Adam and Eve

[Inigo Montoya]

From what I know about the nature of DNA, genetics and Mendels laws of genetics (namely that are inherent species limitations imposed by the genetic makeup of all living things) the account about Adam and Eve, ie two humans parenting the human race, seems to me to be the most plausible explanation of our origins.

What about it, folks? What does/can DNA, genetics, and Mendel do to establish Adam and Eve as the most plausible explanation for our origins?

[Neatras]

[Replying to post 29 by mgb]

Sounds like truscott has company in his pseudo-Calvinist beliefs. Please be sure to be mindful that you're in the science and religion sub-forum, so from here it'd be nice to keep things scientific.

If you're so inclined, wanna try offering scientific evidence for the existence of a spiritual "space," "plane," "dimension," or "thing"?

[ttruscott]

The story of Adam and Eve is an allegory. Adam and Eve represent all humanity and its fallen state. The garden was not an earthly garden, it represents the loss of grace and God's presence.

I must admit I do not remember having seen this from a non-PCE person before. Did you ever notice that an allegory spelled out with real people in history is called a type? I think Adam and Eve are types...

Therefore I do accept that they were real people both in heavenly Sheol before the creation of the physical universe and later in the garden where they were convicted of their sin.

I would also suggest that Adam and Eve and the serpent represent all humanity in its fallen state. This covers all sin: the serpent who rejected GOD'd divinity, Eve who accepted GOD on faith but who represents those who refused to heed YHWH's call to come out for among the unclean thing (the serpents lies) and Adam who represents those elect who accepted YHWH's claims to divinity but who could not give his loved one, Eve, over to the tender mercies of YHWH's grace, not trusting HIM, so he followed her into her sin to stay by her side.

I also strongly suggest that Eve may have actually been the first person to choose to champion the Serpent against YHWH's call for the judgment, forcing the postponement of the judgement, Matt 13:28 “  ‘An enemy did this,’ he replied.

“The servants asked him, ‘Do you want us to go and pull them up?’

29 “ ‘No,’ he answered, ‘because while you are pulling the weeds, you may uproot the wheat with them. 30 Let both grow together until the harvest....and while Adam was not deceived, he could not leave her to her fate but had to follow her to her fate on earth.

[ttruscott]

[Replying to mgb]

mgb do you have a theory of human origins you would like to share?

Yes, but it is not mine it is from Origen of Alexandria. Briefly:

The fall happened in spirtual reality

Some spirits resisted the fall and remained loyal to God (angels)

Some were determined in their rebellion (demons)

In between most were hesitant being neither perfectly loyal nor rebellious.

These are the spirits of human beings.

The story of the fall in the Bible is an allegory about humanity. The fall happened in spiritual terms, not in the physical world.

Origen - his Christology was horrendous but I think he has this down!!!...

He was the most famous adherent to the Pre-Conception Existence theology going and got slammed for it, <wry grin>.

But as I just mentioned, what if this allegory ie, metaphor, was in fact a physical truth with real people as Origin believed, using real people (spirits) as types to point out spiritual truths?

[marco]

He was the most famous adherent to the Pre-Conception Existence theology going and got slammed for it, <wry grin>.

He had a variety of ideas about God and hinted at the Trinity. How he could have deduced that God first made incorporeal souls and later enclosed them in flesh is anybody's guess. The simple account of Adam and his help-mate doesn't give any clue to a pre-existence. It appears to suggest the Earth was God's invention and the stars mere ornamentation, since they seem to have been unpopulated by living clay. An earlier world isn't in the picture.

Anyway, the Church from which Christianity takes her ideas declared Origen heretical or at least some of his writing, so maybe we can ignore him.

[marco]

He was the most famous adherent to the Pre-Conception Existence theology going and got slammed for it, <wry grin>.

He had a variety of ideas about God and hinted at the Trinity. How he could have deduced that God first made incorporeal souls and later enclosed them in flesh is anybody's guess. The simple account of Adam and his help-mate doesn't give any clue to a pre-existence. It appears to suggest the Earth was God's invention and the stars mere ornamentation, since they seem to have been unpopulated by living clay. An earlier world isn't in the picture.

