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Author Topic:   The Serpent of Genesis is not the Dragon of Revelations
Buzsaw
Inactive Member


Message 91 of 302 (294170)
03-10-2006 9:33 PM
Reply to: Message 81 by Modulous
03-10-2006 7:07 AM


Re: legless lizards/legful snakes
Modulous writes:
So Dimetrodon was post curse then?
Being reptilian, yes. I'm aware that he's suppose to be earlier, but we idists assume problems with dating methods due to chemical unknowns in the environment.
Modulous writes:
I agree. However, that doesn't mean that the parents will get fossilized. We have no Biblical evidence that there was more than a few Serpents, why would we expect them to be fossilized?
Please reread me more thoroughly.
1. I said that numerous parents likely lived to be killed in the flood.
2. The Biblical record does not indicate how many there were. The fossil record suggests there were a great number of them.
buzsaw writes:
Not when you consider the whole context. If the curse effected it's power on all humans and the plant kingdom, why not all reptiles?
Modulous writes:
That seems contrary to what you said.
buzsaw writes:
Likely the parent dinos or whatever they were lived out their lives in tact as they were.
1. I said the curse affected all reptillian dinos making them cursed/changed reptile kinds.
2. I also said the precursed parents lived out their lives in tact as they were, i.e. dinos. Their offspring were the ultimate surviving reptillians.
Modulous writes:
Which would indicate that the curse did not affect the Serpent itself, but its offspring. I'm fairly sure a plain reading would show that the Serpent was also cursed, just as his offspring were. Unless you are now pushing back the word parent to before the Serpent? Still, we need to know, did the curse affect all 'reptiles' or did it leave some parent 'dino' group unscathed?
Modulous, please read me more carefully. Didn't you read where I explained this? I said the genes of the parents were affected and that it would not be logical that the parent would be suddenly zapped into the short legged animal. Why do we need to keep wasting or time rehashing these things? As I said, it affected all dinos, imo.
Modulous writes:
I don't that's right at all, several non dino examples have been provided in this very thread which have much closer tails, bodies AND heads to snakes than dinos had.
Look....there were all sorts of variations of reptilian dinos just as there's all sorts of variations of reptilians today.
Modulous writes:
A balloon snake with balloon legs kind of looks like a balloon daschund to me.
You're scraping the bottom here, my friend. The lizzard or snake head and tails of snake, lizzard or gater more resemble dino than does dashund.

BUZSAW B 4 U 2 Z Y BUZ SAW

This message is a reply to:
 Message 81 by Modulous, posted 03-10-2006 7:07 AM Modulous has replied

Replies to this message:
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arachnophilia
Member (Idle past 1344 days)
Posts: 9069
From: god's waiting room
Joined: 05-21-2004


Message 92 of 302 (294182)
03-10-2006 10:18 PM
Reply to: Message 89 by Buzsaw
03-10-2006 8:27 PM


Re: Arachnophilia's strawman
1. I'm not asking for a lot of change.
yes, you are. see all those little short replies you made? those are all changes. big changes. changes you agree to, and then write:
I said there had to be a complete overhaul, didn't I?
"complete overhaul" ≠ "a lot of change?"
which is it buz? are you asking for it, or are you not asking for it? remember, "the bible says..." is not a good argument with me. i've read genesis. i know what it says.
The context reveals a lot of change. Read it carefully and thoughtfully.
hey, context is a useful word, isn't it. perhaps you should (i don't know) maybe describe some of the context that describes a lot of change?
Why should it need be evolutionary change? I, my Bible and the god of it, Jehovah are Idists. Your argument is another strawman, arguing idism on the basis of evolution.
your argument is that this biblical story fits the fossil record. and it's not intelligent design, it's intelligent modification.
2. It does fit the fossil record. It's the only hypothesis that explains the dino fossils and the mystery as to why dinos became extinct all the while other living things living with them survived all in one fell swoop!
excuse me? have you not been following paleontology for the last 40 years or so? we have a pretty good idea what killed most of the dinosaurs. and if you think that dinosaur were the only things that vanished, you should find a textbook or two. those two ancient sea-reptiles i posted? they were gone too. flying reptiles were also gone.
3. It makes biological sense in that the idist miracle curse effected a radical biological overhaul in the genes of the parent reptilians.
you can't say in one breath that id need not fit evolution, and in the next that it makes biological sense. that's what we call a contradiction.
So?
so? so it's a different animal. not one slightly changed.
Think about the change from dino to snake or lizzard........big difference. Right?
yes. you make my point for me. allow me to add that using your "hypothesis" as supporting evidence for your very same "hypothesis" is generally considered bad form. it's no suprise that you agree with yourself.
Not at all! See, you're totally disregarding all I've been saying, that all the reptilians were cursed. Lizzards have little short legs and they too are essentially cursed dust eating belly crawlers. Blow up this little guy and fit him with a couple of long legs, reinstall the biological changes and you have dino with the similar style head and tail.
you seem to know very little about dinosaur biology, and natural history.
a good point that one should note is that it actually went the other way. dinosaurs evolved from early lizard-like creatures. the difference here is that the crocodilian thecodonts actually had similar anatomy. their skulls were flattened in the same direction -- yet they crawled on the ground with stubby legs. the amphibian model for locomotion (the one adopted by reptiles) predates dinosaurs by quite a long time -- it was walking with your legs UNDER you that was the revolution.
...and led to the extinction of thecodonts.


