Great post, bertot. I always look forward to hearing from your perspective.
Thank you, but remember I reserve the right to vehemently disagree with you during the discussion. I will feel happy if you feel the same after the entire discussion. Lets proceed.
To begin with, I am not prone to making “absolute” statements. Phrases like, “appear to be”; “in all likelihood”; “in my opinion”; “according to my understanding”; and so forth, enable me to make my point or a point without claiming that I alone somehow know precisely what the Hebrew text is saying. I hope that helps you comprehend the manner in which I am speaking.[
Everyone is prone to making absolute statements, it simply takes someone else to see it as such and point it out. Absolute statements are statments with a fifty fifty chance of being right or wrong, but thanks for your modesty.
Further if you do not "know precisely what the text is saying", it would follow logically that you cannot be sure that these were not real actual people.
The context and content of the first three verses of Gen. chapter 5 indicate that the author of the text was not referring to an individual male human personality in either the case of “Adam” {KJV) or “Seth” {KJV).
The Hebrew masculine noun ’adam is defined in Gen. 5:2 as the name God gave to “the human species” which consists of males and females for procreative reasons. That portion of Gen. 5:2 reads: “and He called this their name ’adam in the day they were created.” This contextual definition of the Hebrew masculine noun ’adam is completely congruent with the most consistent lexicographic definition of the term: “mankind; humankind; humanity, collective humans.”
Bertot wrote:
What gammatical syntax specifically would it "violated", if it does, that would not allow the possibility of a literal translation.
AM wrote:According to my research, referring to “Adam” and “Seth” as individual male patriarchs is in no way a “literal translation” of the text due to the grammatical syntax of the Text under discussion as well as the fact that “real human beings” do not live to be nine hundred and thirty years of age or nine hundred and twelve years of age. However, human societies and cultures have been known to live for that amount of time and even longer.
The argument that, “For God all things are possible”, does not address the manner in which the author chose to introduce the masculine noun ’adam into the text by employing the 3rd person plural suffixes “their name” and “they were created” at the conclusion of Gen. 5:2. Then Gen. 5:3 begins, “and it lived ’adam thirty and one hundred years...” {BHS). Nowhere does the author indicate that this ’adam is referring to an individual male patriarch who begets in its likeness, like its image, and it called this its name Seth {= established).
As I see your explanation here, there seems to be no reason the actual person Adam could not bear the specific name of the thing he was the first one of, Human Race. I understand completely your contention, (Gen 5:1-2)the basic and primary meaning of Adam, but why would that "absolutly" disqualify him as literal.
In other words you main and only argument is that the author introduces the Human race as "Adam", refering to something that was already in existence. I think this was the point ICANT was making when he said, do 2 people make a race.
The argument that, “For God all things are possible”, does not address the manner in which the author chose to introduce the masculine noun ’adam into the text by employing the 3rd person plural suffixes “their name” and “they were created” at the conclusion of Gen. 5:2. Then Gen. 5:3 begins, “and it lived ’adam thirty and one hundred years...” {BHS). Nowhere does the author indicate that this ’adam is referring to an individual male patriarch who begets in its likeness, like its image, and it called this its name Seth {= established).
If the author is refering to a race of people why would he list and reference an arbitrary number like 130 to describe its length of exsitence, that seems to make no logical sense. If however, he was refering to a person it would.
The rest of this particular Hebrew text in fact does not, in my opinion, allow for any of these “figures” to be actual, mortal, individual male human beings. Hebrew is “a figurative” language. The masculine noun for “name”, shem denotes: “the exact designation, reputation, figure, byword, character; noun.” In Hebrew, nearly all “nouns” and “personal names” are derived from “verb roots”, and these verbs serve to further define what the “nouns” and “personal names” actually mean, as well as who or what they are referring to.
As I am not quite sure what the rules are with Hebrew I am going to bet that what you are saying here is not as absolute and concrete to disallow an actual person to bare the name of the thing it discribes and that the text would disqualify it or Him (Adam)as such. Maybe you are over stating the case and applying it to strickly here. Maybe ICANT can put what you said above in a little simpler English.
