Talk:Genesis creation narrative/Archive 1

message: --- Begin save container for a word for word translation 
In the first section, birds are described as being created as follows:
*"'elohiym 'amar mayim sharats sherets nephesh chay `owph `uwph `al 'erets paniym raqiya` shamayim."
*Literally, "God said waters bring forth creature having life birds fly above earth open firmament heaven"
It is unclear to biblical translators whether the passage should be divided as:
*"God said waters bring forth creature and God said birds fly above earth", or 
*"God said waters bring forth creature having life and waters bring forth birds fly above earth."  
Due to this ambiguity in the text, English translations differ.
--- End save container for a word for word translationg
What was wrong with the above word for word translation?  I thought it explained the issue of this page rather clearly--and rather efficiently. :)) After all, the point of this page is to explain why some people think the two recitations of events differ, is it not?  Without something like the above--or an alternative word for word explanation--people like me will not know what on earth this page is talking about!  :((  What do you think?  ---Rednblu | Talk 16:17, 8 Nov 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: i like it ... any dissent?  Ungtss 16:24, 8 Nov 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: The word-for-word translation is VERY IMPORTANT. It explains why people actually bother discussing this point. CheeseDreams 19:47, 8 Nov 2004 (UTC)
thread_title:  Clarity please, with these "birds" 

message: ---
=== Conclusions if there is one account ===
[Identify the proponents of the one account version by name here and summarize their conclusions.]
=== Conclusions if there are two accounts ===
[Identify the proponents of the two accounts version by name here and summarize their conclusions.]
=== Scholarly alternative: The texts can be read either way ===
Biblical scholar Pamela Tamarkin Reis (2001) proposes that Genesis 1 and 2 can be seen as either one painting with two panels or as two separate paintings.  Both are appropriate.  She draws the parallel with the ancient story-telling technique that Kurosawa employed in the movie Rashomon.  In that movie, the same series of events are told through the eyes of four different people, and of course realistically there are contradictions in the different narratives.  And you could make sense out that movie either as four different stories or as four people having four different realistic narratives of the same story.
Accordingly, Ms. Reis analyzes Genesis 1 as God's narrative and Genesis 2 as man's narrative. In Genesis 1, the style of narration is very orderly and logical, proceeding from basics like heaven and earth, through plants and animals to man and woman. And everything is "good" or "very good." Ms. Reis suggests that the story-teller has a bit of whimsy in noting how perfect everything is from God's view.
In contrast, in Genesis 2, man tells the story from his own self-centeredness.  Man is created first, of course. And there are a few flaws.  Man is alone, without a woman.  Whereas, in Genesis 1, the phrase is "heaven and earth" repeated several times, in Genesis 2, God makes "earth and heaven."  And another thing, in Genesis 2, there is that troubling notice that "there was no one to till the ground."  That sounds like a lot of work, an unending task--very unlike the completeness of Genesis 1.
Even the words used in Genesis 1 suggest serenity, the godly plane of existence.  For example, in Genesis 1, the word for God is Elohim, the generic and distant God, while God's name in Genesis 2 is the personal and very sacred YHWH Elohim, the Lord of God.  Even the verb of making is different in the two narratives, in the first narrative the verb is the Hebrew "arb" which means "create from nothing," something that only God can do.  In contrast, the verb in the second narrative means "make"; God "made earth and heaven."  Maybe man cannot make earth and heaven, but at least man can make many things from what is already at hand.  And then there is that interesting inventory of gold and lapis lazuli and where they can be found--only in the second narrative, of course.  From God's view in the first narrative, gold is not even mentioned; gold is something of interest only in man's narrative.
From all of these clues, Ms. Reis suggests that Genesis 1 and 2 make sense either way, just as for Kurosawa's Rashomon.  They make sense as two different stories.  Or they make sense as two narratives of the same story from different personal perspectives: that of God and that of man.
*IMO, a very good observation and summary. Just as two or three witnesses' accounts of an event may differ in detail and perspective yet can still all be true in what they tell and relate to the same event, so too with the Genesis 1 & 2 renderings of creation. From a Wiki-NPOV perspective this is not an attempt to prove creation, however it does indicate one position from which the creation account can be interpreted. - HTUK 13:05, 1 September 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Begin preservation container of cut text 

