Smullyan-esque

Usually, a person feels a need for a bath when they have discovered that they are dirty. Perhaps this happens because you start out with a confident feeling of being correct in all things, and after you read Sauron's post, you realize that you are covered with error. Instead of learning to avoid the source of your error (your presupposition that the Bible is correct) you try to simply wash it away by shifting goalposts, changing the meanings of words, or manufacturing additional explanation that does not exist in Genesis.

budgie

Well, of course. Everything radiated away from the center as soon as the big bang banged.

-jim

Sauron

1. But *you're* the one here arguing the point - so we're going to take it up with you. If you're unable to support the point, then perhaps you should refrain from trying to push it onto other people.

2. Archer is also an apologetic and an advocate of biblical inerrancy - that alone should tell you enough to reject his 'reading'. Anyone who can claim that the bible is inerrant is clearly willing to let agenda get in the way of scholarship.

We have no problem explaining that - bronze age people didn't think things through very well.

But it's a big problem for you. Why? Because you contradict yourself. You earlier claimed that the sun was present at the very start. But NOW you're saying that there were evenings and mornings BEFORE the sun was created. Which is it?


The question was about your claim that radiation formed the solar system. Stellar wind is not going to help you; stellar wind did not form the solar system. The solar system was already formed before the gas and dust were expelled. Maybe you should read your own link - for the first time.

You admit to not being sure, yet you feel free to make claims about cosmology, and assert "correspondences" to Genesis?

Well, I suppose it's natural: you tried to make definitive claims about ancient maritime techniques, siege technology, and archaeological recovery techniques on little or no knowledge. Why should you limit your grandiose guessing to one field of study?

Hint: radiation works against the clumping of planets - which you would have realized, if you had only thought about stellar wind some more.

Gamera

Doesn't this utterly undermine your point, lee. Clearly the author is not refering to a day as we know it, since the sun hadn't even arrived on the scene. So unless God is chronometrically obsessed, day here has a figurately meaning, and can't be taken literally. And if the very day this is happening is metaphorical, it suggest the entire opening verses are symbolic in nature and really about empirical cosmology.

The authors of Genesis seem completely uninterested with the world as a physical entity, and focus almost solely on the social/psychological/spiritual world of the protagonists.

spin

It's not a matter of Hebrew per se, but of linguistics, so argue your point or drop it.

You are making an erroneous assumption about the writer's world view. That world view is apparently not the same as yours. It is sufficient that there is light and dark to have day and night. The change from day to night is evening and the change from night to day is morning. The sun, moon and stars merely populate the light and darkness (see my table early in the thread).

That doesn't help you. Sabbath means rest, whether it is rest day or rest year. When it is alone the reference is clear. When it is with "year" the reference is again clear.

Your job is to provide a context in the text we are looking at that shows you that "day" doesn't bear the common meaning of the term.

There were no stars at the time, remember? They came to populate the night three days later.


spin

lee_merrill

Hi everyone,

You have perhaps misunderstood my view, which is that evenings and mornings refers to ending and starting of ages.

Oh, I quite agree! Only I don’t say that therefore God was not talking about what happened at creation, clearly this is part of what was meant.

Well, why should we conclude this? I mean, all the talk about land and seas and fishies and beasties gives me reason to think he is talking about land and sea and all the bouncing beasties, in substantial measure that is his point, to tell us how the world and all that is in it got started.

But it would seem you are being dismissive here, what specifically is wrong with my arguments?

Certainly, but these can be analogical:

Amos 5:20 Will not the day of the Lord be darkness instead of light, Even gloom with no brightness in it?

And “day of the Lord” it does seem, refers to some period of time when the Lord is acting openly, not to a 24-hour earth day.

But in this verse indeed it is alone, “sabbaths” is the word, not “sabbath years.”

But I do think “stars” means what people would think of as stars at that time, and not the sun—but maybe I’m misunderstanding your point.

Blessings,
Lee

spin

You don't have any arguments on the particular matter: as I said,

This is simple, lee_merrill. You have absolutely no evidence for reading the words any other way than what they simply mean in the passage.

If you have no evidence from the text itself, ie Gen 1, for reading anything other than the normal meanings of the terms, then you must not read it otherwise. It is that simple. A text is written to communicate. It gives its indications of meaning. You get the meaning from what it says.

