If atheists get accused of taking verses out of context, how do we know fundamentalists making those accusations aren’t doing the same as well?

[Wrangler]

That sentence describes the state of the universe before God began the act of creation by saying "Let there be light."

No, it doesn’t. That’s exegesis.

See post # 839.

 

[Wrangler]

Okay, I now see that my mistake was in not explicitly citing the second sentence of the Bible

No mistake. You repeatedly referenced the first paragraph, which includes the second sentence. :)

BTW if you want to believe in a creation-from-nothing scenario

Your claim is that the first paragraph of the Bible "clearly" proves God is not all-powerful, which has NOTHING to do with what I want to believe about Creation.

I've thought about your claim as an analogy to my claiming to beat Mike Tyson in a boxing match. If my story opens with my beating Iron Mike in a boxing match, it's more than a little silly to claim that subsequent details "clearly" show that I did not beat him. This ploy is typical of Atheists; they invent a standard designed to fail the Biblical narrative. "I beat Mike" is not contradicted by subsequent details of how I beat him.

It is as thought you want the narrative to be any other way, but certainly some other way than it is written. See your fixation on the order in which "let there be light" is relative to forming the Earth. Your reading things into the text. No doubt this is because of your Atheist orientation. You demand a step by step order be detailed to your satisfaction OR conclude the text's opening paragraph contradicts.

You want to conclude - using any rationalization - that existence already existed before the beginning of Creation. This is clearly couched in all your reference to other cultures stories AS IF it supercedes the actual text of Scripture; that God, in the beginning of Creation, created the heaven and the Earth. This phrase "heaven and Earth" is a way the ancients used to describe all that exists. We might use other terms today, like universe or multiverse.

And that reminds me. For nearly a century the dominant scientific theory explaining the orgins of the universe, "The Big Bang" not surprisingly at all, align with the Genesis account. Regarding more recent scientific "postulates" - not theories since there is not a single shred of physical evidence but postulates - puts forth a multi-verse explanation. Either way, science supports the Genesis account that the cause of our universe is outside our universe. Lots to think about.

 

[FlySwatter]

The earth was without form and void, and darkness was upon the face of the deep; and the Spirit of God was moving over the the [sic] face of the waters.​

(Genesis 1:2, RSV)​

That sentence describes the state of the universe before God began the act of creation by saying "Let there be light." That means that the substance of the earth and the waters both existed first, before God began to create the rest of the universe. God therefore fashioned the universe from the preexisting substances of the earth and the waters and did not create it from nothing.

I tend to concur with this. The other poster is choosing to ignore the content of that verse which relates to "the deep" and "the waters".
It doesn't state anywhere that god created the deeps or the waters. His FIRST actions were the creation of the heavens and the earth and in this it was a very basic earth, "without form and void". The deeps and waters clearly existed before the heavens and earth.

However whilst I agree with this hypothesis I struggle to equate that with your leap that god is not omnipotent.

So an obvious question occurs

Is it possible for there to be more than one omnipotent being?

And is it possible for a past and ancient omnipotent being to no longer exist (e.g. it had the power to disappear and end it's own existence"?

Either of these would leave the current god as omnipotent

 

[Illuminator]

Okay, I now see that my mistake was in not explicitly citing the second sentence of the Bible:

The earth was without form and void, and darkness was upon the face of the deep; and the Spirit of God was moving over the the [sic] face of the waters.​

(Genesis 1:2, RSV)​

That sentence describes the state of the universe before God began the act of creation by saying "Let there be light." That means that the substance of the earth and the waters both existed first, before God began to create the rest of the universe. God therefore fashioned the universe from the preexisting substances of the earth and the waters and did not create it from nothing. So yes, the order of the events is very important. I thought that was pretty obvious, but apparently not.

In many ancient cultures the preexisting material was called the chaos. The preexistence of the chaos was a very widely held belief in the ancient world and would not have been considered weird or odd 2500 years ago. To modern eyes, yes-- the idea that the material substances of the earth and the waters both preexisted seems silly. But that is a modern perspective imposed on writers of the ancient world whose ideas and thoughts were products of their time.

The first three words of the Bible are "In the beginning..." That invites the question "Beginning of... what?" There is a Gnostic tradition that there was a time before the time of Yahweh, and that the chaos was created by other, more ancient spirits before Yahweh even existed. So there is evidence that some ancient writers and thinkers were uncomfortable with the notion of a preexisting chaos. But that was by no means a universal concern.

BTW if you want to believe in a creation-from-nothing scenario then you should go all-in with the scientific theory of the Big Bang, because that is truly based on creation-from-nothing. Or, at least, nothing more than a momentary quantum fluctuation. The book "A Universe From Nothing," by Lawrence M. Krauss," does a wonderful job of describing that model for a lay audience.

One of the sophisticated concepts used by great Christian theologians is that of "The Ground of Being." This concept indicates not that God is the fact of things existing, but that God is the basis for the existence of all things. God is more fundamental to existing things than anything else. So fundamental to the existence of all things is God, that God can be thought of as the basis upon which things exist, the ground their being. To say that God is The ground of being or being itself, is to say that there is something we can sense that is so special about the nature of being that it hints at this fundamental reality upon which all else is based.

