Genesis 1 Q&A

[post]

The old cathode ray tubes in TV sets used magnetic to change direction of a photon beam, and gravity in black holes stops photons in their track, so they can’t escape - also during an eclipse, stars that are behind the sun are visible due to solar gravity bending photons around it.

Cathode ray tubes have electron emitters, sending an electron beam ((not photons)) though a controlled magnetic field, striking a surface that then emits photons.

Space is infinitely curved in the center of a black hole, and moderately curved near less massive objects like simple stars.

In neither case is the photon affected in a way that suggests it is baryonic. In a TV it's not photons being bent by the B field, and in the case of supermassive objects it's the geometry of the medium through which the photon travels that is affected.

 

[prism]

If this sentence were, instead, a recapitulation of the whole day—a day lasting from “morning” until “evening”—then it is hard to know why the word “evening” (עֶ֥רֶב, ereb) always occurs before “morning” (בֹ֖קֶר, boqer). It seems that, contrary to the usual Hebrew day which begins at sundown, each 24-hour day begins at dawn and ends with the conclusion of the following night.

Perhaps it is in keeping with the typology of fist comes darkness and chaos, then comes light and order?

 

[post]

What is the “light” that God created on the first day (Gen. 1:3), particularly if not the Sun (created on the fourth day)?

The way to make this narrative cohere best both with common sense and with science is to envision the events of the narrative unfolding from a point of view on the very early proto-earth, making use of human-type perceptual equipment, not from way out in space or from some abstract, scientific point of view. Hence, we can imagine the light from the sun shining through the proto-earth’s gas cloud, there would be periods of light and periods of dark, as the gas blob began to rotate (Gen. 1:5). Atmospheric conditions at some early point might well be such that there were no distinctive clouds visible from the planet surface, and so neither “firmament” nor solid ground or ocean, but merely a massive, slightly opaque dust cloud.

In the big bang model the universe begins infinily dense and becomes more sparse as God stretches out the heavens.

Photonic light has a finite wavelength related to Planck's constant. So there is necessarily a period of time between the beginning and the point where the density of the universe is such that the space in between 'stuff' in the universe is equal to the minimum length of a unit of photonic light. This distance between 'stuff' in a substrate is called the 'mean free path' - the average distance anything can travel in any direction without running into something.

Essentially, big-bang cosmology indicates that in the beginning the universe was dark. It was so dense there could be no light - and then, at a certain, definite, single moment in time, suddenly the density of the expanding universe became sparse enough that a photon could travel a full wavelength for the first time: and there was light!



I don't know that this verse is talking about this event, or if we're not talking about physical, photonic light at all. But it's an implication of big bang cosmology that Christians should know.

 

[post]

So were animals immortal, like man, before the Fall?

Perhaps, but this seems doubtfu

Romans 5 tells us that sin and, poignantly, death entered the world through Adam. In Genesis 3, with the cursing of the dust. 1 Corinthians 15:26 calls death an 'enemy'

Shouldn't we say therefore it's error to think that God created a death system before the fall and called that system with no sin but saturated with and built on death, "good" ?

 

[Curtis]

No.
Gravity affects space, and magnetic fields can affect the medium photons pass through.

Ok - now explain what medium the photon stream inside a vacuum sealed cathode ray tube passed through as the magnets made it sweep vertically and horizontally?

 

[Curtis]

In the big bang model the universe begins infinily dense and becomes more sparse as God stretches out the heavens.

Photonic light has a finite wavelength related to Planck's constant. So there is necessarily a period of time between the beginning and the point where the density of the universe is such that the space in between 'stuff' in the universe is equal to the minimum length of a unit of photonic light. This distance between 'stuff' in a substrate is called the 'mean free path' - the average distance anything can travel in any direction without running into something.

Essentially, big-bang cosmology indicates that in the beginning the universe was dark. It was so dense there could be no light - and then, at a certain, definite, single moment in time, suddenly the density of the expanding universe became sparse enough that a photon could travel a full wavelength for the first time: and there was light!



I don't know that this verse is talking about this event, or if we're not talking about physical, photonic light at all. But it's an implication of big bang cosmology that Christians should know.