message: Biblical scholar Pamela Tamarkin Reis (2001) proposes that Genesis 1 and 2 can be seen as either one painting with two panels or as two separate paintings.  Both are appropriate.  She draws the parallel with the ancient story-telling technique that Kurosawa employed in the movie Rashomon.  In that movie, the same series of events are told through the eyes of four different people, and of course realistically there are contradictions in the different narratives.  And you could make sense out that movie either as four different stories or as four people having four different realistic narratives of the same story.
Accordingly, Ms. Reis analyzes Genesis 1 as God's narrative and Genesis 2 as man's narrative. In Genesis 1, the style of narration is very orderly and logical, proceeding from basics like heaven and earth, through plants and animals to man and woman. And everything is "good" or "very good." Ms. Reis suggests that the story-teller has a bit of whimsy in noting how perfect everything is from God's view.
In contrast, in Genesis 2, man tells the story from his own self-centeredness.  Man is created first, of course. And there are a few flaws.  Man is alone, without a woman.  Whereas, in Genesis 1, the phrase is "heaven and earth" repeated several times, in Genesis 2, God makes "earth and heaven."  And another thing, in Genesis 2, there is that troubling notice that "there was no one to till the ground."  That sounds like a lot of work, an unending task--very unlike the completeness of Genesis 1.
Even the words used in Genesis 1 suggest serenity, the godly plane of existence.  For example, in Genesis 1, the word for God is Elohim, the generic and distant God, while God's name in Genesis 2 is the personal and very sacred YHWH Elohim, the Lord of God.  Even the verb of making is different in the two narratives, in the first narrative the verb is the Hebrew "arb" which means "create from nothing," something that only God can do.  In contrast, the verb in the second narrative means "make"; God "made earth and heaven."  Maybe man cannot make earth and heaven, but at least man can make many things from what is already at hand.  And then there is that interesting inventory of gold and lapis lazuli and where they can be found--only in the second narrative, of course.  From God's view in the first narrative, gold is not even mentioned; gold is something of interest only in man's narrative.
From all of these clues, Ms. Reis suggests that Genesis 1 and 2 make sense either way, just as for Kurosawa's Rashomon.  They make sense as two different stories.  Or they make sense as two narratives of the same story from different personal perspectives: that of God and that of man.
*IMO, a very good observation and summary. Just as two or three witnesses' accounts of an event may differ in detail and perspective yet can still all be true in what they tell and relate to the same event, so too with the Genesis 1 & 2 renderings of creation. From a Wiki-NPOV perspective this is not an attempt to prove creation, however it does indicate one position from which the creation account can be interpreted. - HTUK 13:05, 1 September 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Scholarly alternative: The texts can be read either way 

message: I find from the history file that someone took out a paragraph with the following comment
: "this is pov personal research.  find me one reputable scholar who . . ."
And then I find that someone else put the disputed paragraph back in, making the following comment
: "Restore text removed for horrifically POV reasons"
Let me remind all of us that according to Wikipedia policy, "NPOV is absolute and non-negotiable."  And according to the Wikipedia NPOV explanations, the way NPOV is achieved is by citing to the proponents of the different POVs.  So it is very correct, according to Wikipedia NPOV policy to remove disputed comments for which the proponents are not identified.  "Some say . . ." does not work without a citation if it is not obvious that "Some say . . . ."  I quote you from the Wikipedia NPOV policy page
* "Wikipedia is devoted to stating facts and only facts. Where we might want to state opinions, we convert that opinion into a fact by attributing the opinion to someone."    
So whoever said "find me one reputable scholar who . . ." said the right thing.  This is Wikipedia after all!  ---Rednblu | Talk 00:07, 10 Nov 2004 (UTC)
thread_title:  Reminder!  We are supposed to be writing [[NPOV]] articles 

message: It seems that this artucle uses "textual criticism" and "textual critic" throughout, when it is actually referring to "source criticism" and "source critic."
I'm particularly troubled by the sentence: 
"The small minority[citation needed] of academics rejecting the methodology of textual criticism, as well as non-academic Creationists, argue that when a biblical text is measured against the scholar's own concept of unity and found wanting, this probably says more about the biblical scholar's sense of unity than about the text's prehistory. (Carr 24)."
 which seems to imply that conservatives who reject the two-source theory are rejecting textual criticism (when in fact many of them are very active textual critics).  I propose that in this section (and elsewhere in the article) the term textual criticism be replaced with source criticism, the term "textual critic" be replaced by "source critic" and this particular sentence be altered to read "Some question the methodology of source criticism in passages like this and argue that[...]" This would both help in avoiding arguments over loaded terms like "small minority" and "academic", and improve the accuracy of the statement.  I know many conservative biblicists who would agree with the above argument with respect to source criticism in the Pentatech, but fully accept the methods of source criticism elsewhere (e.g. in identifying Q-quotations in the Gospels), and use the same text-critical methodology as any more liberal scholar would.
Demmeis 03:28, 11 April 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Terminology