The phrases "Ground of Being" and "Being itself" are basically the same concept. Tillich used both at different times, and other theologians such as John McQuarrey prefer "Being Itself," but they really speak to the same concept. Now skeptics are always asking "how can god be being?" I think this question comes from the fact that the term is misleading. The term "Being itself" gives one the impression that God is the actual fact of "my existence," or the existence of my flowerbed, or any object one might care to name. Paul Tillich, on the other hand, said explicitly (in Systematic Theology Vol. I) that this does not refer to an existential fact but to an ontological status. What is being said is not that God is the fact of the being of some particular object, but, that he is the basis upon which being proceeds and upon which objects participate in being. In other words, since God exists forever, nothing else can come to be without God's will or thought; and since there can't even be a potential for any being without God's thought, all potentialities for being arise in the "mind of God" then in that sense God is actually "Being Itself." I think "Ground of Being" is a less confusing term. God is the ground upon which all being is based and from which all being proceeds.


Two senses and they are both related:

(1) Being itself is the basis upon which proceeds in its individual manifestations as it is considered apart from these manifestations.

God is primordial being. God is ontologically prior to all that is (save himself of course that goes without saying).

Considered in this way God is not a single being since god is not a thing alongside other things in creation. God is unique, not a version of some type of thing. there is nothing else like God. What it means to be is to be a creature of God.

(2) God is the "reality generator" or the mind that thinks the universe.

Metaphorically ;God is a great big mind and we are thoughts in that mind. Thus god is off scale to anything we can think of. Since God is the framework in which our whole existence takes place, we can't think of God as "a being" because he's totally off scale, hes not a being along side other beings hes' the basis upon which beingness has any meaning.

These two senses are clearly related since they both stem from God's eternal nature.

Chrisitan Concept?

This may not sound very orthodox, but it is extremely orhtodox.God is not just a big man on a throne, he is not the Zeu Patter(Jupiter,"Sky Father") of Pagan mythology. The great theologians of Chrsitian fatih, the Orthodox Chruch, and theologians such as Paul Tillich and John Mcquarrie, believe, as Timothy Ware (The Orthodox Chruch , New York: Pelican, 1963) quoting St. John of Damascus says, "God does not belong to the class of 'existing' things; not that he has no existence but that he is above existing things, even above existence itself..." The Jewish Virtual Library tells us, "The name of god, which in Hebrew is spelled YHWH, is difficult to explain. Scholars generally believe that it derives from the Semitic word, "to be," and so means something like, 'he causes to be.'"

Being:sub sub menu on topic of Being itself

 

[the.reverent.atheist]

No, it doesn’t. That’s exegesis.

See post # 839.

The author of the creation fairy tale clearly cared greatly about the sequence of statements in his story as he went to the trouble of enumerating each of the days of the creation. Each day of the story has clear boundary markers. Each begins with "And God said...", and each ends with "And there was evening and there was morning a <nth> day." There are no such boundary markers around the second sentence of the first paragraph. That's because that sentence does not describe any actions taken by God, but instead describes the state of the universe before the first day. Note that the second sentence is written in past tense. That's because it describes how things were before God began the act of creation. The earth was. The waters were. I maintain that the author of the story wrote it that way deliberately because he believed that the material substances of the earth and the waters preexisted. And as I said in earlier posts, that was a very widely held belief in the ancient world.

On the first day God created light and began the day/night cycle (without the sun). Here's how the description of Day 2 begins:

And God said, "Let there be a firmament in the midst of the waters, and let it separate the waters from the waters."​

(Genesis 1:6, RSV)​

But there is no specific statement that God actually created the waters on either Day 1 or Day 2! That's because the author believed that the waters preexisted.

The description of Day 3 begins as follows:

And God said, "Let the waters under the heavens be gathered together into one place, and let the dry land appear."​

(Genesis 1:9, RSV)​

The land is said to have appeared, once the waters had been gathered. It could only appear if it already existed. But there's no specific mention in the story of God creating the land on Day 1 or Day 2 or Day 3! That's because the author believed that the substance of the earth preexisted. Once he gathered up the waters the preexisting land was able to appear.

That may seem crazy or irrational to modern readers, but it would have seemed perfectly sensible in the ancient world.

Note that I am only claiming that this particular passage of the Bible clearly implies that God did not create the material substances of the earth and the waters, and that therefore God is not omnipotent. I am not claiming that is generally true of the Bible as a whole. As I said in earlier posts there are many passages in the Bible that call God "Almighty." I believe that we can take "almighty" to be a synonym for "omnipotent."

If you are going to read ancient texts you have to begin by setting aside all of your preconceptions. Christian orthodoxy holds that God created the universe from nothing. The point of my original post was to show that the story of the creation is actually based on the notion of a preexisting chaos. And that is the exact opposite of what Christian orthodoxy claims. It is interesting to note that the Catholic Catechism doesn't explain how the first paragraph of the Bible should be interpreted. I suspect that's because the Church doesn't want to open itself to the types of criticisms I have raised.

 

[Wrangler]

There are no such boundary markers around the second sentence of the first paragraph. That's because that sentence does not describe any actions taken by God, but instead describes the state of the universe before the first day.

Hmmm. As said exegesis.

Verse 1 explicitly stated that God created everything, aka the heavens and the Earth. Any claim to the contrary using verses in the same paragraph are specious.

To satisfy you, how would the Genesis account have to be written in the 1st paragraph to assuage your apprehension?

