Genesis 1-11 Figurative....but now what?!

[brjoseph]

I see, folks.
You’re telling me I’m wrong for believing the Genesis account- particularly the Adam story- is an allegory, and that I* err in not accepting the Genesis account as strict, literal, historic fact… but when those “facts” run up against a logical barrier within the narrative itself, you present me with scenarios completely absent* from the story, in an effort to make it fit your own beliefs about what it does say. In short, to make literal interpretation work, you have to manufacture and add certain details.
This has been enlightening, but I admit I remain unconvinced, especially in light of the lengths to which literalism in this case must be stretched and abused to make it work, that Genesis is in fact anything but an allegory meant to convey higher truths.

 

[MollyMac]

oh goodness,

I guess I need to talk to my teacher…
and maybe the department head.

Alrighty,

Thanks!

Are you in a private school setting or a public school setting?

 

[MollyMac]

Trust in Christ and don’t fear or be shaken (cf.Ps. 16:8, PS. 62:2, and most importantly all of Hebrews 11 & 12) - Adam & Eve were not fable, myth or a universalist fiction. They were real people and it should be noted in the original Hebrew text of Gen. 1-2 there is no allegorical connotation (50 cent phrase for representing or symbolizing ideas and concepts) regarding them, the garden of Eden, or the serpent. There is nothing in the origianl text that directs Creation and the Fall as being anything other than decidely real and factual. Original Sin was the result of A&E not obeying God’s commands and breakng the Covenant of Works. Please note that God’s punishment is never the end; we may rightly fear it, yet He graciously provides a way even after the Fall. Now that’s love!

Know that everyone comes to a discussion with certain presuppositions, or agendas from some motivation. What you’d do well to know is whom does your heart serve: God or something/anything else. That’s the dividing line, a black-or-white question with eternal (smoking or non-smoking) consequences!

The serpent was real, and Jesus, the Anointed One (which is what “Christ” means) crushed the sin of man with His work on the cross. The “snake & heel” is a foreshadowing of His work. Satan is not a physical being, though he can operate in the physical realm (cf. Job 1&2). He is a spiritual being who operates in the spiritual realm, which you can see in the sundry passages that detail his spiritual attributes: Peter 5:8; Matt. 16:23; Acts 5:3; and Ephs 6:12. Please . . . read them.

Throughout literature, fiction has often contained speaking animals (Aesop’s fables, Alice in Wonderland) to represent a theme and apply a metaphor. Knowing this history, one might see a talking serpent and be tempted think the whole Creation/Fall/Bible narrative is a fable: wrong. The key in Genesis 3 is the first/primary sentence “Now the serpent was more crafty than any other beast of the field that the Lord God had made.”
and specifically the word “the”. The original text does establishes the serpent as an actual creature, not a reprepresentation of humain traits in animal form. Hope that suffices to quell any fears. I pray you will be strngthened by Hebrews 12:3-7:
3Consider Him who endured from sinners such hostility against Himself, so that you may not grow weary or fainthearted. 4 In your struggle against sin you have not yet resisted to the point of shedding your blood. 5 And have you forgotten the exhortation that addresses you as sons?

“My son, do not regard lightly the discipline of the Lord,
nor be weary when reproved by him.
6 For the Lord disciplines the one he loves,
and chastises every son whom he receives.”

7 It is for discipline that you have to endure. God is treating you as sons. For what son is there whom his father does not discipline?

“In a time of universal deceit, telling the truth will beceome a revolutionary act.”
~George Orwell

Silence?

 

[fhansen]

I strongly disagree. While no one is suggesting original sin isn’t real- it clearly is- the story itself is just clearly a parable, one with two versions in two chapters of the same book, in fact, and the logical disconnects in it show it to be so. For example, OBVIOUSLY there were people other than Adam and his family around at the time. Either this is a parable, or God pulled another creation a few miles away and didn’t tell anyone. We see that much from the story itself!
We’re not talking about seven literal days, we’re not talking about a literal snake or actual physical “fruit.” This is pure parable. that’s the only way the narrative works.

The following from the CCC is the most critical teaching on this matter regarding the figurative vs. literal matter:
390 The account of the fall in Genesis 3 uses figurative language, but affirms a primeval event, a deed that took place at the beginning of the history of man.264 Revelation gives us the certainty of faith that the whole of human history is marked by the original fault freely committed by our first parents.

The OS, the first act of disobedience of God, was a literal event committed by the first parents of all living human beings. Much of the story including the surroundings uses figurative and highly symbolic language/images.

