Religion, Scripture and logical thinking

a reply to: undo

this changes the whole meaning of the opening verses. verse 1, universe is created. verse 2, the earth became a void wasteland. ya see, i read it and came to my own conclusions. you're just quoting someone else's stuff. easy targets too. (there's more but explaining it all would take thread incredibly off topic)

That's not what it says though. verse 1. heaven and the earth are "created".

Regardless how you interpret the next verse, we have a universe which at this early stage contains 1 heavenly sphere. The earth. Do you really believe the earth is the oldest heavenly body in the universe, existing since time began?

originally posted by: Cogito, Ergo Sum

originally posted by: undo
a reply to: Cogito, Ergo Sum

the actual word is hayah, which is

to be, become, come to pass, exist, happen, fall out
the proper tense of which is BECAME, not was

written in hebrew

Thanks for that.

Source?

It is the Biblical Hebrew language. I believe it has the same meaning today as well.

Any quality Hebrew-English dictionary should be a sufficient reference.

originally posted by: chr0naut

originally posted by: Cogito, Ergo Sum

originally posted by: undo
a reply to: Cogito, Ergo Sum

the actual word is hayah, which is

to be, become, come to pass, exist, happen, fall out
the proper tense of which is BECAME, not was

written in hebrew

Thanks for that.

Source?

It is the Biblical Hebrew language. I believe it has the same meaning today as well.

Any quality Hebrew-English dictionary should be a sufficient reference.

Apparently not. Quite ambiguous at best to make such claims of mistranslation. Possible, but the scribes that translated it into various languages seem to disagree with this claim. Not that it matters in slightest regarding the veracity of the verses themselves.

originally posted by: Cogito, Ergo Sum

originally posted by: undo
and here you go again, quoting someone else's interpretation of it. noah's flood account is 2 catastrophes mixed together: a global catastrophe that spawned the ice age and the less catastrophic but still devastating black sea flood, thousands of years later. see the second verse in the whole bible doesn't say the earth WAS void and without form, no, it actually says the earth BECAME void and without form. why the english translators used the wrong word, is beyond me, but they did. this changes the whole meaning of the opening verses. verse 1, universe is created. verse 2, the earth became a void wasteland. ya see, i read it and came to my own conclusions. you're just quoting someone else's stuff. easy targets too. (there's more but explaining it all would take thread incredibly off topic)

Really? Not that it matters at all regarding the obvious fairy tale nature of such verses but...

This is from the "Vulgate" as far as I know. The one that became synonymous with the Roman spread of Christianity across the western world. Why and where does it necessitate your interpretation?

terra autem erat inanis et vacua et tenebrae super faciem abyssi et spiritus Dei ferebatur super aquas

As a rough understanding..terra (the earth) autem (however/also) erat (he she it/was) inanis (void/without form) et vacua (and empty)...........Could be wrong here, so I might run it past people far more versed in Latin.

Got the feeling your interpretation would be unusual (possibly wrong). Perhaps there is an interoperation from Greek, that you are talking about? What was this verse originally written in anyway, does anyone really know this?

vulgate.org...

The original text was the Torah, which was already ancient before Christ and was written in Biblical Hebrew.

originally posted by: chr0naut


The original text was the Torah, which was already ancient before Christ and was written in Biblical Hebrew.

and how old is the oldest copy we have?

originally posted by: Cogito, Ergo Sum
So what are we saying, the earth existed since the beginning of time? No stars forming first, supernovae creating the elements etc? Cosmology theories have it all wrong?

It not infrequently happens that something about the earth, about the sky, about other elements of this world, about the motion and rotation or even the magnitude and distances of the stars, about definite eclipses of the sun and moon, about the passage of years and seasons, about the nature of animals, of fruits, of stones, and of other such things, may be known with the greatest certainty by reasoning or by experience, even by one who is not a Christian. It is too disgraceful and ruinous, though, and greatly to be avoided, that he [the non-Christian] should hear a Christian speaking so idiotically on these matters, and as if in accord with Christian writings, that he might say that he could scarcely keep from laughing when he saw how totally in error they are. In view of this and in keeping it in mind constantly while dealing with the book of Genesis, I have, insofar as I was able, explained in detail and set forth for consideration the meanings of obscure passages, taking care not to affirm rashly some one meaning to the prejudice of another and perhaps better explanation.

