Genesis 4:25. Unless of course you read Genesis in a non-literal sense. What a strange argument. We are talking about 1 book, not 4 books. Only Genesis. In Genesis, if you take it literally, Adam and Eve had two sons - Cain and Abel. Cain killed Abel and was exiled, married, had children and established a city. THEN Adam and Eve had other children. There is absolutely ZERO mention of other children before this point.
Sorry, Hank, but that is a literal reading of Genesis. If you add to that, you are not reading it literally.
Peace
Tim
OK, I’d like to enter into the discussion.
Hey Tim!
I understand that you have been exposed to a mountain
of geological evidence so that you believe there was not a world-wide flood. You believe that it is demonstrably false for there to have been a world-wide flood. And so you interpret Scripture in a non-historical manner on this point. I would like to persuade you that it is at least describing a historical, local flood, but I don’t have the time or the geological knowledge to accomplish even this.
What I would like to ask of you, my brother, is that you not disparage a historical reading of the text on account of our ignorance of geology. We are bound to a literal reading of the Scriptures unless it can be shown untenable. You have been exposed to scientifically derived conclusions that you feel does this for you. People who believe in a worldwide flood evidently have not. So we’re held to two different standards on this point of interpretation. We who interpret the text historically believe that the text is so clear on this point, that to adopt your alternative interpretation would be to fly as much in the face of reason as it would to remain unpersuaded by the assertions of competent geologists that our interpretation is impossible. I would appreciate… less sardonicism and more sympathy.
Those who adopt the position that history is being narrated here in the early chapters of Genesis do not believe that the text is comprehensive. Neither are the historical narrations of the New Testament comprehensive. In fact, no historical narration is comprehensive. And so we supplement the text with the use of reason and imagination, just as do those who reject a historical reading. We should not be denied the liberty to “fill in the gaps.”
Adam was created in Genesis 1:27. And yet he was not created until Genesis 2:7. We who see this as primeval history believe that the creation of 2:7 is a throwback to 1:27, a zooming in on the scene, if you will. But it seems that you would force us to accept that a literal reading of the text requires us to also believe that Adam was created twice, the second creation occurring after a day of rest. I’m just asking for the consideration that “literalists” be allowed to define a reasonable hermeneutic for themselves. We believe that history is being narrated, and we believe that the text is not comprehensive. We also believe that the order of storytelling was not always intended to correspond with historical chronology, as the example just given demonstrates. And so we seek to reconcile the two accounts. We seek harmony and integration. It is like scenes in a movie. We do not require the director to slice up simultaneously occurring events into a thousand clips. We allow them to finish out the scenes; that’s what we’re allowing our ancient authors to do. This is what reason and the flow of narration seem to suggest for the case of the birth of Seth. He was
definitely born after the death of Abel. But he was most likely
not born after Cain’s great, great, great, great grandchildren.
We know that the genealogy of chapter 5 is not giving us the names of firstborn sons because Cain and Abel were born before Seth and yet they are grouped in the “other sons and daughters” which follow after his birth. This is why we do not understand the Bible to be narrating comprehensive, chronological history here: a literal reading of the text leads us to this conclusion. We are not forcing these ideas on the text; the text is forcing them on us.
And so, since “other sons and daughters” necessarily includes other
sons being born before the birth of Noah’s ancestor, there is nothing to prohibit it from including other
daughters being born before the birth of Noah’s ancestor as well, and I think reason demands it.
I offered reasonable possibilities for when Cain’s wife may have been born.
Before Cain’s birth: plausible
After Cain’s birth and before Abel’s birth: possible
After Abel’s birth and before Abel’s death: very plausible
After Abel’s death and before Cain’s departure: possible
I think it would be fair of you to say, “If I was not convinced by geological data that the flood narration is a fictive account, and that therefore the preceding chapters are also fictive, I would see this interpretation as a reasonable understanding of the text, a reasonable sorting of the Biblical data.”
May the LORD be with you!
