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Author Topic:   Genesis 1:1-5 — Day One
arachnophilia
Member (Idle past 1343 days)
Posts: 9069
From: god's waiting room
Joined: 05-21-2004


Message 97 of 110 (663383)
05-24-2012 3:17 AM
Reply to: Message 61 by ICANT
05-13-2012 1:39 AM


Re: The Light was Good
ICANT writes:
God did say He עשה which was translated made in the KJV but the verb is in the niphal stem which when it is would mean "to be observed".
hi there ICANT. still pretending you know stuff about biblical hebrew, huh?
quote:
וַיַּעַשׂ אֱלֹהִים אֶת־שְׁנֵי הַמְּאֹרֹת הַגְּדֹלִים אֶת־הַמָּאֹור הַגָּדֹל לְמֶמְשֶׁלֶת הַיֹּום וְאֶת־הַמָּאֹור הַקָּטֹן לְמֶמְשֶׁלֶת הַלַּיְלָה וְאֵת הַכֹּוכָבִֽים׃
יַּעַשׂ looks qal imperfect to me. here's what a niphal imperfect would look like, יֵעָשֶׂה as in:
quote:
וְחֵלֶב נְבֵלָה וְחֵלֶב טְרֵפָה יֵעָשֶׂה לְכָל־מְלָאכָה וְאָכֹל לֹא תֹאכְלֻֽהוּ׃
(leviticus 7:24)
note the different niqud: ee and ah, (thus niphal). niphal also generally has a nun prefix (thus the niphal name), and is basically just passive voice. but i'd invite you to show any reason why you think עשה should be translated "observe" in any other verse. what i think you did is cracked open blueletterbible, and read this:
quote:
b) (Niphal)
1) to be done
2) to be made
3) to be produced
4) to be offered
5) to be observed
6) to be used
what that's based on is anyone's guess, considering it's not found translated that way in the actual concordance section:
quote:
AV do 1333, make 653, wrought 52, deal 52, commit 49, offer 49, execute 48, keep 48, shew 43, prepare 37, work 29, do so 21, perform 18, get 14, dress 13, maker 13, maintain 7, misc 154
but hey, maybe it's in the "miscellaneous" ones. also note that the author uses a different word, ראה, when he describes god observing something:
quote:
וַיַּרְא אֱלֹהִים אֶת־הָאֹור כִּי־טֹוב וַיַּבְדֵּל אֱלֹהִים בֵּין הָאֹור וּבֵין הַחֹֽשֶׁךְ׃
(genesis 1:4)
Nowhere does it say God ברא (created) the lights, sun, or moon.
while this is technically correct, i'm forced to wonder why you think this is a valid dichotomy. note that these verse use all three relevant terms as synonyms:
quote:
כֹּל הַנִּקְרָא בִשְׁמִי וְלִכְבֹודִי בְּרָאתִיו יְצַרְתִּיו אַף־עֲשִׂיתִֽיו׃
(isaiah 43:7)
quote:
יֹוצֵר אֹור וּבֹורֵא חֹשֶׁךְ עֹשֶׂה שָׁלֹום וּבֹורֵא רָע אֲנִי יְהוָה עֹשֶׂה כָל־אֵֽלֶּה׃ ס
(isaiah 45:7)
quote:
כִּי כֹה אָֽמַר־יְהוָה בֹּורֵא הַשָּׁמַיִם הוּא הָאֱלֹהִים יֹצֵר הָאָרֶץ וְעֹשָׂהּ הוּא כֹֽונְנָהּ לֹא־תֹהוּ בְרָאָהּ לָשֶׁבֶת יְצָרָהּ אֲנִי יְהוָה וְאֵין עֹֽוד׃
(isaiah 45:18)
quote:
כִּי הִנֵּה יֹוצֵר הָרִים וּבֹרֵא רוּחַ וּמַגִּיד לְאָדָם מַה־שֵּׂחֹו עֹשֵׂה שַׁחַר עֵיפָה וְדֹרֵךְ עַל־בָּמֳתֵי אָרֶץ יְהוָה אֱלֹהֵֽי־צְבָאֹות שְׁמֹֽו׃ ס
(amos 4:13)
Edited by arachnophilia, : No reason given.

