Theory of Evolution Should have never been a part (Civ3)! Part 2

[Zachriel]

Originally posted by Ethelred
The Bible doesn't claim an accidental flood but an intentional one.

Is God's intent a scientific question?

However the story clearly has Noah conversing with Jehovah.

You have evidence to the contrary?

You do realize you are trying to use scientific means to argue something which is not necessarily a scientific question.

[Zachriel]

Originally posted by Ethelred

The god of the Flood is not since there was no flood. I don't see any real reason to believe in any other god either but it is possible that there was a creator.

As you know, there is good evidence of a flood that destroyed all known civilization. Whether you believe it was caused by God, or by natural events is another matter.

[loinburger]

Originally posted by Zachriel
As you know, there is good evidence of a flood that destroyed all known civilization. Whether you believe it was caused by God, or by natural events is another matter.

Where is this supposed evidence?

If there really were a flood that covered the earth within the past hundred thousand years then we wouldn't have as much speciation as we do at the moment. The flood would have caused a mass extinction. Even if Noah had somehow built an ark large enough to carry samples from every single plant and animal species on the planet, he still wouldn't have been able to distribute them properly; not very many plants and animals find the Middle East to be a particularly hospitable environment.

[Ethelred]

Originally posted by Zachriel
Is God's intent a scientific question?

You tell me. I am only accurately reporting what the Bible says.

I am not the one that pretends to know the mind of any god. That was the Bible's authors. Ohh and Oral Robert's. Well it was an eight hundred foot high Jesus that he conversed with and some people here don't believe in the Trinity.

You have evidence to the contrary?

You are the one denying the Flood story as actually told in the Bible. Of course I am denying it too but I don't have the handicap of belief.

You do realize you are trying to use scientific means to argue something which is not necessarily a scientific question.

You do realize you are rewriting the Bible don't you?

I wasn't using scientific means. I was dealing with what the Bible actually says and its real clear. All land life was to be destroyed. Particularly humans.

Pick a side. The Bible has special meaning or it doesn't. If the stories are as unreliable as you admit they are then they don't have anymore meaning than Gilgamesh.

[Ethelred]

Originally posted by Zachriel


As you know, there is good evidence of a flood that destroyed all known civilization. Whether you believe it was caused by God, or by natural events is another matter.

As I know no such thing. The Biblical Flood must have occured 4400 years ago if the Bible is true. The Egyptians never noticed. They just kept building the pyramids without ever noticing they had all drowned.

Don't bother trying to claim all civilization was in the Black Sea. It wasn't. Jericho is over 8000 years old and its not in the Black Sea and it wasn't Flooded.

[Zachriel]

Originally posted by Ethelred
As I know no such thing. The Biblical Flood must have occured 4400 years ago if the Bible is true. The Egyptians never noticed. They just kept building the pyramids without ever noticing they had all drowned.

Don't bother trying to claim all civilization was in the Black Sea. It wasn't. Jericho is over 8000 years old and its not in the Black Sea and it wasn't Flooded.

I'm really surprised at you Ethelred being so dogmatic. At no time did I say that the entire globe was flooded. All I said was that Noah reported that the entire land (as he knew it) was flooded, and that he told the truth (as he knew it). This story was of such dramatic importance, that it was passed down for generations before being collected with other manuscripts in the Bible.

(The Black Sea flood predates the Pyramids.)

[MrBaggins]

Originally posted by Zachriel


I'm really surprised at you Ethelred being so dogmatic. At no time did I say that the entire globe was flooded. All I said was that Noah reported that the entire land (as he knew it) was flooded, and that he told the truth (as he knew it). This story was of such dramatic importance, that it was passed down for generations before being collected with other manuscripts in the Bible.

(The Black Sea flood predates the Pyramids.)

Aren't there skin pigmentation issues with this (I.E. where did blacks skined folk come so soon generationally after the flood)

[Ethelred]

Originally posted by Zachriel
I'm really surprised at you Ethelred being so dogmatic.

Why? I am not being dogmatic. I only using what the Bible actually says. If you don't like what I am saying you don't like the Bible. Which is a good thing cause its a crock.

At no time did I say that the entire globe was flooded.

I see and YOU are named Jehovah not Zachriel then? The Bible doesn't agree with you Jehovah-Zachriel. The Bible is pretty clear. Everthing on the land died. Especially all humans.

All I said was that Noah reported that the entire land (as he knew it) was flooded, and that he told the truth (as he knew it).

He also reported what Jehova told him. Jehovah told him he was going to kill every single human except for Noah's family.

