Did people really live hundreds of years?

[grannymh]

From M-Dent, post 50, page 4

The reality that the Masoretic (Hebrew), the Septuagint and the Samaritan texts do not agree on ages of the patriarchs may be a strong indication the unusual life spans are not the details that matter most. They may have a symbolic nature. They do seem drawn from the literary devices of the time.

The excellent Navarre Bible Commentary notes on Genesis,

In order to make revelations about himself, God led the chosen people to reflect profoundly on the origin of man and the world. Many of Israel’s neighbors had done the same, and, to explain things which were beyond the scope of ordinary language, they devised all sorts of myths about the origins of the world and man and about the earliest times of man. The sacred writers of Genesis sifted through these myths and selected certain literary elements suited to the mentality of their contemporaries in order to convey the message of faith that they wanted to pass on, through their writings, to the people of Israel and, through Israel’s religious experience, to all mankind.

Great age of the Pre-Flood Patriarchs: What are we to make of the accounts of the ages of Pre-Flood Patriarchs? Other ancient Near Eastern civilizations also had traditions of ancestors who lived to great ages prior to an event that their histories recorded as the Great Deluge:

•Based on the tablets of the ancient archives of the great Temple of Marduk, Babylonian historian Berossus (c. 300 BC) copied an ancient king list that named ten long-lived kings who reigned before the Great Flood. According to the ancient list, these kings reigned from ten to sixth thousand years. On his copy of the list, Berosus noted: In the time of Xisuthros the Great Deluge occurred.

•The Weld Prism (c. 2170 BC), discovered at Larsa, an ancient city a few miles north of Ur in Mesopotamia, recorded a list of kings from the beginning of humanity to the generation of the scribe Nur-Ninsubur, who recorded the data. His list included ten long-lived kings who lived prior to the Great Flood. This tablet was inscribed at least a hundred years before the birth of Abraham.

• Other tablets which listed long-lived Pre-Flood kings were discovered among the 50,000 tablets dating to the 3rd millennium BC that were discovered in several archives of Nippur, an ancient city about 50 miles southeast of Babylon. The Nippur Tablets listed Pre-Flood kings who had extremely long reigns.

•In addition to the Sumerian and Babylonians, the Egyptians, Akkadians, Assyrians, Persians, Greeks, Hindu civilization of India, and other cultures also had traditions of great longevity for the earth’s earliest inhabitants.

http://www.agapebiblestudy.com/genesis/Lesson_5.htm

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Michael​

Science can purify religion from error and superstition. Religion can purify science from idolatry and false absolutes.
Pope John Paul II

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If I made an error in reproducing post 50, please correct it.

A gentle suggestion is to continue exploring the Navarre Bible Commentary. See link above–at the end of the second quote.

 

[Zipply]

Well, those are cute ideas, that Adam wrote his history down, but it’s pretty much purely ignorant superstition.

Writing itself is only about 5,000 years old. World’s oldest writing.

Adam, since we believe he was the first rational man, at least predates sophisticated tool-making (surely we agree you have to be rational to plan and use foresight?). That’s currently sitting at almost 2 million years old. Axes.

Or, if, like GK Chesterton, you think painting a representative picture is a sure test of rationality. 40,000 year old cave painting.

Or perhaps you think burying the dead is the best since of rationality. Burial is about 100,000 years old, at least.

Take your pick, but whatever sign of rationality you choose, it’s much older than writing.

Plus there’s the fact that the actual Catholic Church has and uses actual universities in actual places like Rome and Jerusalem containing actual smart scholars (most of them priests) who actually study things like this,and have for a long time. They don’t teach fundamentalist ideas like ‘Adam wrote Genesis’ or even ‘Moses wrote Genesis’.

 

[FrDavid96]

…

Do you think God is incapable of allowing humans to live for so long?

No. But I am convinced that some humans are incapable (or unwilling) of understanding that a biblical text must be understood according to its context and its intended meaning.

 

[FrDavid96]

What I cannot fathom is that some people are more willing to believe that Adam wrote a book and handed it down to Noah, etc.; than they are willing to believe that an ancient oral tradition might actually contain some symbolic numbers.

Really “Adam wrote a book”??? I don’t know whether to laugh or to cry.

Of course, someone’s going to say “not a book,” he wrote it on fig leaves using a reed pen and pomegranate juice for ink.

 

[clem456]

It is true.

Do you think God is incapable of allowing humans to live for so long?

This is like asking if the father in the Prodigal Son parable is capable of bringing his son back home after he rejected him for husks and harlots.

The question is pointless. It has an obvious answer “yes”, of course God is -capable of- anything. Who has called into question God’s capabilities here? The question is not what God is capable of.

It is ironic that some believe scientific study threatens God’s capabilities.
Is God all powerful, or can we only accept his power according to our understanding?
Which is it?