This message is a reply to:
 Message 89 by Buzsaw, posted 03-10-2006 8:27 PM Buzsaw has not replied

arachnophilia
Member (Idle past 1344 days)
Posts: 9069
From: god's waiting room
Joined: 05-21-2004


Message 93 of 302 (294185)
03-10-2006 10:48 PM
Reply to: Message 90 by Buzsaw
03-10-2006 8:42 PM


Re: I Was Waiting For This
Who, my friend, is being scientific here......the evo Arach or the Creo, buz?
i suppose you'd like to think that your are. but proposing ad-hoc "hypotheses" to try to line up with an ancient religious work, while ignoring any evidence to the contrary and lacking the paleontological and biological knowledge to even know why dinosaurs are not lizards and not even remotely snakes, is not what i would call "scientific."
shall we play "count the logical fallacies?"
http://www.cbv.ns.ca/...old/history/dinosaurs/dinosaurs.html
Go to google and google links will tell you over and over that dinos were reptilian.
wow. what an academic link you have provided. you seem to think i have no idea what i'm talking about, like i've never been to a natural history museum, taken a biology class, or read a paleontology community. "how absurd!" you must be saying to yourself, "he actually thinks dinosaurs aren't reptiles EVERYONE knows that dinosaurs are reptiles!"
everyone knows a lot of stuff about dinosaurs. lots of people have a favourite dinosaur that never existed: brontosaurus. lots of people think stegosaurus had two brains. lots of people think iguanodon is bipedal. lots of people think dinosaurs were slow and sluggish -- ok just the big ones now. people are often wrong.
now, there's been a significant debate over what we consider reptiles nowadays. and dinosaurs are the BIG problem. have a look at wikipedia's entry on dinosaurs:
quote:
^ From the classical standpoint, reptiles included all the amniotes except birds and mammals. Thus reptiles were defined as the set of animals that includes crocodiles, alligators, tuatara, lizards, snakes, amphisbaenians and turtles, grouped together as the class Reptilia. However, many taxonomists have begun to insist that taxa should be monophyletic, that is, groups should include all descendants of a particular form. The reptiles as defined here would be paraphyletic, since they exclude both birds and mammals, although these also developed from the original reptile. Thus, some cladists redefine Reptilia as a monophyletic group, including both the classic reptiles as well as the birds and perhaps the mammals (depending on ideas about their relationships). Others abandon it as a formal taxon altogether, dividing it into several different classes.
Dinosaur - Wikipedia
some are filing birds and mammals with reptiles now. that includes us, btw. but mostly birds. shall i do that? if birds are reptiles, dinosaurs clearly are too. but that's hardly a good division: birds aren't very reptilian, and we aren't either. that also makes us amphibians. shall we keep going backwards?
where do we draw the line?
for me, dinosaurs are high-center-of-gravity, rigid backbones, feathered and warm-blooded animals with the socketted teeth of their reptile ancestors. most of the defining characteristics of what makes something a dinosaur are very un-reptilian.