Not that I believe the BB actually happened, or that the perceived expansion of the universe is due to the Doppler effect, but my understanding of it is only energy was released in the singularity, that eventually became hydrogen, which they claim coalesced into stars.

 

[Curtis]

All of Genesis is pictures of Christ. The whole Bible is. See John 5:39
IMO until we are seeing Him testified of in the narrative, we are not fully understanding what the narrative is really about. They are real, literal events - and they are portraying aspects of our Lord all of it is like this.

That's how I arrive at what I said about Cain and Abel. Because it is picturing Christ. Find Him and we find the truth.

Well not just pictures of Christ.

IMO every instance of God appearing in the OT the form of a man, is Jesus - the only manifestation of God in the flesh that exists.

Time is the fourth dimension, and I have no doubt that God controls all four - or ten, depending - dimensions, and can transcend time.

I think it also likely that God removed Elijah and Enoch from their timeline and deposited them directly into the tribulation timeline as the two witnesses.

 

[Curtis]

of course most of my comments here were concerning ch. 2-4, and we'll get to them in more detail later.
but let me just address this:



Here's the opening of Genesis 3:22 in Hebrew --

ויאמר ׀ יהוה אלהים הן האדם היה כאחד ממנו

here's a breakdown of the first few words:

וַיֹּ֣אמֶר ׀ And said
יְהוָ֣ה YHWH
אֱלֹהִ֗ים God (Elohim)
הֵ֤ן behold
הָֽאָדָם֙ the man

"the man" includes the definite article 'ha' -- it's ha-adam, and that's different than 'man' which is just 'adam' -- 'ha adam' is literally 'the man', a specific man.
interpreting the Hebrew requires care because the name "Adam" is the same as the word in Hebrew for "man" -- so it's not always immediately clear whether we are talking about 'a man' or 'Adam' in particular. the language does give us an indication tho, because it includes the definite article, which is a bit like us saying in English, 'the man' -- as opposed to 'a man' in general.
so here God says "the Adam" indicating a specific man, the one named Adam. all of the immediate context is God's pronouncement of the judgement of Adam ((in particular)) and Adam ((in particular)) changing his wife's name. immediately after these things in Genesis 3 which are all about Adam ((in particular)) God says behold, ha-Adam ((a particular Adam)).

ha-Adam is singular here, not plural. so not only are we talking about a particular man we are also absolutely not talking about 'mankind' in general, and we are absolutely not talking about an arbitrary man: God is speaking specifically about Adam.

look at the text: no where does God say that eating from the tree of death ((i.e. committing sin)) will make a person like Him.
it is Satan who says committing sin will make a person like God. Satan, and Satan alone says this. God never says this. it is a lie.
committing sin does not make you like God. that's Satan's lie.

yes i know very well that 95% of churches and commentaries tell us that sinning makes us like God. they all say Satan the father of lies is telling the truth, and that God has sadistically created man in order to keep life and wisdom from him, that committing sin is the way to become free.

but the text doesn't bear that out. God says of Adam that Adam has become like Him - if it was because of committing sin, as Satan & 95% of commentaries say, then God would have included Woman in this statement. it would have been a plural word 'men' or 'mankind' -- but it's not; it's singular, and it's definite: the man, Adam in particular.



so how did Adam become like God, if committing sin is not the way to become like God?
God says this when Adam changes Woman's name to Eve ((life)) -- which he does immediately after God gives the judgement of the Serpent, Woman and Adam. in this God gives the proto-Evangelion, the first revealing of the gospel, saying that the Seed of the Woman will crush the seed of the Serpent. Adam changes his wife's name to "life" because Adam recognizes, understands and believes God's revelation here of the Messiah to come, who will conquer sin & death and restore what has been lost through their transgression. Adam, who has just died, and whose wife has died, calls her "life" because he believes the promise of God in what He said to the Serpent. Adam is extraordinary in faith and wisdom. the fact he calls his dead wife 'life' is amazing -- and God Himself says so, saying "Behold!!"

