"I forgive you but SOMEONE has to pay!"

[Elijah John]

If someone says "I forgive you, but someone has to pay, how about my innocent Son?" Would that really be forgiveness?

Does true mercy require "payment"? If so, how is it still mercy?

If a loan is forgiven, does the creditor require payment from someone else?

Isn't God capable of forgiving the contrite, without "payment"?

[kcplusdc@yahoo.com]

Robot analogy was meant to be an example of creator/created dynamics. Specifically that it is nonsensical to hold a created being responsible for acting as it is designed. Design flaws land on the desk of the creator.
A work around for this type of issue is that this perceived seperation from God is just that, an illusion.
In my opinion the story of Adam and Eves fall reads in that manner.
Why would God put a tree that he knew would fowl up his good works in the garden?
Did he create the tree? Then it must be good right? Do all things work for his Glory, for the good?
Does an omnipotent, and all powerful creator some how lose control minutes after he makes the universe?
Taken literally, God puts a poisonous tree that looked super yummy in the Garden and also put a slithering spokesman to advocate for its awesomeness. To me thats just crazy and definitely has me scratching my head. God is love right?
Furthermore, as the story continues, more problems arise with a literal translation of events.
After the fruit failure why does God ask where Adam is? Is his all powerful GPS on the fritz? Was Adam invisible to him?
Or when he asks about his nakedness, as if he didn't know the answer? Is he advocating nakedness?
Additionally, God seemingly protects Adam after the fall by expelling them from the garden, which shows if he chose to he could of protected them from the first issue that caused the fall in the first place.
To me a literal story of events leads to a pretty incompetent looking God and perhaps a case for child protective services.
And it doesnt really get much better from there, taken literally the biblical treatment of concepts like sin and forgiveness lead to major headaches and in my opinion a theology not worth bothering with.
I will end with a simple question? What are the fruits of a perceived disconnection with God and a preoccupation with being sinful?
More times than not you get guilt, dispair, fear, internal conflict, and thats just for starters.

[myth-one.com]

Do you have any idea why the tree of life was forbidden?

The Tree of Life was never forbidden. The Tree of Knowledge was forbidden.

Man was never commanded not to eat from the tree of life! He could have eaten freely from the tree of life at any time, but he chose poorly.

Man was expelled from the Garden of Eden to separate him from the Tree of Life so that he could not eat from it and live forever.

The one remaining difference between us and the angels is body type, physical versus spiritual. Mankind has a physical body and angels have spiritual bodies.

All physical bodies die, while spiritual bodies live forever.

Not only are they not separated, they join together to produce offspring.

Who is the "they" that you refer to?

Mankind is still separated from the Tree of Life, which is at present located in the midst of the paradise of God:

To him that overcometh will I give to eat of the tree of life, which is in the midst of the paradise of God. (Revelation 2:7)

Believers will be allowed to eat from the Tree of Life and gain everlasting life at the Second Coming.

[myth-one.com]

Why would God put a tree that he knew would fowl up his good works in the garden?

Because a method of choice was required so that man could choose between obeying or disobeying God.

God could just as well have commanded Adam & Eve not to spit on the walkway.

The original angels responsible for maintaining the earth were created directly as spiritual beings. But some of the angels lead by Satan desired more power, so they rebelled.

Man was then made a little lower that the angels, but is given the opportunity to become equal to the angels through his own personal choice.

The rebellious angels did not respect and obey the laws or commandments of God.

Due to this rebellion, the earth had become dark, formless, and void.

God returned, recreated the decimated earth, and created man a little lower that the angels to replenish the earth and eventually replace the rebellious angels.

Thus, man is in training to learn that his way of living is not the best way. Satan and his angels did not have this indoctrination period.

The Bible teaches us that following the laws of God is the best way to live. Most humans learn this the hard way -- by sinning and suffering the consequences as Adam & Eve did.

Essentially, the one command regarding not eating from the tree of knowledge created a choice for Adam & Eve.

They could choose to obey the command (thus obeying God) or disobey God (sin).

Disobeying the law was clearly explained to result in their deaths.

[Elijah John]

According to JWs and Evangelicals, the whole vicarious blood atonement theology seems predicated on a literal Adam, and the notion of the "payment" of a ransom.

What happens to all of that if the Adam and Eve Garden story is only a myth?

Seems a heavy weight for such a tentative foundation.