 

[Della]

Your last post before this one was “Please read my last post. Thank you.” Do you mean the one before that?

Yes. Sorry. I’d forgotten I’d posted another post. :tiphat:

brjoseph:

I see, folks.
You’re telling me I’m wrong for believing the Genesis account- particularly the Adam story- is an allegory, and that I err in not accepting the Genesis account as strict, literal, historic fact… but when those “facts” run up against a logical barrier within the narrative itself, you present me with scenarios completely absent from the story, in an effort to make it fit your own beliefs about what it does say. In short, to make literal interpretation work, you have to manufacture and add certain details.
This has been enlightening, but I admit I remain unconvinced, especially in light of the lengths to which literalism in this case must be stretched and abused to make it work, that Genesis is in fact anything but an allegory meant to convey higher truths.

When we “fill in” details we are not making them up out of thin air to try to make them fit in with our beliefs. The problem you are having is you are reading the Genesis accounts cold–with no understanding of the history involved and the people from which they came, etc. We have to use other sources than the bare text to “fill in the blanks” from other biblical texts, history, as well as the theology believed by who wrote the accounts.

The Bible is not a strict history book or science book or even theology book. It’s made up of many styles of writing by several authors written for various reasons, and to various audiences. It is a compendium of stories, poetry, history, symbolism, prose, etc. No author intended to give us all the details in any of his writings within it. Nearly all its authors expected their audiences to have a certain amount of knowledge about what they wrote. It’s like trying to read Shakespeare without knowing anything about Elizabethan England or European history. It may read as lovely poetry, but it would make little sense to most readers who knew little to nothing about the context in which Shakespeare wrote. Indeed, I never heard of a student reading him for the first time who wasn’t completely lost until certain things were explained.

So, please don’t read the Bible cold and expect to understand anything in it–at least not enough to come to conclusions in matters of faith and morals, or even science based on what you’ve read. A good commentary would help you a lot. You can look up Haydock’s Catholic Bible Commentary online–it’s a bit out of date, but he quotes many early Church Fathers and other theologians before and contemporary to him. Just Google it.

 

[brjoseph]

Della, with respect, and going on the assumption that you didn’t mean to sound condescending, I think you ought to know that I have a rather extensive knowledge of the scriptures and the history surrounding them both as spiritual revelation and as literature. I’m perfectly aware of the different writing styles, different authors, times in which they were composed, and the cultural issues and subtexts to be found therein… so please don’t assume that I disagree with your take on them out of ignorance.
In short, I’m not reading anything “cold.”
If you’d care to take another look at my objection to what was said about Cain’s wife, I think it stands. The scriptures tell us absolutely nothing about who she was or where she came from; it’s silent on the matter. Therefore, yes, in order to make her existence fit with what’s supposed to be a strictly literal interpretation of the story until that point, details DO have to be manufactured, and no matter how well developed, logical or reasoned details about her origin may be, the FACT, Della, is that it all remains nothing but the purest speculation.
Therefore, I contend, that if one views the story as allegorical in entirety, much like Christ’s parables, the point and message become clear, and the inconsistencies and contradictions cease to matter.
I certainly believe that scripture IS the inspired, divine word of God. I don’t for a second believe that God gave dictation to his authors. And while I believe much of the bible to be as historically true as is it spiritually, I do not believe the Genesis account can reasonably be said to be one of those passages.
That doesn’t suggest I discount God as creator, Man made in God’s image, the concept of original sin, or any of the MESSAGE of the story, as it is the very real and substantative precursor of the Gospel.
But I don’t believe in a literal, historic individual “Adam” any more that I believe in a literal, historic “Prodigal Son,” or “Ten virgins with lamps.” This is figurative writing, not history or science.

 

[TMC]

This statement from the Catechism is not inconsistent with an allegorical or figurative reading of the creation accounts. In fact, it supports a figurative reading.

I am continually surprised that so many Catholics want to import a literalistic reading of Genesis into the faith, given that the Church not only does not require such a reading, it supports a figurative or allegorical reading.

 

[Gorgias]

I see, folks.
You’re telling me I’m wrong for believing the Genesis account- particularly the Adam story- is an allegory, and that I* err *in not accepting the Genesis account as strict, literal, historic fact…

Hmm… I don’t think you’re talking to me, right?

