Genesis

[grannymh]

Suggest you read “does God have a body.?” Under “read " section. Search"God anthropomorphic”.
God is pure spirit.

Please refer back to post 49.

Understanding God as Pure Spirit is very important which is why doctrine 2. under the metaphor of “garden” is essential.

The fact that God is Pure Spirit is why doctrine 1. also in the “garden” part is true. The material world in which we live cannot create our spiritual rational soul.

The doctrines presented in Post 49 section on the concept of God making “clothes” also depend on God being a Pure Spirit. Because God is a Pure Spirit, He is all powerful, the first doctrine in this “clothes” section. If He were not a Pure Spirit, He would be limited or restricted by the materialism of His created universe. Being all powerful can be difficult to describe. How does one describe God’s powerful love for each person? The actual Original Sin wounded the human nature of Adam and Eve.
Making clothes signifies that Adam and Eve’s wounded nature is ""different from the pre-Fall experience.

Please notice that not one of the 10 doctrines listed in post 49 declares that God is not a Pure Spirit. Neither do they declare that God at the beginning of human history assumed a human nature. It is doctrine 4. in the “clothes” section which cites the “promise” for the future when God, the Second Person of the Trinity, will assume human nature in human time.

Yes, God is Pure Spirit. But that did not forbid ancient humans from using human terminology to describe the actions of God at the beginning of human history (first three chapters of Genesis). As we read St. Paul, we find that he correctly interpreted the terminology or semantics used by these ancient writers inspired by the Holy Spirit. An important example is Romans 5: 12-21.

The first three chapters of Genesis will become less troublesome, when one understands basic Catholic doctrines regarding human origin, human nature, original sin, wounded human nature, and the necessity for reconciliation of humanity with divinity.

 

[grannymh]

. Even the “image of God” is metaphorical language: God has no image, he is spirit. Theologians still don’t know exactly what it means, only that it sets us apart from everything else but the angels (“and he breathed in to the man the breath of life, and he became a living soul”): does it refer to our spirit? to our soul? to our intellect? to our rational faculties? to our subsidiary dominion over nature? Most definitions of the “image of God” are in essence this: “The image of God is what makes man man.” Followed by a bit of speaking on speech, and maybe a discussion of rationality here or there.

While I cannot speak for the theologians you refer to, I can say that the basic or primary issues of being in the “image of God” have already been defined domatically by the Catholic Church.

Warning: it takes time to study these issues found in the Catechism of the Catholic Church, Second Edition, parapraphs 355-421 plus all the cross-references in the margins plus gaining an understanding of basic Catholicism.

 

[juliamajor]

Please refer back to post 49.

Understanding God as Pure Spirit is very important which is why doctrine 2. under the metaphor of “garden” is essential.

The fact that God is Pure Spirit is why doctrine 1. also in the “garden” part is true. The material world in which we live cannot create our spiritual rational soul.

The doctrines presented in Post 49 section on the concept of God making “clothes” also depend on God being a Pure Spirit. Because God is a Pure Spirit, He is all powerful, the first doctrine in this “clothes” section. If He were not a Pure Spirit, He would be limited or restricted by the materialism of His created universe. Being all powerful can be difficult to describe. How does one describe God’s powerful love for each person? The actual Original Sin wounded the human nature of Adam and Eve.
Making clothes signifies that Adam and Eve’s wounded nature is ""different from the pre-Fall experience.

Please notice that not one of the 10 doctrines listed in post 49 declares that God is not a Pure Spirit. Neither do they declare that God at the beginning of human history assumed a human nature. It is doctrine 4. in the “clothes” section which cites the “promise” for the future when God, the Second Person of the Trinity, will assume human nature in human time.

Yes, God is Pure Spirit. But that did not forbid ancient humans from using human terminology to describe the actions of God at the beginning of human history (first three chapters of Genesis). As we read St. Paul, we find that he correctly interpreted the terminology or semantics used by these ancient writers inspired by the Holy Spirit. An important example is Romans 5: 12-21.

The first three chapters of Genesis will become less troublesome, when one understands basic Catholic doctrines regarding human origin, human nature, original sin, wounded human nature, and the necessity for reconciliation of humanity wit

 

[Khalid]

While I cannot speak for the theologians you refer to, I can say that the basic or primary issues of being in the “image of God” have already been defined domatically by the Catholic Church.

Warning: it takes time to study these issues found in the Catechism of the Catholic Church, Second Edition, parapraphs 355-421 plus all the cross-references in the margins plus gaining an understanding of basic Catholicism.