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 Message 61 by ICANT, posted 05-13-2012 1:39 AM ICANT has not replied

  
arachnophilia
Member (Idle past 1343 days)
Posts: 9069
From: god's waiting room
Joined: 05-21-2004


(1)
Message 98 of 110 (663385)
05-24-2012 3:46 AM
Reply to: Message 96 by New Cat's Eye
05-21-2012 11:25 PM


"when"
catholic scientist writes:
And there's the part about stuff happening "in the day" god created the earth.
this is just poor understanding hebrew idioms and grammar. i've had this discussion with ICANT before. he refuses to learn.
gen 1:1 is a subordinate clause. it says,
quote:
בְּרֵאשִׁית, בָּרָא אֱלֹהִים, אֵת הַשָּׁמַיִם, וְאֵת הָאָרֶץ
in the beginning of god creating the heaven and the earth...
what it does not say is that this all happened at some arbitrary beginning of time. if it had meant to say that, it would have said,
quote:
ברשונה ברא אלהים
with an abstract, "at first". see rashi for confirmation:
quote:
In the beginning of God’s creation of: Heb. בְּרֵאשִית בָּרָא. This verse calls for a midrashic interpretation [because according to its simple interpretation, the vowelization of the word בָּרָא, should be different, as Rashi explains further]. It teaches us that the sequence of the Creation as written is impossible, as is written immediately below as our Rabbis stated (Letters of R. Akiva , letter beth ; Gen. Rabbah 1:6; Lev. Rabbah 36:4): [God created the world] for the sake of the Torah, which is called (Prov. 8:22): the beginning of His way, and for the sake of Israel, who are called (Jer. 2:3) the first of His grain. But if you wish to explain it according to its simple meaning, explain it thus: At the beginning of the creation of heaven and earth, the earth was astonishing with emptiness, and darknessand God said, ‘Let there be light.’ But Scripture did not come to teach the sequence of the Creation, to say that these came first, for if it came to teach this, it should have written:At first (בָּרִאשׁוֹנָה) He created the heavens and the earth, for there is no רֵאשִׁית in Scripture that is not connected to the following word, [i.e., in the construct state] like (ibid. 27:1):In the beginning of (בְּרֵאשִית) the reign of Jehoiakim ; (below 10:10)the beginning of (רֵאשִׁית) his reign ; (Deut. 18:4)the first (רֵאשִׁית) of your corn. Here too, you say בְּרֵאשִׁית בָּרָא אלֹהִים, like בְּרֵאשִׁית בְּרֹא, in the beginning of creating. And similar to this is,At the beginning of the Lord’s speaking (דִּבֶּר) to Hosea, (Hos. 1:2), i.e., at the beginning of the speaking (דִּבּוּרוֹ) of the Holy One, Blessed be He, to Hosea, the Lord said to Hosea, etc. Now if you say that it came to teach that these (i.e., heaven and earth) were created first, and that its meaning is: In the beginning of all, He created these-and that there are elliptical verses that omit one word, like (Job 3:9): For [He] did not shut the doors of my [mother’s] womb, and it does not explain who it was who shut [the womb]; and like (Isa. 8:4): he will carry off the wealth of Damascus, and it does not explain who will carry it off; and like (Amos 6:12): or will one plow with cattle, and it does not explain: if a man will plow with cattle ; and like (Isa. 46: 10): telling the end from the beginning, and it does not explain that [it means] telling the end of a matter