According to the bible.....what were birds made of? (page 6)

shotgun

Shotgun - we all know that storks bring babies! Do you know what kind of bird keeps the babies away though?

Just a guess...A Swallow!

imallgrowedup

If the bible writer said he made light on the first day, but the sun (luminary) on the 4th day, do you think this bible writer was speaking about somewhere else in space he made some light, or was he talking about this planet? If he was talking about this planet....which he was, then WHERE did the "light" come from if the sun hadn't been created till the 4th day?

Could it be that since Jesus refers to himself as "the light", and it is generally believed that he was created first, that this is the "light" the bible is referring to in this particular instance?

growedup

Kaethra

Ding Ding Ding! Somehow, I knew you'd get it! lol

ok...back to the regularly scheduled serious topic. :)

tazmaniac

According to the bible they were made from the lower rib of the teradactyl

peacefulpete

Gumby read my last post. Your confusion is understandable and that was a great question.

gumby

Gumby read my last post.

I did pete, but I still don't see what your getting at.....like I said, I guess I'm dumb.

Gumby

I'm unable to edit for some reason again. After rereading my post I can see why it was unclear. Simply said each of the first 3 days are in preparation for the corresponding next three days. As Leolaia said the Luminaries were reckoned as distinct from the light they gave off. Our modern linear thinking disallows this but to myth makers there was nothing strange. Follow the pattern for day two and 5 as well as 3 and 6 to begin to see the connection for 1 and 4. Day 2 waters are divided and heaven created....day 5 the fish and birds that live in the water are made to occupy the role just created. Day 3 produces dry land and vegetation for human consuption....day 6, land animals and man are made to occupy the role just created. Day one has light and dark divided...day 4 has the shinny things that occupy the role of light givers and time keepers created.

Leolaia

Gumby.....It's difficult to understand because we are predisposed to read the narrative with modern preconceptions. In your second to the last post, you are talking in terms of earth being a "planet" and it being in "space". The ancients did not think of earth as a planet; planets were those stars that wandered across the zodiac. And in the Priestly creation narrative in Genesis 1, earth did not exist in "space"....the heavens were simply the expanse between the land and the celestial waters. Moreover, the "heavens" were not created until v. 8, and the earth itself was not even created until v. 10. Thus light appeared in v. 3-5 without there being a heavens and earth. The "earth" (h'rts) is described in Genesis 1:2 as thwwbhw, a hendiadys expression based on thw "nothingness" (cf. 1 Samuel 12:21; Job 26:7; Isaiah 29:21, 40:17, 41:23, 44:9, 49:4), so basically the idea is "the earth had been in a state of confused non-existence", not just that the earth was "shapeless" (which Westerman points out is not quite accurate). It was the same earth (h'rts), or specifically the "dry land" of Genesis 1:10 that did not yet exist, or was in a state of non-existence. Since the land is what was left when the water was extracted in v. 9-10, the primeval thwm "watery deep" would have included what later became "dry land" and "seas" (ymym) in a comingled state (along with the waters that formed the firmament). The related Phoenician creation myth similarly speaks of a muddy liquid as being what existed in the beginning. Genesis 1:2 clearly states what did exist: darkness, the watery deep (thwm), and wind (or spirit, rwch). That was all there was in the entire cosmos, aside from God. So when you read the word "earth" in Genesis 1, don't picture in your mind a "planet earth", but rather dry land. The division between light and darkness was not "setting the earth rotating on its axis" as Undaunted Danny surmised, because the "earth" was not regarded as a spherical planet and there was no sun to illuminate it. We must get rid of these modern concepts if we are to understand the passage as it was written. The cosmology of the ancient Hebrews was radically different from what we know from modern science.