Is God’s truth reducible to proof? Is that what God wants, a faith that is only as big as our science?
If this is what we want, then we need science more than we need faith. That’s an odd position for a Catholic to be in.

The Catholic Church does not do science. We listen to science in the context of faith, because science (reason) is a gift from God. And to not listen to science, would be, well, stupid.
It would be like walking in front of a moving bus because I reject physics.

 

[Zipply]

Of course, someone’s going to say “not a book,” he wrote it on fig leaves using a reed pen and pomegranate juice for ink.

“in the divine language” I’m sure.

Seriously, I think Catholics can ask “Am I really practicing the same religion as these people?” more often than we do…and I remain convinced that Rome’s weasel language (not error, of course not error, but apparently the Holy Spirit does not protect the Popes and Councils from dissembling) is to blame. If any loophole for fundamentalism is left open, some American will try to drive a truck through it.

 

[grannymh]

Well, those are cute ideas, that Adam wrote his history down, but it’s pretty much purely ignorant superstition.

Writing itself is only about 5,000 years old. World’s oldest writing.

Adam, since we believe he was the first rational man, at least predates sophisticated tool-making (surely we agree you have to be rational to plan and use foresight?). That’s currently sitting at almost 2 million years old. Axes.

Or, if, like GK Chesterton, you think painting a representative picture is a sure test of rationality. 40,000 year old cave painting.

Or perhaps you think burying the dead is the best since of rationality. Burial is about 100,000 years old, at least.

Take your pick, but whatever sign of rationality you choose, it’s much older than writing.

Plus there’s the fact that the actual Catholic Church has and uses actual universities in actual places like Rome and Jerusalem containing actual smart scholars (most of them priests) who actually study things like this,and have for a long time. They don’t teach fundamentalist ideas like ‘Adam wrote Genesis’ or even ‘Moses wrote Genesis’.

Great links! I have no trouble with crediting those fantastic, upright walking, subhuman fossils, with being highly sentient.

Here’s an interesting question – since “painting a representative picture is a sure test of rationality” could it be remotely possible that Adam painted some pictures of a garden, a few trees, a snake or scary animal, and a man holding his head in his hands in shame and regret as the “rational communication” that he freely and knowingly committed Original Sin?

Please note that for the present time on this thread, I do not discuss my evaluation of primitive rocks formed by the instinct for survival. Nor do I discuss the date when Adam, with a true, fully-complete rational spiritual soul capable of sharing in God’s life, left the Garden and became the only extant hominin with living descendants.

 

[Zipply]

I think the American Church needs an intervention.

Anytime you get this sort of scriptural fundamentalism, you know what attends it? Scriptural literalism that describes God as literally violent and jealous and eventually starts to glory in the pain and suffering he causes (see, oh, any Traditional Latin Mass chapel or any crackpot message board like Cathinfo where every other thread is people getting all excited about coming chastisements) and occasionalism that blames all current human suffering (especially that visited on dark-skinned people) on God’s vengeful wrath.

This is my single, biggest discomfort with being Catholic is that these incredibly wrong-headed ideas are allowed to persist and are not stamped out like one of the great heresies.

 

[clem456]

What I cannot fathom is that some people are more willing to believe that Adam wrote a book and handed it down to Noah, etc.; than they are willing to believe that an ancient oral tradition might actually contain some symbolic numbers.

Really “Adam wrote a book”??? I don’t know whether to laugh or to cry.

Of course, someone’s going to say “not a book,” he wrote it on fig leaves using a reed pen and pomegranate juice for ink.

This issue illustrates a classic reason why so many reject Christianity out of hand.
They see Christians claiming literal and scientific certainty where there cannot possibly be any, and it doesn’t pass the smell test for any reasonable person.

People are searching for real Truth, and we give them literally “6 - 24 hour days” and Adam with a pen and paper writing literal history while he runs from dinosaurs.

This scenario leaves no room for faith to grow. It is it’s own (misguided) science.

 

[grannymh]

No. But I am convinced that some humans are incapable (or unwilling) of understanding that a biblical text must be understood according to its context and its intended meaning.

Re: “a biblical text must be understood according to its context and its intended meaning.”

I agree especially when it comes to the first three chapters of Genesis. This is why I start with basic Catholic doctrines as a way of understanding the depth of those chapters. Naturally, the intended meaning is Divine Revelation duly expressed in Catholic doctrines under the guidance of the Holy Spirit…

Divine Revelation trumps!

 

[clem456]

From M-Dent, post 50, page 4

The reality that the Masoretic (Hebrew), the Septuagint and the Samaritan texts do not agree on ages of the patriarchs may be a strong indication the unusual life spans are not the details that matter most. They may have a symbolic nature. They do seem drawn from the literary devices of the time.