from the beginning of a matter-if so, [if you say that Scripture indicates the order of creation] be astounded at yourself, for the water preceded, as it is written: and the spirit of God hovered over the face of the water, and Scripture did not yet disclose when the creation of water took place! From this you learn that the water preceded the earth. Moreover, the heavens were created from fire and water. Perforce, you must admit that Scripture did not teach us anything about the sequence of the earlier and the later [acts of creation]. (chabad)
further, "in the day of" as in genesis 2:4:
quote:
בְּיוֹם, עֲשׂוֹת יְהוָה אֱלֹהִים--אֶרֶץ וְשָׁמָיִם.
is an idiom. note that these two verses, and genesis 5:1:
quote:
בְּיוֹם, בְּרֹא אֱלֹהִים אָדָם, בִּדְמוּת אֱלֹהִים, עָשָׂה אֹתוֹ.
all have the same structure: complex preposition ("in the day of" and "in the beginning of") followed by an infinitive verb ("creating", "making" and "creating", though the first bara as the wrong vowel points, as above) followed by the subject ("god"), and a predicate. following that predicate is the independent clause, which describes the actual actions that take place during the timeframe described in the subordinate clause.
so, "in the day of god making adam, he made him in god's image." did that happen over the course of the whole day, or at some arbitrary point during the day, or right when god made adam?
or, "in the day of god making earth and heaven, no shrub of the field was yet in the earth." was there no shrub for that whole day, or just when god made the earth?
it turn out that "when" is actually a great translation for this complex preposition. it's all that it actually means. and in this case, the "when" refers to the general creation: when god made everything. basically, the whole of genesis 1, though that chapter had not yet been written when genesis 2 and 3 were composed.
"Adam" can mean just "mankind" rather than an individual person.
and it almost certainly does. in the example i posted above, genesis 5:1,2, it calls adam "him" and uses singular in verse 1, and "them" (male and female) in verse 2. it's almost certainly referring back to the story of genesis 2-4. a similar thing happens in genesis 1:27, singular and then plural.
The probelm is, that at the end of Gen 4, those last two verses, Adam gives birth to Seth who gives birth to Enoch. And at the begining of Gen 5, we have Adam giving birth to Seth who gives birth to Enoch. But according to his timeline, those are two unrelated groups of people because those in Gen 5 all die off before the earth becomes formless and void because of the flood as recorded in Gen 1:2. Then there's a whole new group of mankind. ICANT writes this off as a coincidence: i.e. there were enough people with those names that they don't have to referring to the exact same people.
yup, and the whole thing is formed on an overly literal reading, devoid of knowledge about idioms and grammar, and based too heavily on a preconception that doesn't really hold up to examination.
note that the plant thing is another contradiction: if you read it all as one literal day, god then goes on to, you know, plant a garden and call it "eden". all in that same poorly conceived "day". the story itself contradicts that reading.
Edited by arachnophilia, : No reason given.