now who is God saying "behold!!!!!" to? who is listening? He speaks in 3rd person about Adam, so He's not speaking to Adam. the only other options we have are Woman, Satan, and the rest of the angels, who are all watching all of this intensely. this is 1 Peter 1:12 -- our salvation, the mystery of Christ, which things angels long to look into, which are mysteries even to them -- but Adam understood, and believed, and acted on that belief, changing the name of Woman to Eve. so God says "BEHOLD!!!!" -- not an insignificant word in scripture. every time God says this word, something amazing follows. here, in Genesis 3, it is the redemption of mankind, and the angels marvel at it. it is grace through faith: Adam displays great faith, and God sheds the blood of a Lamb, making tunics to cover their shame with the skin of That Lamb. BEHOLD!! Salvation is come to man, from God, and man is made like Him.

not by committing sin, as Satan teaches.
by grace through faith, as God teaches.

My understanding isn’t that Adam became like God due to his sin - only that he gained the knowledge of good and evil that God has from sin.

 

[Curtis]

of course most of my comments here were concerning ch. 2-4, and we'll get to them in more detail later.
but let me just address this:



Here's the opening of Genesis 3:22 in Hebrew --

ויאמר ׀ יהוה אלהים הן האדם היה כאחד ממנו

here's a breakdown of the first few words:

וַיֹּ֣אמֶר ׀ And said
יְהוָ֣ה YHWH
אֱלֹהִ֗ים God (Elohim)
הֵ֤ן behold
הָֽאָדָם֙ the man

"the man" includes the definite article 'ha' -- it's ha-adam, and that's different than 'man' which is just 'adam' -- 'ha adam' is literally 'the man', a specific man.
interpreting the Hebrew requires care because the name "Adam" is the same as the word in Hebrew for "man" -- so it's not always immediately clear whether we are talking about 'a man' or 'Adam' in particular. the language does give us an indication tho, because it includes the definite article, which is a bit like us saying in English, 'the man' -- as opposed to 'a man' in general.
so here God says "the Adam" indicating a specific man, the one named Adam. all of the immediate context is God's pronouncement of the judgement of Adam ((in particular)) and Adam ((in particular)) changing his wife's name. immediately after these things in Genesis 3 which are all about Adam ((in particular)) God says behold, ha-Adam ((a particular Adam)).

ha-Adam is singular here, not plural. so not only are we talking about a particular man we are also absolutely not talking about 'mankind' in general, and we are absolutely not talking about an arbitrary man: God is speaking specifically about Adam.

look at the text: no where does God say that eating from the tree of death ((i.e. committing sin)) will make a person like Him.
it is Satan who says committing sin will make a person like God. Satan, and Satan alone says this. God never says this. it is a lie.
committing sin does not make you like God. that's Satan's lie.

yes i know very well that 95% of churches and commentaries tell us that sinning makes us like God. they all say Satan the father of lies is telling the truth, and that God has sadistically created man in order to keep life and wisdom from him, that committing sin is the way to become free.

but the text doesn't bear that out. God says of Adam that Adam has become like Him - if it was because of committing sin, as Satan & 95% of commentaries say, then God would have included Woman in this statement. it would have been a plural word 'men' or 'mankind' -- but it's not; it's singular, and it's definite: the man, Adam in particular.



so how did Adam become like God, if committing sin is not the way to become like God?
God says this when Adam changes Woman's name to Eve ((life)) -- which he does immediately after God gives the judgement of the Serpent, Woman and Adam. in this God gives the proto-Evangelion, the first revealing of the gospel, saying that the Seed of the Woman will crush the seed of the Serpent. Adam changes his wife's name to "life" because Adam recognizes, understands and believes God's revelation here of the Messiah to come, who will conquer sin & death and restore what has been lost through their transgression. Adam, who has just died, and whose wife has died, calls her "life" because he believes the promise of God in what He said to the Serpent. Adam is extraordinary in faith and wisdom. the fact he calls his dead wife 'life' is amazing -- and God Himself says so, saying "Behold!!"

now who is God saying "behold!!!!!" to? who is listening? He speaks in 3rd person about Adam, so He's not speaking to Adam. the only other options we have are Woman, Satan, and the rest of the angels, who are all watching all of this intensely. this is 1 Peter 1:12 -- our salvation, the mystery of Christ, which things angels long to look into, which are mysteries even to them -- but Adam understood, and believed, and acted on that belief, changing the name of Woman to Eve. so God says "BEHOLD!!!!" -- not an insignificant word in scripture. every time God says this word, something amazing follows. here, in Genesis 3, it is the redemption of mankind, and the angels marvel at it. it is grace through faith: Adam displays great faith, and God sheds the blood of a Lamb, making tunics to cover their shame with the skin of That Lamb. BEHOLD!! Salvation is come to man, from God, and man is made like Him.

not by committing sin, as Satan teaches.
by grace through faith, as God teaches.