Anyway, the Church from which Christianity takes her ideas declared Origen heretical or at least some of his writing, so maybe we can ignore him.

[ttruscott]

He was the most famous adherent to the Pre-Conception Existence theology going and got slammed for it, <wry grin>.

He had a variety of ideas about God and hinted at the Trinity. How he could have deduced that God first made incorporeal souls and later enclosed them in flesh is anybody's guess.

Origen taught that the pre-existence of souls can be found in both the Old and New Testaments in the story of Esau and Jacob and how God loved Jacob and hated Esau before they were even born (Malachi 1:2-3 and Romans 9:11-24) [https://www.near-death.com/reincarnatio ... y.html#a05] HE could not envision apparently that Esau could be hated before birth unless he had an existence and sinned the unforgiveable sin.

The simple account of Adam and his help-mate doesn't give any clue to a pre-existence.

Thanks for the challenge which I'm glad to pick up,

Because I take the hints in Gen 1-3 that there was sin in the garden before the eating, I believe that we must have had a pre-earth existence with a free will as I contend that only by a free will decision to rebel against GOD can anyone become evil.

1. Adam was being rebellious to seek his mate amongst the animals, that is, GOD knew HE had Eve planned so an animal wasn't in HIS plans at all making Adam to be working outside the plans of GOD, ie sinful.

2. The root word for Adam and Eve being naked and the serpent being crafty in an evil way is the same word, `rm.* They can be read the opposite, ie, Adam and Eve were crafty and the serpent was naked. The vowels that make them to be naked or crafty were not put into the writing until ç600AD. The reason the Rabbis and the Church Fathers chose naked for Adam and Eve was their decision that all mankind was created at conception (traducianism) or at birth (creationism of the soul) So, as newly created in the garden they had to be innocent.

*There is also a perfectly good word about Noah that describes the nakedness of being unclothed with absolutely no chance of thinking it meant evil.

3. Naked is a metaphor for evil in other parts of scripture. Rev 3:17 You say, ‘I am rich; I have grown wealthy and need nothing.’ But you do not realize that you are wretched, pitiful, poor, blind and naked. 18 I counsel you to buy from Me gold refined by fire so that you may become rich, white garments so that you may be clothed and your shameful nakedness not exposed, and salve to anoint your eyes so that you may see.

Where is the sin in being unclothed in your own garden as GOD made you? Even if naked refers to sex, how could it be sinful when they were commanded to procreate? No, the telling part of this verse is "They were not ashamed!". If there was no sin in being naked then why bring up shame? They were not over 12 feet tall either but there is no hint that they should be ashamed of that.

The reference to their shame is echoed in Rev 3:17 - 18, being a sinner is shameful and those blinded by sin need their eyes opened by the Lord's salve and their shame covered by white garments, the righteous acts of the saints, Rev 19:18.

It is also curious how, when their eyes were finally opened to their sin, they saw their being naked, a nakedness they had before they ate, not their eating. The only thing that happened when they ate was that they now saw their sinfulness and were ashamed but their nakedness did not change in the least. So, if being unclothed is no sin, why did they suddenly become ashamed of their nakedness when they sinned?

4. Eve treats the serpent like a mentor or pastor. Is it not a sin to fraternize with a demon this way? IF she was innocent then why did GOD allow the serpent access to her and not warn her to beware of him? Not very loving I'd say...

BUT if she was already sinful and the serpent was her friend and a pretty good guy in her eyes which she had to learn to repudiate, then HE might have let the serpent deceive her to open her eyes to her own sinfulness and to the serpent's sin so she would never choose him over her GOD ever again.

5. The bible is pretty clear that the law / commands are given to convict sinners of their sinfulness. Romans 3:20 Therefore no one will be justified in His sight by works of the Law. For the Law merely brings awareness of sin.

Gal 3:23 But before faith came, we were kept under the law, shut up unto the faith which should afterwards be revealed. 24 Wherefore the law was our schoolmaster to bring us unto Christ, that we might be justified by faith. Only sinners need the schoolmaster who will bring them to Christ.