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arachnophilia
Member (Idle past 1343 days)
Posts: 9069
From: god's waiting room
Joined: 05-21-2004


Message 99 of 110 (663387)
05-24-2012 4:11 AM
Reply to: Message 85 by ICANT
05-17-2012 11:44 AM


Re: light and life
ICANT writes:
Actually, unless my memory fails me I leave 2 verses of chapter 4 out as I do not agree with the division into chapters made by Stephen Langton, an Archbishop of Canterbury.
nor do i!
quote:
זֶה סֵפֶר, תּוֹלְדֹת אָדָם: בְּיוֹם, בְּרֹא אֱלֹהִים אָדָם, בִּדְמוּת אֱלֹהִים, עָשָׂה אֹתוֹ.
but do you suppose that the author of genesis just randomly interjected "this is the book of the generations of adam" without, you know, intending for it begin a new section? toledot are commonly recognized as division markers by... every biblical scholar ever?
now, if you'd lopped off everything from, say, 4:16 or 4:17 (or somewhere in there) to 4:26, i might understand. that's suddenly concerned with genealogy, and doesn't do as good a job of it as chapter 5 does, as you note.
but it's pretty clear that is the interjection, and that the "adam" in verse 25 is the same "adam" in verse 1. and "adam" to "enosh" is a pretty important step symbolically, since those are the two words for "man".
My reasons for doing so is that there are 8 generations of people mentioned prior to the person known as Seth being born. Yet he was said to be born when his father was 120 years old. You do the math.
sure. but only if you do the math on genesis 10. why to cham and yafeth have a bunch of kids and grandkids (and why do their kids have a bunch of kids and grandkids) before shem? yet shem has his first child at only 100?
The second reason is that the book of the generations recorded in chapter 5 of the man created in Genesis 1:27 does not include any of the people in Genesis chapter 2:4 through 4:24.
sure it does: adam. your problem is that you think there's more than one. this is, of course, begging the question. you can't demonstrate something with evidence based on the assumption of what you set out to demonstrate. ruling out genesis 4:25 and 26 is further question begging: you've rigged it. genesis 5 mentions seth and enosh. you think these are a different seth and a different enosh? or do you just pretend those two verse don't exist?
The third reason is that the people in Genesis 2:4 through 4:24 have no ages attached to any of them.
nor do the people in genesis 10.
In fact there is only 2 deaths recorded of any of these people.
ditto for genesis 10. these are just people that the authors of the genealogies were unconcerned with.

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This message is a reply to:
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arachnophilia
Member (Idle past 1343 days)
Posts: 9069
From: god's waiting room
Joined: 05-21-2004


Message 100 of 110 (663388)
05-24-2012 4:16 AM
Reply to: Message 14 by kbertsche
05-05-2012 1:19 PM


Re: The Light was Good
kbertsche writes:
One minor quibble with the OP: it wasn't the light on Day 1 which was created to "demarcate time", it was the light bearers (sun, moon, stars) on Day 4 which were created to do so, "to indicate seasons and days and years" (v.14).
yes, and no. the days are still clearly defined as periods of darkness, followed by periods of light, meant to be the origin of the jewish daily calendar.

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arachnophilia
Member (Idle past 1343 days)
Posts: 9069
From: god's waiting room
Joined: 05-21-2004


Message 101 of 110 (663389)
05-24-2012 4:18 AM
Reply to: Message 15 by jar
05-05-2012 2:56 PM


Re: The Light was Good
jar writes:
Sine the story uses the plural 'waters'
hey jar. "water" singular is the correct translation, as well as "heaven" singular, and "god" singular. and all for the same reasons, even though they all end with a typically plural suffix: you can't count them.

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arachnophilia
Member (Idle past 1343 days)
Posts: 9069
From: god's waiting room
Joined: 05-21-2004


Message 102 of 110 (663390)
05-24-2012 4:27 AM
Reply to: Message 74 by ICANT
05-14-2012 1:56 AM


Re: Life before Genesis 1:2? - NOWAY!
ICANT writes:
So the heavens and the Earth began to exist in Genesis 1:1
heaven began to exist in verses 6-8, and earth began to exist in verses 9-10.
do you honestly think they existed before god made them, and before god named them, with their current appearances and current names? i understand that you think god made his creation twice, but they wouldn't need to be named again the second time.
That was the first city built and it was built during the day the Lord God created the heavens and the Earth as it is part of the history of that day.
this is a busy day! people are being born, and dying, and having grandkids, and building cities!
Isaiah said God did not create the mess found in Genesis 1:2.
isaiah said that god had purpose to his creation. and, in any case, if you'd like to read super-literally, genesis 1:1 doesn't say that god created waste, either. just that it was waste when he began creating. the bible doesn't describe creation as ex-nihilo.

