My flood questions

by Moxy 43 Replies latest jw friends

• 

  Yadirf

  Hillary_Step
  

  If you check a decent Hebrew lexicon you will find many alternate possible renditions of this phrase, including the most likely, ''everything that stands in the land'.*

  But you didn’t say which ONE out of the “many alternate possible renditions” you are fond of. Oh, that’s right you said “the most likely” … which I suppose reflect your thinking. Of course, “everything that stands in the land” CAN conceivably equate with “every existing thing that I have made off the surface of the ground”. “In the land”? What land? The land where the animals and mankind resided? Where was that? What about the Dinosaurs? They were part of the “every existing thing that I have made”. Where do the facts show they lived? In Noah’s neck of the woods? No sweat there, that I can see. Besides, the water canopy thing pretty much proves that the Flood had to have been earthwide.

  ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

  Moxy
  

  friday: your having god warp animals around and now youre talking about what kind of rainfall is 'reasonable' for god to make. cant you see a certain inconsistency here?

  Hey, I didn’t realize that you were paying that close of attention. No I DON’T see any inconsistency on my part, because I consistently used reason in each case. 1)You have to admit that God had the capability to DIRECTLY transfer some of the animals into the Ark. 2)You also have to admit that the Bible indicates that the Flood’s source was the earth-enveloping canopy that God placed there at earth’s creation. The question then remains: Did God have a REASON to cause it to miraculously rain out of a cloud for 40 days and nights? No he didn’t, and because of that it isn’t reasonable to go that route with one’s logic.

  and yet even literalists dont think 'every creature that has the breath of life in it' includes marine life. do you? certainly there are many cases where the bible clearly uses words like 'all' and 'every' in ways that are less than absolute. im sure i dont need to furnish examples.

  In case you don’t realize it (I do) ... what you’re doing is merely jumping to ANOTHER objection without first acknowledging that one had been answered. Namely, the fact about the water canopy … the logical source for the waters. That’s not the way to participate in an fair exchange of ideas.

  Now, God had said: “I will wipe every existing thing that I have made off the surface of the ground.” Actually, then, those creatures that are water bound wouldn’t be threatened particularly. However, the birds, land animals, and mankind would … because these live on the land. When I said “every existing thing that God had made takes in every living creature,” I said that in response to your having suggested that the Flood wasn’t necessarily intended to destroy all mankind. That’s the reason I asked you, “So how is it that you say that the Deluge account doesn’t require that the Deluge destroy all mankind? Rather than answer THAT though, you choose to pick at somewhere I might not have made myself perfectly clear enough about so as to prevent a faultfinder from having anything to pick at. I think that it's ironic that you earlier asked me: "Why do you persist in stubbornly making war with your brothers?" I honestly think that you need to ask that question of yourself. Since it has become plain to you and me both, I believe, that we’re not going to be able to communicate, I’ll address your one last comment and call it that.

  why does it matter what i believe? i was simply relating what the majority of christians believe and asking why you wish to hold to views that oppose them all.

  Why did that seem to hit a sore spot with you? You had said: “the bible itself is open to many interpretations.” I merely responded to that by saying that you are probably an example of that, because you were unclear, one way or the other. Touchy, touchy! Why?

  Yadirf

  Daniel 11:35 ... a prophecy that must be fulfilled before the "time of the end" gets underway.
• 

  Moxy

  hillary_step: thx. i actually had not heard about this find. but you're right, i was deliberately avoiding adding too many items that relied on radiocarbon dating. in fact, i believe most of my questions can be answered using science from 100 years ago. (note however that radioactive dating as a practice is about a hundred years old. C14 dating came later.)

  homer simpson: "hmmmm.... cheddaaar goorge..."

  friday: i have tried to be fair and cover and all points concisely. i apologize if i was too brief.

  i believe there are two points on the table. 1) the water canopy 2) indications in the biblical text of the global nature of the Deluge.

  water canopy

  i did kind of skip over the water canopy a bit, merely stating that i thought your use of logic about what you thought was a reasonable way for god to cause rainfall was inconsistent with earlier comments. after all, couldnt your arguments be easily swapped? like so:

  You have to admit that God had the capability to DIRECTLY transfer some of the animals into the Ark

  You have to admit that God had the capability to make it rain in a LOCAL area, just like rain normally does.

  Did God have a REASON to cause it to miraculously rain out of a cloud for 40 days and nights? No he didn’t, and because of that it isn’t reasonable to go that route with one’s logic.

