Augustine on literal interpretation of Genesis/OT

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iohannes13 said:
Modern Science is relatively new in the history of humanity. The writers of Genesis had no inkling of the Scientific Method so they couldn’t transmit their information in modern scientific terms. I do believe that the Genesis story is mythic in nature. It is telling a story to help us understand several things, especially about the human condition. I personally do not view it as a creation story as that has no bearing on my life. When I read it, I see it as a metaphor of our childhood and growth into adulthood. Think about it. But this is only one of many things this story can convey to us. But while I think the story is a myth, I do recognize that many Modern Scientific findings across serveral disciplines have some interesting parallels with the Genesis creation myth. So while Genesis can never be a science or literal history book, these parallels show that the ancients were transmitting wisdom. These are but a few to highlight my point.
  1. Everything was created from nothing. Same thing taught in Genesis and by Science (the Big Bang Theory).
  2. Man was a special creation. Genesis states man was created in God’s image and received God’s breath. Science (i.e. archaeological record) shows that after millions of years of evolution something special happened with the arrival of Homo sapiens during a specific period of time, referred to as the Big Mind Bang Theory. Meaning that signs of true humanity and our mental capacity appeared virtually instantaneously approximately 50,000 years ago.
  3. Man created religion. All religions are man-made. Religion is the practice of theology (the belief in God). Abel and Cain are described as making sacrifices to God. Science shows that ritualistic and religious activity appeared very early in our pre-history.
  4. Earliest religions were based on worship of animals or nature resulting in polytheistic religions. On careful reading of Genesis, the culture that wrote Genesis story was polytheistic or at the very least henotheistic. Science shows all the earliest religions were polytheistic.
  5. Early cultures practiced animal sacrifices. Cain and Abel are referenced in Genesis as making such sacrifices. Science shows evidence of this across the world.
  6. Humans Domesticated crops and animals. Science fact. Cain and Abel are referenced in Genesis as one being a farmer, the other a herder.
  7. Farmers and animal herders fought for land. Science shows evidence that shortly after people began farming and domesticating animals, both groups began fighting each other for land. One needed the land to farm, the other for their herds to graze. Interestingly, much of this evidence comes from the Middle East. Genesis has hints of this in the Cain and Abel story in which the herder kills the farmer.
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I don’t believe any of that, except for the first one. God did and continues to perform miracles. Science has nothing to say about the Bible. None of it. Yet people post here constantly trying to make some connection without any peer-reviewed papers to back them up. It’s all guesswork.

I only trust the Church to teach me the whole truth about this. As these threads continue to appear, my thought is that science is not why these threads appear. I trust the Biological sciences as they relate to the past less and less as time goes on. Too bad, I used to like Biology.

Peace,
Ed
 
IbnFiktur said:
EDIT: ACCIDENTALLY POSTED IN THIS FORUM. Can it please be moved to the Philosophy forum? Thanks!

I’ve lurked around debates on “creationism” and whatnot on these forums for some time now, and I was mildly shocked to see so many Catholics staunchly defending a literal interpretation of various events in Genesis (creation, the flood, etc). I’ve been reading St. Augustine’s Confessions lately, and much of what my favorite Saint has to say on the topic seems to be relevant. I am curious how Catholics (and Christians of all stripes) who advocate literal interpretation of Genesis feel about these passages.

Thoughts?
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Thank God for your brain. I appreciate and welcome your (name removed by moderator)ut on this issue. I am greatly humiliated and embarrassed by the fact that so many Catholics feel compelled to reject science for a literal interpretation of scripture when it is clear that many respectable Catholics throughout history didn’t see a conflict between science and religion. Yet they still keep fuelling the idea that science is at war with scripture.

Its a good thing you brought up Augustine; he had a theory that was kinda close to the idea that we evolved from animals. Augustine believed the universe was created in an instant rather than six days, and yet he is crowned as a saint.

That should give people pause for thought before they start talking creationist nonsense.
 
