From: I3150101@dbstu1.rz.tu-bs.de (Benedikt Rosenau)
Subject: Re: Where does Adam and Eve Fit In?
Organization: Technical University Braunschweig, Germany
Date: Sat, 23 Jan 1993 13:28:26 GMT

In article <1993Jan20.232345.19915@organpipe.uug.arizona.edu>
brian@lpl.arizona.edu (Brian Ceccarelli 602/621-9615) writes:
 
>
>In article <16B5C11F88.I3150101@dbstu1.rz.tu-bs.de> I3150101@dbstu1.rz.tu-bs.de (Benedikt Rosenau) writes
>concerning Brian Ceccarelli's post on the fact that the Creation Account in Genesis
>is a poem:
>
>>Most interesting. So the form has higher priority than the content?
>
>No. They go hand in hand.   Reading anything depends on its form.
>Do you look at C code and read it as iambic pentameter?
>
 
No, but I wouldn't expect Blank verses to run smoothly pass the syntax
check of my compiler. Not even to speak of generating code.
 
 
>>Have you never wondered why scientific texts are rarely written as
>>poems?
>
>Exactly the point.
>
>About the possible non-chronologic sequence of days in the
>creation . . .
>
 
My point is, when it is a truth, that is so important as
biblical truths are supposed to be, the form interfered
with the content. In other words, there was truth destroyed.
 
 
>>Another creative interpretation. That way, one can derive any form
>>of information out of the text, which basically means that it does
>>not reflect the knowledge of the author but of the interpreter. Or
>>better, it reflects the *intent* of the interpreter, and the intent
>>of the author is lost.
>
>The idea is to reflect the intention of the writer.  Moses was
>Hebrew and he was writing poetry.  Hebrew poets do what Hebrew
>poets do.  They rhyme thoughts.  Chronology is not the first thing
>in a Hebrew poet's mind.  Do you read poetry like a scientific
>discourse?  Do you impress your girlfriend or wife by reading to
>her do loops and case statements?  My wife would look at me
>mighty strange if I did that to her!
>
 
My girlfriend wonders about a lot of things I do.
But she would wonder even more when I would tell
her that fables and fairy tales from the orient
are the big Truth.
 
>
>>And then you say that he has never heard of science. There goes plausibility.
>
>A person that never has heard of science is implausible?  Since
>when?
>
 
It is more or less an axiom that anything that is not derived by the
scientific method, and it is important to note that most people use
it anyway, though not rigidly, will make statements that are correct
only by chance.
 
In the case of the author(s) of Genesis, they make statements about
how the world came into action, yet there is hardly a consistent system
that allows them to make such conclusions, nor are there any ways given
how to check out if that model makes reliable predictions.
 
In other words, fantasies can have similarities in reality, but
most of the time they have not.
 
>>And it raises the interesting question, if Moses (or whoever wrote the
>>books that are attributed to him) could have cared less, why hasn't he?
>
>I think you need to reread my original paragraph.
>
 
If he has got a truth to tell, he hasn't been careful enough.
 
 
>>Anyway, as far as denouncing (our god is bigger than theirs) goes, the story
>>tells that god used to care for all humans, but all the other people have
>>fallen from grace.
>>
>
>Maybe you should read the story before interpreting it for them. Or do
>you believe, Benedikt, that one  can tell us the plot and details and
>purpose of a book and all its characters without reading it?  Guess
>what?  Your two presumptions have no basis.  They are Biblically
>incorrect.
>
 
What do you mean? Do you dispute that there are sayings in the OT
like that god makes a deal with only a subset of humans?
And that those who worship figurative gods are an abomination?
And that the deal is not made with them?
 
Biblically incorrect, what a joke. Show me that it is not in the
bible.
   Benedikt
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