Biblical Translation—Eden, 3

bertot:

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AM wrote: Language and consciousness go hand in hand. Literary texts and language go hand in hand. Literary texts influence human consciousness as well as our language. And our worldview is established in our consciousness and is expressed by our language. And on and on And on ...

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bertot replied: My question is, then: Why do I have to keep saying the same thing in as many different ways as I can come up with?bertot wrote: And this was in reply to:

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AM had written: Wrong! It is never “all or nothing.” That is not what I conveyed in the above quote. Try reading it and the rest of what I wrote above again.

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And before that:

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AM wrote: Whatever the literary text describes as true and valid and can be corroborated by other means can and should be accepted as being a historical event. That is how human beings arrive at historically based conclusions. But just because a literary text, or portion of a literary text happens to turn out to be of a “legendary or mythical” nature, that does not mean that the legendary or mythical text is not valuable, it only means that it is not historical in nature.

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bertot wrote: In your dogmatic, religious opinion, it has to be all or nothing. From a secular- research perspective none of the Old Testament has to be "from God" for the Old Testament {or even the New Testament} to have literary value, social and historicl significants, impact the human understanding of oral and written linguistic evolution, and impart to modern twenty-first century humanity a worldview, wisdom and understanding held sacred by ancient human beings thousands of years ago.According to your personal worldview the Holy Bible must be "The Word of God." Period. To you, if the Holy Bible is not "The Word of God" your entire faith-based religious socialization is rendered meaningless. I understand your need. However, I am not burdened by such a need.To you, what does the phrase in the KJV 1st Samuel 18:10--"the evil spirit from God came upon Saul"--mean?Can this phrase from 1st Samuel 18:10 be compared with Isaiah 45:7--"I make peace and create evil: I the LORD do all these things."?I have a limited amount of time I can spend on the thread today. I will respond to your posts as thoroughly and as soon as I can.All the best,
Ger

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Joseph I will leave you with your insanity. This is the Word or the Lord.

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Knock, knock. The law comes from Sinai, and is recorded in the Mosaic five books. One of those 613 laws says: DO NOT ADD OR SUBTRACT. And a million gospels cannot dent here. If you need proof, check with every nation's judiciary system. Why would a new, contradictory book which emerged 2000 years later, with no track record of ever being monotheistic, have any say here?You don't want to know about the law - you want to defend the NT at all costs - a document with alternate views which is not embedded in reality, because it is in error - thus it clings to 'belief'. I see every contradiction of the OT is in abject error, including a host of other ubsurditites as god-son-man, exclusive kingdom keys, the law is fullfilled [read, not applicable anymore]. You can quote the gospels and nominate this as the word of Jesus. But if your talking about a Jew in Judea 2000 years ago: show me his hebrew writings. Else this law applies:THOU SHALT NOT BEAR FALSE WITNESS.Now if a thought can be a sin, I would ask for the thought which never happened: why did you not ask for proof of Jesus's teaching as being from him?Edited by IamJoseph, : No reason given.

I was impressed by a post nominating this as a 'deep sleep' paradigm. I see this as meaning it did not occur in this corporeal realm, and is thus either metaphoric or meta-physical.

IamJoseph: The "deep sleep" begins with Gen. 2:21 and concludes with Gen. 3:21. The Hebrew Eden Narrative presents four poetic paradigms: 1. nothing lives in the field; 2. plants, humanity, trees, and brute animals emerge from the field; 3. the garden in Eden is established and humanity is put into it and eventually sent from it; 4. the deep sleep is caused to fall upon humanity, and humanity is awakened and clothed once again with skin. The "Deep Sleep" paradigm is more a "Wisdom riddle" with natural metaphors woven throughout the composition. For example, an actual serpent of the field {formed of the ground by God in Gen. 2:19} does not talk but has much to say. This prudent/sensible serpent talks only to the metaphorical "woman." The serpent never lies or deceives the metaphorical "woman". God is depicted as not knowing where its human creation is hiding. The serpent is cursed but never sent or driven from the garden in Eden. And much much more.It is also important to note that the author never employs the Hebrew terms "zakar=male" and "neqebah=female."This might be a good proposition for a new Thread.Tell me what you think,
Ger