With the scriptures it is a matter of treating about the faith. For that reason, as I have noted repeatedly, if anyone, not understanding the mode of divine eloquence, should find something about these matters [about the physical universe] in our books, or hear of the same from those books, of such a kind that it seems to be at variance with the perceptions of his own rational faculties, let him believe that these other things are in no way necessary to the admonitions or accounts or predictions of the scriptures. In short, it must be said that our authors knew the truth about the nature of the skies, but it was not the intention of the Spirit of God, who spoke through them, to teach men anything that would not be of use to them for their salvation.

- St Augustine (4th century)

For who that has understanding will suppose that the first, and second, and third day, and the evening and the morning, existed without a sun, and moon, and stars? And that the first day was, as it were, also without a sky? And who is so foolish as to suppose that God, after the manner of a husbandman, planted a paradise in Eden, towards the east, and placed in it a tree of life, visible and palpable, so that one tasting of the fruit by the bodily teeth obtained life? And again, that one was a partaker of good and evil by masticating what was taken from the tree? And if God is said to walk in the paradise in the evening, and Adam to hide himself under a tree, I do not suppose that anyone doubts that these things figuratively indicate certain mysteries, the history having taken place in appearance, and not literally.

- Origen of Alexandria (3rd century)

Insofar as the study of the original languages of the Bible was severed from authoritative ecclesiastical preaching as its matrix, it fueled literalism... Biblical literalism taken for a source of scientific information is making the rounds even nowadays among creationists who would merit Julian Huxley's description of 'bibliolaters.' They merely bring discredit to the Bible as they pile grist upon grist on the mills of latter-day Huxleys, such as Hoyle, Sagan, Gould, and others. The fallacies of creationism go deeper than fallacious reasonings about scientific data. Where creationism is fundamentally at fault is its resting its case on a theological faultline: the biblicism constructed by the [Protestant] Reformers.

- Fr. Stanley Jaki (priest)

originally posted by: Cogito, Ergo Sum
Quite ambiguous at best to make such claims of mistranslation.

Undo admitted a confirmation bias. That should be sufficient to you to know what to make of her claims.

a reply to: Cogito, Ergo Sum

nope. i believe the universe was created and then, at some later point, the earth underwent a global cataclysm, at which point, the earth and its lifeforms were re-created from prior lifeforms.
i'm not entirely sold on the idea that god was an ET, only that he wasn't an earthling.

originally posted by: undo
a reply to: Cogito, Ergo Sum

nope. i believe the universe was created and then, at some later point, the earth underwent a global cataclysm, at which point, the earth and its lifeforms were re-created from prior lifeforms.
i'm not entirely sold on the idea that god was an ET, only that he wasn't an earthling.

So basically, you take a spiritual book, the Bible, and turn it into a book about cosmology and evolution.


Even God, the "Supreme Spirit", the "Great Absolute", a concept beyond human grasp, formless and eternal, becomes nothing more than a vulgar alien or post-human in your eyes.

Typical. Are you American?


A materialistic interpretation is the mark of a materialistic society.

check this out

a reply to: Develo

that is incorrect. i said i'm not entirely sold on him being ET, only that he wasn't an earthling.

What a load of pseudo-scientific new-agey crap.

originally posted by: undo
a reply to: Develo

that is incorrect. i said i'm not entirely sold on him being ET, only that he wasn't an earthling.

You still see God as a physical person/character.

That says it all about you.


That's how a 5 years old understands God.

originally posted by: Develo

originally posted by: Cogito, Ergo Sum
So what are we saying, the earth existed since the beginning of time? No stars forming first, supernovae creating the elements etc? Cosmology theories have it all wrong?

It not infrequently ......teach men anything that would not be of use to them for their salvation.

- St Augustine (4th century)

For who that has understanding...... not suppose that anyone doubts that these things figuratively indicate certain mysteries, the history having taken place in appearance, and not literally.