If I claimed to have beaten Mike Tyson in a boxing ring, how could details I provide about how I achieved that be used to justify the opposite; that I did not beat Mike Tyson? Sounds like someone with an agenda.

1. “God created the heavens and the earth” the text states.
2. You want that to mean he merely molded what already existed.
3. And then, since you pre-suppose it means God did not create what already existed, conclude he lacks the ability to create matter.
4. Finally, you arrive at your desired conclusion, pre-supposition, on top of pre-supposition, that God is not all powerful.

This lists your position. Yet this leaves the question of where did the matter you pre-suppose existed before Creation come from?

 

[Illuminator]

If you are going to read ancient texts you have to begin by setting aside all of your preconceptions. Christian orthodoxy holds that God created the universe from nothing. The point of my original post was to show that the story of the creation is actually based on the notion of a preexisting chaos.

Is your point based on cosmology or philosophy? A preexisting chaos can't be proven by cosmology which means you have to take a philosophical approach. Be careful with those false philosophies spawned from the Enlighten Era, that "enlightened" mankind with communism and the synthesis of all heresies: Modernism.

And that is the exact opposite of what Christian orthodoxy claims. It is interesting to note that the Catholic Catechism doesn't explain how the first paragraph of the Bible should be interpreted. I suspect that's because the Church doesn't want to open itself to the types of criticisms I have raised.

Your criticisms have been demolished repeatedly in the not-distant-past, by many men and women of great learning. That rules me out. Your criticisms won't hold up to scrutiny because your premise on the nature of God is flawed. Worse, your premise "the Catholic Catechism doesn't explain how the first paragraph of the Bible should be interpreted" is a gross misrepresentation of what the Catechism is for, and a false assumption of what it contains.

Catholics don't have to interpret every verse of the Bible according to some dogmatic proclamation of the Church. This is another ridiculous (and highly annoying) myth that we hear all the time. Indeed, the orthodox, faithful Catholic must interpret doctrines he derives from Scripture in accordance with the Church and tradition, but so what?
Every Protestant does the same thing within their own denominational tradition.

The Freedom Of The Catholic Biblical Exegete / Interpreter

Catholics have freedom to exegete and interpret the Bible. We submit to the guidelines of orthodoxy, but so do Protestants in large part as well.

www.patheos.com

Don't YOU interpret the Bible through the lens of a questionable philosophy?

DOGMATIC CONSTITUTION ON DIVINE REVELATION:

12. However, since God speaks in Sacred Scripture through men in human fashion, (6) the interpreter of Sacred Scripture, (could be anybody) in order to see clearly what God wanted to communicate to us, should carefully investigate what meaning the sacred writers really intended, and what God wanted to manifest by means of their words.

To search out the intention of the sacred writers, attention should be given, among other things, to "literary forms." For truth is set forth and expressed differently in texts which are variously historical, prophetic, poetic, or of other forms of discourse. The interpreter must investigate what meaning the sacred writer intended to express and actually expressed in particular circumstances by using contemporary literary forms in accordance with the situation of his own time and culture. (7) For the correct understanding of what the sacred author wanted to assert, due attention must be paid to the customary and characteristic styles of feeling, speaking and narrating which prevailed at the time of the sacred writer, and to the patterns men normally employed at that period in their everyday dealings with one another. (8)

But, since Holy Scripture must be read and interpreted in the sacred spirit in which it was written, (9) no less serious attention must be given to the content and unity of the whole of Scripture if the meaning of the sacred texts is to be correctly worked out. The living tradition of the whole Church must be taken into account along with the harmony which exists between elements of the faith. It is the task of exegetes to work according to these rules toward a better understanding and explanation of the meaning of Sacred Scripture, so that through preparatory study the judgment of the Church may mature. For all of what has been said about the way of interpreting Scripture is subject finally to the judgment of the Church, which carries out the divine commission and ministry of guarding and interpreting the word of God. (10)

13. In Sacred Scripture, therefore, while the truth and holiness of God always remains intact, the marvelous "condescension" of eternal wisdom is clearly shown, "that we may learn the gentle kindness of God, which words cannot express, and how far He has gone in adapting His language with thoughtful concern for our weak human nature." (11) For the words of God, expressed in human language, have been made like human discourse, just as the word of the eternal Father, when He took to Himself the flesh of human weakness, was in every way made like men.

Notes:

6. St. Augustine, "City of God," XVII, 6, 2: PL 41, 537: CSEL. XL, 2, 228.

7. St. Augustine, "On Christian Doctrine" III, 18, 26; PL 34, 75-76.

8. Pius XII, loc. cit. Denziger 2294 (3829-3830); EB 557-562.

9. cf. Benedict XV, encyclical "Spiritus Paraclitus" Sept. 15, 1920:EB 469. St. Jerome, "In Galatians' 5, 19-20: PL 26, 417 A.

10. cf. First Vatican Council, Dogmatic Constitution on the Catholic Faith, Chapter 2, "On Revelation:" Denziger 1788 (3007).

11. St. John Chrysostom "In Genesis" 3, 8 (Homily l7, 1): PG 53, 134; "Attemperatio" [in English "Suitable adjustment"] in Greek "synkatabasis."