Yes, this is a very well discerned insight, among the best I've encountered. The text is clearly posing an enigma for the reader here, seemingly leaving no coherent reading aside from the metaphoric.The differential between sleep and deep sleep is at least signifant here, and again made elsewhere under similar, enigmatic contexts, eg. Abraham being lifted to a point outside of the universe, and shown both the extent and expanse of the stars and the grains of sands, and in a mode where the passage of verses are suddenly and abruptly non-contextual.Ok, so we are taken to another realm here, be it a garden within a garden, or a another space within space, or more likely, a thought premise which is not exactly within the normaal realm of thinking. In this regard, if we are taken to another realm, what is the message of this enigma. One thing is clear, if the serpent is an analogy of temptation, this is the plight effecting all humans, in every turn they make and every breath they take. So this in itself is not an enigma, but quite an obvious reading of this metaphor. Somehow, I suspect the eden story hides answers to many enigmas, including the seperation treshold between humans and all other life forms - clearly, this is not signified by ToE's skeletal and dna seperations, which are common to all life forms. Clearly, humans constitute such a variation from all life, while harbouring all commonalities, that they consttute a seperate classification. I agree with genesis in marking humans as a seperate 'kind' of its own.Clearly, something happened some 6000 years ago, which is outside the normal thread of evolution. It was a ONCE only occurence, which never happened in all the 5 billions years of this planet's history, and is thus uneffected by such premises as evolution, survival of the fittest, adaptation or speciation. Here, it is all too easy to jump to the God did it premise, however I see no other alternatives. I also find it unacceptable that this knowledge or presentation came from the minds of some desert wandering Hebrews 3,500 years ago, with no similar writings elsewhere, even for 2000 years after its assumed date. The only writings I have found more amazing than the Eden chapter, is the first creation chapter of genesis: all of science emerged from these two pages.

I see it that the only reason for your reading of creating another meaning for the word 'covet', is to allign it with the gospels. That is why this debating will always be a cyclical one. I have had similar debates with muslims, and surprise-surprise - that too was unresolvable - even as its difference of the OT being different again from your own and the gospels. I see there is a common denominator with both the NT and the Quran with the OT, and both reasons appears the same: a retrospective allignment to a pre-ordained, belated position.

Joseph writesLet me put this as plainly as I can. Will you please "shut up" about the New Testamnt, I NEVER brought it up until you did in this discussion. If you dont believe me go back and check the record. You have this overwhelning obsession against the NT and I never brought in to the discussion. The record on this topic will indicate that I was talking about the command itself and the rest of the OT untilyou started interjecting your hatred about the NT as indicated in almost of all you posts. I further, demonstrated I did not need the NT here to demonstrate my point about coveting and what is involved in the command.Besides the NT does not need my defense, itstands as witness for itself. Please show me the person or persons that wrote the OT. Please connect the books of the OT with the authors that bear thier names in the books. You have Faith that the person or persons said to have written the OT, did indeed write these books. your above challenge is something you cannot even do yourself and you ridicule someone else for being unable to do the same. Were you actually at Sinai, did you see this happen or are you trusting that it did. Your method of debating is about as valid as your interpretaion process. Again it is of no concern to me whether you believe Jesus said or did not say the things attributed to him, this simply is not the issue. this is simply a way for you to avoid the rediculous conclusions you are trying to draw on Exodus 20:17. The OT with no assistance from the NT clearly demonstrates that a thought can be sinful."Every imagination or thier heart was continuously EVIL". Now unless "evil" has a different meaning to you than it does to everyone else, this verse closes the door on your "silly philosophising" and vain speculation. this verse Joseph is in he OT and numerous others could be cited to demonstrate this point."every nations judiciary system" my friend has nothing to do with how God views things all the time and in every instance.D Bertot