This message is a reply to:
 Message 90 by Buzsaw, posted 03-10-2006 8:42 PM Buzsaw has not replied

arachnophilia
Member (Idle past 1344 days)
Posts: 9069
From: god's waiting room
Joined: 05-21-2004


Message 94 of 302 (294186)
03-10-2006 10:51 PM
Reply to: Message 91 by Buzsaw
03-10-2006 9:33 PM


Re: legless lizards/legful snakes
Being reptilian, yes. I'm aware that he's suppose to be earlier, but we idists assume problems with dating methods due to chemical unknowns in the environment.
still ad hoc. and this ad-hoc requires that all of the evidence of just about everything in paleontology is wrong. why even bother?
Look....there were all sorts of variations of reptilian dinos just as there's all sorts of variations of reptilians today.
um. no. there were not. perhaps the problem is that this is circular: the definition of a reptile partly has to do with locomotion -- they hug the ground. basically, you're arguing that dinosaurs were MADE INTO reptiles from SOMETHING ELSE.


This message is a reply to:
 Message 91 by Buzsaw, posted 03-10-2006 9:33 PM Buzsaw has not replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 95 by NosyNed, posted 03-11-2006 1:34 AM arachnophilia has replied

NosyNed
Member
Posts: 8996
From: Canada
Joined: 04-04-2003


Message 95 of 302 (294202)
03-11-2006 1:34 AM
Reply to: Message 94 by arachnophilia
03-10-2006 10:51 PM


Re: legless lizards/legful snakes
but we idists assume problems with dating methods due to chemical unknowns
Somwhat off topic Arach, but note that Buz thinks IDists don't accept dating when, as far as I know, they all do.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 94 by arachnophilia, posted 03-10-2006 10:51 PM arachnophilia has replied

Replies to this message:
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jaywill
Member (Idle past 1941 days)
Posts: 4519
From: VA USA
Joined: 12-05-2005


Message 96 of 302 (294226)
03-11-2006 7:39 AM
Reply to: Message 65 by NosyNed
03-08-2006 9:20 AM


Re: What? Me worry?
NosyNed,
Concerning my saying that John was a Christian and a Jew you reply:
Could you explain to me how those could both be true?
Well, in one sense as a disciple of Christ John is a constituent of the "one new man" in which there is no Jew and no Gentile but one God indwelt new humanity.
But in another sense he was a Jew who turned to Jesus believing that He was the Messiah. Now if this seems self contradictory it should not be. There are other Jews who took a course of action in faith that put them outside of the status quo as being judged as a turncoat or rebel.
Moses was considered a rebel by hundreds of distinguished fellow Hebrews. They wanted to stone him and lead the people back to Egypt which they ironically called the land flowing with milk and honey. Saul the king considered David a turncoat who betrayed the Jewish national interests. Saul hunted down David as a fugitive and sought to kill him. He also executed many priests because he thought they were in conspiracy with David. The Jews left in Judea after the Babylonians came and captured multitudes of their countrymen considered the prophet Jeremiah as a betrayer of Jewish interests. When Jeremiah spoke the word of the Lord to them they accused him of conspiracy and lying.
Other prophets were also persecuted as not serving the interests of the Jewish nation. So it should not altogether surpise us that some New Testament apostles, who were Jews, might have circulated about them that it was impossible for them to be Jewish and disciples of Jesus. Of course Jesus Himself was a Jew.
And it should not surpise us, if there is indeed a Yahweh, a God of Israel, that if He took a radical turn in His manner of dispensing His plan on the earth, that He would secure for Himself a thoroughly Jewish scholar educated by the strictest sect of rabbis, to communicate His purposes to the world. I speak of Saul of Tarsus who became the Apostle Paul, the author of some 13 of the 27 books of the New Testament.
So indeed a Jew can turn to Jesus with faith that He is the promised Jewish Messiah who is also the Savior of the world.
This message has been edited by jaywill, 03-11-2006 07:40 AM
This message has been edited by jaywill, 03-11-2006 07:42 AM
This message has been edited by jaywill, 03-11-2006 07:43 AM
This message has been edited by jaywill, 03-11-2006 07:45 AM
This message has been edited by jaywill, 03-11-2006 07:47 AM
This message has been edited by jaywill, 03-11-2006 07:48 AM
This message has been edited by jaywill, 03-11-2006 07:57 AM
This message has been edited by jaywill, 03-11-2006 07:58 AM

