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| gabriel... |
 Posted: Mon Oct 19, 2009 8:37 pm |
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www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/religion/6274502/God-is-not-the-Creator-claims-academic.html?state=target#postacomment&postingId=6367823
www.answersingenesis.org/articles/2009/10/17/news-to-note-10172009#one
An Old Testament professor thinks the translations of Genesis
should be rewritten—to accommodate her view on what the text
actually means.
The professor is Ellen van Wolde of Radboud University, and her
idea is based on a “re-analysis” of the Genesis Hebrew that
“place[s] it in the context of the Bible as a whole, and in the
context of other creation stories from ancient Mesopotamia,” The
Telegraph reports. Thus, we already see the first flaw in her
research: she has assumed other creation stories should be used
to interpret the Bible. But since the Genesis creation account
(like the rest of the Bible) is the inspired, inerrant Word of
the Creator on this subject and the other creation stories of the
nations around ancient Israel are not, those stories must be
either complete myths or corrupted versions of the Genesis
account.
But what is her big idea? According to Van Wolde, the Hebrew word
bara translated as “to create” in English should actually be
translated “to [spatially] separate.” So she renders Genesis 1:1
as “In the beginning God separated the heavens from the Earth.”
The Telegraph offers a peek at her logic:
She said technically “bara” does mean “create” but added:
“Something was wrong with the verb. “God was the subject (God
created), followed by two or more objects. Why did God not create
just one thing or animal, but always more?” She concluded that
God did not create, he separated: the Earth from the Heaven, the
land from the sea, the sea monsters from the birds and the
swarming at the ground. “There was already water,” she said.
Let’s deconstruct Van Wolde’s deconstruction of Genesis. First,
if bara “technically . . . does mean ‘create’”—as in, that is the
“dictionary definition,” and that meaning is central to
understanding where it is used elsewhere in the Old
Testament—then what are the grounds for reading it in another
sense? The plain reading hermeneutic tells us to interpret the
text based on words’ ordinary meanings and, if necessary, select
among multiple definitions based on contextual and grammatical
clues.
Yet, as we stated above, Van Wolde presupposes that other
creation stories can help us “correct” the Genesis account. (In
particular, she cites creation myths that speak of an “enormous
body of water in which monsters were living, covered in
darkness,” The Telegraph reports.) But why must it be that the
Genesis account is corrupted and the others correct, rather than
the other way around? Essentially, Van Wolde is altering the
dictionary meaning of bara to fit her idea that Genesis should
mesh with other accounts.
Second, we cannot understand the reasoning behind Van Wolde’s
statement that because “God created” is always “followed by two
or more objects,” the verb should be translated as “separated”
instead of “created.” We’re hoping her actual paper contains a
more rigorous argument to support this logic; otherwise, why
could God not have created two objects simultaneously or in
sequence, and why could Genesis not fairly document such events
using bara? For that matter, why wasn’t the verb meaning “to
separate” (badal) used, if that is what God wanted to convey?
That verb worked just fine in Genesis 1:4, 6 and 18 to describe
the separation of light from darkness and the waters into two
distinct places.
Third, this new interpretation creates confusion and
inconsistency elsewhere in Scripture. Take Exodus 20:11, for
example, which states that “In six days the Lord made the heavens
and the Earth, the sea, and all that is in them.” That plainly
suggests both (a) that God created, rather than separated,
everything listed in Genesis 1; and (b) that whatever God did
with the heavens and the Earth, so he also did with “all that is
in them.” In other words, if bara actually was better translated
as “to separate” in regards to the heavens and the Earth, that
must also apply to, e.g., animals and man. Yet what would it mean
for God to separate man in His own image (Genesis 1:27)?
Furthermore, bara and asah (to make) are used interchangeably in
many verses that refer to Creation Week, as this article shows.
Right in the Creation account, these verbs are so used with
reference to man (Genesis 1:26-27) and regarding the heavens and
the earth and all their hosts (Genesis 2:1-3). Finally, the New
Testament clearly says that Jesus Christ is God and that He
created everything (John 1:1–3; Colossians 1:15–16; Revelation
4:11).