message: And anonymous editor inserted the following statement into the article, regarding the use of "Jehovah" in Genesis 2:4&ndashGenesis 2:24
:(However, anyone who knows Hebrew can check the text and see that this statement is wrong - the title "God" (elohim) is used in the first chapter, consistantly "Jehova God" is used in chapters 2 and 3, only in chapter 4 do we find Jehova used alone.)
I reverted simply because inserting an editorial comment into the article is not appropriate.  Either the article should have been corrected, or the matter discussed on this talk page.  Not being a Hebrew reader, I don't know whether either the claim or counter claim is correct, so I hope that someone will clarify that.  (If the anonymous editor's counter claim is correct, how do we correct the article?)  Perhaps Ungtss, who appears to have inserted the original claim, can add his two cents' worth?   Philip J. Rayment 09:06, 28 Jan 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: i really appreciate your knowledge on the subject -- silly me, i just took those idiots who support the JEDP idea at their word -- but i looked it up -- and you're right -- it's Jehovah Elohim -- so i fixed it:).  what to do now with all the BibKrit material that falsely says that genesis 2 uses Jehovah exclusively:)?  it sounds as tho you have a great knowledge of hebrew -- do you have any other insight into these issues which could further benefit the page?  Ungtss 12:50, 30 Jan 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Anonymous edit re JEPD 

message: The bias of this article is a little too anti-documentary-hypothesis.  In order to counteract this, I have added a link with a more critical view of the "Moses wrote the first five books" viewpoint. Samboy 22:29, 28 Mar 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  The bias of this article is a little too anti-documentary-hypothesis 

message: The Existance of this page
This page was recently created by someone for POV reasons. It entirely duplicates the Creation accounts in Genesis page. It is now a candidate for deletion, for NPOV reasons. User:CheeseDreams
I don't see why this should have been merged (I can't see much relevance), but it was tagged for merging -- I guess it might be of use to someone, so here you have it. Robinoke 21:50, 12 May 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: Merged From: Talk:Creation account in Genesis

message: I believe there is no legitimate form of the word 'nothing' in Latin that is spelled 'nihilio,' though I could find no satisfactory confirmation; however, 'nihilo' seems to be the accurate word used in the Doctrine of the Eternity of Matter.
Anyone versed in Latin?
The headword is 'nihilum' (also 'nihilominus' and 'nilum').
'Nihilio' is not a word.66.156.79.45 02:43, 29 November 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  de nihilio [or nihilo?] nihil, in nihilum nil posse reverti--The Doctrine of the Eternity of Matter 

message: The article is just badly written - it's sophomoric. Delete, and save us all the embarrassment of its existence.
PiCo 12:15, 27 September 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Delete? 

message: The last point appears to be unsubstantiated.  IMHO to state that numbers in the Bible rarely have significance requires a reference. "It is appointed unto man once to die ..." has numerical significance. Dan Watts 15:42, 3 November 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Literary intent 

message: The article reads "The level to which the story is taken at its literal meaning is in part related to how theologically conservative or theologically liberal the interpreter is."
Why do you here exclude non-Christians, agnostics or atheists?  Surely they have opinions too about the nature of Creation according to Genesis!
Regards John D. Croft 04:16, 9 February 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Exclusion of Agnostic or Atheist positions

message: "[M]odern documentary hypothesis is currently supported by over 90% of academics in the field." — Show some reference for this statement or remove it. Dan Watts 01:19, 17 April 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: JEDP Hypothesis

message: I propose to split this page in to Creation according to Judaism, Creation according Christianity, etc. As both understand Genesis totally differently and have very different ideas. 
Judaism holds the Hebrew grammatically correct translation the first verse is: "In the beginning of God's creating the heavens and the earth." Rashi refutes the reading of the verse as "In the beginning [of everything] God created the heavens and the earth", as it is illogical, due to the fact that, in the next verse, water is mentioned before having been created. Indeed, water is never said to be created in the Genesis account of creation. The Jewish understanding of Genesis has no similarities and is incompatible with the Christian understanding.
I propose this split because the viewpoints have no similarities. ems (not to be confused with the nonexistant pre-dating account by the same name) 10:15, 7 May 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: It's a legitimate complaint. The article is a mish-mash of differing traditions. I tried to edit the stories so they stick more closely to the text and clearly identify the dusk of the sixth day material as part of the Jewish tradition.--agr 15:52, 1 June 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Proposing split 

message: 3/6/0 (for/against/neutral)
*Support ems (not to be confused with the nonexistant pre-dating account by the same name) 10:15, 7 May 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Survey