And even more succinctly: 1 Timothy 1:8-10 Now we know that the law is good, if one uses it lawfully, understanding this, that the law is not laid down for the just but for the lawless and disobedient...

Thus for Adam and Eve to be given a command is an indication that they were sinners (lawless and disobedient) who needed their eyes to be opened to their sin by their inability to obey an easy command.

6. Adam was said to be the one who brought sin into the world: Romans 5:12 Therefore, just as sin entered the world through one man... yet the serpent arrived in the garden with evil intent, and both Eve and the serpent sinned before Adam ate so how did he bring sin into the world if he was the third to sin? IF he was a sinner when he was sown (Matt 13:36-39), ie breathed, into the world, then as the first person in the world, he brought sin with him.

So, a half a dozen hints and clues in just the one story that can be read as support for our pre-earth existence if it is read with an open mind not clouded by the orthodox interpretation of 4,000 years. And there are literally dozens more in the rest of scripture!

[mgb]

The story of Adam and Eve is an allegory. Adam and Eve represent all humanity and its fallen state. The garden was not an earthly garden, it represents the loss of grace and God's presence.

I must admit I do not remember having seen this from a non-PCE person before. Did you ever notice that an allegory spelled out with real people in history is called a type? I think Adam and Eve are types...

Therefore I do accept that they were real people both in heavenly Sheol before the creation of the physical universe and later in the garden where they were convicted of their sin.

Yes it makes sense in terms of God's Justice. We are all fallen. Otherwise how can it be that we are guilty of Adam's sin? It does not make sense if we take Genesis literally. Such are the pitfalls of literal interpretation.

[mgb]

He was the most famous adherent to the Pre-Conception Existence theology going and got slammed for it, <wry grin>.

He had a variety of ideas about God and hinted at the Trinity. How he could have deduced that God first made incorporeal souls and later enclosed them in flesh is anybody's guess. The simple account of Adam and his help-mate doesn't give any clue to a pre-existence. It appears to suggest the Earth was God's invention and the stars mere ornamentation, since they seem to have been unpopulated by living clay. An earlier world isn't in the picture.

Anyway, the Church from which Christianity takes her ideas declared Origen heretical or at least some of his writing, so maybe we can ignore him.

Origen had enemies in the Church and they tried to discredit him and deliberately distorted his teachings.

Without pre-existence our punishment for original sin does not make sense.

[mgb]

There is a hint in Genesis 2:3 that plants were made before they existed in the ground:-

And God blessed the seventh day, and sanctified it: because that in it he had rested from all his work which God created and made.
4 These are the generations of the heavens and of the earth when they were created, in the day that the Lord God made the earth and the heavens,
5 And every plant of the field before it was in the earth, and every herb of the field before it grew: for the Lord God had not caused it to rain upon the earth, and there was not a man to till the ground.

[Danmark]

He was the most famous adherent to the Pre-Conception Existence theology going and got slammed for it, <wry grin>.

He had a variety of ideas about God and hinted at the Trinity. How he could have deduced that God first made incorporeal souls and later enclosed them in flesh is anybody's guess. The simple account of Adam and his help-mate doesn't give any clue to a pre-existence. It appears to suggest the Earth was God's invention and the stars mere ornamentation, since they seem to have been unpopulated by living clay. An earlier world isn't in the picture.

Anyway, the Church from which Christianity takes her ideas declared Origen heretical or at least some of his writing, so maybe we can ignore him.

Origen had enemies in the Church and they tried to discredit him and deliberately distorted his teachings.

Without pre-existence our punishment for original sin does not make sense.

You are correct "Original sin" does not make sense. It is so obvious that it does not make any sense that the fantasy of 'pre-existence' had to be developed to try to account for it and for other logical absurdities orthodox Christianity tries to maintain.

The far simpler and more logical explanation is that neither "original sin" nor this absurdity of the 'pre-existence' are real. Neither exist and that is hardly surprising because there is ZERO evidence for either. Once one starts to travel down the road of make believe and fantasy, new fantasies must be invented to account for each new logical absurdity until we finally arrive at this convoluted mess of various and contradictory Christian doctrines.