Apparently Van Wolde realizes this, which brings us to our fourth
complaint: if much of what Genesis 1 describes already existed,
where did it come from? Perhaps Van Wolde is an evolutionist
herself, though she noted, “[Genesis means] to say that God did
create humans and animals, but not the Earth itself.” Such a
reading is confusing and incompatible with other verses
confirming that God did, indeed, create more than just humans and
animals (see Genesis 2:1–3; Nehemiah 9:6; Psalm 146:5–6).
Otherwise, are we to assume God “stumbled upon” another deity’s
created universe (a concept which demotes God) and decided to use
it for His master plan?
Van Wolde concludes, “The traditional view of God the Creator is
untenable now.” We reply, “Dr. Van Wolde’s view of God and
Genesis is untenable, for it is based on ancient pagan myths,
rather that the sound interpretation of God’s own Word.” |
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| Bill M... |
| Posted: Tue Oct 20, 2009 1:21 pm |
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"gabriel" <gabriel_baptist at (no spam) hotmail.com> wrote in message
news:fj8qd5pq7n94h41v9js3jlnqjfvrl35ocq at (no spam) 4ax.com...
Quote: www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/religion/6274502/God-is-not-the-Creator-claims-academic.html?state=target#postacomment&postingId=6367823
www.answersingenesis.org/articles/2009/10/17/news-to-note-10172009#one
An Old Testament professor thinks the translations of Genesis
should be rewritten-to accommodate her view on what the text
actually means.
The professor is Ellen van Wolde of Radboud University, and her
idea is based on a "re-analysis" of the Genesis Hebrew that
"place[s] it in the context of the Bible as a whole, and in the
context of other creation stories from ancient Mesopotamia," The
Telegraph reports. Thus, we already see the first flaw in her
research: she has assumed other creation stories should be used
to interpret the Bible.
">But since the Genesis creation account
Quote: (like the rest of the Bible) is the inspired, inerrant Word of
the Creator"
Read the Bible. It is a collection of ancient myths and fables - nothing
more!
Christians totally base their faith on the Bibles.
The Bibles are nothing more than books of myths, fables, contradictions,
human and animal sacrifices, genocide, slaveholding, misogyny, destruction,
barbarisms, and impossible tales. They are not accurate history and
certainly are not the words of any god unless he is an insane and totally
untrustworthy monster. They are not even good fiction.
The average person today does not appreciate the difficulty and unlikelihood
of producing accurate transmissions of the original Bibles. Firstly there
are NO ORIGINALS in existence. They are all copies of copies of unknown
accuracy.
One of the problems with the accuracy of the Bibles is that when they were
copied, no marks of punctuation were used, no distinction was made between
lower case and upper case letters and more bizarre to modern script, no
spaces were used to separate words.
This kind of continuous writing was called "scriptuo continua"
'godisnowhere' could mean 'god is now here' or quit the opposite, 'god is no
where' depending on the spacing which was not used at the time. This left
accurate interpretation very unlikely if not impossible.
Add to this the natural occurrence of errors of transmission and the
intentional modification to suite the transcribers wishes and beliefs and
you have documents of highly questionable meaning and very poor accuracy.
Further compounding the problem was the size and accuracy of the
vocabularies were much more limited than today.
The Bibles are a foundation of quicksand. There are NO ORIGINALS in
existence. Why would any 'real' God not protect the originals??? What are
available are altered copies of copies by unknown men of questionable
veracity. The books of the Bibles were written over 1,000 years before the
invention of the printing press. Even the so called originals were
supposedly written by 50 or more different authors of unknown veracity. They
are biased by, and dependent on the writings and opinions of the clergy. And
the status and survival of the clergy is totally dependent on their follower's
belief in their Bible stories. There are 18 different English versions alone
and there is no way of knowing how far they have wondered from the
originals.
The new testament Bibles were written 60 and many more years AFTER Jesus
death. Jesus never wrote a word. He was apparently illiterate.
And there is no evidence that even the originals are anything more than
inaccurate fiction.
Basing ones life and faith on these MYTHS AND FABELS is not very sound
reasoning. It is the equivalent of depending on the good luck of a rabbits
foot. |
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