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Replies to this message:
 Message 104 by Evangelical Humanists, posted 05-29-2012 6:48 AM arachnophilia has replied

  
arachnophilia
Member (Idle past 1343 days)
Posts: 9069
From: god's waiting room
Joined: 05-21-2004


(1)
Message 105 of 110 (664204)
05-29-2012 8:44 PM
Reply to: Message 104 by Evangelical Humanists
05-29-2012 6:48 AM


Re: Life before Genesis 1:2? - NOWAY!
Evangelical Humanists writes:
It's implied in Hebrews 11:3 which contradicts Genesis 1:1.......
i believe you're reading that wrong. hebrews 11:3 says:
quote:
Through faith we understand that the worlds were framed by the word of God, so that things which are seen were not made of things which do appear.
making things (that appear) out of other things (that do not appear) is not making things out of nothing. in any case, it does contradict genesis 1 in that the raw materials are still present: the water that formed the seas is the same water from which heaven and earth were made. the authors of the new testament had a decidedly different ideology from the authors of the old testament, and appeared to only be reading the old testament in translation. it's quite easy to see how they could get different ideas.
In Genesis 1:1 he creates heaven and earth so this indicates that before there was nothing. If earth did not exist prior to that then why would the writer say expressly that he created heaven and earth?
perhaps you had better scroll up a bit, and read this comment. my reply above was to ICANT, who knows this yet refuses to listen, as he think he knows the language better than rashi, even though he can't even keep his alef-bet straight.
his problem -- the reason for much of this thread's divergence -- is that he thinks that genesis 1:1 describes a creation event, even though that creation event is obviously described in the chapter that proceeds from that verse. in that description, the heaven and the earth are both made from materials that already exist: water. ICANT sees this as indicating two separate creation events, but that's demonstrably wrong for grammatical reasons. but even if the verse were an independent clause (it's not), it would still be quite obviously a preface or introduction to story itself, which provides the details. and in those details, creation is not ex-nihilo.

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This message is a reply to:
 Message 104 by Evangelical Humanists, posted 05-29-2012 6:48 AM Evangelical Humanists has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 106 by Evangelical Humanists, posted 05-30-2012 6:14 AM arachnophilia has replied

  
arachnophilia
Member (Idle past 1343 days)
Posts: 9069
From: god's waiting room
Joined: 05-21-2004


Message 107 of 110 (664271)
05-30-2012 4:53 PM
Reply to: Message 106 by Evangelical Humanists
05-30-2012 6:14 AM


Re: Life before Genesis 1:2? - NOWAY!
Evangelical Humanists writes:
Genesis 1:1 says "In the beginning he created heaven and earth" correct?
nope! you should probably read the comment i linked to above. it says, literally, "in the beginning of god creating..." or more idiomatically, "when god began creating..."
This is talking present tense not past tense as in if it would have read " In the beginning there was heaven and earth" according to Genesis 1 not earth or a heaven existed prior to a god creating them.
the verb in the sentence is pointed as a qal perfect verb, but it was almost certainly meant to be an infinitive construct as in genesis 5:1. it's being used as a noun, in construct with "beginning".
the actual creation is described in the rest of the chapter. heaven is made in verses 6-8. and earth in 9 and 10. it isn't hard to see how verse 1 is talking about those events (and the others in the chapter) even if you don't follow the grammatical reasons above. as described in the rest of the chapter, neither earth nor heaven are made out of nothing. they are both made from water, which is already there.
Do you believe that matter is eternal? This idea is put forth by the Mormons.
my beliefs aren't relevant. i'm just discussing what the bible says.
While you maybe correct in saying that nothing in the Bible indicates a belief in ex-nihilo the very wording in Genesis 1 indicates it is.
it doesn't. it's possible to read it that way in most translations, yes. but if you noted in the linked post above, i'm not looking at translations, am i?
quote:
n the beginning God created the heaven and the earth.
may be a little unclear, but
quote:
בראשית ברא אלהים את השמים ואת הארץ
is not. if i had meant the above, it would have said
quote:
בראשונה ברא אלהים את השמים ואת הארץ
see the difference? one word is a construct, ending in ית. the other is not. that makes all the difference. it's not ex-nihilo because the following statements describe what creation was like god began creating. there was something there already: water.
Edited by arachnophilia, : No reason given.