This message is a reply to:
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Modulous
Member
Posts: 7801
From: Manchester, UK
Joined: 05-01-2005


Message 97 of 302 (294228)
03-11-2006 7:57 AM
Reply to: Message 91 by Buzsaw
03-10-2006 9:33 PM


God said to the Serpent: upon thy belly shalt thou go
Being reptilian, yes. I'm aware that he's suppose to be earlier, but we idists assume problems with dating methods due to chemical unknowns in the environment.
It wasn't a dating issue, I was just wondering how your thinking was working. So basically the only lizard like creatures pre-curse were dinos, after the curse other reptiles formed. It seems rather unorthodox, is there any basis at all for it, or is just a pet theory?
Please reread me more thoroughly.
1. I said that numerous parents likely lived to be killed in the flood.
2. The Biblical record does not indicate how many there were. The fossil record suggests there were a great number of them.
I'm just trying to get a grip on your position. What are these parents? When you said parents, I was inferring you meant the original serpent and another. Do you mean their parents? Or do you mean their offspring?
The second point confuses me even more. You originally said
buz writes:
Everyone seems to be ignoring that a legged creature exists and should show up in the fossil record which was the legged pre-cursed serpent.
I am asking why should this legged creature show up in the fossil record? What Biblical support is there for many serpents to exist? You've just conceded that the Bible says nothing about numbers, so there is no reason to believe that they should have fossilized.
1. I said the curse affected all reptillian dinos making them cursed/changed reptile kinds.
2. I also said the precursed parents lived out their lives in tact as they were, i.e. dinos. Their offspring were the ultimate surviving reptillians.
OK, so before the curse, there were only dinosaurs, no reptiles is that right?
These precursed parents were dinosaurs I take it.
The curse affected all dinosaurs, except these precursed parents?
It seems to me you are saying the curse affected all dinosaurs on one hand, and on the other hand you are saying it affected only most dinos. I'm trying to follow the argument but I was hoping for clarification. The only way I can reconcilliate the problem is that God cursed the dinosaurs to have reptillian offspring. Is that what you are saying?
Modulous, please read me more carefully. Didn't you read where I explained this? I said the genes of the parents were affected and that it would not be logical that the parent would be suddenly zapped into the short legged animal. Why do we need to keep wasting or time rehashing these things? As I said, it affected all dinos, imo.
And this would seem to suggest my reconciliation is correct. I needed to rehash this because it seemed to be contrary to the plain reading of the Genesis account, but you insisted it wasn't. As such I thought that I had misunderstood something you had said, so I am looking for clarification.
The problem I am having with it is that a plain reading of the Genesis account would suggest that one of the parents (ie the garden Serpent) was cursed to crawl on its belly. It might not be logical that the parent was zapped into a belly crawler, but that's what Genesis says. This came up in Message 74, if you want to start at the beginning.
Look....there were all sorts of variations of reptilian dinos just as there's all sorts of variations of reptilians today.
True, but they universally have characteristics which no reptile has, and vice versa. Whereas the other candidates that have been put forward don't have this problem. Hence why I would recommend looking at non-dinos for the serpent.
A balloon snake with balloon legs kind of looks like a balloon daschund to me.
You're scraping the bottom here, my friend. The lizzard or snake head and tails of snake, lizzard or gater more resemble dino than does dashund.
I'm not scraping the barrel, I know that lizards/dinos and dogs are very different. I will repeat what you said so you can understand where this came from, you may realize that my tongue was in my cheek...from Message 74:
As an aside here, if you could take a shapable snake balloon with a snake head, blow it up, shape it up a bit and add legs to it you could come up with a thing resembling some of the dinos.
In the very simplest way, yes, but it could also look like a daschund so that wouldn't be useful! When we look closely at snake body structure and dino body structure we see that dinos are far from snakes with legs. There are other organisms in the fossil record that would be more obvious candidates for legful snakes.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 91 by Buzsaw, posted 03-10-2006 9:33 PM Buzsaw has not replied