IbnFiktur said:
The point was not that science can prove or disprove Genesis. The point is that (and I believe Augustine and Ambrose would have agreed) we should not actively go out of our way to dismiss scientific findings on issues that ARE considered factual in the scientific community such as:

-The ages of the world/universe
-Evolution
-That there was not a “global” flood

If we are so self-conscious about defending the literal meaning of Genesis that we vehemently deny scientific evidence, I believe we are doing the Church a great disservice.
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Thank-you.
 
Ed: you still haven’t addressed the points in the OP; namely,

-Augustine’s use of science to evaluate claims made by religions, and
-Augustine’s claim the OT should be taken figuratively in many cases; it was “death” to him when he took them literally.

Just trying to get us back on track here. What one father or another’s theory on creation was is only BARELY related to the topic, if at all. The point is how Augustine felt about the science of the natural world and interpretation of the OT. Obviously, if he viewed secular scientific knowledge in a positive light (which he did) his opinion on natural history would change as science progressed.

So again, I refer you back to the specific passages from Augustine in the OP.

Buffalo: broken link?
 
IbnFiktur said:
Ed: you still haven’t addressed the points in the OP; namely,

-Augustine’s use of science to evaluate claims made by religions, and
-Augustine’s claim the OT should be taken figuratively in many cases; it was “death” to him when he took them literally.
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Saint Thomas Aquinas also agreed with Saint Augustine:

“In discussing questions of this kind two rules are to be observed, as Augustine teaches. The first is, to hold to the truth of Scripture without wavering. The second is that since Holy Scripture can be explained in a multiplicity of senses, one should adhere to a particular explanation only in such measure as to be ready to abandon it if it be proved with certainty to be false, lest Holy Scripture be exposed to the ridicule of unbelievers, and obstacles be placed to their believing.”
  • Summa
Where there are varying interpretations of scripture, then we need to look outside scripture to help resolve which interpretation is correct.

rossum
 
IbnFiktur said:
Ed: you still haven’t addressed the points in the OP; namely,

-Augustine’s use of science to evaluate claims made by religions, and
-Augustine’s claim the OT should be taken figuratively in many cases; it was “death” to him when he took them literally.

Just trying to get us back on track here. What one father or another’s theory on creation was is only BARELY related to the topic, if at all. The point is how Augustine felt about the science of the natural world and interpretation of the OT. Obviously, if he viewed secular scientific knowledge in a positive light (which he did) his opinion on natural history would change as science progressed.

So again, I refer you back to the specific passages from Augustine in the OP.

Buffalo: broken link?
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Augustine? Let’s look at what the Church Fathers have to say:

scripturecatholic.com/evolution.html

Scroll down to the heading: Tradition / Church Fathers.

Peace,
Ed
 
Ed,

I believe you posted that before. You’re continuing to ignore what I said in the OP and here. Emphasis mine.
IbnFiktur said:
Ed: you still haven’t addressed the points in the OP; namely,

-Augustine’s use of science to evaluate claims made by religions, and
-Augustine’s claim the OT should be taken figuratively in many cases; it was “death” to him when he took them literally.

Just trying to get us back on track here. What one father or another’s theory on creation was is only BARELY related to the topic, if at all. The point is how Augustine felt about the science of the natural world and interpretation of the OT. Obviously, if he viewed secular scientific knowledge in a positive light (which he did) his opinion on natural history would change as science progressed.

So again, I refer you back to the specific passages from Augustine in the OP.

Buffalo: broken link?
Click to expand...
 
rossum said:
Saint Thomas Aquinas also agreed with Saint Augustine:

“In discussing questions of this kind two rules are to be observed, as Augustine teaches. The first is, to hold to the truth of Scripture without wavering. The second is that since Holy Scripture can be explained in a multiplicity of senses, one should adhere to a particular explanation only in such measure as to be ready to abandon it if it be proved with certainty to be false, lest Holy Scripture be exposed to the ridicule of unbelievers, and obstacles be placed to their believing.”
  • Summa
Where there are varying interpretations of scripture, then we need to look outside scripture to help resolve which interpretation is correct.

rossum
Click to expand...
The key words are “proved with certainty.” There is no certainty.

usatoday.com/tech/science/2007-04-12-pope-evolution_N.htm

Peace,
Ed
 
edwest2 said:
I don’t believe any of that, except for the first one. God did and continues to perform miracles. Science has nothing to say about the Bible. None of it. Yet people post here constantly trying to make some connection without any peer-reviewed papers to back them up. It’s all guesswork.

