Friday, January 2, 2015

... on Historical Adam and Eve

On Philologica and New Blog on the kid : 1) Flat Earth theories - Common Sense or Solar Mythology?, 2) Why were Babylonians so sure Apsu and Tiamat were different substances?, 3) Genesis among Myths - were they meant to be understood literally? Yes

On Assorted Retorts : 1) ... on Historical Adam and Eve, 2) ... on Genre of Genesis

The Historical Adam and Eve
RomanMissalExegete
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rwlNlFNT6oc


6:32 Homer is NOT making an allegory about how the Trojan War happened.

He is making a literal statement about it, and he is leaving out the Hittites - perhaps because he was the first generation that had succeeded forgetting that Troia and Ilios were known to Hittites as Tarwusha and Wilusha(s?). Or perhaps because he agreed on the omertà.

Whether Homer's description of divine actions are meant as allegories (certainly interpreted like that by Neo-Platonists much later) or literally is another question. But those would either way be his "theological" interpretations.

Agamemnon praying to Helios to stop so he could have time to rout Trojans before they took refuge and not getting that prayer granted is NOT allegory. It is a sign he knew better than later Greek tradition why the Sun had behaved in a funny way that day described in Joshua X. Which is ALSO literal fact, not allegory.

Taking epic poetry for allegory is a category mistake.

Your Orthodox friend is as wrong about Homer as about Genesis.

8:00 Narratives were indeed used by serious thinkers, but not without claim to either historic truth or its at least clear possibility.

In Genesis where so much hinges on historic truth, the latter nuance would hardly apply, and you are not actually applying it either, since you are taking it for granted the Flood can't have actually taken place.

8:09 Added and subtracted detail?

If you mean non-contradicting detail, which is the case for Genesis, that is the case for Gospels too.

If you mean contradicting versions, the unsophisticated audience would still have tended to take its version as literal even among Canaaneans.

8:26 "the origin of sth was supposed to explain its nature" ... well, generally it does!

8:52 when it comes to straight forward historic interpretation of Genesis 1-11, we are dealing with Patristics, we are dealing with Scholastics. Not just my or your personal subjective interpretation.

We can talk about subjective interpretation when it comes to making sense of "turn the other cheek" (some consider it obliges ALL Christians in ALL situations and therefore condemns a Christendom which has had military force and judicial systems), or "in spirit and truth" (some considering it is not referring to valid intention rather than OT "valid place", but to absense of any kind of external solemnity - as if rituals of familiarity were more likely to be spirit and truth) ... but Biblical History from Genesis 1 to Acts 28 is meant to be taken literally. Simple as that, nothing strangely subjective about it.

9:09 As said, the A situation of believing pastor's interpretation of what Bible says IS distinct from the B situation of not accepting the extra modernist nuances in interpretation of Genesis.

9:33 "if we don't allow for this rich nuanced interpretation, then we are in a sense putting God in a box" ...

I don't know what YOU mean by rich.

What I mean by it is not to miss Mariological implications of Genesis 3, the curse of the snake.

But in this context YOU seem to mean taking Genesis 1 - 11 as literally having happened is "putting God in a box" ... well, God has put Himself in more boxes than one. The Arc of Noah and the Tabernacle being two of them.

And the human body is of course also a six walled box (confer Alcuin's Dialogue with Pepinus), so Incarnation also puts God in a box.

10:18 blatant repetition of blatant genre MIS-understanding both of Iliad and of Genesis.

10:35

"390 The account of the fall in Genesis 3 uses figurative language, but affirms a primeval event, a deed that took place at the beginning of the history of man.264 Revelation gives us the certainty of faith that the whole of human history is marked by the original fault freely committed by our first parents.265"


Footnotes:

264) "GS (Gaudium et Spes)13 # 1." May say the language is figurative. Of 265) "Council of Trent: DS 1513; Pius XII: DS 3897; Paul VI: AAS 58 (1966), 654." It is VERY certain that Council of Trent did NOT say the narrative was mainly figurative.

You will NOT find such allegations in more Traditional Catechisms, like the 4 Baltimore Catechisms or St Pius X or Penny Catechism or Catechism of St Robert Bellarmine.

11:12 Etymology of Adam is not an argument against Adam being an actual person who was acc. to Luke 3 (is that where the genealogy is?) was father of Seth and directly created by God.

Theory of Evolution absolutely does NOT allow Cro-Magnon to be anywhere near only 72 generations from Christ, and this has left some speculating that these were pre-human, that humanity starts about time of Agricultural Revolution.

11:59 Acc. to Genesis we share TEN common patrilinear ancestors - Adam to Noah.

We all descend from Noah's three sons and from their three wives.

Not only are there no para-Adamite humans, but there are not even any para-Noahide humans left - all except his three daughters in law and (if you call that para?) wife perished.

12:34 if you accept by divine revelation that Adam was created specially by God, why don't you accept for same excellent reason the rest of historic implications of Genesis 1 - 11?

Don't you know your Ortho friend is fooled by Communism, through Patriarchate of Moscow, which obeyed an outlawing of Creationism, a decree on teaching and not contradicting Evolution?

12:51 We share a common ancestor with other primates, do we?

New blog on the kid : Is Evolution a Great Story? Specifically Theistic Evolution?
http://nov9blogg9.blogspot.com/2015/01/is-evolution-great-story-specifically.html


Creation vs. Evolution : Scenario impossible
http://creavsevolu.blogspot.com/2014/01/scenario-impossible.html


13:18 free paraphrase or misquote?

Uses "figurative" language, bad enough, but doesn't say allegory.

13:33 "a theological and allegorical description of a historical reality, namely the evolutionary change where somewhere ..."

The Allegory is not allegorical ABOUT the history. It is the history as such - the actual events - which are allegorical about the Gospel.

No way during Tradition of Four Senses that it was understood as you describe it.

13:50 if we want to know about the Historical Adam and Eve we turn to Historical, also known as Literal sense.

14:12 "somewhere in our evolutionary heritage" ... "he was the first man to be given a rational soul" ...

OK? What about this first man to be given a rational soul being placed at the BEGINNING of CREATION?

Mark 10:6. The speaker there is none less than God Incarnate.

14:37 "whoever ..."

What about Toledoth? Toledoth means genealogy, you know. And if we have a real genealogy, we have no room for the kind of agnosticism you confess by using the words "whoever he was" ..

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