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arachnophilia
Member (Idle past 1343 days)
Posts: 9069
From: god's waiting room
Joined: 05-21-2004


(1)
Message 109 of 110 (664297)
05-30-2012 9:25 PM
Reply to: Message 108 by Evangelical Humanists
05-30-2012 6:31 PM


Evangelical Humanists writes:
Ex-nihilo either way you look at it changing words does not change it.
i believe you have ignored my argument, perhaps because you didn't understand it? can i help explain it to you in any way?
I am aware that the Hebrew is ברא bara' for (creation)
correct. and that's actually neither here nor there (though ICANT likes to make some kind of nonsense issue about it). the issue is that the first word, ראש ("first"), is in the construct state, ראשית ("first of"), which means that it's joined to the next word. it's common in hebrew for words to be paired this way, but you can only have a construct between two nouns. that means the verb, ברא ("create") must be functioning as a noun ("creating"). in other words, an infinitive (or gerund, in english terms).
the issue is that, in hebrew, verb tenses are determined by the vowels and/or semi-vowels that have been applied to modify the three letter root. in this case, the people who added the vowel points added the vowels for a simple (qal) perfect (generally translated as past tense) verb, instead of the points for an infinitive. the points, of course, were not part of the original text.
in this case, i haven't changed any of the words, just made an educated inference about what the vowels should have been. this inference is supported by rashi and orlinsky, both of whom know what they're talking about. (rashi is the tenth century jewish rabbi responsible for one of the most comprehensive commentaries on the torah. he wrote in hebrew, so i believe that counts as fluent.)
as rashi notes, if the author had meant to say "in the beginning, god created" in an abstract sense, to give a timeframe for the story, instead of "in the beginning of god creating" ("when god began creating") he would have used ראש in the abstract sense, not in the construct. so instead of ראשית ("first of"), it would say ראשונה ("first").
since, in this case, ברא is not an actual verb, we have ourselves a subordinate clause. no action has taken place here. the clauses that proceed from this verse describe what it was like at the beginning of god's creation. so, if you read from there, it says that, "when god began creating the heaven and the earth... the earth was formless and empty, and darkness was on the face of the deep." that's what it was like, when god began creating.
this is actually a common way to begin stories. genesis 2:4 says,
quote:
אֵלֶּה תוֹלְדוֹת הַשָּׁמַיִם וְהָאָרֶץ, בְּהִבָּרְאָם: בְּיוֹם, עֲשׂוֹת יְהוָה אֱלֹהִים--אֶרֶץ וְשָׁמָיִם
"these are the generations of the heaven and the earth, when they were created: in the day of yahweh god making earth and heaven..."
i don't expect you to follow the grammar here specifically, but you should know that it's exactly the same. ביום is a complex preposition, similar to בראשית, and means "in the day of" something. the verb that follows it, עשות ("making") is (correctly pointed as) an infinitive construct. the whole thing begins a subordinate clause. here is genesis 5:1:
quote:
זֶה סֵפֶר, תּוֹלְדֹת אָדָם: בְּיוֹם, בְּרֹא אֱלֹהִים אָדָם, בִּדְמוּת אֱלֹהִים, עָשָׂה אֹתוֹ.
"this is the book of the generation of adam: in the day of god creating adam, in the image of god he made him."
same structure. complex preposition, constructed with an infinitive noun (this time, ברא pointed correctly), forming a subordinate clause. the independent clause, "in the image of god he made him" tells what happened when god made adam.
yes? so in genesis 1:1-3, the second and third verses tell what happened at the beginning of god creating. ergo, no ex-nihilo creation. the hebrew doesn't support it. further, as i tried to point out above, even if you miss all of these points, the rest of the chapter goes on to tell the actual story of creation, in which god creates from raw materials.
And since I do not speak fluent Hebrew I got no idea what you posted in Hebrew.
does this post help any?
Edited by arachnophilia, : No reason given.

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This message is a reply to:
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