I only trust the Church to teach me the whole truth about this. As these threads continue to appear, my thought is that science is not why these threads appear. I trust the Biological sciences as they relate to the past less and less as time goes on. Too bad, I used to like Biology.

Peace,
Ed
Click to expand...
My main point is that Genesis cannot be read like a science book because it is not a science book. And making this book into something that it is not is the mistake that many Christians and Non-Christians make. Atheist Scientists accuse the Bible of being a bad science book, and using the Bible, some Christians accuse scientists of practicing bad science. The Bible is a collection of Theology books. Would it be correct to assert that Genesis is a bad detective book? Even if the Bible is not a science or history book, it can still provide many clues about the culture that wrote it. And that is very interesting to me.

The arguments back and forth about evolution vs Genesis tells me one thing. That many Christians do not understand that the author of Genesis was trying to teach the people of that time something about God and their relationship with Him. It was not intended to be a manual for us to follow explaining how God created the universe. But even if it was not likely written with us in mind, the wisdom that is the book contains can still be applied to our lives thousands of years after it was written.

I see hints of what the Genesis author(s) experienced and remembered. And yes, this is simply my reading of Genesis. Neither the Catholic Church nor Scientists claim this. Anthropology/Archeaology (Science) teaches that the first humans were hunters and gatherers. Genesis alludes to this in that the first humans, Adam and Eve, did not work but ate by picking fruits from the trees. I don’t recall if they ate the animals, but I remember something or other that God gave them dominion over the animals. Science teaches that people stopped being hunters and gatherers across the world once they learned to farm and domesticate animals. The first generation after Adam is shown knowing how to farm and herd animals. This alludes to some primordial event in which people began farming and herding animals, activities that weren’t performed before. Adam and Eve did neither in the garden. Oh, and I was mistaken!!! Abel was the herder and Cain the farmer. That the farmer killed the herder alludes to something else that science teaches, that farming became the dominate form of sustenance for humans!
 
Is religion invented by man? Our Catholic religion was not created by Jesus. We can thank the Apostles for that. Christianity resulted from the belief that Jesus is God Incarnate. There is a very good (and long) article on the definition of religion in the Catholic Encyclopedia (newadvent.org). In very simple terms, Religion is putting into practice (the act of worship) our belief in God. After describing their vocations, Cain and Abel are immediately portrayed making sacrifices to God. Each offering what they produced. There is no mention that God asked them to sacrifice animals or crops to Him. Making such sacrifices was the first act of worship from Cain and Abel that is described in the Bible. Did Adam and Eve worship in this way?

I believe that the Genesis culture believed in many gods even if they may have believed that only one was worthy of worship. Genesis quotes God as saying “Let us make man in our image…” etc. etc. etc. The word for God in this instance is Elohim which is plural form of the word God. For the past two thousand years, many Christians apologists have argued that the “US” and “OUR” is the Trinity speaking (i.e. Father to the Son, etc). Jewish scholars, who don’t believe in the Trinity have claimed that God, in his humility is speaking to the angels or that he is referring to himself in the majestic third-person as some kings have been portrayed to do so. Some Jewish scholars add that Elohim was not plural in that instance. I really believe that the arguments from both groups have been influenced by their preconceived notion that there is only ONE god.
 
There is a further mistake many people make. Many modern scholars, either secular or religious, take out modern maps when interpreting the Bible. But one cannot use a modern map. You need a map that was made 2,000 or 3,000 years ago to find the places described in the Bible. This is also true of how other things are interpreted. With little or no knowledge of the actual culture that wrote the Genesis story, we project our preconceived ideas to their writings. Am I making the same error? Maybe. Most likely.