First of all, the bible writer(s) was speaking of the earth.....period! Without a sun, this planet would be in total darkness.....correct? ....See Gen. 1:1

Genesis 1:1 does not refer to a creative act distinct from the six days. The words of "heaven" and "earth" in v. 1 are exactly the same words that occur in v. 8 and v. 10, referring to what was later created at the beginning of the second and third days. Furthermore, v. 2 explicitly says that the earth was in a state of nothingness before the first creative act, the creation of light.....remember, "earth" simply refers to dry land, and according to v. 2, only the watery deep existed. The grammatical construction of v. 1 also indicates that it does not refer to a seperate event. See my post on this topic:

http://www.jehovahs-witness.com/10/71394/1135560/post.ashx#1135560

But you are correct that before the creation of light, the deep was shrouded in darkness as v. 2 says.

If the bible writer said he made light on the first day, but the sun (luminary) on the 4th day, do you think this bible writer was speaking about somewhere else in space he made some light, or was he talking about this planet?

Again to clarify, there was neither "space" (e.g. the heavens) or dry land that existed, much less a "planet earth". All there was when light appeared was the deep and the wind of God. That was the cosmos. So there was no other place for the light to come from. Note that in v. 2 darkness is described as crouching on "the face of the deep", as practically an object resting on top of the waters. The "wind of God" is also described in the same manner. So presumably when the light is divided from the darkness in v. 3-5, and each placed in their own separate temporal abode (day and night), the light is probably likewise viewed as something resting on top of the waters, replacing darkness. And since God, or the "wind/spirit of God", was likewise resting upon the waters, there is no problem in thinking of God as the source of the light -- tho this is not stated explicitly, and it is just not a concern in the account of where the light came from -- since there is no where yet to speak of (e.g. the heavens, the land, the seas had not yet been created).

If he was talking about this planet....which he was, then WHERE did the "light" come from if the sun hadn't been created till the 4th day?.....

Again, the notion of a "planet" is foreign to the narrative, and the light doesn't come from anywhere -- it is just something resting on top of the waters, and there is no other location in the cosmos until the expanse of the heavens is created in v. 6-7. And as I argued in my last post, there is no reason at all to demand the existence of a "sun" before the 4th day. The sun was created to rule the day, but day and night already pre-existed the creation of any luminaries. It is a very different concept than what we have today. We know that day and night are entirely dependent on the earth's rotation and illumination from the sun. The Hebrews did not know that. In the Priestly creation account, there were periods of light and darkness even when all there existed was the thwm, the watery deep, with God's spirit/wind hovering above it.

No matter how you slice it, there was vegatation bearing fruit without a sun according to the bible.

This is a common misunderstanding, that vegetation could not have grown before the creation of the sun in v. 14-18. The luminaries were created to be master over the day and night, but day and night were already in existence before then, and thus there were already periods of light and darkness without them. The sun, moon, and stars simply took over the work of marking off these periods of light and darkness. Think of it this way. When you look into the sky on a sunny day, it isn't just the sun that is casting light. The sky is as well. The sun is the brightest thing in the sky and it rules the sky -- the sky darkens and lightens according to what the sun does. If the sun is eclipsed, the sky also darkens. But the sky appears to cast its own light. We know now that the sky is simply light refracted from the sun through the atmosphere, but do you think the ancients knew that? Look at the sky the way an ancient Hebrew would, and you can see that the "heavens" appear to shine down their own light apart from the sun. So during the second and third creative days, we presumably have a sky that is shining during the day without a sun occupying it and ruling it. Then, going further back in time, we have the first creative day when there wasn't even a heaven -- and the brightness of day and darkness of night were simply illumination and darkness resting on top of the waters.

Maybe I'm too dumb for this, or your too dumb. One of us is dumb.

It's not a matter of being dumb. It's just a matter of thinking outside the box.

Valis

Ya think outside that rubbery Gumbox like Leo said...Oh and BTW Gumbrilliant...see what happens when you start a thread that interests Leo? Dude she will spolde your brains..

Sincerely,

District Overbeer

According to the bible.....what were birds made of?

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