jaywill
Member (Idle past 1941 days)
Posts: 4519
From: VA USA
Joined: 12-05-2005


Message 98 of 302 (294238)
03-11-2006 8:36 AM


The Job - Genesis - Revelation connection
There is a connection between the "soul life" mentioned in the 12th chapter of Revelation and the activities of the Devil throughout the Bible. This is especially true in Job and in Genesis.
The overcoming army in Revelation are said to overcome the accuser of the brothers because they loved not their soul life even unto death. Satan told God that all men loved their souls to the extent that that he could get humans to curse God. He did his best to affict Job's self in an attempt get Job to curse God. God proved that He could get a man on the earth who would not love his self life to the extent that he would curse God. Satan's accusations were defeated in the book of Job.
Where did this self or this soul life come into existence? It came into existence when Adam and Eve plunged the human race into an alliance with the serpent. Satan attached himself to man in some sense and the result was that the independent soul life or self centered life came into existence. Man loves this self life.
Now the soul God created. But the soul of man was never to be independent with its own self centered life. The soul life was the result of man's union with the Devil. Satan boasts to God that man loves this Satanic soul life and will curse his Creator if it suffers too much.
Now this is a short post on a mammoth subject.
The soul with its facility for mind, emotion, will and enjoyment was created by God. But the independent soul centered soul life came into being through the serpent's temptation of the first humans - Adam and Eve.
In Revelation this Satan is overcome by those believers in Christ who did not love their soul life even to the death. They loved God above themselves. They enjoyed God above themselves. And because they have taken away the ground of Satan in their being, they are raptured and fight with Christ to bring in His kingdom over the globe.
Now here again is two very relevant verses in Revelation 12 on this matter:
"And the great dragon was cast down, the ancient serpent, he who is called the Devil and Satan, he who deceives the whole inhabited earth; he was cast to the earth, and his angels were cast down with him" (Rev. 12:9)
But even more signficant is the symbol of the manchild who is able to regain the God ordained order in their being, therefore taking away Satan's ground through their following Christ and His gospel:
"And they overcame him because of the blood of the Lamb and because of the word of their testimony, and they loved not their soul-life even unto death" (Rev. `12:11)
This refers to the manchild who was brought forth from the symbolic pregnant woman before whom the dragon stands, ready to devour her child (See 12:1-3).
Adam's fall before Satan brought about the soul life - a Satanic parasite / host relationship between fallen humanity and the rebellious angel. Throughout history some followers of God have overcome Satan because they loved God more than their Satanified self centered soul life. The blood of Jesus cleanses them from their past sins. The truth of the word of God saves them from Satan's accusations. And they loved not their self centered soul life, but rather God in Christ instead - even unto death.
The coarse of the planet is determined by such persons, by such followers of the Lord Jesus Christ.
This message has been edited by jaywill, 03-11-2006 08:37 AM
This message has been edited by jaywill, 03-11-2006 08:39 AM
This message has been edited by jaywill, 03-11-2006 08:40 AM
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Replies to this message:
 Message 99 by ringo, posted 03-11-2006 10:37 AM jaywill has replied

ringo
Member (Idle past 412 days)
Posts: 20940
From: frozen wasteland
Joined: 03-23-2005


Message 99 of 302 (294266)
03-11-2006 10:37 AM
Reply to: Message 98 by jaywill
03-11-2006 8:36 AM