At the end of this portion your only argument seems to be that because the author initially refers to actual individuals or a group, as "mankind=Adam", that it must necessarily mean that he could not be refering to a literal persons. Is that enough to throw it over the top, to cause someone to say, "oh well, they simply could not have been literal? And when I say "they" I dont mean a society or group.
According to my research, referring to “Adam” and “Seth” as individual male patriarchs is in no way a “literal translation” of the text due to the grammatical syntax of the Text under discussion as well as the fact that “real human beings” do not live to be nine hundred and thirty years of age or nine hundred and twelve years of age. However, human societies and cultures have been known to live for that amount of time and even longer.
It is truly unfortunate in these discussions of the "Bible", that we leave behind the very real fact of providence and intervention and we pretend that it doesnt really exist as the discussion proceeds. As I pointed out in an earlier post, there are going to be alot of things mentioned in the scriptures or divine nature that are not going to be dug up out of the earth.
On the surface and presently it would seem absurd that someone could live to be 1000 years old. This would of necessity have to be an act of divine intervention. Since divine intervintion in this process cannot be easily dismissed, it would not be unreasonavle, illogical or absurd to include as a method for these individuals to have lived this long.
From an archeological standpoint we are talking about a very small group of people, by the time things began to "normalize" as they are today. It would be no great surprise that we could not find thier remains, since you are talking about only a handful of people comparativly. Stick humanistic stances and approaches rearly work when interpreting the scriptures. Believers in God and the Bible as his Word almost always get caught up in these methods and usually fail to defend or present the Bible as Gods Word or approach it from the possibilty of divine and are caught up in tireless circles of the "physical evidence" discussion.
Intervention and providence must be dismissed absolutley and its possibilty demonstrated illogical and unreasonable before it is illiminated in the discussion. This simply cannot be done. Therefore there is no reason to belive that for Gods purposes, he could allow someone to live long past that which is presently "normal".
It seems as though the Hebrew masculine noun ’adam employed in Gen. 5: 1, 2, 3 & 1:26 & 27, as well as in the Hebrew Eden Narrative are referring to the prehistoric Homo Sapiens Cro-Magnon human species and/or their descendents. And medical science, archeological science, and paleontological science point to the fact that these early human beings lived shorter lives than most humans who exist on planet earth today.
"It seems as though". Modesty aside, this statment must be reduced to mere speculation and conjecture, specifically due to the "fact" that the ToE is a theory and not a fact.
Question. If there were these intermidiate things in between man and primate, where are they? In other words we have nearly every example of Ape, Gorrilla, chimpanze, monkey, spider monkeys ("I maybe 10 years old but I am going to come at you like a spidermonkey, grandpa)(its from a movie)and numerous other harry little and large goomers, to many to mention. Then on the other side we have hundreds of types of humans, yet not one example of a Hommonid. Where did they all go? Do you mean to tell me that not one example of these things survied to the present day. What are the chances of that?
Oh yeah Im forgetting about the Yetti and all of the skulls put together from small teeth and bone fragments. Now I see the light. Give me a break.
Prior to the Homo Sapiens Cro-Magnons there were the Homo erectus and the Neanderthal, and neither the Homo erectus nor the Neanderthal remains present skeletal remains that suggest that they could have existed for 930 or 912 years of age. Furthermore, the same can be said regarding the remains of Homo habilis and the Australopithecus. We are going back millions of years now.
Remember you asking me to "show" you hell, then you would believe in it. Present one example of these, living, not some fabrication from remains, or explain from any reasonable standpoint how "every" example of these could simply vanish and not have survived to the present then I will believe in them my friend. Heck I will make it simple for you, just find a perserved one frozen in ice or a sludgy one mucked up in a tar pit. Isnt it interesting how animals, dinosaurs and people are always found in these places, but no Bertots, whoops I mean hommonids. By the way the "chimpanzee" will not work, its just another monkey. Notice I said "just another", ha ha.
D Bertot
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