most of those people make a career of studying such things, while you do not as far as i know, your statement is hilariously false and is a blinding example of how discussions with you are generally worthless. fishbowl.

btw, in order for your case to be correct, you would have to prove that people who disagree with you are completely unaware of the objections you have raised. good luck with that.



*looking around*



why are you harping on criswell? i didn't even mention his name. i mentioned the biblical scholars who wrote the study notes and that it is indicative of a popular belief among other biblical scholars. i am not trying to appeal to numbers or appeal to authority. the reason why i brought them into the discussion is because their position represents the logical outcome of the case i made; that being the use of genealogies to date the flood.



that's not what happened as i just explained.



this is obfuscation on your part because you can't show that your interpretations are the only ones that can possibly be correct.

check post #38.

funinspace

Thanks! I think I see where you are coming from now. Carry on...

Jack the Bodiless

bfniii:
So that's a "no", then.

No competent Biblical scholar would attempt to date the Flood from the genealogies: but not for the reason you're implying. Here's why: they are fictional, containing a mixture of mythological and (probably) real persons, and nobody nowadays can tell which is which. Medieval kings did the same, tracing their own ancestry "back to Adam". And we have no means of knowing the politics behind the inclusion or exclusion of various names (there are numerous contradictions between genealogies in different parts of the Bible).

...But none of this involves any imaginary "problem" with the Hebrew yalad, a word whose association with childbirth is quite clear:
So, even though it could be used in a metaphorical or poetic phrase (to "bring forth" something), that doesn't change the meaning of the concept, and it's the right word to use in a true genealogy: as it is used in Genesis 11.

You need to distinguish between scholarly reasons not to use the genealogies to date the Flood (they're fictional, they're unreliable, there was no global Flood anyhow) and apologetic reasons not to do so (they give an inconvenient date, and we can't admit that they are unreliable, so let's pretend yalad doesn't mean "begat").

But you seem to have quietly reversed your position on this anyhow. You said that a range of dates could be accurately derived, not that dates could not be derived:
I sought further clarification:
So, you can't actually come up with a radically different answer.

bfniii

i am not distracted by the fact that you are unable to prove that your interpretation is the only one that can possibly be correct.



hurling the elephant. perhaps you could be so kind as to show how the genealogies are completely fictional.



not that this means the biblical ones had to have done the same



since i am fairly certain that you are unable to show unequivocably that the biblical genealogies are fictional, the issue with the term stands. furthermore, you could also prove your point by polling every scholar, everywhere and getting their response on this issue.



i accept your acknowledgement that it could be used in that way. that was the point.



an ad hominem? from you? no way.



i'm sorry you didn't understand my responses.

Diogenes the Cynic

If the characters listed in the genealogies are proveably fiction then the genealogies have to be fictional as well. There was no "Adam," therefore no genealogy which traces ancestry from him can be authentic any more than if it traced ancestry to Hercules.