Re: The Job - Genesis - Revelation connection
Jaywill writes:
Where did this self or this soul life come into existence? It came into existence when Adam and Eve plunged the human race into an alliance with the serpent.
Adam and Eve used the "self" that they already had to make a decision. How could they make a decision without a "self"?
God said one thing - the serpent said another. Adam and Eve made their choice. Genesis says nothing about an "alliance" with the serpent. It was strictly a one-off.
Satan's accusations were defeated in the book of Job.
They were not "Satan's accusuations" - they were tests that God allowed him to perform. In the book of Job, Satan was a minion, a flunky doing God's bidding.
God proved that He could get a man on the earth who would not love his self life to the extent that he would curse God.
Why would God need to "prove" anything? And to whom?
Do you think God didn't know that Job would pass the test?
The book of Job does not portray a struggle between God and His "adversary". It teaches a lesson - stay loyal to God and He will stand by you through any hardships.
(Once again, the character "Satan" is cast as the bad guy, so we won't blame God for the hardships that we do suffer. That doesn't mean that there really is an "adversary" or that God "allows" hardships. It just means that life inevitably involves hardships.)
Satan boasts to God that man loves this Satanic soul life and will curse his Creator if it suffers too much.
Did you not read through to the end? Satan was wrong. Job did not curse his Creator. He did not love his own self/soul more than God.
You contradict yourself. How can there be an "alliance" with Satan, going back to the Garden, when Job took part in no such alliance?
You have not shown that the serpent of Eden was anything but a serpent.

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This message is a reply to:
 Message 98 by jaywill, posted 03-11-2006 8:36 AM jaywill has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 102 by jaywill, posted 03-11-2006 7:42 PM ringo has replied
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ringo
Member (Idle past 412 days)
Posts: 20940
From: frozen wasteland
Joined: 03-23-2005


Message 100 of 302 (294294)
03-11-2006 2:04 PM
Reply to: Message 91 by Buzsaw
03-10-2006 9:33 PM


Walking, talking snakes do not suggest a historic event or a scientific phenomenon
It just occurred to me: are you suggesting that all dinosaurs could talk?
(Edited subtitle for the edification of AdminNosy and anybody else who reads them.)
This message has been edited by Ringo, 2006-03-11 12:35 PM

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This message is a reply to:
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AdminNosy
Administrator
Posts: 4754
From: Vancouver, BC, Canada
Joined: 11-11-2003


Message 101 of 302 (294296)
03-11-2006 2:17 PM
Reply to: Message 100 by ringo
03-11-2006 2:04 PM


legless talking dinos??
Ringo? Just what do talking dinosaurs have to do with the post title?
Please help others reading the threads by picking good post titles.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 100 by ringo, posted 03-11-2006 2:04 PM ringo has not replied

jaywill
Member (Idle past 1941 days)
Posts: 4519
From: VA USA
Joined: 12-05-2005


Message 102 of 302 (294360)
03-11-2006 7:42 PM
Reply to: Message 99 by ringo
03-11-2006 10:37 AM


