Neanderthals and the Bible?

by uncle_onion 52 Replies latest jw friends

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  aChristian

  Before saying that the Genesis account of creation contradicts science we should keep in mind that Genesis uses the Hebrew word for "create," Bara, only in describing God's bringing into existence the heavens and earth, life in the sea and mankind. All other kinds of life, vegetation and animals, Genesis tells us, were not directly "created" by God but were "produced" by "the land." (vs.11,12, 24) Hebrew lexicons tell us that "Bara," Hebrew for "create," refers to "the initiation" of something, while the Hebrew words translated in Genesis 1 as "produced" refer to "the fashioning of", or the changing shape of, preexisting materials. These things being so, I believe Genesis chapter one not only allows for the possibility that God used evolutionary processes to bring about all life on earth, but actually strongly indicates that He did so.

  I believe God "created" the human race by giving highly evolved primates moral consciences and the ability to grasp concepts such as eternity, morality, justice and God, and by giving His new creations eternal spirits.

  I believe Genesis chapter 1 tells us of Gods creation of the human race and that Genesis chapter 2 tells us of God's creation of Adam and Eve, an event which took place tens, or even hundreds, of thousands of years later.

  Edited by - aChristian on 12 March 2001 16:0:30
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  jelly

  Good post Achristian. That is exactly my view of the genesis account also, I really do not understand why fundies are so upset with the thought of evolution. I think there are three things we can learn from the genesis account: (1) The bible is very hard to understand (2) mans understanding is often flawed (esp. fundies) (3) when understood the bible can be a marvel.
  Jelly
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  uncle_onion

  Thanks everyone for their help

  The point of veiw that achristian put forward is interesting but then would that not God out to be a liar? He has put an account in the Bible that is not true?

  Let me explain where I am coming from on this.

  In my quest to find truth, I have tried to examine everything.I used to be a Prison Officer and one of my duties was to be a Dock officer in a court of law. I would have to sit for days, next to a prisoner that was being tried. After the Prosecution had finished, I used to think that if I were a member of the Jury, I would have no trouble convicting this man for the crime that he had been tried for, and could go home and have a clean conscience. HOWEVER I had only heard one side of the story and now the defence had to have their turn.And sometimes, after hearing the defence, my opinion changed.

  I feel as JWs that we have only heard one side of the story and have been presented with the "facts" for one side of the story. I am to put that right now and that is why I am searching everything.

  Deep down, I want to believe that there is a God and I know that you can not prove this conclusively, as you can not see him and it requires faith. But how does it fit in with History?

  I have one question that I hope that some one can answer: If there is no God, How do people speak in tongues at churches? Whether this is from a good or bad source, where does it come from if there is not a God?

  Uncle onion
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  Delilah blue

  For some further fun reading, check out http://reptile.users2.50megs.com/research/r110199a.html
  As I was looking up some info on my nationality, Basque, I came across this . Can you imagine my surprise when I read about the o-neg blood which I and most of my family have. Amusing reading.
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  waiting

  Hey uncle onion,

  We chatted briefly this morning and you gave me the address to your website - which I promptly did not write down. Duh.

  Would you post it for me and my sister? Thank you.

  waiting
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  uncle_onion

  sure www.607v587.com
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  jelly

  Why do you consider the genesis account untrue. I agree with everything Achristian has said and I think that the genesis account is a good brief outline for creation. If you think about it when you write something you can make it timeless, or scientific but not both God just choose to make the creation account vague so it would be timeless. If God chose to be scientific the tribal men he gave his word to would not understand it. The genesis account just states that God created the heavens and the earth, that life on earth started simply and progressed untile the creation of man.
  Sometimes also when you think about how Jesus spoke it can help to understand the rest of the bible, Jesus used stories to convey a 'truth' even though the story might not have been true, like the rich man and lazerus (sp?). Jesus was speaking metaphorically, there was never a rich man and lazuras but the message conveyed can be considerd a truth.
  Jelly (who believes in creation and evolution)
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  Thirdson

  Uncle,

  I found the full article on Early Australians. It is not quite what I said earlier but that the difference in early Australian's mtDNA compared to modern humans doesn't discount them as being modern humans and thus Neandertal mtDNA differences does not infer a different species. We could well be related if not sharing some ancestry.

  Thirdson

  This is the article from Scientific American.
  

  HUMAN ORIGINS
  DNA from Ancient Australians

  The study of modern human origins has traditionally relied on fossil and archaeological data, and genetic studies of living populations. But in recent years researchers have succeeded in retrieving ancient DNA from fossils, adding a compelling new data set to the mix. So far, scientists have focused on DNA from Neandertals, a population of archaic humans who inhabited Europe and western Asia. The sample size is small (DNA from three specimens has been analyzed), but the results indicate that Neandertal DNA—at least the DNA from the cell's energy-producing organs, the mitochondria—differed from our own. As a result, a number of researchers concluded that Neandertals must therefore have been a separate species. Critics, however, have charged that without mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) data from anatomically modern humans of similar antiquity for comparison, such differences are virtually meaningless. Now new research published today in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences is filling in that gap, and the results may force some scholars to reconsider the evolutionary position of the Neandertals.

  Gregory J. Adcock of the Australian National University and his colleagues retrieved and studied mtDNA from the fossilized remains of 10 ancient but anatomically modern Australians, including a 60,000-year-old specimen known as Lake Mungo 3 (LM3). Intriguingly, like the Neandertal mtDNA studies, analysis of the LM3 sequence revealed an mtDNA lineage that no longer exists as such in living humans. "If the mtDNA present in a modern human (LM3) can become extinct, then perhaps something similar happened to the mtDNA of Neandertals," population geneticist John H. Relethford of the State University of New York at Oneonta writes in a commentary accompanying the PNAS report. "If so, then the absence of Neandertal mtDNA in living humans does not reject the possibility of some genetic continuity with modern humans." That is, the much maligned Neandertals may well be among our ancestors. —Kate Wong

  'To avoid criticism, say nothing, do nothing, be nothing'
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  circare

  Thanks Uncle Onion and Thirdson for finding this info and sharing.

  I can't say that I understand very well what is being said but I do find it interesting. I was wondering if anyone knew if they have been able to extract any of the mt(DNA) of the Cro-Magnons and if these have been compared to the Neanderthals as well as modern man? I have done a little 'surfing' but haven't been able to find anything relevant yet.
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  patio34

  I have just started my search outside of WTS. Am reading books by Richard Dawkins, Carl Sagan, etc. I personally don't think the answers as to how everything fits will be clear for a long time, if ever. As a friend says "whenever anyone says the KNOW how things happened, I start backing away." It may be our background as jws (decades for me) that makes one feel there is a black and white answer for everything. I don't want any labels, such as "atheist," "agnostic," etc. It's enough for now just to be learning different points of view. Maybe "secular" is good.