Dei verbum

Dogmatic Constitution on Divine Revelation - Dei verbum

www.vatican.va

 

[FlySwatter]

Verse 1 explicitly stated that God created everything, aka the heavens and the Earth. Any claim to the contrary using verses in the same paragraph are specious.

You've just contradicted yourself.

The heavens and the earth are very obviously not "everything". If that were true we would not need the subsequent Genesis verses explaining all the other things that were created. For example the plants and animals and man. All those were created AFTER the heavens and earth and so are separate things. Hence the heavens and earth can not be "everything".

The "reverent atheist" is correct in his reading of Genesis. The deeps and waters were clearly already there BEFORE the heavens and earth were created.

This does not imo of itself mean that god is not omnipotent, though that IS one possibility.

 

[the.reverent.atheist]

Hmmm. As said exegesis.

Verse 1 explicitly stated that God created everything, aka the heavens and the Earth. Any claim to the contrary using verses in the same paragraph are specious.

To satisfy you, how would the Genesis account have to be written in the 1st paragraph to assuage your apprehension?

If I claimed to have beaten Mike Tyson in a boxing ring, how could details I provide about how I achieved that be used to justify the opposite; that I did not beat Mike Tyson? Sounds like someone with an agenda.

1. “God created the heavens and the earth” the text states.
2. You want that to mean he merely molded what already existed.
3. And then, since you pre-suppose it means God did not create what already existed, conclude he lacks the ability to create matter.
4. Finally, you arrive at your desired conclusion, pre-supposition, on top of pre-supposition, that God is not all powerful.

This lists your position. Yet this leaves the question of where did the matter you pre-suppose existed before Creation come from?

I believe that I have already answered all your questions in earlier posts. I have stated my reading of the story as clearly as I can, and others on this thread appear to have understood what I mean. But just to summarize what I already said-- several times-- I'll answer each of your questions below.

1. "God created the heavens and the earth" the text says.

Yes, absolutely, that's exactly what the first sentence of the Bible says.

2. You want that to mean he merely molded what already existed.

Uh, NO. What I said was that the SECOND sentence describes the substance of the earth and the waters as already existing BEFORE the first day of creation. You apparently think that sentence is irrelevant, or that it somehow references actions God took later in the sequence of creation. That sentence says "The earth was..." and "...the Spirit of God was moving over the waters." That's extremely explicit. It describes the earth and the waters as already existed before God began the act of creation on Day 1. So if the material substances of the earth and the waters already existed, then God must have fashioned the rest of the universe from those preexisting substances. After all, all living forms of life on planet earth are comprised of raw materials that can be found in the earth and the waters. In fact, listen to how the story describes the creation of life:

And God said, "Let the waters bring forth swarms of living creatures..."
(Genesis 1:20, RSV)​

Note that this passage doesn't say that God created the living creatures. It says that the waters were to "bring forth" the living creatures. That is, the material substances necessary for the creation of life already existed in the preexisting material substances of the chaos, and God merely called upon the waters to assemble living creatures from the existing substances necessary for life. That, by the way, is very similar to the creation as told in other ancient myths of Egypt and Mesopotamia.

But I'm willing to concede that the same reasoning does not apply to the creation of the sun, the moon, the planets, and the stars. So okay, God must have created the matter for the heavenly objects.

3. And then, since you pre-suppose it means God did not create what already existed, conclude that he lacks the ability to create matter.

I said that God did not create either the substance of the earth or the waters because that's what the second sentence says. If you think it means something different, then tell me exactly what you think it means.

4. Finally, you arrive at your desired conclusion, pre-supposition on top of pre-supposition, that God is not all powerful.

Well if God did not create the preexisting substances of the earth and the waters, that must be because God was not capable of creating them. What other conclusion could there be? Again, this gets back to the interpretation of the second sentence.

5. This leaves the question of where did the matter you pre-suppose existed before Creation come from?

I'm not the one presupposing the existence of the substance of the earth or the waters. It's the author of the fairy tale who began his story with that supposition. I suggest you take that question up with him.

You appear to have completely missed a point I made in my first posting on this issue-- that the first paragraph is an introduction. It's the author telling you, the audience, "I'm going to tell you the story of the creation of the universe, and here's the state of the universe at the time the creation began."

That's about all I have to say about the matter. I won't respond to any more of your posts on this topic unless you tell me exactly how you are interpreting the second sentence. Here it is once again, for reference:

The earth was without form and void, and darkness was upon the face of the deep; and the Spirit of God was moving over the the [sic] face of the waters.​

(Genesis 1:2, RSV)​

I've given you my interpretation-- several times. Now let's hear yours.

 

[Illuminator]

I believe that I have already answered all your questions in earlier posts. I have stated my reading of the story as clearly as I can, and others on this thread appear to have understood what I mean. But just to summarize what I already said-- several times-- I'll answer each of your questions below.

1. "God created the heavens and the earth" the text says.

Yes, absolutely, that's exactly what the first sentence of the Bible says.

