Must we believe OT stories literally for salvation?

  • Thread starter Thread starter Duke_of_St_Paul
  • Start date Start date
Status
Not open for further replies.
D

Duke_of_St_Paul

Guest
Adam & Eve, Job, Jonah in the fish, etc. are stories found in the Old Testament and are often regarded as historical accounts. But is it necessary to believe these stories are historical accounts in order for us to receive salvation? May we view them as merely descriptive myths?

What does it change if a person doesn’t believe Job actually existed, or Adam & Eve for that matter? It doesn’t change or diminish any doctrine or fundamental belief; a person arrives at the Truth regardless of their historicity.
 
We are required to believe that all of mankind has two original parents (Adam and Eve) for by their transgressions, we inherited Original Sin.

We are not required to believe the literal details of a snake, and a tree, and an apple.

God Bless
 
bilop said:
We are required to believe that all of mankind has two original parents (Adam and Eve) for by their transgressions, we inherited Original Sin.

We are not required to believe the literal details of a snake, and a tree, and an apple.

God Bless
Click to expand...
👍 Also, I thought the majority view was already that Job didn’t exist and is just a metaphor.
 
I think the question is a bit tough to answer: must we believe in the OT literalistically to be saved? The Church teaches certain truths concerning the OT, such as the literal existence of our first parents who somehow lost our original grace, but how denying these truths (let alone not knowing them!) would affect your salvation is not the purview of anyone on this forum, I’d say.
 
The bible isn’t a book. It’s a library. You have to read each book with a different lens. Some of them were written figuratively and some of them were written historically. And, importantly, you have to read each book in light of Christ’s sacrifice and teaching. This isn’t new. It has been done since the early days of the Church. For instance, Origen was estimated to have written between 203-250 AD and understood this fact.
 
edwest2 said:
Jesus refers to Moses and Abraham as literal people.
Click to expand...
I don’t think anyone’s doubting Moses or Abraham. The debate’s about if we must believe that Job existed or that Jonah was literally eaten by a whale.
 
Razanir said:
I don’t think anyone’s doubting Moses or Abraham. The debate’s about if we must believe that Job existed or that Jonah was literally eaten by a whale.
Click to expand...
The topic is broader than that.

"Adam and Eve: Real People

"It is equally impermissible to dismiss the story of Adam and Eve and the fall (Gen. 2–3) as a fiction. A question often raised in this context is whether the human race descended from an original pair of two human beings (a teaching known as monogenism) or a pool of early human couples (a teaching known as polygenism).

"In this regard, Pope Pius XII stated: “When, however, there is question of another conjectural opinion, namely polygenism, the children of the Church by no means enjoy such liberty. For the faithful cannot embrace that opinion which maintains either that after Adam there existed on this earth true men who did not take their origin through natural generation from him as from the first parents of all, or that Adam represents a certain number of first parents. Now, it is in no way apparent how such an opinion can be reconciled that which the sources of revealed truth and the documents of the teaching authority of the Church proposed with regard to original sin which proceeds from a sin actually committed by an individual Adam in which through generation is passed onto all and is in everyone as his own” (Humani Generis 37).

“The story of the creation and fall of man is a true one, even if not written entirely according to modern literary techniques. The Catechism states, “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. 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” (CCC 390).”

Why are we baptized? Why was Jesus Christ Born? Why do we all have Original Sin?

Peace,
Ed
 
I’ll delve a little deeper into the story of Adam & Eve, and my understanding of it.

I find it hard to believe the first two homo sapiens were a specific male, whose name was actually Adam, and a specific female, whose name was actually Eve; and that the events of Genesis actually happened. It seems more reasonable to understand this story in the context of theistic evolution and the advent of self-awareness; knowing thyself is to know God and thus to receive a soul (in my opinion). Therefore, it seems to me the creation story is literally true but in such a context. I see it is true that there were actually two people from whom we are descended but their “fall” was in the sense of knowing good, because to know good means to know evil as well, and this good/evil, yin/yang is original sin. The fall was not an actual expulsion from a garden.

This is how I understand it. Is this wrong? Do I really need to believe the traditional interpretation? This is one example of OT stories.
 
This is a common misconception that is being spread. Basically, it is a purely mechanistic view of what it means to be human and that the mind is the same as the spirit. The mind being just another mechanism.

This cuts God out of the picture entirely. Each of us has a soul which is not the result of material action. Knowing also becomes a purely mechanical action. Just getting enough neurons firing away and we know, through some unexplained way, what is “right” or “wrong.” Again, this amounts to mechanical actions. “Walking off that cliff” is wrong. “Killing my children” is wrong, somehow. I mean, other people have children and I’ll just hang out with them. This relativistic thinking is based on mechanistic motives.

biblehub.com/romans/5-12.htm

Jesus Christ was born, suffered, died and rose again as a sacrifice and as a means to reconnect our broken connection with God. He established a new covenant and told us that what is born of the flesh is flesh but what is born of the spirit is spirit.

Some believe we, and all life, are just biological robots. Our functions are mechanical.

Peace,
Ed
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top