Re: The Job - Genesis - Revelation connection
Adam and Eve used the "self" that they already had to make a decision. How could they make a decision without a "self"?
They could. But it is a difficult question to answer just the same.
Since the state that Adam and Eve were in at the time of their direct creation from God cannot be known by me, I may not be able to answer that tough question.
And maybe my expression of words is not the best expression to discribe the situation.
God said one thing - the serpent said another. Adam and Eve made their choice. Genesis says nothing about an "alliance" with the serpent. It was strictly a one-off.
It is not possible for me to isolate Genesis totally from the rest of the Bible. With you it is perhaps preferable to do so.
But you will notice that God said that He would put enmity between the woman ("the mother of all living") and the serpent. So it was not a happy alliance. God would place enmity between the mother of all living humans and the serpent so that the unity between the serpent and the human race would not be a cozy one.
You see when Adam and Eve listened to the serpent that in itself established a cooperation between the two parties. If "alliance" is not the best word to discribe the relationship, there was nonetheless a relationship. And God had to do something so that the relationship would be not peaceful or happy but full of enmity between the two co-partners:
"And I will put enmity between your seed and her seed; He will bruise you on the head, But you will bruise him on the heel." (Gen. 3:15)
Cain, the firstborn of "the mother of all living" expressed the the evil continuation of opposing God in his murder of the proper seeker of God, Abel. This fact, told next in Genesis, also establishes that, for lack of a better word at the moment, an alliance was formed between the enemy of God and man.
If you missed that fact, it is you who are way off.
They were not "Satan's accusuations" - they were tests that God allowed him to perform. In the book of Job, Satan was a minion, a flunky doing God's bidding.
They were too accusations against man. And most likely he also accused Job via Job's three poor "comforters" who just knew that Job must have sinned to deserve this treatment from God. And of course Satan accused God in Job's mind also. For no human being escapes thoughts against God injected into his or her mind by Satan.
Why would God need to "prove" anything? And to whom?
Why do you think He would not need to "prove" anything?
Do you think God didn't know that Job would pass the test?
I think God knows everything. Many things He allows or performs so that we would know. The problem is not with God's not knowing. The problem is with man not knowing or rather not believing.
Many things were do by God in the Bible for the sake that we would
what God knew all along. And we still don't get it many times.
The book of Job does not portray a struggle between God and His "adversary". It teaches a lesson - stay loyal to God and He will stand by you through any hardships.
I would not say that this intepretation is wrong. But I think it is a little shallow. It only sees a personal matter for the sake of your personal improved spirituality. This kind of lesson may help you to be a individualistically spiritual person.
I rather think the book of Job is not simply a lesson on personal spirituality. That lesson is a part of the larger fabric of the universal battle between God and His will and Satan and his opposing will. It is a story about the warfare between two kingdoms.
So your taking it as just a lesson in personal spirituality is not altogether wrong. It is just shortsighted, only concerned with one's individual piety.
(Once again, the character "Satan" is cast as the bad guy, so we won't blame God for the hardships that we do suffer. That doesn't mean that there really is an "adversary" or that God "allows" hardships. It just means that life inevitably involves hardships.)
You may state that once again or many times again. It is blindness on the part of whoever concocted that concept and on the part of those who are led to believe it.
Did you not read through to the end? Satan was wrong. Job did not curse his Creator. He did not love his own self/soul more than God.
I think there is a misunderstanding here of what I wrote. Or maybe I didn't write something very well.
Job passes on one hand the test. But he does not completely pass because God has to scold him for about three chapters. But comparatively, to his friends, he speaks rightly. God tells Job after the scolding, to pray for his three comforters who really were off in understanding the whole affair.
So Job passes somewhat compared to his three friends. But he still needs some education in the end for even questioning God's actions.
You contradict yourself. How can there be an "alliance" with Satan, going back to the Garden, when Job took part in no such alliance?
Why did God have to rebuke and adjust Job, telling him to answer His many questions?
All of God's rebukes are aimed at obliterating Job's doubt of God's wisdom and God's heart. This misunderstanding started in mankind with the deception in Eden. In that deception man went the way of the lying opposer to God's word. He believed the liar against God. That was the beginning of his believing many more lies down through human history until the end, until the establishing of God's perfect will again over the whole earth.
You have not shown that the serpent of Eden was anything but a serpent.
You haven't shown that you have valid arguments against a view that the serpent represents something more than a naughty talking water mocosin.
And you're view of Job as having nothing to do with the great conflict between God and Satan deserves some kind of prize for outstanding theological naivete.
Tell us more. Tell us more. I bet the story of God creating the heavens and the earth in the beginning is also just about how a diety decided to keep himself entertained for a few days, and nothing more.
Now there is this deeper book that I'd like to hear your thoughts on. Its called "The Cat in the Hat" by Dr. Seuss. Compared to Genesis it really has some weighty philosophical themes for man's most probing questions.
Okay, sarcasm aside. I think that .... Oh, you know already what I think! The Bible is God's communicating with us, His living word.
This message has been edited by jaywill, 03-11-2006 07:54 PM
This message has been edited by jaywill, 03-11-2006 07:55 PM

This message is a reply to:
 Message 99 by ringo, posted 03-11-2006 10:37 AM ringo has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 103 by ringo, posted 03-11-2006 8:30 PM jaywill has not replied

ringo
Member (Idle past 412 days)
Posts: 20940
From: frozen wasteland
Joined: 03-23-2005


Message 103 of 302 (294363)
03-11-2006 8:30 PM
Reply to: Message 102 by jaywill
03-11-2006 7:42 PM