The excellent Navarre Bible Commentary notes on Genesis,

---

Michael​

Science can purify religion from error and superstition. Religion can purify science from idolatry and false absolutes.
Pope John Paul II

---

If I made an error in reproducing post 50, please correct it.

A gentle suggestion is to continue exploring the Navarre Bible Commentary. See link above–at the end of the second quote.

Thanks for the research.

 

[FrDavid96]

…

The Catholic Church does not do science. We listen to science in the context of faith, because science (reason) is a gift from God. And to not listen to science, would be, well, stupid.
It would be like walking in front of a moving bus because I reject physics.

Actually, the Church does do science. Take for example the Vatican Observatory which is an eminently respected and trusted scientific institution. Respected by scientists the world over.

vaticanobservatory.org/

Its very existence makes an important point. The Church is not afraid of science, but on the contrary fosters and encourages it. We are not afraid to look at the stars, and we are not afraid to engage in legitimate scientific research. The point though, is that said research is done by scientists rather than theologians (although some are both).

 

[clem456]

I would invite anyone here who believes the Bible in a literalist way:

Take a 100 level Geology course at any college, or high school for that matter.
In this course the origins of man won’t even be discussed, so nothing threatening there…
But you will gain an appreciation for time, for fossil records, for how the natural world changes, how long it takes, how agonizingly slow it is. And how small of a time mankind has been present on this earth.

We are here for the blink of an eye compared to the world we entered into. Before true man became flesh, God spent billions of years forming the earth according to his goodness. Pondering this reality should lead one to an awestruck appreciation for who we truly are in God’s eyes. We are very tiny in this whole plan and God is huge beyond measure. Yet we are created by him as the pinnacle of all his goodness.

An appreciation of science should lead one to appreciate the magnitude of God’s goodness.

 

[clem456]

Actually, the Church does do science. Take for example the Vatican Observatory which is an eminently respected and trusted scientific institution. Respected by scientists the world over.

vaticanobservatory.org/

Its very existence makes an important point. The Church is not afraid of science, but on the contrary fosters and encourages it. We are not afraid to look at the stars, and we are not afraid to engage in legitimate scientific research. The point though, is that said research is done by scientists rather than theologians (although some are both).

point taken.

 

[FrDavid96]

I’m reading Genesis and over and over people are living 600-900 years. We know scientifically (obviously) this is not possible. So is it true?

And if it’s not true, what kind of metaphor was God giving? What does it symbolize and who was the earliest to deny the literal interpretation of these people’s ages?

The short answer is “no.”

The extended answer is that the numbers are symbolic, or representative, or allegorical, or other similar concepts.

Unfortunately, an explanation of that doesn’t appear possible in this context.

If you truly want to understand the meaning of the texts, talk to someone who actually has expertise in legitimate scripture scholarship (which necessarily excludes anyone who might be described as “fundamentalist”).

I suggest talking to your local Catholic priest. He can explain it to you without the distractions and misinformation that’s already clouded the topic in this thread.

In the meantime, here is the text that’s printed in the New American Bible (which is the “official” bible for Catholics in the United States) in the Introduction to the Book of Genesis.

How should modern readers interpret the creation-flood story in Gn 2–11? The stories are neither history nor myth. “Myth” is an unsuitable term, for it has several different meanings and connotes untruth in popular English. “History” is equally misleading, for it suggests that the events actually took place. The best term is creation-flood story. Ancient Near Eastern thinkers did not have our methods of exploring serious questions. Instead, they used narratives for issues that we would call philosophical and theological. They added and subtracted narrative details and varied the plot as they sought meaning in the ancient stories. Their stories reveal a privileged time, when divine decisions were made that determined the future of the human race. The origin of something was thought to explain its present meaning, e.g., how God acts with justice and generosity, why human beings are rebellious, the nature of sexual attraction and marriage, why there are many peoples and languages. Though the stories may initially strike us as primitive and naive, they are in fact told with skill, compression, and subtlety. They provide profound answers to perennial questions about God and human beings.
usccb.org/bible/scripture.cfm?bk=Genesis&ch=

 

[FrDavid96]

point taken.

It was not intended to dispute what you wrote, but rather as an opportunity to make the point that the Church does not fear or avoid scientific research, but instead encourages and fosters it.

The Vatican Observatory has some wonderful quotes from Pope Francis on their webpage. I would like to post them here, but since they address the topic indirectly rather than directly, I decided not to.

 

[clem456]

And whether or not the NAB, or the CCC, or any document expresses things the way we’d like, we can be sure the Church is:

a mother who has at heart the good of her children. (Pope Francis)

So our task is to read Scripture with the mind of our Mother.

 

[grannymh]

The short answer is “no.”

The extended answer is that the numbers are symbolic, or representative, or allegorical, or other similar concepts.

Unfortunately, an explanation of that doesn’t appear possible in this context.