2. You want that to mean he merely molded what already existed.

Uh, NO. What I said was that the SECOND sentence describes the substance of the earth and the waters as already existing BEFORE the first day of creation. You apparently think that sentence is irrelevant, or that it somehow references actions God took later in the sequence of creation. That sentence says "The earth was..." and "...the Spirit of God was moving over the waters." That's extremely explicit. It describes the earth and the waters as already existed before God began the act of creation on Day 1. So if the material substances of the earth and the waters already existed, then God must have fashioned the rest of the universe from those preexisting substances. After all, all living forms of life on planet earth are comprised of raw materials that can be found in the earth and the waters. In fact, listen to how the story describes the creation of life:

And God said, "Let the waters bring forth swarms of living creatures..."​

(Genesis 1:20, RSV)​

Note that this passage doesn't say that God created the living creatures. It says that the waters were to "bring forth" the living creatures. That is, the material substances necessary for the creation of life already existed in the preexisting material substances of the chaos, and God merely called upon the waters to assemble living creatures from the existing substances necessary for life. That, by the way, is very similar to the creation as told in other ancient myths of Egypt and Mesopotamia.

But I'm willing to concede that the same reasoning does not apply to the creation of the sun, the moon, the planets, and the stars. So okay, God must have created the matter for the heavenly objects.

3. And then, since you pre-suppose it means God did not create what already existed, conclude that he lacks the ability to create matter.

I said that God did not create either the substance of the earth or the waters because that's what the second sentence says. If you think it means something different, then tell me exactly what you think it means.

4. Finally, you arrive at your desired conclusion, pre-supposition on top of pre-supposition, that God is not all powerful.

Well if God did not create the preexisting substances of the earth and the waters, that must be because God was not capable of creating them. What other conclusion could there be? Again, this gets back to the interpretation of the second sentence.

5. This leaves the question of where did the matter you pre-suppose existed before Creation come from?

I'm not the one presupposing the existence of the substance of the earth or the waters. It's the author of the fairy tale who began his story with that supposition. I suggest you take that question up with him.

You appear to have completely missed a point I made in my first posting on this issue-- that the first paragraph is an introduction. It's the author telling you, the audience, "I'm going to tell you the story of the creation of the universe, and here's the state of the universe at the time the creation began."

That's about all I have to say about the matter. I won't respond to any more of your posts on this topic unless you tell me exactly how you are interpreting the second sentence. Here it is once again, for reference:

The earth was without form and void, and darkness was upon the face of the deep; and the Spirit of God was moving over the the [sic] face of the waters.​

(Genesis 1:2, RSV)​

I've given you my interpretation-- several times. Now let's hear yours.

Pope Benedict XVI, gave four homilies on creation in the Liebfrauenkirche, the cathedral church of Munich in Germany. 5 In his first homily, entitled “God the Creator,” he discusses the principles that govern his reading of Genesis. He begins by recalling the opening words of the Sacred Scriptures that highlight the creative action of God “in the beginning.” However, he goes on to ask the question that lies at the heart of the creationist debate: Are these words true? Do they count for anything? In order to answer these questions, he suggests three criteria for interpreting the Genesis text:

1. the distinction between form and content in the creation narrative,
2. the unity of the Bible,
3. and the hermeneutical importance of Christology.

First, he proposes that the exegete “must distinguish between the form of portrayal and the content that is portrayed.” 6 He must keep in mind that the Bible is, first and foremost, a religious book and not a natural science textbook. Thus, Cardinal Ratzinger concludes that Genesis does not and cannot provide a scientific explanation of how the world arose. Rather, it is a book that seeks to describe things in such a way that the reader is able to grasp profound religious realities.
It uses images to communicate religious truth, images that were chosen from what was understandable at the time the text was written, “images which surrounded the people who lived then, which they used in speaking and in thinking, and thanks to which they were able to understand the greater realities.” 7 In other words, the Catholic exegete is called to respect the text as it is. He is called to read Genesis as its human author wished it to be read, not as a scientific treatise, but as a religious narrative that communicates profound truths about the Creator.

Reading Genesis with Cardinal Ratzinger - Homiletic & Pastoral Review

How is a Catholic supposed to read the first chapter of Genesis that details the six days of creation? In a lecture entitled, “Restoration of Traditional

www.hprweb.com

 

[Illuminator]

The Catholic Church has always taught that “no real disagreement can exist between the theologian and the scientist provided each keeps within his own limits. . . . If nevertheless there is a disagreement . . . it should be remembered that the sacred writers, or more truly ‘the Spirit of God who spoke through them, did not wish to teach men such truths (as the inner structure of visible objects) which do not help anyone to salvation’; and that, for this reason, rather than trying to provide a scientific exposition of nature, they sometimes describe and treat these matters either in a somewhat figurative language or as the common manner of speech those times required” (Leo XIII, Providentissimus Deus 18).

As the Catechism puts it, “Methodical research in all branches of knowledge, provided it is carried out in a truly scientific manner and does not override moral laws, can never conflict with the faith, because the things of the world and the things the of the faith derive from the same God. The humble and persevering investigator of the secrets of nature is being led, as it were, by the hand of God in spite of himself, for it is God, the conserver of all things, who made them what they are” (CCC 159).
The Catholic Church has no fear of science or scientific discovery.

Adam, Eve, and Evolution

The controversy surrounding evolution touches on our most central beliefs about ourselves and the world. Find out what Catholics believe about it.

www.catholic.com

 

[the.reverent.atheist]

Pope Benedict XVI, gave four homilies on creation in the Liebfrauenkirche, the cathedral church of Munich in Germany. 5 In his first homily, entitled “God the Creator,” he discusses the principles that govern his reading of Genesis. He begins by recalling the opening words of the Sacred Scriptures that highlight the creative action of God “in the beginning.” However, he goes on to ask the question that lies at the heart of the creationist debate: Are these words true? Do they count for anything? In order to answer these questions, he suggests three criteria for interpreting the Genesis text:

1. the distinction between form and content in the creation narrative,
2. the unity of the Bible,
3. and the hermeneutical importance of Christology.

