Is the story of Adam and Even real...or allegory?

The problem is you are using common western predilection to interpret something from an entirely different culture with radically different customs and times that we cannot even easily imagine...

What happened to the post with the linked page--that was interesting?

RexRed wrote:

The problem is you are using common western predilection to interpret something from an entirely different culture with radically different customs and times that we cannot even easily imagine...

It would almost seem unnecessary to point this out, but then, i am responding to RR. It is more than a little ludicrous to describe the bible as being from a completely different culture. To an extent which is alarming given the complete idiocy of the source, the bible has conditioned the dominant culture in the west. To contend that it is an "entirely different culture" is no less than merely stupid.

Thanks Chumly . . . i promise not to try to use you for bait again . . .


Rex, i'm amazed . . . "But if you don't think of any of this as factual I guess there is not much point."--it seems that the nickel so rarely drops for you . . .

I have not as of yet sized you up but one day believe me, I will...

You do have an argument, we do deal with many of the very same issues today that the ancients did. Good point and well taken.

Yet the ancients developed "unique" intricate almost superstitious ways of dealing with the seemingly unknown.

It is this grey area that looks barbaric to us today but then again...

I do not stand in judgment of how people lived before enlightenment because I have never been confronted with the reality of life like that. But, I do not use their model of living today to measure my standard of tolerance. I guesss that is the heart and meaning of "enlightenment".

law versus love...

Setanta wrote:

What happened to the post with the linked page--that was interesting?

Oh sorry, I'll bring it back.

Martin Gardner is perhaps the wittiest, most devastating unmasker of scientific fraud and intellectual chicanery of our time. Here he muses on topics as diverse as numerology, New Age anthropology, and the late Senator Claiborne Pell's obsession with UFOs, as he mines Americans' seemingly inexhaustible appetite for bad science.

Gardner's funny, brilliantly unsettling exposés of reflexology and urine therapy should be required reading for anyone interested in "alternative" medicine. In a world increasingly tilted toward superstition, Did Adam and Eve Have Navels? will give those of us who prize logic and common sense immense solace and inspiration.

If Adam and Eve did not have navels, then they were not perfect human beings. On the other hand, if they had navels, then the navels would imply a birth they never experienced.

http://www.wwnorton.com/catalog/fall01/032238.htm

By the way...one of the puishments meted out to the snake or serpent...was that from then on, it was to crawl on its belly.

I wonder how it moved about before that???

Anybody got any ideas on that?

RexRed wrote:

You do have an argument, we do deal with many of the very same issues today that the ancients did. Good point and well taken.

My point goes deeper than that--the "West" has had the Judeo-Christian tradition shoved down its throat. What passed for virtue and truth among the ancient Jews, to the extent that the bible accurate reports it, is constantly foisted on our society as the basis of all morality and all that is good in society (although the historical evidence is much in contradiction). Which was more my point in saying that the culture to which you refer was certainly not "entirely different."

The west has had an entirely westernized version of the Judeo-Christian tradition taught to them. They see the stories through western eyes and this is why we have the problems we have. Western Jews see westernized Christianity and Western Christians see westernized Judaism...

This is why we have people like Frank scratching their heads...

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Yet the ancients developed "unique" intricate almost superstitious ways of dealing with the seemingly unknown.

As a general thing, there is nothing unique about an appeal to superstition among human cultures. As far as the ancient Hebrews are concerned, appeal to superstition (real superstition, not "almost" superstition) were the order of the day. The "ancients," however, describes not simply the Jews, but many other people as well. Not all of them were obsessionally devoted to superstition.

My point is that a unique culture is harder to understand...

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It is this grey area that looks barbaric to us today but then again...

I don't consider that to have been a particularly meaningful statement. People in our world are victims of tribal judgment constantly, and superstition still rules a great deal of the human race.

Yea, that statement was not that well thought out...

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I do not stand in judgment of how people lived before enlightenment because I have never been confronted with the reality of life like that. But, I do not use their model of living today to measure my standard of tolerance. I guesss that is the heart and meaning of "enlightenment".

law versus love...

I never believe people who claim not to be jugmental, because i know that is not true. We make judgments one after the other from the time we arise in the morning until we go to bed at night. It is good policy to make careful judgment about those with whom we associate. On that basis, i consider the ancient Jews to have been a bad bunch with whom i would never have associated.

I also never buy anybody's story when they start attempting to "share the love" . . .

I believe they did have navels.

Because I believe they were physically born through evolution.

The only thing God "created" in Eden was his spirit in Adam and Eve... God walked with them. Eve evolved beside Adam (as in Adams rib).

The heavens and the earth (evolution) were created before the seven days of Eden... In the seven days God did not "create" the sun he "made it to shine".

Eden was a revamping of the world after the fall of lucifer...

I don't get my info from some sensationalism website I get it from reading and "studying" the Bible...

neologist wrote:

Frank, on the other hand, attempts to refute the writing from within by applying Frank's standards to Moses' account.

I agree that I try to refute the writing from within...but not by applying my standards to Moses' account. I simply try to make the words mean what they mean. I do not invent elaborate, creative scenarios whose existence is for no other purpose than to make the absurd...somehow seem not quite so absurd.

No Frank these elaborate customs and mannerisms were invented by a people you are judging on the surface...

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Was Moses a liar?

Whoever wrote the Moses chronicles...or whatever you call them...most assuredly was a liar...or at least, that is the best guess one can make.

The revelations of Moses were supposedly given him while travelling through the desert with the people he had just freed from captivity in Egypt. But it is obvious to even a casual inspector of the narrative...that the entire of the Hebrew civilization was already in place and thriving when the stuff was written.

There were instructions on how to properly beat slaves...how to buy and sell them...for people who had just been released from slavery themselves and who had no slaves.

Frank how should we beat the Mexican slaves if they revolt in California picking our fruit and washing our toilets so we can sit all day and talk on the internet? The US Congress is making laws now as we speak on how we should treat our "slaves"...

There were instructions on all sorts of things that any reasonable person (which obviously excludes most of the defenders of this nonsense)...would see to be for a functioning civilization...not a group of resently rescued slaves in distress in the desert.

Thank you for asking. I hope that answers your question.

It certainly doesn't answer my questions...

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I don't think so.

Yes, I see that. You certainly are able to blind yourselves to logic on these issues. Hey...that is a great talent. I congratulate you on it.

Now who's blind on the issues?

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Did he provide a coherent explanation? You betcha.

Oh, Neo...what a laugh. Coherent explanation??? That is what you see this pathetic, superstitious prattle being???

Oh well...I guess fear does strange things to people.

RexRed wrote:

I believe they did have navels.

Because I believe they were physically born through evolution.

The only thing God "created" in Eden was his spirit in Adam and Eve... God walked with them. Eve evolved beside Adam (as in Adams rib).

The heavens and the earth (evolution) were created before the seven days of Eden... In the seven days God did not "create" the sun he "made it to shine".

Eden was a revamping of the world after the fall of lucifer...

I don't get my info from some sensationalism website I get it from reading and "studying" the Bible...

I would very much like hear all about this "born through evolution" you talk about. I am also very pleased that you did not get your "info from some sensationalism website" you got "it from reading and studying the Bible".

When you make your references to "physically born through evolution" please make sure you use biblical quotes and references as garnered "from reading and studying the Bible".

RexRed,
What are you talking about?