Nature and the fall of man

There are some Christians who hold that before the fall of man nature was different from what we see today. Animals were not wild but tame and peaceful, and they did not eat each other. There were no diseases and there were no natural disasters. This was the condition of nature in Eden. However, when man sinned and was turned out of Eden, nature changed and became what we see today, in which disasters and diseases are common, and animals eat each other.So this view explains that the reason for human suffering due to events in nature is that man brought such a state of affairs on himself. It is all the fault of mankind.Some Christians do not, I think, hold this view. If one believes in evolution, for example, I would think it would not be possible to hold the view that nature changed in this way. So my question is for those Christians who do not hold the view that nature changed in the way I have described. If the current state of nature is not due to the Fall, then what is it due to? Why does God permit these terrible natural events to occur? {For the record, this topic was promoted from message 6 of the PNT version. - Adminnemooseus}This message has been edited by Adminnemooseus, 12-26-2005 01:37 PM

I must presume that God had included some efective birth control program in his creation. Otherwise all that perfection would start to really pile up.Moose

As one of those Christians, LOL, let me give this a try.First, while there are some assertions of some kind of Fall in parts of the NT, when looking at the source material, Genesis, there is nothing that would suggest either a Fall, some earlier perfect nature or that anything changed. It's simply not to be found there.It appears to me that you have two questions; first "If the current state of nature is not due to the Fall, then what is it due to?" and second,"Why does God permit these terrible natural events to occur?"The current state of Nature doesn't seem to be any different than at any other time of history. I can see no indications that anything has changed except from a human-centric position, things are somewhat better than they have ever been before.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

According to this wikipedia entry: The wikipedia entry on the restoration movement indicates that these churches range from fundamentalist to liberal. It thus seems likely that there are fundamentalist churches who do not accept "the fall".

Perhaps we could assume this about Eden. But I cannot find any basis for assuming that such unusual conditions existed elsewhere on earth.While there is some weak biblical support for the idea of the fall, as it affected human souls, the idea that there were no meat eaters, no diseases and no natural disasters on earth strikes me as an invented theology, a 20th century invention intended to explain away some of the problems of YEC theology.

Although your question is not addressed to those who do believe in the Fall, just for the sake of stating that position, as a baseline or something, here's
The Longer Westminster Catechism on the subject. See from Question 17 on.And here's The Shorter Catechism with long footnotes of scriptural support. Q. 19 describes the spiritual and physical consequences of the Fall.A couple of links on the history of the Catechism: Wikipedia, and The complete report on the Westminster Assembly; see Chapter 5.A brief history of the Catechism. {Turns out this link only goes to a registration page for the Britannica}{ABE to add better historical refs than the Britannica}This message has been edited by Faith, 12-28-2005 05:00 PMThis message has been edited by Faith, 12-28-2005 05:02 PM

And your answer to the second question?

nwr, come on man, the Fall is a very old Christian and Jewish concept. Anyone barely educated in this stuff knows that. Original sin was written about by Augustine, Paul the apostle, the Reformers, etc,...long before evolution.Paul flat out states death entered the world through Adam.This message has been edited by randman, 12-26-2005 04:20 PM

Did Augustine write about "Animals were not wild but tame and peaceful, and they did not eat each other"?

I think he did say something along those lines, but I never like Augustine and preferred not to spend any more time reading him than was necessary.

the problem is you are wrong, the jews never believed in original sin, thats a christian concept, they only believed that man screwed up and was kicked out of eden, not that we some how inherent sin, this is a false concept

That's a pretty weak statement.My claim was that the part about "animals were not wild but tame and peaceful, and they did not eat each other" is 20th century. I was certainly not challenging the long tradition, within Christianity, of a doctrine of original sin.Given the weakness of your response I shall take it that, at least for the present, my claim stands uncontested.

What about those other Christians, the ones I am addressing. How do they explain away nature?

I'm not completely sure what it is that you're talking about. But I'll take a stab and if you think I'm off on a tangent, you can help me out.I'm not sure there are terrible natural events. There are events. The events are Natural. Whether or not the events are good, bad or neutral depends on the perspective of the observer. I discussed this in great depth in the thread Message 1 with Gilgamesh.Change is the norm. It is the result of the Universe GOD created.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

If your cat scratches your valuable antique furniture, you don't accuse the cat of sin. You simply accept that the cat does not know better.We do know better, as a consequence of human consciousness and free will. And I suggest that is what the Adam and Eve story is really about. It is an ancient fable that attempts to explain our consciousness and our free will. The current state of nature, including sinfulness, mistakes, accidents, disasters, is the price of having free will and human consciousness. Who is to say that a world with consciousness and free will is not more perfect than a world containing only mindless zombies? It isn't up to us to dictate standards of perfection to God.