Re: The Job - Genesis - Revelation connection
Jaywill writes:
... God said that He would put enmity between the woman ("the mother of all living") and the serpent. So it was not a happy alliance.
It doesn't sound like an "alliance" at all.
If "alliance" is not the best word to discribe the relationship, there was nonetheless a relationship.
Yes, and the relationship is enmity - practically the exact opposite of an "alliance". Genesis is explicit about that.
... an alliance was formed between the enemy of God and man.
Once again, you have not established that God has "an enemy" or that He can, in fact, have enemies. I repeat, if God is all-powerful, how can He have "an enemy"?
Why would God need to "prove" anything? And to whom?
Why do you think He would not need to "prove" anything?
God is God. Is He so puny that he needs to "prove" anything?
If you think He needed to prove something, then show us.
Do you think God didn't know that Job would pass the test?
I think God knows everything. Many things He allows or performs so that we would know. The problem is not with God's not knowing. The problem is with man not knowing or rather not believing.
You didn't answer the question.
If God knew what Job's response would be, why did He need to do the experiment? Clearly, it is a teaching story for us - which is why I pointed out that Satan is a character in the story (the "bad guy"), not a real "enemy".
That lesson is a part of the larger fabric of the universal battle between God and His will and Satan and his opposing will. It is a story about the warfare between two kingdoms.
So you keep saying, but you haven't shown how there could even be an "opposing will" to God's. It can not be a story about the "warfare between two kingdoms" because an all-powerful God is the only King of the only Kingdom.
Job passes on one hand the test. But he does not completely pass because God has to scold him for about three chapters.
There is no test until after the lesson is taught.
... he still needs some education in the end for even questioning God's actions.
Education comes from asking questions.
Why did God have to rebuke and adjust Job, telling him to answer His many questions?
Job was a fallible human, like all of us. The story is to teach us, remember?
And you're view of Job as having nothing to do with the great conflict between God and Satan deserves some kind of prize for outstanding theoligical naivete.
That prize would go to the puny-god hypothesis - the hypothesis that there can be any conflict with God - your hypothesis.
The Bible is God's communicating with us, His living word.
What use is any communication from the puny god you describe? He's too busy looking over his shoulder for Satan's attacks to be of any use to us.
You need to raise your sights. God can not have enemies. The snake of Genesis was not an enemy. He was a snake.

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This message is a reply to:
 Message 102 by jaywill, posted 03-11-2006 7:42 PM jaywill has not replied

arachnophilia
Member (Idle past 1344 days)
Posts: 9069
From: god's waiting room
Joined: 05-21-2004


Message 104 of 302 (294380)
03-12-2006 12:02 AM
Reply to: Message 95 by NosyNed
03-11-2006 1:34 AM


Re: legless lizards/legful snakes
but we idists assume problems with dating methods due to chemical unknowns
Somwhat off topic Arach, but note that Buz thinks IDists don't accept dating when, as far as I know, they all do.
yes, i noticed that. but since "id" is really just *ANY* creationism in disguise, and it wasn't the topic, i let it go.


This message is a reply to:
 Message 95 by NosyNed, posted 03-11-2006 1:34 AM NosyNed has not replied

arachnophilia
Member (Idle past 1344 days)
Posts: 9069
From: god's waiting room
Joined: 05-21-2004


Message 105 of 302 (294384)
03-12-2006 12:10 AM
Reply to: Message 88 by ReverendDG
03-10-2006 7:55 PM


Re: let's be a bit more careful here
i forgot rev describes a seven headed serpent, yes it would describe taimat better, i should have said tiamat was the serpent of chaos, rather than leviathan, must have been tired at the time
no no, you were still right. leviathan embodies the same characteristic as tiamat, and is associated with chaos through some implications in the text we do have. leviathan seems to come from tiamat, through lothan.
it's just never mentioned in the hebrew texts that we have that leviathan had seven heads -- so that bit of coincidence leads me to believe that john had other sources.
being that i have a large mythos knowledge i picture the world serpent from norse mythology - a huge ass immortal snake that will eat thor in the end
it's odd that similar stories keep popping up. the ironic thing is that buzsaw might accidentally be right in reverse. dragon myths might actually come from dinosaur remains.
however, the serpent in the garden is a snake, not a dragon.


This message is a reply to:
 Message 88 by ReverendDG, posted 03-10-2006 7:55 PM ReverendDG has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 108 by ReverendDG, posted 03-12-2006 1:29 AM arachnophilia has not replied

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