grannymh
Do you think the Bible is being literal when it talks about a first man and a first woman who were in communion with God until they sinned, and are there any special texts that you feel are evidence or clues that their existence is meant to be taken literally?
Pardon me for answering your valid question with a question.
Actually, it is a question from page 80,* ‘In the Beginning…’ A Catholic Understanding of the Story of Creation and the Fall.* Here, Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI asks: “Is there something proper to human beings that ultimately can be explained only in theological terms? Or, in the cold light of day, must humankind be relegated to the domain of the natural sciences?”
As I returned to my favorite explanatory verses in the first three chapters of Genesis, there was a nagging question. If this Genesis author was not a scientist, what was he? Stepping back from the contemporary battles over science and scripture, it seemed to me that, among many other things, the author(s) was philosophizing, i.e., he was using his rational gifts to seek knowledge about God and the human being.:doh2:
Apparently, this author(s) was discerning between the various stories handed down by the early descendants of our original parents Adam and Eve. We need to remember that like children today, Adam’s children either remained true to Adam’s teachings or they rejected them as an old man’s wandering imagination. They, too, wanted to be “modern”.
Obviously, these Genesis writers started with the simple observation that their people had a real relationship with the real God. Like us, with our ancestor trees, these writers, under the inspiration and guidance of God Himself, pulled together the truth of human ancestry and original sin.
Sidebar In my childhood neighborhood there was this saying. “Every family tree has a horse thief hanging from a branch.”
When we look at both the Hebrew Scriptures and the New Testament together, we find an amazing oneness. For example. John 3:16 verifies that the very beginning of human life was a communion of love between God the Creator and His first human creatures, Adam and Eve. “For God so loved the world that He gave His only Son, so that everyone who believes in Him might not perish but might have eternal life.” Genesis, chapter 3 contains the* Protoevangelium* (“first gospel”) the “first announcement of the Messiah and Redeemer, of a battle between the serpent and the Woman, and of the final victory of a descendant of hers. The Christian tradition sees in this passage an announcement of the “New Adam”…” (paragraphs 410 and 411,
Catechism of the Catholic Church, Second Edition) With divine inspiration, St. Paul verifies the preceding in Romans 5: 12-21.
What is personally amazing to me, is that the author(s) of the first three chapters of Genesis did not know St. Paul’s writings; yet, they understood the condition of man which necessitated a Redeemer Who is True God and True Man. This line of reasoning by starting with the truth of Christ and working backwards is not original with me. A CAF poster shared his intellectual journey from Christ backwards to the final piece of the “puzzle” which had to be the reality of Adam and Eve
As Catholics, we believe in the literal Christ hanging bleeding on a literal cross.
It is philosophically reasonable to believe that the reason for Christ’s literal obedience even unto death is that there were both a literal original sin and an original human in whom existed the whole human race “as one body of one man”.
Footnote 293. St. Thomas Aquinas,* De Malo* 4, 1. (CCC 404)
We often isolate scripture passages from the context of the Bible. Normally, that is appropriate because there is an understanding of the larger context. Because of the Catechism’s paragraph 389, last sentence – “T
he Church, which has the mind of Christ, knows very well that we cannot tamper with the revelation of original sin without undermining the mystery of Christ.” – I believe that it is important to first connect the literal Adam with the Catholic Church and its Sacrament of Baptism which literally erases original sin. (CCC 405)
A figure of speech does not need the cleansing “water” of Baptism’s sanctifying grace.
Yes. I shall return to those Genesis texts that, in my humble opinion, give evidence or clues that Adam and Eve are real people.
In the meantime – Please do not hesitate to cite the passages which you see as relevant to Adam’s existence as the first human person.