If you truly want to understand the meaning of the texts, talk to someone who actually has expertise in legitimate scripture scholarship (which necessarily excludes anyone who might be described as “fundamentalist”).

I suggest talking to your local Catholic priest. He can explain it to you without the distractions and misinformation that’s already clouded the topic in this thread.

In the meantime, here is the text that’s printed in the New American Bible (which is the “official” bible for Catholics in the United States) in the Introduction to the Book of Genesis.
How should modern readers interpret the creation-flood story in Gn 2–11? The stories are neither history nor myth. “Myth” is an unsuitable term, for it has several different meanings and connotes untruth in popular English. “History” is equally misleading, for it suggests that the events actually took place. The best term is creation-flood story. Ancient Near Eastern thinkers did not have our methods of exploring serious questions. Instead, they used narratives for issues that we would call philosophical and theological. They added and subtracted narrative details and varied the plot as they sought meaning in the ancient stories. Their stories reveal a privileged time, when divine decisions were made that determined the future of the human race. The origin of something was thought to explain its present meaning, e.g., how God acts with justice and generosity, why human beings are rebellious, the nature of sexual attraction and marriage, why there are many peoples and languages. Though the stories may initially strike us as primitive and naive, they are in fact told with skill, compression, and subtlety. They provide profound answers to perennial questions about God and human beings.
usccb.org/bible/scripture.cfm?bk=Genesis&ch=

Re: Last sentence: “They provide profound answers to perennial questions about God and human beings.”

My curious nature asks.

1. What are the perennial questions about God and human beings in Genesis, chapter 5?
2. If there are perennial questions in chapter 5, what are the profound answers?

Personally, I look at Chapter 5 as the “evidence” needed for the claim that the Catholic teachings regarding the Creator’s interactions with His human creatures are directly based on the truths found in the first three chapters of Genesis.

At the same time that I will not deny the possibility that, under God’s creative power, early humans could have lived long lives, I accept the possibility that chapter 5 is more devoted to the reality of human preservation of the original Divine Revelation. The repeated phrase that there were other sons and daughters is the evidence of the early expansion of the human species which divided into the Hebrews and the non-Hebrews who established their own versions of gods. This is the environment in which the Genesis author lived. Thus, the Genesis author had to affirm the stability of the early Divine Revelations.

A long time ago, a writer suggested that the use of genealogies was an attention getter. It was a loud long signal that readers better pay strict attention to the material following the genealogy no matter whom it included. Regarding chapter 5, in my humble opinion, the genealogy is telling us that we better pay attention to God’s information in the preceding chapters.

If that is a reasonable explanation, it makes me more curious about the answers to the above two questions.

 

[buffalo]

Nature Oct 8, 2014 - As I posted many times - down goes the modern synthesis. Can’t yet admit to ID though…Maybe soon…
Does evolutionary theory need a rethink?

“The number of biologists calling for change in how evolution is conceptualized is growing rapidly. Strong support comes from allied disciplines, particularly developmental biology, but also genomics, epigenetics, ecology and social science. We contend that evolutionary biology needs revision if it is to benefit fully from these other disciplines. The data supporting our position gets stronger every day.
Yet the mere mention of the EES often evokes an emotional, even hostile, reaction among evolutionary biologists. Too often, vital discussions descend into acrimony, with accusations of muddle or misrepresentation. Perhaps haunted by the spectre of intelligent design, evolutionary biologists wish to show a united front to those hostile to science. Some might fear that they will receive less funding and recognition if outsiders – such as physiologists or developmental biologists – flood into their field.”

How does this affect people living old ages?
http://idvolution.blogspot.com/2011/05/while-ago-i-posted-about-genes-being.html
Genetic Piano

 

[randomusername]

The Fall of Adam doesn’t mean that he and his descendants had the same bodies with the same mutations we did. The Fall of Adam led to original sin but that doesn’t mean that it made his body as mutated as ours. Something like 200 mutations get introduced every generation. So, back in Adam’s time and a few generations after, there were way, way less mutations. Their bodies were purer and less mutated. So who’s to say that they couldn’t have lived far longer?

And the Bible actually shows how lifespans declined gradually. Noah lived to be 950 years old, while Abraham lived to be 175. Moses, who lived to be 120, was unusually old for his time. “The days of our lives are seventy years; and if by reason of strength they are eighty years, yet their boast is only labor and sorrow; for it is soon cut off, and we fly away” (Psalm 90:10). So unless Moses and his contemporaries died extremely young, we know that the years the Bible says they lived to are the same or similar to our years and that lifespans gradually declined.

Also, the flood and the scattering after Babel would have led to huge genetic bottlenecks which would have severely reduced genetic variety. Adam and Eve and the people a few generations later would have had huge genetic variety being the world’s first humans.

Gradual mutation /=/ Gradual Fall.