Another mistake people make in taking Genesis literally is that they do not have an understanding of how God inspired the book. Genesis was written long after the events that are being described. How long after is anybody’s guess. God did not pick up a pen to write Genesis Himself. The pen was actually picked up by a person who wrote. Was God or an angel present dictating everything that had to be written? Seeing how the world works, I don’t believe this was the case. Referring to one of the Gospels one can read that the author took it upon himself to write the book. What gives? No supernatural event of the heavens parting, God appearing, no angels, no thunder, no voices? If the author took it upon himself to write it, how can it be inspired? Knowing how history works, first one lives through the event; then the event is passed on verbally with repeat retellings of the event; after time has passed, before the event is forgotten, it is written down. This is a very natural process that is no different than how Genesis and the Gospel came about. The writer was inspired to write the story down. The inspiration was not in some ultra-spectacular way. The inspiration came naturally to them probably similar to the inspiration an artist feels, nothing spectacular. As it turns out, Inspiration was most likely a very boring but profound event. Does this negate the holiness of the book? Not at all.

Did God create the day in 6 literal days or billions of years? Did man evolve from apes or was he a single creation (don’t know correct term but there is one)? Did God through Moses part the red sea? At the end of the day none of this matters to me. WHO CARES!!! Whatever really happened has no impact in my life. I still have to go to work tomorrow to earn money because I have to eat. Again, did God part the Red Sea? WHO CARES!!! That God parted the Red Sea thousands of years ago does nothing to help me deal with my terrible boss. But if I walk away after reading that story knowing that God has my back, even if I have to struggle a little, then I’m ok. Is that what the writers of the Bible were trying to explain?
 
IbnFiktur said:
EDIT:

Thoughts?
Click to expand...
Sorry, feel like I may have high jacked your post without actually discussing Augustine. Sorry if I did. But to make amends, this a link to a very interesting article on the same subject.

asa3.org/ASA/PSCF/1988/PSCF3-88Young.html

I’ve read sermons from St. Augustine which were very profound, but I’ve never read any of his books. My mind was blown away when I read this article even though it is a paraphrasing of Augustine. This is point number three of the article.

*3. .Augustine claims that we ought to be willing to change our minds about the interpretation of Genesis 1-3,
particularly as new information comes to light.

Consistent with the claim that Genesis 1-3 is difficult and obscure, Augustine repeatedly urges restraint, flexibility, openness to new interpretations, and openness to new knowledge that may provide insight into the text. He says that “in matters that are obscure and far beyond our vision … we should not rush in headlong and so firmly take our stand on one side that, if further progress in the search of truth justly undermines this position, we too fall with it. That would be to battle not for the teaching of Holy Scripture but for our own, wishing its teaching to conform to ours, whereas we ought to wish ours to conform to that of Sacred Scripture” (p. 41).*
 
iohannes13 said:
My main point is that Genesis cannot be read like a science book because it is not a science book. And making this book into something that it is not is the mistake that many Christians and Non-Christians make. Atheist Scientists accuse the Bible of being a bad science book, and using the Bible, some Christians accuse scientists of practicing bad science. The Bible is a collection of Theology books. Would it be correct to assert that Genesis is a bad detective book? Even if the Bible is not a science or history book, it can still provide many clues about the culture that wrote it. And that is very interesting to me.

The arguments back and forth about evolution vs Genesis tells me one thing. That many Christians do not understand that the author of Genesis was trying to teach the people of that time something about God and their relationship with Him. It was not intended to be a manual for us to follow explaining how God created the universe. But even if it was not likely written with us in mind, the wisdom that is the book contains can still be applied to our lives thousands of years after it was written.