  Did God have a REASON to flood antarctica and south america and transport animals out of there? No he didn’t, and because of that it isn’t reasonable to go that route with one’s logic.

  all i want to illustrate is that the biblical text, taken alone, allows for a variety of interpretation and therefore our extrabiblical knowledge can be useful in determining which is more likely.

  i hadnt really wanted to go into much more depth regarding the viability of the water canopy and thats why i had left it at that. however, if you wanted to have further exchange on that subject, maybe you could tell me a few things:

  1) do you think the bible's description of 'the waters above' allows for alternate interpretations? e.g. clouds?
  2) how is it that 'the Bible indicates that the Flood’s source was the earth-enveloping canopy?'
  3) do you think that there is extrabiblical evidence for the water canopy?

  if you could answer one or all of those, i would have a better idea where to go with that discussion. thanks.

  textual evidence of global nature of Deluge

  here are the verses, just in Chapter 6, that i think someone might use to support a global nature (NIV):

  vs7 "I will wipe mankind, whom I have created, from the face of the earth--men and animals, and creatures that move along the ground, and birds of the air."

  vs13 "I am going to put an end to all people."

  vs17 "I am going to bring floodwaters on the earth to destroy all life under the heavens, every creature that has the breath of life in it. Everything on earth will perish."

  Now you quoted the first one, and demonstrated that 'move along the ground' implies land animals, and i agree with you. perhaps you did not notice, because again, i was being brief and didnt call attention to it, that I had used the last one: 'every creature that has the breath of life in it' in vs17. now this sounds much stronger, doesnt it? especially the entire verse, which even mentions 'all life under the heavens' and 'everything on earth.' surely you would agree that we cant take those verses at face value but must rather apply a little reasoning to exactly what the author meant by 'all' and 'every' and 'everything.' please understand i am not arguing that the bible is in error here. i believe this is a perfectly valid literary device in hebrew. to use absolute words with unstated and implied qualifications. in this case, we all agree that some unstated qualification are 'except those in the ark' and 'except marine life.' cant we perhaps add 'except those outside the known land' and still be perfectly within the bounds of the language? surely we would make that application to pauls words regarding the good news at Rom 10:18:

  'Their voice has gone out into all the earth, their words to the ends of the world.'

  Interestingly, the original recipients of this message would have no need to add qualifications to pauls use of 'all the earth,' for in the limits of their geographical knowledge, the good news probably had gone into 'all the earth' and it is only later extrabiblical evidence, geography and archeology that forces us to add the qualification 'all the known earth.' similarly, a multitude a extrabibilical evidences force us to add qualifications to the global words in the Deluge text.

  and also, i assure you that you did not hit 'a sore spot.' i objected to your line of questioning because i was presenting the views of the majority of modern christian scholars and asking why you wanted to fight against other christians. by speculating about what I believed, i really felt you were avoiding my point. since that was really the only reason i addressed you originally, as you will note, to offer 'hopefully a more Christian viewpoint,' and since you havent yet addressed that question, i was frustrated with your attempt to turn the question around. i would still appreciate it if you would try and meet that question in my first post to you more directly.

  thanks.

  mox
• 

  Frenchy

  Belial's argument against war with heaven:
  192.Not more almighty to resist our might
  193.Than wise to frustrate all our plots and wiles.
  --Paradise Lost by John Milton

  It must be remembered that the account is presented as an act of God, a miracle. How does one present 'evidence' against God? What is it that exists for our inspection that is beyond the reach of God?
• 

  JanH

  Moxy,

  I wrote a little text against the idea that a "local flood" scenario can be harmonized with the Bible:

  http://home.broadpark.no/~jhauglan/localflood.htm

  If you have any comments, I'd like to hear them.

  I think even if you leave textual concerns aside, the points I rise in "where was the flood?" actually refutes the local flood scenario totally.

  I am of course not arguing against the idea that a real, local flood somewho inspired the flood legends. What I will argue is that you can't say that Noah and the Ark literally existed and that the events in Genesis actually happened roughly as described, and at the same time argue a local flood. It is simply not possible, since there is nowehere for the Ark to have been.

  The global flood scenario is absurd and impossible for a number of other reasons, and that is covered adequately elsewhere, e.g. http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/faq-noahs-ark.html

  - Jan
  --
  "Doctor how can you diagnose someone with Obsessive Compulsive Disorder and then act like I had some choice about barging in here right now?" -- As Good As It Gets