Why the gift of immortality for Adam in a mortal world?

[catholic1seeks]

It is absolutely opposes to the historical and scientific record.

Unless you mean something figurative by “paradise.” What does that mean to you? Do you think the fall of man disordered natural laws and the physical universe such that natural “evils” came into being? If yes, this means you would believe things like animal pain, animal death, disease, the organisms that cause disease, floods, and all the rest did not pre-date the fall, no?

BUMP.

Wesrock, you are a smart fellow. I’d like to see what you make of my response to you.

Also I think the best direction so far has been provided by GEddie:

I assume that their bodies were standard issue human bodies; they had to be, for their descendants to be average human life.

Standard-issue bodies know pain; even in a putative Eden, they would have stubbed their toes, cricked their necks, etc. And with the fall, Eve was not told “ye shall now know pain,” but that her pain would be increased.

A body who can feel pain can die; toes that stub can become infected, necks that crick can get broken. In all likelihood, A&E never possessed true “immortality of the body,” but would have been actively kept from dying, potentially for ever.

 

[catholic1seeks]

Evidence that physical evil and diseases existed in the pre-fallen world, even for our pre-human ancestors:

Up until now, researchers and scientists have held to a tacit assumption that cancer didn’t exist in humans this far back in history. Now that there is proof that it does, the understanding of cancer’s origins and processes will evolve as well.

cnn.com/2016/07/28/health/oldest-human-cancer-found/index.html

So again, science testifies to (1) physical evils and diseases have existed and have been experienced by organisms, including advanced human-like animals, in a pre-fallen world; (2) modern humans were placed/created/evolved in a world already subject to physical evil and disease.

 

[steve_b]

I know this question is somewhat speculative because we know so little about the Fall and our parents - as testified by the many theories about what the images of Genesis correspond to, what the sin was, how much is literal, etc.

For this question, I would like us all to assumethat physical evils including animal pain, death, storms, diseases, and the like have been present since the very beginning of the Universe. The Church only has us believe that human death and suffering resulted from the Fall. And this is good, for science shows us that our universe and our Earth go through natural finite processes that allow for decay, death, and the arrival of new organisms.

*The question is: Why would God give our first parents the preternatural gift of immortality in the context of a world seemingly unfitting for that gift? *The surrounding world consisted of things, such as microbes, storms, predator animals, etc – all of which could otherwise kill our first parents, had it not been for gifts of impassibility (no suffering) and immortality. We know that in Heaven, the world will be such that our immortality in the body will correspond quite nicely to the glorious environment around it.

But* why this gift of immortality in such an otherwise contrary environment?* Do we have any ideas to why this was the case?

Again,* I will not appreciate answers that do not assume what the science tells us.** I do not at all accept the view that the Fall of man introduced physical evils such as suffering, deadly storms, diseases among plants and animals, and so on*.

Science can give us every answer with proof, to all that seen and unseen. Is that true? No!

If science, knowing it has no solid evidence to back up a theory, yet expects acceptance confidently in that theory being true, … THAT is **not **science.

what is it?

Faith =confidence in what we hope for and assurance about what we do not see. Heb 11:1

 

[catholic1seeks]

Science can give us every answer with proof, to all that seen and unseen. Is that true? No!

If science, knowing it has no solid evidence to back up a theory, yet expects acceptance confidently in that theory being true, … THAT is **not **science.

what is it?

Faith =confidence in what we hope for and assurance about what we do not see. Heb 11:1

So did animals and plants die before the Fall - before man came into the picture? Do you not think that is scientifically certain?

 

[steve_b]

So did animals and plants die before the Fall - before man came into the picture? Do you not think that is scientifically certain?

We’re talking about Adam and in extension Eve, creatures created to the image and likeness of God.

 

[fred_conty]

So did animals and plants die before the Fall - before man came into the picture? Do you not think that is scientifically certain?

The church teaches that Adam and Eve were not going to die. It was the will of God who would determine when to take them into heaven, just as it was the will of God to determine when Mary, Jesus’ mother, would be taken into heaven.

The church doesn’t have all the scientific facts to prove the will of God. That isn’t the role of the church. But our faith does tell us that God is all powerful and that he speaks thru his church. The church doesn’t have scientific explanations for many things. And science doesn’t have explanations for many things.

We know that when man named the animals it meant that he controlled the animals. Since we weren’t there at that time, it seems that the animals were subject to man in the original plan of God. But after the sin, they weren’t, nor was nature itself since God told them they would now have to sweat to make a living, that paradise would be no more.

Adam and Eve had wonderful powers of the mind, not like ours after the sin which lost so much. Who knows exactly what they were capable of, using their supreme intelligence. That was lost. Now it would be difficult and they would have to struggle with themselves as well as the hostile world.

As far as the universe itself dying, it is made of imperfect beings, and as such made for an end. But just because the universe would die, it doesn’t mean that man himself would die. For the universe would be around long enough to suite God’s divine plan in regard to mankind, and when each man’s time came to be, he would be taken to his heavenly paradise before the universe caved in.

As far as dinasours, they came before man as science tells us so they are not in paradise to cause a problem.

As far as man living in paradise without deadly accidents, Jesus lived his life without these. And his death of course was no accident. Abraham is another example of a man of old age until God called him even tho he lived in a hostile world. Moses another. It isn’t as difficult as it sounds if God plans it.

I believe the most difficult thing about the narritive of Adam and Eve is the wonderful paradise they experienced. When we look around our world today and see the aweful headlines, it does seem to be a stretch in our own experience.

What God has revealed to us explains why we are in the condition we are today. It is an important revelation, not from just this point of view, but also that God would send someone to make it possible for us to again be in a heavenly paradise. As Jesus said on the cross, “This day you will be with me in paradise.” He wants to say that to everyone…if they but ask, “…remember me when you come into your kingdom.”

“You will show me the paths of life, the fullness of joy before your face, and delights at your right hand until the end of time.” Psalm 15