message: * Many Jewish translation are the grammatically correct version. Artscroll, The Gutnick Chumash (will check), The Living Torah. The Judaica Press, Samson Raphael Hirsch's German translation, etc. While the most notable one translates grammatically wrong is the public domain JPS edition. ems (not to be confused with the nonexistant pre-dating account by the same name) 10:44, 7 May 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: It's a legitimate complaint. The article is a mish-mash of differing traditions. I tried to edit the stories so they stick more closely to the text and clearly identify the dusk of the sixth day material as part of the Jewish tradition.--agr 15:52, 1 June 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Comments

message: This is not a "weasel word" usage, but is a direct reference to the very real fact that people who believe the Bible is inspired by God have a variety of views regarding what "inspired by God" means. The relevant Wikipedia article is Biblical inspiration. (Greeneto 00:18, 6 June 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: My mistake.  I mistook "in some way" as some kind of ambiguity.  Of course, I thought to my self, that's ridiculous as people either think that the Bible is inspired by God or it is not.  If did not even occur to me that there are different ideas of inspiration.  El Cubano 00:33, 6 June 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Use of phrase "in some way" with "inspired by God" 

message: The section on chapter 2 begins "Chapter 2 continues with what some consider to be a different account of creation."  Not everybody views it that way, so I added Others consider it to be an account of the details of Day 6.  Wdanwatts reverted the change, saying in his edit summary I don't see how a comment on day 6 covers chapter 2.  I propose to reinstate the sentence with the following citations:   Any other opinions? PrometheusX303 21:24, 20 June 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I stand corrected. Your references show a clear and reasonable exegesis. (I believe that including the references will make the statement quite unassailable.) Dan Watts 04:53, 21 June 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I should have included them to begin with. PrometheusX303 12:34, 21 June 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Chapter 2 

message: There is a clear inaccuracy in the statement "Those who treat Genesis as an historical description take the Genesis 1 creation account to be teaching that the creation events took place over six successive days of 24 hours each." Later, under the heading Timescale this is contradicted: (a)nother theory, propounded by The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, holds that the word "day" may also be understood to mean "separate period of time," and thus the time-scale for God having organized the earth from existing matter could extend over thousands or even millions of years of "earth time," In addition to the Mormons, Jehovah's Witnesses and some other groups also take the Day-Age view that the Biblical "day" represents a time period of more than 24 literal hours, yes all these groups consider Genesis an historical account insofar as it outlines the activities of God and the order of creation "in the beginning".
I'm inclined to rewrite that initial statement along these lines: "Among those who consider Genesis Chapters 1 & 2 an historical account, some believe creation took place over six literal 24 hour periods (Young Earth creation view), while others contend that each creative "day" represents a period or age of indeterminate length (Day-Age creation view)"
Will wait a few days to see what people think, then edit as above if no pertinent objections are raised - HTUK 13:38, 1 September 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I'd take out "Chapters 1 & 2" from the text you propose.--agr 15:05, 1 September 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Ok, have amended accordingly. Took out "Chapters 1 & 2" from the above as suggested, as I don't think it changes the essential meaning although it was in there originally to refer more specifically to the creation account itself, not other aspects of Genesis. - HTUK 00:28, 8 September 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Overview - historical description, literal days?

message: Has anyone ever proposed having an article for Genesis 1, Genesis 2, Genesis 3, and on and on throughout the entire bible?  It might seem extreme, but such an important document should be looked at as closely as possible.  Someone please direct me to the page on wikipedia where this matter is being discussed. - ShadowyCabal 19:22, 16 October 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: You are welcome to start. If others see them as unnessisary they might put them up for deletion. But there is nothing to stop you starting. There is no page to discuss new article proposals - you just start writing. --Michael Johnson 05:12, 18 October 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I support your idea.  Let me call to your attention two parallel projects, although neither may be responsive to your interests:  There is an article on Genesis 1:1, and see the discussion page there at Talk:Genesis 1:1.  But see the discussion of the related discussion of including the text as such at Wikipedia:Centralized discussion/Whole bible chapter text.  And there are articles on each of the 54 portions of the first five books in the Bible that are read in Synagogues on a weekly basis.  These tend to be three or four chapters each.  For example, see Bereishit (parsha), Noach (parsha), and the rest cited at the bottom of each of those pages.--Dauster 08:01, 18 October 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Bible by Chapter

message: What is the reason for the two versions here? I think this format is inappropriate.--agr 04:25, 27 November 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I removed the second story as duplicative.  --agr 10:41, 28 November 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Story 1 - Story 2 

message: The article says that "...many copies of Shakespeare mention his death." I don't think so. This statement needs to be verified or removed. PiCo 07:05, 16 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Shakespeare's been cloned?  :)  Probably means many of Shakespeare's works.  But it's a new one to me either way. Prometheus-X303- 07:42, 17 December 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Shakespeare and Genesis