I see hints of what the Genesis author(s) experienced and remembered. And yes, this is simply my reading of Genesis. Neither the Catholic Church nor Scientists claim this. Anthropology/Archeaology (Science) teaches that the first humans were hunters and gatherers. Genesis alludes to this in that the first humans, Adam and Eve, did not work but ate by picking fruits from the trees. I don’t recall if they ate the animals, but I remember something or other that God gave them dominion over the animals. Science teaches that people stopped being hunters and gatherers across the world once they learned to farm and domesticate animals. The first generation after Adam is shown knowing how to farm and herd animals. This alludes to some primordial event in which people began farming and herding animals, activities that weren’t performed before. Adam and Eve did neither in the garden. Oh, and I was mistaken!!! Abel was the herder and Cain the farmer. That the farmer killed the herder alludes to something else that science teaches, that farming became the dominate form of sustenance for humans!
Click to expand...
There are no pee-reviewed scientific papers that prove or disprove anything written in the Bible. Science is silent about God and the supernatural.

Peace,
Ed
 
iohannes13 said:
Is religion invented by man? Our Catholic religion was not created by Jesus. We can thank the Apostles for that. Christianity resulted from the belief that Jesus is God Incarnate. There is a very good (and long) article on the definition of religion in the Catholic Encyclopedia (newadvent.org). In very simple terms, Religion is putting into practice (the act of worship) our belief in God. After describing their vocations, Cain and Abel are immediately portrayed making sacrifices to God. Each offering what they produced. There is no mention that God asked them to sacrifice animals or crops to Him. Making such sacrifices was the first act of worship from Cain and Abel that is described in the Bible. Did Adam and Eve worship in this way?

I believe that the Genesis culture believed in many gods even if they may have believed that only one was worthy of worship. Genesis quotes God as saying “Let us make man in our image…” etc. etc. etc. The word for God in this instance is Elohim which is plural form of the word God. For the past two thousand years, many Christians apologists have argued that the “US” and “OUR” is the Trinity speaking (i.e. Father to the Son, etc). Jewish scholars, who don’t believe in the Trinity have claimed that God, in his humility is speaking to the angels or that he is referring to himself in the majestic third-person as some kings have been portrayed to do so. Some Jewish scholars add that Elohim was not plural in that instance. I really believe that the arguments from both groups have been influenced by their preconceived notion that there is only ONE god.
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Your opinions show that you do not understand Church teaching. Therefore, they don’t matter.

Peace,
Ed
 
edwest2 said:
Your opinions show that you do not understand Church teaching. Therefore, they don’t matter.

Peace,
Ed
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Ouch!! My opinions were based on actual teachings I received…and you would be surprised by whom. Believe me, I understand Church teachings just fine.

If you read the article I linked, Augustine, was never considered a heretic for his teachings that Genesis should be viewed in light of other information, even worldly information.

Anyways, Historians, Anthropoligists and can tell us a lot about what is written in the Bible. For example, based on their studies they can highlight 1st Century customs that I would have no idea about living in 21st Century USA in one of it’s most advanced cities in the world. In a way, their research actually makes the Bible richer for me because it helps me see the writings more in their historical context. Of course there are people with agendas and try to discredit the Bible. But that is why we were taught in school to have a critical mind. Then with more knowledge from History, Archeaology, etc., it becomes easier to pick up the bias of those writers.
 
edwest2 said:
There are no pee-reviewed scientific papers that prove or disprove anything written in the Bible. Science is silent about God and the supernatural.

Peace,
Ed
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I don’t understand where you are coming from. You keep repeating that. Do you believe that the purpose of Science is to prove that there is no God? Did you know that the Catholic Church paved the way for modern science? More recently, the Big Bang theory was developed by a Catholic Priest. He was not excommunicated. No my friend, Science is not evil.
 
edwest2 said:
There are no pee-reviewed scientific papers that prove or disprove anything written in the Bible. Science is silent about God and the supernatural.

Peace,
Ed
Click to expand...
Of course there is no peer review papers disproving the Bible. Just like there is no peer review paper disproving the activities of Zeus or the Olympians.Why would there be?

However, concerning the age of the universe, the way it developed, and how life develops, science indirectly undermines young earth creationism as a rational world-veiw, and thus, in so far as one accepts science, it disproves any interpretation of the bible that doesn’t correlate with the scientific evidence.
 
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