Anyway, the Church doesn’t force a literalistic approach to the first chapters of Genesis upon anyone – however, neither does it force an approach that sees allegory! In fact, what the Church teaches are the theological truths that are found in these chapters (creation ex nihilo, the goodness of creation, creation of humanity in the image and likeness of God, the fall of man, etc). Stick with those truths – however you arrive at them through the text – and you’re fine.

 

[Della]

Della, with respect, and going on the assumption that you didn’t mean to sound condescending, I think you ought to know that I have a rather extensive knowledge of the scriptures and the history surrounding them both as spiritual revelation and as literature. I’m perfectly aware of the different writing styles, different authors, times in which they were composed, and the cultural issues and subtexts to be found therein… so please don’t assume that I disagree with your take on them out of ignorance.
In short, I’m not reading anything “cold.”
If you’d care to take another look at my objection to what was said about Cain’s wife, I think it stands. The scriptures tell us absolutely nothing about who she was or where she came from; it’s silent on the matter. Therefore, yes, in order to make her existence fit with what’s supposed to be a strictly literal interpretation of the story until that point, details DO have to be manufactured, and no matter how well developed, logical or reasoned details about her origin may be, the FACT, Della, is that it all remains nothing but the purest speculation.
Therefore, I contend, that if one views the story as allegorical in entirety, much like Christ’s parables, the point and message become clear, and the inconsistencies and contradictions cease to matter.
I certainly believe that scripture IS the inspired, divine word of God. I don’t for a second believe that God gave dictation to his authors. And while I believe much of the bible to be as historically true as is it spiritually, I do not believe the Genesis account can reasonably be said to be one of those passages.
That doesn’t suggest I discount God as creator, Man made in God’s image, the concept of original sin, or any of the MESSAGE of the story, as it is the very real and substantative precursor of the Gospel.
But I don’t believe in a literal, historic individual “Adam” any more that I believe in a literal, historic “Prodigal Son,” or “Ten virgins with lamps.” This is figurative writing, not history or science.

First of all, I meant no condescension. We get a lot of people on CAF with little to no understanding of the Bible or Sacred Tradition. My intention was merely to explain for your benefit and that of others who read without responding. :tiphat:

Then you are in disagreement with the Church on this point for the Church teaches, as Christ and the Apostles did, that Adam and Eve were real people. As Catholics we don’t go by the Bible alone but by all that is contained within Sacred Tradition, the teaching of the Apostles and Early Church Fathers, and the living Magisterium. As others have cited, what the Church teaches regarding Adam and Eve is stated in the CCC.

Jesus often taught using parables, but we are clearly told that they were parables. Not so the creation stories. They were told in mythological/figurative language telling us about real people and events. The opening passage of Genesis is obviously poetry, but that doesn’t make it a parable. There are many poems written about historical events and persons, such as G. K. Chesterton’s “Lepanto” or even about the midnight ride of Paul Revere. Just because they are cast into poetic form doesn’t make the events relayed any less true. From what you’ve written here, I believe you are confusing form with author intention/veracity of events and persons. We have no good reason to doubt the reality of the biblical accounts for science and history certainly hasn’t proved them wrong in their general information, again taking into account the form in which the stories were given to us and what we are able to know about our origins.

 

[TMC]

…

Then you are in disagreement with the Church on this point for the Church teaches, as Christ and the Apostles did, that Adam and Eve were real people. As Catholics we don’t go by the Bible alone but by all that is contained within Sacred Tradition, the teaching of the Apostles and Early Church Fathers, and the living Magisterium. As others have cited, what the Church teaches regarding Adam and Eve is stated in the CCC.

…

The Church does not require that Catholics believe in a literalistic reading of the Genesis creation accounts.

 

[Della]

The Church does not require that Catholics believe in a literalistic reading of the Genesis creation accounts.

I NEVER stated that it does. Please people. Actually read what I write instead of leaping to erroneous conclusions. Thank you.

 

[TMC]

I NEVER stated that it does. Please people. Actually read what I write instead of leaping to erroneous conclusions. Thank you.

OK, let me refine my statement. The Church does not require a literalistic reading of the story of Adam in Genesis, including that the Church does not require the belief that there existed an actual person named “Adam” who did the things recounted in the first chapters of Genesis. The Church accepts, and even supports, a figurative reading of Adam and Eve.

 

[Della]

OK, let me refine my statement. The Church does not require a literalistic reading of the story of Adam in Genesis, including that the Church does not require the belief that there existed an actual person named “Adam” who did the things recounted in the first chapters of Genesis. The Church accepts, and even supports, a figurative reading of Adam and Eve.

