Hawkpeter

The Old Earth Creationist believes that the book of Genesis refers to 'God days' or basically a 'very long time'.

Christ was supposedly sent to earth to die for the sins of mankind.

Mankind isnt able to make up for his/her own sins by good deeds and whatnot because we all carry 'original sin' from the 'Fall of mankind' by Adam and Eve.

But for the Old Earth Creationist, and those who believe in evolutionary theory but still claiming to be identified as christian, where does the 'original sin' come from in the Old Earth model.

The OEC who has conceeded that the age of the earth is a very large number must then buffet pick either:-

a) humans coming along at the beginning of all life (where an Adam and Eve character might get planted 4 billion years ago, gee that would be a stretch even for a creationist) or

b) humans being dropped on earth as is at some point in recent history.. say 10 000 years ago and the rest of the story is picked up in Genesis (first two were Adam and Eve blah blah blah fall of man etc) or

c) humans evolved from lesser life forms as per the theory of evolution and at some magical point became the special beloved children of god and all that jazz

Firstly, am I missing any options?

Secondly, for option c) where does the 'original sin' come into it? It seems a bit like a house of cards. If there was no original sin then what was the purpose for the crucifixion? Option c) seems to put the onus on god as the reason we all ended up as terrible sinners who should ask for forgiveness because he designed us to turn out that way and there's no original sin involved.

Without an Adam and Eve story does the original sin theory (its JUST a theory) become useless? And without original sin what is the purpose of the crucifixion? Adam and Eve seem necessary so that we can be 'saved' because all of the things wrong with gawd's perfect creation are because of our 'original sin'.

Anat

Well, since Adam and Eve were the first humans to be pair-bonded, and their 'original sin' is associated with acquisition of knowledge of good and evil, I would say they represent the original population of Homo ergaster, African ancestors of Homo erectus. This was the first hominoid species where males and females were similar in body size (a Homo habilis male was several times the size of a female). Male/female body ratio is positively correlated with the amount of male-male competition over females, which correlates positively with harem size. IOW Homo ergaster is a candidate for the first pair-bonded (serially) monogamous hominoid species. This is also when the runaway increase in human brain size ocurred, including the increase in the size of the prefrontal cortex, an area of the brain that is essential for interpreting and participating in complex social interactions - which would imply a deeper understanding of concept such as good and evil. This increase in brain size must have been accompanied by more painful childbirth.

(OK, there are still a couple of problems: agriculture is still some 2 million years in the future for these guys, whereas fear of snakes is much older. Vervet monkeys were observed to warn each other of approaching snakes.)

Toto

This is more of a general religious question than a question of Biblical criticism. Those who see "six days" as a metaphor can see "original sin" as a metaphor for practically anything.

But questions about OEC are best handled in the Evolution/Creationism forum, where this thread will find a new home.