I’m a theology graduate student/seminarian. The catechism definition is essential that of “the image of God is what makes man man [a person]”; the debate is over what makes a person, what is essential to it? Rationality, language, spirit, intellect, cognition, love, creativity? It seems that more modern thinkers lean towards creativity and love, and more traditional ones to “mind” (most of the above) and the will, especially in its ability to love.

Even the great Saint Thomas Aquinas got not much further than “it’s what makes man man” (ST I-I q. 35 a. 1) but he located the essential nature of man, along with Aristotle, in rationality (ST I-I q. 93 a. 1f: man is a rational animal) and in the intellect (ST I-I q. 93 a. 6: non-temporal act of understanding, not the process of thinking). ST I-I q. 93 a. 7 is well worth reading while you’re at it.

But there’s no other way to describe it - even though the formless God has no image, we are made in his image. One of the ineluctable mysteries of the faith, like how the eternal, immutable, invisible God became temporal and visible man, remained fully God and fully man, and was crucified to reconcile the world to himself. Compared to these doctrines, the Trinity is the epitome of lucidity, and is intellectual child’s play!

 

[juliamajor]

It is not at all troublesome for people who know
Catholic doctrines and accept them.

In regard to the concept of God walking in a “garden”,
The Catholic doctrines you are missing are:

1. God is the maker of heaven and earth, of all things visible and visible.
2. God created human nature as an unique unification of both the material world *and *the spiritual world.
   3.God is a personal God in that He has the power to communicate with His humans.
3. Humans have an intellective, rational soul which enables us to know and love God.
   5.God calls each human person to share in His life through knowledge and love.

In regard to the concept of God making “clothes”.
The Catholic doctrines you are missing are: I’m not missing any doctrine. You read a heck of a lot into what I wrote. I was writing primarily to Khalid who sees all as literal and not as spiritual or metaphorical. If your reply hadn’t ’ been so hurtsome maybe iwould have seen it clearer. I’m very well acquainted with scripture and doctrine. God’s clothes for disobedient children are a sign of His continuing love and concern despite of their sin. His continuing love forgiveness and His will to reinstate that divine intimacy that was once between God and man which can only come through salvation by the efficacy of the Blood of Christ is a synopsis of salvation History.

1.God is all powerful. (When did I deny His power)
2. God is not limited or restricted by the material/physical world.(his limits are only by His own nature. He can not be what he is not(like evil) he cannot deny that which he gave us (like Free will) .He cannot break His covenant. To do so would to be a God of the nation. Puny small arrogant. That is not YHWH’s nature
3. God did not abandon the first humans after the freely committed Original Sin.
4. God promised a Messiah.
5. Human nature was not totally destroyed.

 

[Khalid]

No, I merely say the literal underlay this metaphorical. The clothes God made were clothes; but two animals had to be sacrificed to make them, clothes of skin and fur, which is a spiritual/typological foreshadowing of the Levitical cult of the Jews and of the final and infinite sacrifice of Christ on the Cross, and a statement and prefigurement that forgiveness can not come except through the shedding of blood.

But if there were no Adam, no Eve, and no clothes, the spiritual and typological readings make no sense; it’s just a myth (one of the above posters demonstrated very well the kind of Scripture-denying lengths one can go to, viewing, in essence, Genesis as a baptized Jewish tribal creation myth: I could not have illustrated the consequences of my own point half as well as that poster did).

Also, though it has no bearing on the topic, God is limited in one way: he can not defy the laws of logic. He can not make a circle with 38º, nor can he make a four-sided triangle. He can not make A not equal A. We have this explicitly ordered universe with an ordered and rational mind behind it due to the genius of such men as Augustine and St Thomas Aquinas correctly teaching that the intellect of God was primary to his will, instead of falling in to a Ockhamite-Ghazalian occasionalism where God is literally “unchained”, and the universe has no order to it whatsoever.

 

[juliamajor]

I never denied that we need a savior in fact it’s right in my post. I never said God 's love was limited. It is continuous and never ending. So why did you feel the need to denigrate me?

 

[Khalid]

I did not intend to. I stated that a Savior as presented by Paul makes no sense without a literal Adam and Eve and original sin to be redeemed from. If we all came about from a process of evolution, we’re more perfect now than we were in the past: what do we need to be redeemed from?

 

[juliamajor]

No, I merely say the literal underlay this metaphorical. The clothes God made were clothes; but two animals had to be sacrificed to make them, clothes of skin and fur, which is a spiritual/typological foreshadowing of the Levitical cult of the Jews and of the final and infinite sacrifice of Christ on the Cross, and a statement and prefigurement that forgiveness can not come except through the shedding of blood.