No. Figurative does not mean the stories were “imaginary” or “symbolic” only. Rather, the creation stories of Genesis are cast in figurative language/style of writing–which is an entirely different thing. The CCC plainly tells us that we had one man and one woman as the progenitors of the human race.

As an author of mythological fantasy who writes using figurative language, I can say without hesitation that, although my works are fiction, the style of writing is not limited to fiction. It can be, and is, employed in stories about real people and real events, especially in ancient times in which most people did not read or write. It was an easy way to pass down histories from one generation to another.

In our times, when illiteracy is largely confined to 3rd world countries, it can be hard for us to grasp how people could remember histories without history books and the internet. But, they did. Poetry and the use of figurative language enabled them to learn and pass on what they’d learned about their histories, religion, and peoples. This form of learning and remembering was the primary means of passing on history up until and into the times when the printing press was invented. We cannot apply modern ideas to ancient peoples. Doing so only confuses the issue.

 

[TMC]

No. Figurative does not mean the stories were “imaginary” or “symbolic” only. Rather, the creation stories of Genesis are cast in figurative language/style of writing–which is an entirely different thing. The CCC plainly tells us that we had one man and one woman as the progenitors of the human race.

As an author of mythological fantasy who writes using figurative language, I can say without hesitation that, although my works are fiction, the style of writing is not limited to fiction. It can be, and is, employed in stories about real people and real events, especially in ancient times in which most people did not read or write. It was an easy way to pass down histories from one generation to another.

In our times, when illiteracy is largely confined to 3rd world countries, it can be hard for us to grasp how people could remember histories without history books and the internet. But, they did. Poetry and the use of figurative language enabled them to learn and pass on what they’d learned about their histories, religion, and peoples. This form of learning and remembering was the primary means of passing on history up until and into the times when the printing press was invented. We cannot apply modern ideas to ancient peoples. Doing so only confuses the issue.

I did not say the creation stories were “imaginary.” The CCC says “figurative” which means “departing from a literal use of words; metaphorical.” That is not the same thing as “fiction.”

IMHO, one of the problems we have in modern times is that we are too tied to the literal. The authors of Scripture understood that truth was not limited to the literal or historical. Genesis imparts a deeper truth than merely telling a story about a person named Adam who lived 6000 years ago. We now understand that all people on earth did not descend from one couple that lived 6000 years ago. But that does diminish the truths that are represented in that portion of Scripture because the truths being imparted have nothing to do with whether or not there was a man named Adam who was the only person on earth 6000 years ago.

 

[Gorgias]

OK, let me refine my statement. The Church does not require a literalistic reading of the story of Adam in Genesis, including that the Church does not require the belief that there existed an actual person named “Adam” who did the things recounted in the first chapters of Genesis. The Church accepts, and even supports, a figurative reading of Adam and Eve.

If, by figurative, you mean that there was a first man and first woman who, through their disobedience, sinned against God, creating the situation we call ‘original sin’, then yes, it’s figurative. If, on the other hand, you mean that the Genesis story doesn’t imply a first man and woman, or a first sin, or the condition of ‘original sin’, then no, that’s not what the Church means…

 

[TMC]

If, by figurative, you mean that there was a first man and first woman who, through their disobedience, sinned against God, creating the situation we call ‘original sin’, then yes, it’s figurative. If, on the other hand, you mean that the Genesis story doesn’t imply a first man and woman, or a first sin, or the condition of ‘original sin’, then no, that’s not what the Church means…

I disagree. The Church does not require a belief in a literal Adam and Eve who were the only two people on earth 6,000 years ago. For example, look at the Vatican document Communion and Stewardship That document refers to Adam as a “symbol.” (para 43). And in discussing the origins of man, it says (para 63):

While the story of human origins is complex and subject to revision, physical anthropology and molecular biology combine to make a convincing case for the origin of the human species in Africa about 150,000 years ago in a humanoid population of common genetic lineage.

Those statements were approved by then-Cardinal Ratzinger while he was the head of the CDF, and are consistent with the teachings of at least the last three Popes.

 

[Gorgias]

I disagree. The Church does not require a belief in a literal Adam and Eve who were the only two people on earth 6,000 years ago.

You’re right; it doesn’t. Yet, that’s not what I claimed; I didn’t make a claim for a 6000-year-old earth. I didn’t make a claim for Adam and Eve as the only inhabitants on earth (the only humans, perhaps, I might argue for; but I didn’t make the claim you assert I did).

That document refers to Adam as a “symbol.” (para 43).