Two problems, lee_merrill:

1. this is not from the passage we are analysing: you must find evidence from the specific passage for the specific meanings used in the passage.
2. there is no reason to believe even from this passage that "day" is being used as anything other than its normal usage, despite the lack of light.

If I say, "I went for a run yesterday", would you think of anything other than a means of moving the body which uses feet and legs but is faster than a walk for the term "run"? If so, on what grounds?

If I say, "I went for a run in my new Ferrari", would you think of a means of moving the body which uses feet and legs but is faster than a walk for the term "run"?

The sense of the word comes from its specific usage and you must find the indicators where the term is used. Anything else has no relation to the text itself. (You look elsewhere when you are unsure of what the term actually means in the first place. There is no doubt here of the common meaning of YWM.)

There is no indication from the text (2 Chr 36:21) that sabbaths mean anything other than the sabbath days. The text talks of every sabbath in 70 years.

Go back to the text and read it for what it says. You mightn't like it for its science -- for it has none --, but it is still a remarkable passage.

Sun, moon and stars were created on day four to populate the day and night. You cannot have stars for day one, as they did not exist, so you cannot have solar winds or radiation from stars.


spin

Sauron

Nope. I have not misunderstood your view. And restating your view does not erase the contradiction in that same view. Earlier you said that the sun was present from the start:

I believe the sun was what was giving light on the first day, actually,

But NOW you're saying that there were evenings and mornings BEFORE the sun was created. How can there be evenings and mornings before the sun, if (according to you) the sun was present from the very start?


1. For starters, the fact that you can't tell the difference between a noun and an adverb?

2. Secondly, you tried to point everyone to Gleason Archer. But spin's point is that YOU are here arguing the point - so you need to defend it, instead of waving your hands and trying to shift the work onto Archer's back.

Except that "the day of the LORD" has a specific known value as a metaphorical term. Context tells that, as well as usage.

But in your case, there is no such supporting context to prop up the claim of metaphor. You can't just borrow the word "day" from a known metaphor and then claim it's a metaphor whenever you want.

In that case, it refers to Sundays, and not years. So you've just undercut your own argument.

lee_merrill

Well then, this is simple, Mr. Spin, you have absolutely no evidence for refuting my interpretation to convince me to interpret them in any other way than the way in which I read them. I mean--these sorts of statements are not an argument.

The problem however is that "yesterday" is a more specific word than Hebrew "yom."

Right, so a day without the sun might have another meaning than a regular day. It must, in fact.

Actually, the sabbaths referred to were sabbath years, once every year, the land was to lie fallow.

Again I expect the Hebrews did not mean by "stars", the sun, for as you said, we have to take the Hebrew meaning, and not some meaning we wish was there.

And yes, this is your conclusion that the sun moon and stars were created on day four, but conclusions generally must be accompanied by arguments, at least if you want me to adopt them.

Very curious, I say evenings and mornings here does not mean the sun rising and setting, and you misunderstand me.

An adjective! I do agree that it’s a noun, but its function is to qualify, when it means time periods.

I have made points, to refute me, you will need to show me evidence why Gleason Archer and my statements here which correspond to his are wrong.

A morning without a sun marking it off? I think that is excellent context to indicate a day that is not the sun rising and setting.

Well, no, see Lev. 25:20-21.

Regards,
Lee

spin

lee_merrill, you aren't doing your job. Read this carefully:

You have to show from the text that the meaning you give to a particular word -- a meaning which is different from the word's normal understanding -- is justified in the context it is found.

All the rest is tangent. You will just crap on about the rest (and as you realize I am quite capable of taking the rest of what you have said apart), so let me keep focus for you.

What in our text of Gen 1 gives you the idea that the word YWM as it appears in any of its usage in the passage has any meaning other than the normal meaning of "day" as we understand the English equivalent? In responding, please don't retroject your understandings of modern science. Deal with the language of the text on language grounds.

If your understanding of a word cannot be sustained by the text in which it is found then your understanding of the word cannot have any weight. You cannot support your understanding of the text from the text itself, so you have no way of knowing about what you are trying to say.


spin