reconcile adam and eve

  • Thread starter Thread starter mikeabboud
  • Start date Start date
Status
Not open for further replies.
M

mikeabboud

Guest
How are we to reconcile a literal Adam and Eve with development of human kind over the years. The evidence seems to indicate humans evolved not from two people but from multiple people. At what point were souls added or Adam and Eve were real ? I am aware that we have a Pope saying that Adam and Eve are real beings but i don’t think the evidence can lead to that conclusion. I am not at odd with theological creation I am simply looking for a way to reconcile that which seems to contradict each other. Any theologians or philosophers who have done some work on this. I cant find any.
 
mikeabboud said:
How are we to reconcile a literal Adam and Eve with development of human kind over the years. The evidence seems to indicate humans evolved not from two people but from multiple people. At what point were souls added or Adam and Eve were real ? I am aware that we have a Pope saying that Adam and Eve are real beings but i don’t think the evidence can lead to that conclusion. I am not at odd with theological creation I am simply looking for a way to reconcile that which seems to contradict each other. Any theologians or philosophers who have done some work on this. I cant find any.
Click to expand...
There is plenty of scientific evidence to suggest that the world is much older than the time when Adam and Eve supposedly lived. I have never taken the story of Genesis as literal truth and history. Adam and Eve may have been real people and might possibly be the first recorded man and woman is history but not necessarily the first or the only ones.

Consider that Genesis says that Adam and Eve had two sons; Cain and Abel, and Abel was killed by his brother. If Genesis was literally true that would leave only two men and one woman on the whole planet. Where did the subsequent generations come from if there were no other people, particularly women, around?

More importantly, I don’t view Adam and Eve as historical characters so much as an allegory of man’s fall from grace.

My :twocents:
 
Lost_Sheep said:
There is plenty of scientific evidence to suggest that the world is much older than the time when Adam and Eve supposedly lived. I have never taken the story of Genesis as literal truth and history. Adam and Eve may have been real people and might possibly be the first recorded man and woman is history but not necessarily the first or the only ones.

Consider that Genesis says that Adam and Eve had two sons; Cain and Abel, and Abel was killed by his brother. If Genesis was literally true that would leave only two men and one woman on the whole planet. Where did the subsequent generations come from if there were no other people, particularly women, around?

More importantly, I don’t view Adam and Eve as historical characters so much as an allegory of man’s fall from grace.

My :twocents:
Click to expand...
that’s where the problem lies we have to believe that Adam and eve are literal persons that has been declared true.
 
I don’t see any contradiction. Genesis isn’t written as a historical textbook. The stories relate truths God wanted imparted. Namely, there were originally the first two human beings, and they disobeyed God in some manner, which was the Original Sin and led to man’s fall.

The specifics on the stories help to convey those truths to mankind, but the text was never intended to be read as a six, 24-hour period creation.

As far as I know, even science supports the idea of an original man and woman, especially evolution. Before humans existed, there were evolving stages of human-like creatures, until eventually they became human. Well at SOME point, the offspring of one of these pre-humans had evolved to finally become homo-sapien. Evolution is advanced in stages, not continuously, because reproduction is in stages. (There is a separate and distinct entity from the prior generation, and there is no evolution during a generation, each generation is ever so slightly different than the prior generation). So there had to be one generation, where the baby born was a human and not a pre-human creature.
 
Lost_Sheep said:
Consider that Genesis says that Adam and Eve had two sons; Cain and Abel, and Abel was killed by his brother. If Genesis was literally true that would leave only two men and one woman on the whole planet. Where did the subsequent generations come from if there were no other people, particularly women, around?
Click to expand...
Genesis is silent on children of Adam and Eve other than Cain, Abel and Enoch. That doesn’t mean there weren’t more children. Scripture just discusses those three. It tells us Adam and Eve lived hundreds of years, they could have had hundreds of children.
 
zz912 said:
Genesis is silent on children of Adam and Eve other than Cain, Abel and Enoch. That doesn’t mean there weren’t more children. Scripture just discusses those three. It tells us Adam and Eve lived hundreds of years, they could have had hundreds of children.
Click to expand...
But we have a pope declaring something as infallible that all humans descend from a primordial couple. Where does that couple fit in to the evolution of the species and at what point along the time line are the souls added.Were they able to mate with the non human almost humans without a soul but still biologically the same or were they completely separate species due to the addition of the soul? I don’t think the evidence we have to date supports the claim that all humans descend from one couple.

spelling
 
mikeabboud said:
But we have a pope declaring something as infallible that all humans descend from a primordial couple. Where does that couple fit in to the evolution of the species and at what point along the time line are the souls added.Were they able to mate with the non human almost humans without a soul but still biologically the same or were they completely separate species due to the addition of the soul? I don’t think the evidence we have to date supports the claim that all humans descend from one couple.

spelling
Click to expand...
I might be proven wrong, but I don’t think that this is declared infallible. What is infallible is that God implanted souls into us humans. This is something supernatural and will never be investigated or denied by science.
 