- Origen of Alexandria (3rd century)

Some poetic license required there, but if you are saying as St. Augustine and Origen seem to be, that it shouldn't be taken literally and was written with a different motive and possibly deeper meaning than a literal explanation for how we came to exist (our universe), that's fair enough. No problem at all, I can understand that.

originally posted by: Cogito, Ergo Sum

originally posted by: chr0naut

originally posted by: Cogito, Ergo Sum

originally posted by: undo
a reply to: Cogito, Ergo Sum

the actual word is hayah, which is

to be, become, come to pass, exist, happen, fall out
the proper tense of which is BECAME, not was

written in hebrew

Thanks for that.

Source?

It is the Biblical Hebrew language. I believe it has the same meaning today as well.

Any quality Hebrew-English dictionary should be a sufficient reference.

Apparently not. Quite ambiguous at best to make such claims of mistranslation. Possible, but the scribes that translated it into various languages seem to disagree with this claim. Not that it matters in slightest regarding the veracity of the verses themselves.

Some people reject the Bible outright, some people accept some bits and reject others, still other people accept the Bible in paraphrase (allowing it to include imagery and metaphor), still others take it all literally.

The contention over meaning is largely based on the way it is read, but the literal meanings of the words are not really at issue.

An exhaustive concordance is useful here because you can cross reference to a particular word and see how it applies in different sentences.

Hebrew itself is quite resistant to the drift in meanings of words to which English is prone (e.g: awesome and awful used to be similes less than 100 years ago).

In Hebrew, each letter has a conceptual meaning/s and words were built by stringing together these meanings. Changes to meaning of one word would therefore poison the meaning of other words using those letters, so changes are resisted by the languages' construct.

i also don't believe in macro evolution, only micro evolution.

originally posted by: Cogito, Ergo Sum
Some poetic license required there, but if you are saying as St. Augustine and Origen seem to be, that it shouldn't be taken literally and was written with a different motive and possibly deeper meaning than a literal explanation for our existence, that's fair enough. No problem at all, I can understand that.

What I'm saying is similar to the last quote and what I posted earlier.

Biblical literalism has never been advocated in Christian history, and its current incarnation rests on an intellectual fraud caused by the Protestant reformation.

originally posted by: Develo

originally posted by: Cogito, Ergo Sum
Some poetic license required there, but if you are saying as St. Augustine and Origen seem to be, that it shouldn't be taken literally and was written with a different motive and possibly deeper meaning than a literal explanation for our existence, that's fair enough. No problem at all, I can understand that.

What I'm saying is similar to the last quote and what I posted earlier.

Biblical literalism has never been advocated in Christian history, and its current incarnation rests on an intellectual fraud caused by the Protestant reformation.

are you sure? i think i'll go look that up.

originally posted by: undo

originally posted by: Develo

originally posted by: Cogito, Ergo Sum
Some poetic license required there, but if you are saying as St. Augustine and Origen seem to be, that it shouldn't be taken literally and was written with a different motive and possibly deeper meaning than a literal explanation for our existence, that's fair enough. No problem at all, I can understand that.

What I'm saying is similar to the last quote and what I posted earlier.

Biblical literalism has never been advocated in Christian history, and its current incarnation rests on an intellectual fraud caused by the Protestant reformation.

are you sure? i think i'll go look that up.

Yes I'm sure, literalism is a modern, American invention that appeals to people with no critical education.

This is how a perfectly normal Christian (member of the ecclesiastical hierarchy nonetheless!) deals with the question of the creation of the universe:

In January 1933, Lemaître and Einstein, who had met on several occasions—in 1927 in Brussels, at the time of a Solvay Conference, in 1932 in Belgium, at the time of a cycle of conferences in Brussels and lastly in 1935 at Princeton—traveled together to the U.S. state of California for a series of seminars. After the Belgian detailed his theory, Einstein stood up, applauded, and is supposed to have said, "This is the most beautiful and satisfactory explanation of creation to which I have ever listened."

a reply to: Develo

so are you catholic? if so, why do they teach that the eucharist is literal? and that the pope literally becomes christ during communion? i'm not criticizing, btw, i'm trying to figure out where the literal line stops and ends, in catholicism and why they would be literal about those things but not about the text itself