But if there were no Adam, no Eve, and no clothes, the spiritual and typological readings make no sense; it’s just a myth (one of the above posters demonstrated very well the kind of Scripture-denying lengths one can go to, viewing, in essence, Genesis as a baptized Jewish tribal creation myth: I could not have illustrated the consequences of my own point half as well as that poster did).

Lest I be misunderstood. Did YHWH MAKE PHYSICAL CLOTHES With His Edenic Singer sewing machine( with the foot treadle!) Or did he not! Or is it metaphorical, metaphysical, rhetorical, analogical or any other "Cal " you can think of.?

 

[juliamajor]

I did not intend to. I stated that a Savior as presented by Paul makes no sense without a literal Adam and Eve and original sin to be redeemed from. If we all came about from a process of evolution, we’re more perfect now than we were in the past: what do we need to be redeemed from?

Wow I think we are at cross purposes. Khalid. I think that there huge misunderstanding here.
I apologize if I have had in any part of it (though unwittingly!)

 

[Khalid]

Lest I be misunderstood. Did YHWH MAKE PHYSICAL CLOTHES With His Edenic Singer sewing machine( with the foot treadle!) Or did he not! Or is it metaphorical, metaphysical, rhetorical, analogical or any other "Cal " you can think of.?

He did make physical clothes, through what means I know not, except, that in the process of making them, two animals were sacrificed. Remember that he also made the material universe out of nothing; God can most certainly make (or fashion, the Hebrew yatsar as opposed to create, the Hebrew bara) and manipulate all material objects that he already created, which are as arranging sticks in a line are to us (but it’s infinitely harder for us to arrange the sticks), as well as create both immaterial (souls) and material objects still.

Edit: it’s not an either/or, it’s a both/and, and the necessity of the both/and and the complete untenability of the either/or has been the main thrust of my programme throughout this thread, from my first post on.

 

[Khalid]

Wow I think we are at cross purposes. Khalid. I think that there huge misunderstanding here.
I apologize if I have had in any part of it (though unwittingly!)

“Cross purposes” means we’re fighting each other; a “huge misunderstanding” implies otherwise. I’m confused! (Context doesn’t let me sort out which one you’re trying to say!)

If it’s cross purposes, where are they at? If it’s a huge misunderstanding, where are our points of agreement and disagreement, and is there anything that you would like me to hold out further on, elucidate, or rephrase, that you are not certain of my meaning? (Not a demand in any sense, if you do not wish to continue on, but an exercise in critical thinking, if you will, to work out what’s what, the different ways of phrasing it, the importance of precise terminology [which I attempt to use, but use in a very Byzantine fashion], and not writing in a Byzantine fashion.)

 

[juliamajor]

He did make physical clothes, through what means I know not, except, that in the process of making them, two animals were sacrificed.

Sorry. Can’t t agree. Anthropomorizing the Almighty is ti make Him like any other puny pagan God. Check out the article on anthropomorphism in New Advent. It is improper to say the least.

 

[juliamajor]

“Cross purposes” means we’re fighting each other; a “huge misunderstanding” implies otherwise. I’m confused! (Context doesn’t let me sort out which one you’re trying to say!)

If it’s cross purposes, where are they at? If it’s a huge misunderstanding, where are our points of agreement and disagreement, and is there anything that you would like me to hold out further on, elucidate, or rephrase, that you are not certain of my meaning? (Not a demand in any sense, if you do not wish to continue on, but an exercise in critical thinking, if you will, to work out what’s what, the different ways of phrasing it, the importance of precise terminology [which I attempt to use, but use in a very Byzantine fashion], and not writing in a Byzantine fashion.)

Oh forget about it.

 

[Khalid]

Read the rest of my post: he created the material universe as well. Creating the material universe and manipulating objects within it are not anthropomorphisms in any sense. Or is that to say God could not have caused the Virgin Birth, or could not have turned water to wine, or could not have parted the Red Sea, or appeared in a burning bush, or as Melchizedek, or as a pillar of smoke by day and a pillar of fire by night, the shekhinah in the Temple, and all of the other theophanies (=appearances of God) in the Old Testament?

Edit: Heh, we’re posting past each other. If you’re annoyed, feel free to come back to it tomorrow (or drop it altogether). I need practice in beating my head against brick walls until they give way (not in any way implying that you’re a brick wall, but in general stating, “dealing with annoying subjects repeatedly”) if I ever hope to be even a quarter-decent priest! Not everyone necessarily does, and for many it can be an unnecessary source of stress.

 

[grannymh]

I’m a theology graduate student/seminarian. The catechism definition is essential that of “the image of God is what makes man man [a person]”; the debate is over what makes a person, what is essential to it? Rationality, language, spirit, intellect, cognition, love, creativity? It seems that more modern thinkers lean towards creativity and love, and more traditional ones to “mind” (most of the above) and the will, especially in its ability to love.