No, it doesn’t. It says that Adam is ‘the symbol of the original unity of the human race.’ There’s a big difference between those two assertions. Jack Lambert and Mean Joe Green are symbols of the Steel Curtain defense of the 1970’s-era Pittsburgh Steelers; of course, that doesn’t mean that they are only ‘symbols’ and aren’t ‘real human beings.’

And in discussing the origins of man, it says (para 63):

Yes, and this is a discussion of the existence of humanoids on earth. Further, it says:

Pope John Paul’s message is specifically critical of materialistic theories of human origins and insists on the relevance of philosophy and theology for an adequate understanding of the “ontological leap” to the human which cannot be explained in purely scientific terms. The Church’s interest in evolution thus focuses particularly on “the conception of man” … The implication of these remarks is that theories of evolution and of the origin of the universe possess particular theological interest when they touch on the doctrines of the creation ex nihilo and the creation of man in the image of God

And further:

With respect to the immediate creation of the human soul, Catholic theology affirms that particular actions of God bring about effects that transcend the capacity of created causes acting according to their natures. The appeal to divine causality to account for genuinely causal as distinct from merely explanatory gaps does not insert divine agency to fill in the “gaps” in human scientific understanding (thus giving rise to the so-called "God of the gaps”). The structures of the world can be seen as open to non-disruptive divine action in directly causing events in the world. Catholic theology affirms that that the emergence of the first members of the human species (whether as individuals or in populations) represents an event that is not susceptible of a purely natural explanation and which can appropriately be attributed to divine intervention. Acting indirectly through causal chains operating from the beginning of cosmic history, God prepared the way for what Pope John Paul II has called “an ontological leap…the moment of transition to the spiritual.” While science can study these causal chains, it falls to theology to locate this account of the special creation of the human soul within the overarching plan of the triune God to share the communion of trinitarian life with human persons who are created out of nothing in the image and likeness of God

In other words, although scientists can study the physical world, and can discuss the rise of hominids, it cannot speak to the spark that God provided in order to create humans. Did hominids arise in isolation – one mating pair – or in a community? It’s immaterial; the Church still contends that God created human souls, without mediation, and thus began the human race. It’s this creation of the first two humans that the Church addresses in the context of the first chapters of Genesis.

What you have shown is that the Church is in conversation with scientific progress, not in competition with it. As the document says in paragraph 70, the theology of the Church “does not insert divine agency to fill in the ‘gaps’ in human scientific understanding (thus giving rise to the so-called ‘God of the gaps’)”; rather, it shows how the descriptions in Genesis proclaim the truth, in ways that science does not – and can not – appropriate in its descriptions of physical processes. The theology that proceeds from Genesis is therefore not mythological or symbolic, but true in a way that its figurative language does not diminish…!

Those statements were approved by then-Cardinal Ratzinger while he was the head of the CDF, and are consistent with the teachings of at least the last three Popes.

Yes, they are; yet, they don’t make the claims that you assert they’re making…

 

[irenaeuslyons]

I disagree. The Church does not require a belief in a literal Adam and Eve who were the only two people on earth 6,000 years ago. For example, look at the Vatican document Communion and Stewardship That document refers to Adam as a “symbol.” (para 43). And in discussing the origins of man, it says (para 63):
Those statements were approved by then-Cardinal Ratzinger while he was the head of the CDF, and are consistent with the teachings of at least the last three Popes.

Then why do you believe in original sin? I mean, why would you reject the story but accept the part that talks about original sin.

 

[coco2]

I had classes taught by a priest that the story of Adam and Eve was not to be taken literally. I had a class for catechists given by a nun who said the same thing. I assumed it was correct, but have thought about it for many years and now even DNA testing proves that everyone’s DNA started in the same place in the world.

 

[MollyMac]

I am reading through this thread and others on the forum and some hold to the belief that Jesus’ parables used to teach the crowds are similar or are to be read and comprehended the same way as the Creation and Fall of man account in Genesis and also the account of Noah and the flood. I do not see the resemblance. Christ told the disciples and those who followed that parables were used so the crowds might understand. Nowhere in Genesis or thereafter does anyone refer to Creation or the Flood as just a symbolic story or a parable or anything of the like. There are different instances in the Old Testament where prophets used stories to explain things (such as David and Nathan) but the stories were reveled as stories used to teach a lesson. The Creation account and the Flood are not explained that way in scripture by anyone. So why is it not taken literally?

Would anyone have any thoughts on Matthew 24:37-39?