First, he proposes that the exegete “must distinguish between the form of portrayal and the content that is portrayed.” 6 He must keep in mind that the Bible is, first and foremost, a religious book and not a natural science textbook. Thus, Cardinal Ratzinger concludes that Genesis does not and cannot provide a scientific explanation of how the world arose. Rather, it is a book that seeks to describe things in such a way that the reader is able to grasp profound religious realities.
It uses images to communicate religious truth, images that were chosen from what was understandable at the time the text was written, “images which surrounded the people who lived then, which they used in speaking and in thinking, and thanks to which they were able to understand the greater realities.” 7 In other words, the Catholic exegete is called to respect the text as it is. He is called to read Genesis as its human author wished it to be read, not as a scientific treatise, but as a religious narrative that communicates profound truths about the Creator.

Reading Genesis with Cardinal Ratzinger - Homiletic & Pastoral Review

How is a Catholic supposed to read the first chapter of Genesis that details the six days of creation? In a lecture entitled, “Restoration of Traditional

www.hprweb.com

Yes, I agree with the statement you cited of Cardinal Ratzinger. The story of the creation is myth, not fact. In my original posting (#834 on this thread) I cited what the Catholic Catechism has to say about the creation:

We believe that God needs no pre-existent thing or any help in order to create, nor is creation any sort of necessary emanation from the divine substance. God creates freely “out of nothing”:​

If God had drawn the world from pre-existent matter, what would be so extraordinary in that? A human artisan makes from a given material whatever he wants, while God shows his power by starting from nothing to make all he wants.​

(Catholic Catechism, 296; Part 1, Section 2, Chapter 1, Article 1, Paragraph 4)​

My preceding posts were merely intended to show that the Catechism's position is the exact opposite of what the story of the creation actually says. Are you implying that the position of the Church has changed since the publication of the Catechism? If so the Church should update its Catechism to reflect its current understanding. Or do you mean that we should just ignore the entire story of the creation in Genesis and assume that God created the universe from nothing? THAT would be an astonishing admission! Here's what the Pope had to say about the Catechism when he approved it for publication:

The Catechism of the Catholic Church, which I approved June 25th last and the publication of which I today order by virtue of my Apostolic Authority, is a statement of the Church’s faith and catholic doctrine, attested to or illumined by Sacred Scripture, the Apostolic Tradition, and the Church’s Magisterium. I declare it to be a sure norm for teaching the faith and thus a valid and legitimate instrument for ecclisial communication.​

(Catholic Catechism, On the Publication of the Catechism of the Catholic Church, pg. 5-6)​

​

Note that the statement says only that Catholic faith and doctrine are "attested to or illumined" by the Bible-- not expressly and exclusively derived from the Bible. But even so I don't see how it can be argued that the creation-out-of-nothing doctrine could have been either "attested to or illumined" by the actual story of the Creation. It's a doctrinal position, yes. But it is absolutely at odds with what the Bible actually says.

 

[Wrangler]

You've just contradicted yourself.

The heavens and the earth are very obviously not "everything".

"Obvious" to you. Let me type this slowly so you understand ... we might use the word "universe" to refer to everything. The ancients used the phrase "heavens and earth" to refer to everything.

Consider supporting text. John 1:3 Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made. This does not alter the WHAT; that God created everything. It only expands on the HOW, through the Messiah.

 

[Wrangler]

Uh, NO. What I said was that the SECOND sentence describes the substance of the earth and the waters as already existing BEFORE the first day of creation.

And that is false. You are inventing a standard designed to fail the Biblical narrative. The absence of evidence is not evidence in support of an opposing proposition. You got a nasty Appeal to Ignorance going there.

 

[Illuminator]

Yes, I agree with the statement you cited of Cardinal Ratzinger. The story of the creation is myth, not fact. In my original posting (#834 on this thread) I cited what the Catholic Catechism has to say about the creation:

Cardinal Ratzinger didn't say the creation story is myth. He said there must be a distinction between form and content. Your argument is based on content in the absence of form.

We believe that God needs no pre-existent thing or any help in order to create, nor is creation any sort of necessary emanation from the divine substance. God creates freely “out of nothing”:​

If God had drawn the world from pre-existent matter, what would be so extraordinary in that? A human artisan makes from a given material whatever he wants, while God shows his power by starting from nothing to make all he wants.​

(Catholic Catechism, 296; Part 1, Section 2, Chapter 1, Article 1, Paragraph 4)​

You make an extraordinary claim that God had drawn the world from pre-existent matter. Does that mean "pre-existent matter" had no beginning? "pre-existent matter" came from infinity? How did "pre-existent matter" get there in the first place? This is where you defy the first three words of Genesis: "In the beginning..." by sticking to a rather rigid literal viewpoint.

My preceding posts were merely intended to show that the Catechism's position is the exact opposite of what the story of the creation actually says. Are you implying that the position of the Church has changed since the publication of the Catechism?