I take it you just don't like what the Bible really says. Neither do I but it is what it says. Fortunatly for me I know its a just story with little or no reality behind it.

This story was of such dramatic importance, that it was passed down for generations before being collected with other manuscripts in the Bible.

So why pretend its has religous significance and the real creator of all the life that Jehovah found so corrupt he even killed the children? Its real or it isn't. Its really Jehovah in the story or it isn't. You are trying to have your Jehovah and deny him too.

(The Black Sea flood predates the Pyramids.)

Yes it does but it does not predate Jericho.

The key though is the Biblical Flood does not predate the Pyramids. The timing isn't that hard to check. I even know of a site where the authors worried about the Flood having historical problems but the best they could manage was to say history is wrong because they simply could not find a way to move the Flood back to before 4400 years ago. In fact most have it more like 4300 years ago.

Just add up all that begatting. Its real clear. Even with people living many hundreds of years you still can't push it back before 4400 years ago without saying the Bible is wrong. Which it is of course.

What you doing is claiming the Bible is true whilst simultaneously saying its wrong and on the other hand you believe it. One or the other. Both is silly. All three at once is going to give you motion sickness.

[Ethelred]

Originally posted by MrBaggins


Aren't there skin pigmentation issues with this (I.E. where did blacks skined folk come so soon generationally after the flood)

Oh you don't have to go that way. No need for it. The genetics don't work for the versions of Noahs Flood that is in the Bible. At all.


What Zach is doing is giveing us the secular version like the Illiad is real in some sense but he still wants the gods in. Either that or he is agnostic and trying to be a major pain (troll).

[Zachriel]

It is interesting how you have tried to discredit a strong supporter of evolution and science by attempting to ascribe to him views which he has never had. Of further interest is that our only difference of opinion has been at most epistemological (or merely semantic, as I had warned).

To avoid being a "major pain" to anyone, I will try to limit my discussions of science to scientific forums -- where there are actual scientists.

(I do apologize for my use of the word "dogmatic.")

[Sarxis]

Gen 1:1- "In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth."

This fact is in dispute, and more precisely, the actual time of this event is in dispute. Wether you believe in a god that can create things from nothingness is a matter of faith, though the very existance of the universe proves that "His invisible attributes are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made" Rom 1:20.

Gen 1:2- "The earth was without form and void; and darkness was on the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God was hovering over the face of the waters."

This is perhaps the least understood, and most erroneous translation of scripture.

"The earth was without form and void.." The King James version is simply bad when it comes to translating this passage. In the Hebrew according to The New Strong's Exhaustive Concordance for the Bible (used as reference here throughout), the Hebrew word for 'without form' is 'tohuw' (phonetic), which means "to lie waste; a desolation (of surface) i.e. a desert; fig. a worthless thing; adv. in vain", and has also been translated as "confusion, empty place, without form, nothing, (thing of) nought, vain, vanity, waste, wilderness." in the KJV. The word 'void' in this passage is 'bohuw', meaning "a vacuity", i.e. (superficially) an indistinguishable ruin" and is translated elsewhere as "emptiness". The footnotes of my New American Standard Version bible actually state that these words can be translated as 'waste and emptiness'.

But the most egregious error in this passage is the translation of the word 'was'. The Hebrew word 'hayah' translated as 'was' here literally means "to exist". It is translated elsewhere in the KJV as "be(-come, accomplished, committed, like), break, cause, come (to pass), continue, do, faint, fall.. happen" etc. It is translated 'became' or 'becamest' over sixty times in other passages in the Old Testament. Some of the newer translations do use 'became' or an equivalent in this passage, or at least make specific note of the likelihood that this word is 'became'.

Therefore, the passage can also, and has also been, translated "..the earth became waste and empty..". This translation better resolves the next passage, which is much misunderstood: "..and darkness was on the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God was hovering over the face of the waters."

This passage makes NO SENSE if at this point, nothing exists. But obviously, at least four things exist according to this scripture: God, darkness, the deep, and the waters. I am not going to argue the existance of God or even darkness here, but I do want to clarify the definition of 'the deep'.

the deep: tehowm; an abyss (as a surging mass of water), espec. the deep (the main sea or the subterranean water-supply).

So thus far, we can see that there is at least a sea or large mass of water, with the Spirit of God hovering over it (space/time is necessary for that).

Later, in Gen 1:9- "Then God said, "Let the waters under the heavens be gathered together into one place, and let the dry land appear...".

Appear: ra'ah; to see; and not 'bara; to create'.

Gen 1:10- "And God called the dry land Earth..."