zz912 said:
Well at SOME point, the offspring of one of these pre-humans had evolved to finally become homo-sapien.
Click to expand...
The current findings state that humans evolved as a group (polygenesis), not into one human at a time, not into 2 humans who later produced more humans. The Church explicitly condemns polygenesis and binds its faithful to believe in 2 literal first humans who started humanity. That is where the problem lies for many.
 
mikeabboud said:
But we have a pope declaring something as infallible that all humans descend from a primordial couple. Where does that couple fit in to the evolution of the species and at what point along the time line are the souls added.Were they able to mate with the non human almost humans without a soul but still biologically the same or were they completely separate species due to the addition of the soul? I don’t think the evidence we have to date supports the claim that all humans descend from one couple.

spelling
Click to expand...
The Church has not actually declared this to be infallible. In fact, the Church tends to lean towards the Big Band Theory of creation (a term originally meant as an insult because it was formulated by a Catholic priest and secular authorities thought it was absurd). Not sure where you’re getting that Catholics have to believe a literal interpretation of Genesis.
 
Hans_W said:
I might be proven wrong, but I don’t think that this is declared infallible.
Click to expand...
RedFox0456 said:
The Church has not actually declared this to be infallible.
Click to expand...
It was infallibly declared in Humani Generis, I believe. Explicit condemnation of polygenesis while affirming the faithful must believe in 2 literal first humans who started humanity and disobeyed God.
 
Hans_W said:
I might be proven wrong, but I don’t think that this is declared infallible. What is infallible is that God implanted souls into us humans. This is something supernatural and will never be investigated or denied by science.
Click to expand...
from catholic answers.

dam 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).
 
I don’t have any issue with the fall of man, I really don’t have an issue with Adam and Eve, i am really looking for the way our church squares two competing truths.
 
Lost_Sheep said:
There is plenty of scientific evidence to suggest that the world is much older than the time when Adam and Eve supposedly lived. I have never taken the story of Genesis as literal truth and history. Adam and Eve may have been real people and might possibly be the first recorded man and woman is history but not necessarily the first or the only ones.

Consider that Genesis says that Adam and Eve had two sons; Cain and Abel, and Abel was killed by his brother. If Genesis was literally true that would leave only two men and one woman on the whole planet. Where did the subsequent generations come from if there were no other people, particularly women, around?

More importantly, I don’t view Adam and Eve as historical characters so much as an allegory of man’s fall from grace.

My :twocents:
Click to expand...
Trust God, HE knows what he is doing. If God would have wanted us to know all the details, He would have told us. He will explain it all when we get to Heaven. Adam and Eve had more children than just Cain and Able. Why would Jesus be called the second Adam and Mary the second Eve if there were NO true real people.
 
Memaw said:
Trust God, HE knows what he is doing. If God would have wanted us to know all the details, He would have told us. He will explain it all when we get to Heaven. Adam and Eve had more children than just Cain and Able. Why would Jesus be called the second Adam and Mary the second Eve if there were NO true real people.
Click to expand...
This does not really address the issue. I am sure the church and its theologians and philosophers have addressed the issue, id like some source information as to how they addressed it, i have not found any.
 
mikeabboud said:
I don’t have any issue with the fall of man, I really don’t have an issue with Adam and Eve, i am really looking for the way our church squares two competing truths.
Click to expand...
Because there are no competing truths. There is a religious truth, and there is a scientific theory (polygenism) that seems, at the moment, to conflict with it.

New theories come out several times a year. Only a few weeks ago, an article came out crowing that the Big Bang was disproven.

ICXC NIKA
 
mikeabboud said:
This does not really address the issue. I am sure the church and its theologians and philosophers have addressed the issue, id like some source information as to how they addressed it, i have not found any.
Click to expand...
There are many Mysteries in life that we may never know all the answers to. That’s where Faith comes in. I don’t rack my brain over things that can’t be answered completely. I know God is our creator and He is in charge of everything. That’s enough for me. If science goes against the teachings of the Church, guess whose wrong! And its NOT the Church. The Chuich is quided by the Holy Spirit and cannot teach error. God Bless, Memaw
 
GEddie said:
Because there are no competing truths. There is a religious truth, and there is a scientific theory (polygenism) that seems, at the moment, to conflict with it.

New theories come out several times a year. Only a few weeks ago, an article came out crowing that the Big Bang was disproven.

ICXC NIKA
Click to expand...
its not a new theory, And its something that I’d like to see addressed. I am sure it has been so if you know of any scholarly literature put out by reputable catholic theologians or philosophers Id like to see it for my own edification.
 
Memaw said:
There are many Mysteries in life that we may never know all the answers to. That’s where Faith comes in. I don’t rack my brain over things that can’t be answered completely. I know God is our creator and He is in charge of everything. That’s enough for me. If science goes against the teachings of the Church, guess whose wrong! And its NOT the Church. The Chuich is quided by the Holy Spirit and cannot teach error. God Bless, Memaw
Click to expand...
and yet if the Pope is right and the scientists are right then we have a contradiction somewhere or at least an apparent one. The church is not lead by idiots please quit assuming they are. I am sure there is something written about this somewhere and Id be grateful to anyone who has something I can sink my teeth into. it is of personal interest to me and not something that harms my faith in the least but my faith would be further strengthened if the church has done some work on this.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top