AM writesAM I am going to be very busy tommorrow and I will try to get to some of this, hold my place and I will try to avoid as much as I can your discussions with Joseph on related points. You and him are discussing things that you and I have not reached an agreement on yet. I will however start the ball rolling.thanks here AM, this is pretty much I believed you believed in this matter, but you must admit that you verbage tends to confuse more that it helps a discussion. this is why "ICANT", said "it is hard to discuss these things with a man who does not belive in God or the scriptures as his word". but I will give it a try ok?how can there be a "mental connection" between man and God, if the man is simply using his estimations and imaginations to determine the nature of things. Why would one persons be better or worse, less or more. How could you possibly arrive at even the slightest verifiable conclusions?forgive me AM but your above quote only serves to confuse the issue even further, with your uses of Eternal/Mortal when MAN is the initiater of the process.. What things or conclusions would be remotely Knowable and what would be the method of this seemingly very difficult process?D Bertot

[qs]On to the question, “The Hebrew Eden Narrative is “valid as what?” Let me try to put this in the context of the territory on planet earth that is regarded by many as “The Holy Land.” This small piece of real estate”Canaan, Phoenicia, Israel, Judea”historically {really, actually} is where the first phonetic alphabet {>alephbeyth} emerged; is where the concept of a monotheistic Deity emerged; is where the first agrarian and urbanized human culture emerged; is where the first tent-village is found; is where the first signs of animal domestication is found; is where the earliest signs of farming is found; is where the oldest Cro-Magnon human remains are found. The Holy Land is where the transition from Paleolithic hunter-gatherer human cultures to Neolithic human civilizations is actually documented in the tangible ground itself. Now then, according to my research into the Hebrew Eden Narrative”a narrative like none other found in the ancient Near & Middle East; the origin of which scholars cannot be certain”this ancient and unique Hebrew Text describes in stunning detail {employing Hebrew Wisdom-Literature: riddle, metaphor, and poetic allegory} that which is documented in the tangible ground of The Holy Land. Thus, I perceive the Hebrew Eden Narrative as a “valid” poetic description of the human evolution that actually occurred and is documented in the actual dirt of the Holy Land.I am not interested in you interpretation at this point, only if you can decide whether it is inspired directly by your supreme ntaural God with a conscious and free will? Do you think its contents warrent that conclusion?Again, the term “inspired””as applied in this context”denotes Man going to God {so to speak}, NOT God intervening in the affairs of Man through supernatural means. Using this definition of the term “inspired”= “Man connecting with the Eternal”, then the answer is “yes”, the contents of the Hebrew Eden Narrative warrants the conclusion that Man through Eternal-inspiration composed what is conveyed in the Hebrew Eden Narrative.I hope the above aids us in moving along with our discussion.[qs] This is a very interesting position and warrents alot of discussion andI am eager to get toit.Could you ask them if we can continue?D Bertot

AM, what in the heck are you doing up this late you never stay up this way? Did the wife give you position or something, Ha.Do you think you could hang with a 3 or 4AM like me and Joseph?D Bertot

bertot & IamJoseph:The Hebrew term chamd denotes desire & taking pleasure in. The verb chamd in the context of Ex. 20:17 and Deut. 5:18 appears to refer to inordinate, ungoverned, selfish desire, which is followd by one's choice to take another mans wife. I personally perceive this command as pertaining to both "thought" and "action." Or, "a thought" which will inevitably lead to "an action." "An inordinate, ungoverned, selfish thought", that if left ungoverned will in fact lead to "an unwarented choice and socially disruptive action."That is how I read it.
All the best,
Ger

bertot:I can give it a try. But I am a real sissy-boy when it comes to late night fun and games.Let's give it a try.Ger

bertot: I am thinking that perhaps I can employ this post, #294, as the means to request a Biblical Translation--Eden 4 thread.What do you think?I'll await your reply.
Ger

This helps but is almost as if you are adding to the very specific definitons, in and of themselves. As i pointed out to Joseph we have incorrect (sinful)thoughts or even harmless thought that we do not act on every second of our lives. It would follow that even the wrong ones do not need an action every time, itwould be immpossible to act on every thoughtConsider this "Every imagination of thier heart was continuosly Evil"D Bertot

I will leave this to your expertise.D bertot