So thus far, what we have is a waste and emptiness that has become this way, and that indeed the dry land, or earth, is underneath, and is not created here, but already exists. This does not debunk the possibility that some time in the distant past, God very well could have created the universe, and that indeed, the Dinosaurs were destroyed by flood before Genesis chapter one, verse two.

This also gives new meaning to God's covenant with Noah in Gen 9:11, when he states, "Thus I establish my covenant with you: Never again shall all flesh be cut off by the waters of the flood, never again shall there be a flood to destroy the earth."

What is God saying here? Is he implying that the cataclysm of global flood has happened before? Of course the passage doesn't say that specifically, but it could be inferred.


But there is a passage in the Book of Jerimiah which is very intriguing. In this passage, the term 'formless and void' (waste and empty) appears once again only here:

Jer 4:23-26 "I beheld the earth, and indeed it was without form, and void; And the heavens, they had no light.
I beheld the mountains, and indeed they trembled, and all the hills moved back and forth.
I beheld, and indeed there was no man, And all the birds of the heavens had fled.
I beheld, and indeed the fruitful land was a wilderness, and all its cities were broken down At the presence of the Lord, By his fierce anger."

What is intriguing about this passage is how closely it parallels Genesis 1:2 in its description. In Genesis, the earth is waste and empty; in Jeremiah we see the same thing, only it seems to actually be in the process of happening! In Genesis, God must bring forth light, because in Jeremiah, we see the heavens witholding the light. In Genesis, we see God having to create the flora and fauna and man, because in Jeremiah, all that has been destroyed.

The second book of Peter best sums this up:

2 Peter chapter 3, versus 3 to 7: "..knowing this first: that scoffers will come in the last days...saying, 'Where is the promise of His coming? For since the fathers fell asleep, all things continue as they were from the beginning of creation." For this they willfully forget: that by the word of God the heavens were of old, and the earth standing out of the water and in the water, by which the world that then existed perished, being flooded with water. But the heavens and the earth which are now preserved by the same word, are reserved for fire until the day of judgment and perdition of ungodly men."

And there are other passages in the New Testament talking of the three 'Heavens and Earth': that which then was, that which is, and that which is to come.

I for one don't doubt the existance of a very ancient earth, and that the Dinosaurs- and whatever else was here on our planet- were destroyed by cataclysm in the ancient past. I also know that man and the world that we see now is also a very recent part of the epic story of our world. And there is also no reason that creationism and science can not come to the same conclusions, if indeed, both accounts are the truth.

As far as evolution, and how the universe came to exist in the first place..

I know God has those answers.

[Ethelred]

As far as evolution, and how the universe came to exist in the first place..

I know God has those answers.

I know the world around us has a lot of answers answers. Most of them anyway. We just have to look and think. You only THINK a god has the answers. That is something no one can know. Unless of course the god decides to quit being so cryptic.

You can play games with the first chapter of Genesis but it still has the wrong order of creation and there is still that little tiny Flood that didn't happen as the Bible describes it.

This also gives new meaning to God's covenant with Noah in Gen 9:11, when he states, "Thus I establish my covenant with you: Never again shall all flesh be cut off by the waters of the flood, never again shall there be a flood to destroy the earth."

Never happened anyway. So why do you even bother with:

What is God saying here? Is he implying that the cataclysm of global flood has happened before? Of course the passage doesn't say that specifically, but it could be inferred.

I prefer to infer from the physical evidence. No flood. Not world wide, not ever. Unless you want to talk about before life on earth. There may have been a time with no dry land billions of years ago but I doubt that myself.

Science and religion can coexist. Young Earth Creationism cannot and neither can the Flood.

[MrBaggins]

Originally posted by Anunikoba

Why didn't the flood leave evidence in ice cores, Sherlock?

god was all about leaving evidence in the things he created... why not in the frozen water molecules?

[monkspider]

Most of you are attacking straw men by still going after the "William Jennings Bryan"-type creationists.

[Lincoln]

Sorry everyone but you will have to be patient with the rest of the information debate. I was going to reply to McBragin's latest post and also to Etheired's but ming closed the thread. This one has already turned into a faith/science quagmire so I am not going to enter into this current discussion. I will be posting a seperate thread when I get a little more time on information and the source. By the way Eheired, thanks for actually reading the pdf file. We can discuss that when I get some more time, and the key term Mcbragin is "intelligent intervention" Read the pdf file and you will see why your GA solution is irrelevant. But anyway I hope to have time in a couple of days to do this subject justice. There may be still in the archives a thread called "The Blind Atheist" which will further explain the problem. So long for now.