No, I am implying that
1) You are not reading the Catechism correctly
2) "pre-existent matter" is a philosophical argument that defies science.
Furthermore, the truths of science and the truths of the faith cannot contradict themselves. Truth cannot contradict truth. Doctrines deepen with more clarity over time, they develop without intrinsic change.

If so the Church should update its Catechism to reflect its current understanding. Or do you mean that we should just ignore the entire story of the creation in Genesis and assume that God created the universe from nothing?

Faith is not based on assumptions. Faith is compatible with reason. Since you lack faith, you have to make assumptions about the nature of God, falling into the trap of materialism and rationalism.

THAT would be an astonishing admission! Here's what the Pope had to say about the Catechism when he approved it for publication:

The Catechism of the Catholic Church, which I approved June 25th last and the publication of which I today order by virtue of my Apostolic Authority, is a statement of the Church’s faith and catholic doctrine, attested to or illumined by Sacred Scripture, the Apostolic Tradition, and the Church’s Magisterium. I declare it to be a sure norm for teaching the faith and thus a valid and legitimate instrument for ecclesial communication.​

(Catholic Catechism, On the Publication of the Catechism of the Catholic Church, pg. 5-6)​

​

Note that the statement says only that Catholic faith and doctrine are "attested to or illumined" by the Bible-- not expressly and exclusively derived from the Bible. But even so I don't see how it can be argued that the creation-out-of-nothing doctrine could have been either "attested to or illumined" by the actual story of the Creation. It's a doctrinal position, yes. But it is absolutely at odds with what the Bible actually says.

All Catholic doctrine is derived from the Bible, explicitly or implicitly. You are at odds with what the Bible says about creation because you uphold content and ignore form. You treat God as if He were another item in the universe, apart from "pre-existent matter". That is simply a form of atom worship.

Atheists Seem to Have Almost a Childlike Faith in the Omnipotence of Atoms

The atheist places extraordinary faith in matter. Indeed, this is a faith of a non-rational, almost childlike kind.

www.ncregister.com

 

[FlySwatter]

Uh, NO. What I said was that the SECOND sentence describes the substance of the earth and the waters as already existing BEFORE the first day of creation.

Having re-read these verses over and over I'm no longer in agreement with you.

Surely the entire first day of creation is covered by ALL the verses 1 thru 5

Thus on that first day god created:

1. The heavens and the earth (which included it's formless existence and the deeps/waters on it/within it)
2. Light

 

[Illuminator]

Having re-read these verses over and over I'm no longer in agreement with you.

Surely the entire first day of creation is covered by ALL the verses 1 thru 5

Thus on that first day god created:

1. The heavens and the earth (which included it's formless existence and the deeps/waters on it/within it)
2. Light

The Rev.Atheist is force fitting a literal chronological account into a narrative that was never intended to be literal. Judaism doesn't view Genesis in that way. They should know something about it since they wrote it.

The Time Question​

Much less has been defined as to when the universe, life, and man appeared. The Church has infallibly determined that the universe is of finite age—that it has not existed from all eternity—but it has not infallibly defined whether the world was created only a few thousand years ago or whether it was created several billion years ago.

Catholics should weigh the evidence for the universe’s age by examining biblical and scientific evidence. “Though faith is above reason, there can never be any real discrepancy between faith and reason. Since the same God who reveals mysteries and infuses faith has bestowed the light of reason on the human mind, God cannot deny himself, nor can truth ever contradict truth” (Catechism of the Catholic Church 159).

It is outside the scope of this tract to look at the scientific evidence, but a few words need to be said about the interpretation of Genesis and its six days of creation. While there are many interpretations of these six days, they can be grouped into two basic methods of reading the account—a chronological reading and a topical reading.

Chronological Reading​

According to the chronological reading, the six days of creation should be understood to have followed each other in strict chronological order. This view is often coupled with the claim that the six days were standard 24-hour days.

Some have denied that they were standard days on the basis that the Hebrew word used in this passage for day (yom) can sometimes mean a longer-than-24-hour period (as it does in Genesis 2:4). However, it seems clear that Genesis 1 presents the days to us as standard days. At the end of each one is a formula like, “And there was evening and there was morning, one day” (Gen. 1:5). Evening and morning are, of course, the transition points between day and night (this is the meaning of the Hebrew terms here), but periods of time longer than 24 hours are not composed of a day and a night. Genesis is presenting these days to us as 24-hour, solar days. If we are not meant to understand them as 24-hour days, it would most likely be because Genesis 1 is not meant to be understood as a literal chronological account.

That is a possibility. Pope Pius XII warned us,

“What is the literal sense of a passage is not always as obvious in the speeches and writings of the ancient authors of the East, as it is in the works of our own time. For what they wished to express is not to be determined by the rules of grammar and philology alone, nor solely by the context; the interpreter must, as it were, go back wholly in spirit to those remote centuries of the East and with the aid of history, archaeology, ethnology, and other sciences, accurately determine what modes of writing, so to speak, the authors of that ancient period would be likely to use, and in fact did use. For the ancient peoples of the East, in order to express their ideas, did not always employ those forms or kinds of speech which we use today; but rather those used by the men of their times and countries. What those exactly were the commentator cannot determine as it were in advance, but only after a careful examination of the ancient literature of the East” (Divino Afflante Spiritu 35–36).​

The Topical Reading​

This leads us to the possibility that Genesis 1 is to be given a non-chronological, topical reading. Advocates of this view point out that, in ancient literature, it was common to sequence historical material by topic, rather than in strict chronological order.