Even the great Saint Thomas Aquinas got not much further than “it’s what makes man man” (ST I-I q. 35 a. 1) but he located the essential nature of man, along with Aristotle, in rationality (ST I-I q. 93 a. 1f: man is a rational animal) and in the intellect (ST I-I q. 93 a. 6: non-temporal act of understanding, not the process of thinking). ST I-I q. 93 a. 7 is well worth reading while you’re at it.

But there’s no other way to describe it - even though the formless God has no image, we are made in his image. One of the ineluctable mysteries of the faith, like how the eternal, immutable, invisible God became temporal and visible man, remained fully God and fully man, and was crucified to reconcile the world to himself. Compared to these doctrines, the Trinity is the epitome of lucidity, and is intellectual child’s play!

I use common sense.

I read more than one CCC paragraph when I am looking for the nature of man. In other words, I am not satisfied with the explanation that the “image of God is what makes man man”. So what is meant by man? Somewhere it was mentioned that man is different from angels–am I recalling that correctly? No matter, different than angels in what respect? Learning the Catholic doctrines regarding the nature of man is important in this case.

Speaking of the Catechism of the Catholic Church, Second Edition, could you possibly be basing the total explanation of human nature on this one sentence from CCC 357. “Being in the image of God the human individual possesses the dignity of a person, who is not just something, but someone.”

 

[Khalid]

Indeed, I am exactly placing it on that one sentence, which I have interpreted to be the hinge of the entire section - everything else is around it is about what makes man man (and therefore the image of God).

The entire 9 articles of the 93rd question of the first part of the Summa Theologiae (available on the internet: newadvent.org/summa/1093.htm ) deal with the question in more detail: they will be of interest to you, as, indeed, I believe they are one of the best Catholic treatments of the image of God available anywhere (Orthodox have some very good treatments expanding on a. 9, the difference between “image” and “likeness”).

 

[triumphguy]

With all due respect, I think someone representing CA would have a firmer understanding of what we’re to believe than any of posters.
Here is another reply from CA to this question:catholic.com/quickquestions/did-people-really-live-for-900-years-as-described-in-genesis

There’s some pretty bright, orthodox and well read posters on here you know

 

[Faith1960]

Exactly, the inerrancy of the bible does not extend to every recorded detail. It applies to matters of faith and morals not the number birthdays celebrated or concubines consummated. In uncertain passages the church will guide.
Peterk

Why do you suppose it’s listed that people in the OT lived to 900+ years?

 

[grannymh]

Indeed, I am exactly placing it on that one sentence, which I have interpreted to be the hinge of the entire section - everything else is around it is about what makes man man (and therefore the image of God).

The entire 9 articles of the 93rd question of the first part of the Summa Theologiae (available on the internet: newadvent.org/summa/1093.htm ) deal with the question in more detail: they will be of interest to you, as, indeed, I believe they are one of the best Catholic treatments of the image of God available anywhere (Orthodox have some very good treatments expanding on a. 9, the difference between “image” and “likeness”).

Dang! I wish I had stayed awake during my philosophy/theology courses. Fortunately, a CAF poster nailed me for my Cartesian [extreme] dualism which in turn started me really studying human nature from the position of Catholic doctrines.

I did look at the nine titles of your link, but did not open them. This is because I learned in a high school Catholic religion course that regardless of what St. Thomas Aquinas or the many Church Fathers and Doctors wrote, it is the Catholic Church per se, through its protocol of discerning Divine Revelation under the guidance of the Holy Spirit, that has the last say. In other words, not every word St. Thomas wrote is automatically a Catholic doctrine. The tail does not wag the dog.

Obviously, we are interested in St. Thomas Aquinas. A short cut to his contributions to the Catechism of the Catholic Church, Second Edition is page 751. St. Thomas is one of many entries in the Catechism’s Index of Citations. Obviously, Aquinas citations are used in the teachings about Catholic doctrines. For example, I defend the reality of Adam, consequently I constantly refer to DeMalo 4,1, a footnote to CCC 404. Footnotes are great.

What I am trying to say is that if one believes in Catholicism, then one should start one’s inquiry about human nature by studying all the pertinent paragraphs in the CCC.

I should have replied to this in one of your posts.
“…the debate is over what makes a person, what is essential to it? Rationality, language, spirit, intellect, cognition, love, creativity? It seems that more modern thinkers lean towards creativity and love, and more traditional ones to “mind” (most of the above) and the will, especially in its ability to love.”

This debate skips the essentials of human nature which have already been defined, not by one single CCC paragraph, but rather by an in depth study of many CCC paragraphs.