Jack the Bodiless

By the way:
Of course, wriggling out of "this day" wouldn't let God off the hook anyhow. In the story, eating the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge doesn't directly cause death ("spiritual" or otherwise). The direct consequence is described as a form of enlightenment, their "eyes were opened" (basically the exact opposite of "spiritual death"): the negative consequences were separately inflicted by God. Adam lived on for 930 years, and his eventual death was due to God's denial of the fruit of the Tree of Life.

Wads4

If I may butt in--yes of course it is fictional;-it is merely a rationalisation of why humans behave so abominably to each other, which was "explained" by a bit of primitive psychology as an original misdeed, or "sin" by the Bible writers, which then had to be "punished" by expulsion from Eden.
As Christians worship the Bible, they have to accept everything in it as literally true instead of allegorical.

yalla

Gidday heretic,
No problem, I am not happy with the ambiguity of e messages, I have written some things in the past and then looked at them later and realized I did not say what I thought I said. Conversely I have more than once misread other persons posts.
In the case of my first post I knew I was having difficulty trying to "translate', as it where, the complexity and subtlety of Thompson's thought.
None of what I wrote was my opinion, just paraphrase through my understanding.

Out of curiousity, what did you think I was saying/implying?
cheers
yalla

Amaleq13

Really? Which translations are ambiguous about the death sentence? All the ones I've found make it pretty clear that the death was to relatively immediately follow the eating:

but you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for when you eat of it you will surely die." (NIV, emphasis added)

but from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat from it (A)you will surely die." (NASB, emphasis added)

But of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it: for in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die. (KJV, emphasis added)

but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it; for in the day that thou eatest of it thou shalt certainly die. (Darby, emphasis added)

I see no evidence of confusion in the translations available. The only individuals who appear to have difficulty with the wording are those whose religious beliefs conflict with the plain meaning of the passage. Feel free to disabuse me of my misconception with examples of confusion from individuals who do not match that description.

heretic

yalla, I thought you were giving me a christian interpretation of what its meant to be. Faithful tend to believe in it completely or are told that certain parts are to be taken verbatim while others need to be interpreted and even certain others need to be completely glossed over.

When I see the discussions, I notice that some faithful tend to believe in some parts more than others and other faithful gloss over some parts more than others. Even if at times they are the same section.