Until Jehovah Himself says it's a myth and not men saying its a myth to suit their dogma, then speaking for myself, I will continue in the belief that the Adam and Eve Garden account is real. I personally don't base faith on 'what if' statements.

And the apologist is not embacing the story as literal fact in order to suit their dogma and agenda?

Besides "the Bible tells me so", what is your evidence that Eve was created from Adam's rib?

And just what makes you so sure that the Genesis account was intended to be taken literally, and not as myth?

Just because Paul took it literally as the basis for his blood ransom theology? Is that evidence of the story's veracity? Or of Paul's gullibility.

Gen 4.17

And Cain knew his wife...

Where did Cain's wife come from?

Do women come from the ribs of men?

Do men have fewer ribs than women? Do men have one less rib on one side than they do on the other?

What is a serpent? A snake? Do snakes speak Hebrew, or English?

The Genesis account of the first family and their fall contains internal contradiction, and contradicts reason.

Did God give us the gift of reason in order to confound us?

[ttruscott]

Mankind was created originally with only two differences between him and God and the angels.

These two differences are body type and knowledge of good and evil.

It can be said:
Man [kind] is a created spirit contained by a body, and angels are created spirits working for GOD, not always with a body.

Mankind is a spirit who has chosen to be evil in GOD's sight; an angel is a spirit who chose to be holy in HIS sight and has never sinned.

Angel is a job description, not a species name or race name. There is only one species mentioned in the bible, spirits "created in HIS image" which became self separated into two groups by their free will, the sinful and the holy.

The reason that Adam and Eve were especially said to be created in HIS image is NOT because they were the first or only ones so created but to let everyone know that as evil and as horrible as they are by their descent into sin, they were indeed created in HIS image, able to be HIS Bride.

[ttruscott]

Where did Cain's wife come from?

After Abel died Seth was born in Adam's 130 year.

I wrote to a mathematical friend:

I am bothered not knowing how to work out exponent growth patterns. To use a simple population pattern, no twins, no deaths, let’s consider one birth a year by one person for 13 years when the oldest child also starts having children. All children start having children at 13 years old and keep having children every year. How many people are there in 125 years?

Yeehaw. Branching processes.

Let’s do the simplest case we can first, which we can arrive at because in the case you have here, everything is deterministic and happens in 13 year increments, so you can take one generation to be 13 years and work only in terms of generations. In generation 0, there is 1 person. Each person in the previous generation produced 13 people in the next generation, plus themselves, so, notating the number of people in generation i as N_i,

N_i = 14 * N_{i-1}

with N_0 = 1, the solution to this is N_i = 14^i.

125 years is between 9 and 10 generations, so there are between 20 billion and 289 billion people in this model.

So there is one answer, he chose someone from the 100 billion or so possibilities.

Do women come from the ribs of men? Do men have fewer ribs than women? Do men have one less rib on one side than they do on the other?

Do you forget your high school genetic science? No offspring inherits the accidents of life of either parent; they only inherit the dna which is unchanged by things like losing a finger or rib.

What is a serpent? A snake? Do snakes speak Hebrew, or English?

Snake, serpent, worm or dragon all refer to the evil cunning nature of the person, not to his being a true reptile with vocal cords. Do you think David actually became a worm: Psalm 22:6 But I am a worm and not a man, scorned by mankind and despised by the people.?

The Genesis account of the first family and their fall contains internal contradiction, and contradicts reason.

only if you accept the strawman version and not the spirit of the account.

Did God give us the gift of reason in order to confound us?

Just may be...or at least to teach us our intellect as sinners is debased: Proverbs 21:30 There is no wisdom, no insight, no plan that can succeed against the LORD.

[shnarkle]

Man was expelled from the Garden of Eden to separate him from the Tree of Life so that he could not eat from it and live forever.

Yep, and that prevents him from the tree of life. It is forbidden.

Not only are they not separated, they join together to produce offspring.

Who is the "they" that you refer to?

The angels. "the sons of God" which are spirit beings, and "the daughters of men". You can read about it in Genesis 6, Jude, and Peter's comments on it in his letters.

Mankind is still separated from the Tree of Life, which is at present located in the midst of the paradise of God:

Not all mankind. The tree of life is Christ, and those who are in him have eternal life.

[2timothy316]

According to JWs and Evangelicals, the whole vicarious blood atonement theology seems predicated on a literal Adam, and the notion of the "payment" of a ransom.

What happens to all of that if the Adam and Eve Garden story is only a myth?

Seems a heavy weight for such a tentative foundation.