The argument for a topical ordering notes that at the time the world was created, it had two problems—it was “formless and empty” (1:2). In the first three days of creation, God solves the formlessness problem by structuring different aspects of the environment.

On day one he separates day from night; on day two he separates the waters below (oceans) from the waters above (clouds), with the sky in between; and on day three he separates the waters below from each other, creating dry land. Thus the world has been given form.

But it is still empty, so on the second three days God solves the world’s emptiness problem by giving occupants to each of the three realms he ordered on the previous three days. Thus, having solved the problems of formlessness and emptiness, the task he set for himself, God’s work is complete and he rests on the seventh day.

Real History​

Even if Genesis 1 records God’s work in a topical fashion, it still records God’s work—things God really did. It is impossible to dismiss the events of Genesis 1 as a mere legend. They are accounts of real history, even if they are told in a style of historical writing (3000 years old) that Westerners do not typically use.

 

[FlySwatter]

It is impossible to dismiss the events of Genesis 1 as a mere legend. They are accounts of real history, even if they are told in a style of historical writing (3000 years old) that Westerners do not typically use.

Oh come come ! They are words in a book written by men likely millions of years after the Earth was created. It's entirely possible that it's all a myth, a simple story.

 

[the.reverent.atheist]

Cardinal Ratzinger didn't say the creation story is myth. He said there must be a distinction between form and content. Your argument is based on content in the absence of form.

You make an extraordinary claim that God had drawn the world from pre-existent matter. Does that mean "pre-existent matter" had no beginning? "pre-existent matter" came from infinity? How did "pre-existent matter" get there in the first place? This is where you defy the first three words of Genesis: "In the beginning..." by sticking to a rather rigid literal viewpoint.

No, I am implying that
1) You are not reading the Catechism correctly
2) "pre-existent matter" is a philosophical argument that defies science.
Furthermore, the truths of science and the truths of the faith cannot contradict themselves. Truth cannot contradict truth. Doctrines deepen with more clarity over time, they develop without intrinsic change.

Faith is not based on assumptions. Faith is compatible with reason. Since you lack faith, you have to make assumptions about the nature of God, falling into the trap of materialism and rationalism.

All Catholic doctrine is derived from the Bible, explicitly or implicitly. You are at odds with what the Bible says about creation because you uphold content and ignore form. You treat God as if He were another item in the universe, apart from "pre-existent matter". That is simply a form of atom worship.

Atheists Seem to Have Almost a Childlike Faith in the Omnipotence of Atoms

The atheist places extraordinary faith in matter. Indeed, this is a faith of a non-rational, almost childlike kind.

www.ncregister.com

@Illuminator said:

You make an extraordinary claim that God had drawn the world from pre-existent matter. Does that mean "pre-existent matter" had no beginning? "pre-existent matter" came from infinity? How did "pre-existent matter" get there in the first place? This is where you defy the first three words of Genesis: "In the beginning..." by sticking to a rather rigid literal viewpoint.​

I'm not the one making that claim. The author of the story made it, not me. As I said in several previous postings on this thread the idea that the universe was created from preexisting matter was common throughout the ancient world. Where did the preexisting matter come from, and when did it appear? I have no idea how the author of the story would have answered that question, but I'm pretty sure he wouldn't have been bothered by the idea that the preexisting matter was always just "there."

Here's how I explained it in a previous posting (#845):

The author of the creation fairy tale clearly cared greatly about the sequence of statements in his story as he went to the trouble of enumerating each of the days of the creation. Each day of the story has clear boundary markers. Each begins with "And God said...", and each ends with "And there was evening and there was morning a <nth> day." There are no such boundary markers around the second sentence of the first paragraph. That's because that sentence does not describe any actions taken by God, but instead describes the state of the universe before the first day. Note that the second sentence is written in past tense. That's because it describes how things were before God began the act of creation. The earth was. The waters were. I maintain that the author of the story wrote it that way deliberately because he believed that the material substances of the earth and the waters preexisted.​

@Illuminator said:

Furthermore, the truths of science and the truths of the faith cannot contradict themselves. Truth cannot contradict truth. Doctrines deepen with more clarity over time, they develop without intrinsic change.​

Psalm 93:1, Psalm 96:10, and Psalm 104:5 all say that the earth cannot move:

Yea, the world is established; it shall never be moved;​

(Psalm 93:1)​

These were among the passages cited by the Pope when he turned Galileo over to the Inquisition for the investigation of heresy. The fact is that the earth does move. It spins on its axis, it revolves around the sun, and the entire solar system is revolving around the center of the galaxy. So yes, it is perfectly possible that the facts discerned by the scientific method can directly contradict both the actual words of the Bible and the teachings of the faith.

 

[the.reverent.atheist]

Having re-read these verses over and over I'm no longer in agreement with you.

Surely the entire first day of creation is covered by ALL the verses 1 thru 5

Thus on that first day god created:

1. The heavens and the earth (which included it's formless existence and the deeps/waters on it/within it)
2. Light

How do you square that with the fact that Heaven wasn't created until Day 2? (Genesis 1:8)