Until Jehovah Himself says it's a myth and not men saying its a myth to suit their dogma, then speaking for myself, I will continue in the belief that the Adam and Eve Garden account is real. I personally don't base faith on 'what if' statements.

And the apologist is not embacing the story as literal fact in order to suit their dogma and agenda?

No. There is exegesis and eisegesis. To believe the story as it is written is exegesis and to interpret it as a myth is eisegesis. Eisegesis meaning that something outside of the Bible is being forced onto the Bible to give it a different meaning. I choose to embrace what was written and changed my agenda to fit it. Not have what was written to fit mine.

Besides "the Bible tells me so", what is your evidence that Eve was created from Adam's rib?

Sorry you don't think of the Bible as an eye witness account. I do and it doesn't not matter what anyone else says, no man alive today can say 'they were there'. Jehovah can and I believe the Bible to be from him. Thus the A&E account is truth.

And just what makes you so sure that the Genesis account was intended to be taken literally, and not as myth?

Romans 5:12 describes sin coming into the world through one man. This coincides with the Genesis account. I know of nowhere in the Bible that the account is referred to as a myth. Only the Bible could convince me it's a myth.

Just because Paul took it literally as the basis for his blood ransom theology? Is that evidence of the story's veracity? Or of Paul's gullibility.

Paul was told what to write from God. I do not view Paul writing as of his own accord.

Gen 4.17 And Cain knew his wife...

Where did Cain's wife come from?

Most likely a sister.

Do women come from the ribs of men?

According to the Bible the genetic material was taken from his rib. Interesting fact, a person's rib will grow back as long as the periosteum remains.

Do men have fewer ribs than women? Do men have one less rib on one side than they do on the other?

No.

What is a serpent? A snake? Do snakes speak Hebrew, or English?

Snakes do not speak but neither does Kermit the frog. The snake was used as a puppet. Satan is described as the original serpent. He was the one speaking, the snake was used because he knew the women was new and seemed to favor the attitude of the snake. (Revelation 20:2) This is not much different today. Animals are used in a lot of advertising. Studies show people trust information more if it looks like it comes from an animal.
https://www.huichawaii.org/assets/stone ... hs2014.pdf

The Genesis account of the first family and their fall contains internal contradiction, and contradicts reason.

It doesn't to me. I have researched the account thoroughly and find no contradiction of reason.

Did God give us the gift of reason in order to confound us?

We are made in his image. Knowing this makes this question confounding.

[shnarkle]

[Replying to post 47 by 2timothy316]

There is exegesis and eisegesis. To believe the story as it is written is exegesis and to interpret it as a myth is eisegesis.

Not really. You're simply begging the question. You're assuming the author intended it to be taken literally when this is simply your own assumption.

Eisegesis meaning that something outside of the Bible is being forced onto the Bible to give it a different meaning. I choose to embrace what was written and changed my agenda to fit it. Not have what was written to fit mine.

That's a pretty bold claim. When Christ says, "Beware of the leaven of the Pharisees", do you take that literally? Do you honestly believe he was talking about literal leaven? When Jesus points out that Lazarus "sleeps", do you take that literally as well? How about when he refers to Herod as "that fox"? Was Herod actually a fox? When the author of Revelation refers to "that old serpent, the devil and Satan", do you still believe he is referring to a literal snake, or a celestial being? The Hebrew word "naXash" means "burning one, shining one", and only refers to snakes because of the burn of their bite. Why should we take the Genesis account to be presenting Eve holding a conversation with a snake when the rest of the bible presents people holding conversations with celestial beings? e.g. Abraham, Moses, Jacob, etc.

[myth-one.com]

Mankind is still separated from the Tree of Life, which is at present located in the midst of the paradise of God:

Not all mankind. The tree of life is Christ, and those who are in him have eternal life.

Yes, the Tree of Life is Christ.

And Christ is in the paradise God:

To him that overcometh will I give to eat of the tree of life, which is in the midst of the paradise of God. (Revelation 2:7)

The Word is preparing our place, and He will come again when our place is prepared.

No believer has eternal life until born again of the Spirit.

For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him, should not perish, but have everlasting life. (John 3:16)

"But have eternal life," is undeniably future tense.

Eternal life is something those who believe in Jesus Christ will have in the future!

Specifically, at the Second Coming Jesus is bring our reward:

Behold, thy salvation cometh; behold, his reward is with him... (Isaiah 62:11)

And behold, I come quickly; and my reward is with me... (Revelation 22:12)