Adam lived quite a long time physically after he died spiritually, on the day he sinned.

Why did Adam sin by eating the forbidden fruit, when he, unlike Eve, wasn’t deceived?

Could it be he knew Eve would be kicked out of Eden, and he wanted to stay with his wife?

 

[Curtis]

look please - i've no beef with you , okay
.. i translated all prophets ... in their right context .. word for word
and within them , quite a number of concepts are confirmed : because they cross-read
(you know that only scripture can explain scripture right)

.. God made eden AFTER the evil realm had made , cq occupied 'a land' already ;
so he made eden paradise as a kind of "counter move"
Heaven is definately "in the east",
but [and scripture does nót adress that] ,
satan obviously was thrown out of heaven and occupied 'the west realm' .
So far , this is not 'dualism',
and in prophets [and Rev 20] God will punish the great dragon - satan ,
and it stands to reason that the western realm will cease to exist , right

... in Job he says : I turned the land upside down , so that the sinners fell off it",
and then he proceeds explaining how he created eden

this is the land in question :
see it as "the outskirt of Heaven",
which the evil western realm of the dragon "wanted to hold on to - in order to can feed off heaven"
(evil always needs 'something to hang onto')
so this region is "an intermediary region, a buffer , a no mans land"

God made his high mountain upon this land ,
which carried paradise at its summit

...the realm abóve this land - and now above páradise , since she came inbetween - is this 'behemoth-realm' , from hebrew 'beast', -bmh ,
and in prophets always related to 'the high places', specifically said as the sin
when people 'offer upon the high places' ;
it means that they honour an evil consciousness : namely that dragon , as 'corrupt masculine' ;
also termed 'Baal' etc .
okay .
This realm is ofcourse NOT 'from heaven', because God's realm is NOT dualistic :
and this masculine has his counterpart in "the south dimension",
also called the dragon - in Job and Enoch specified as 'Leviathan'.

...this latter 'feminine' realm is not per sé evil [like the northern one] , just 'corrupted' :
therefore "waters stream from the temple [=the temple in the other reality , in restored eden]"
and "those waters fall in the sea in the south to cleanse her" - book Ezekiel .
so , the south dimension is cleaned up , in time .

...this is exact what the temple-plan of the new temple depicts :
there are gates to the NORTH and to the SOUTH ,
while the gate to the EAST will be closed [=Heaven] ,

..but there is NO GATE TO THE WEST

why ?
because the temple represents 'ruling in the centre

Cathode ray tubes have electron emitters, sending an electron beam ((not photons)) though a controlled magnetic field, striking a surface that then emits photons.

Space is infinitely curved in the center of a black hole, and moderately curved near less massive objects like simple stars.

In neither case is the photon affected in a way that suggests it is baryonic. In a TV it's not photons being bent by the B field, and in the case of supermassive objects it's the geometry of the medium through which the photon travels that is affected.

It makes no sense to me that photons have momentum with no mass. But oh well..

 

[post]

Adam lived quite a long time physically after he died spiritually, on the day he sinned.

Why did Adam sin by eating the forbidden fruit, when he, unlike Eve, wasn’t deceived?

Could it be he knew Eve would be kicked out of Eden, and he wanted to stay with his wife?

i think that essentially, yes -- Adam willingly chose death so that she would not be alone in it. because he loved her, he gave himself for her.

 

[Ronald Nolette]

When we consider divine inspiration (what is God-breathed or theopneustos) as "holy men of God being moved by the Holy Ghost", then the prior knowledge of Moses (or any of the Scripture writers, whether accurate or inaccurate) would have to give place to the words given by God the Holy Spirit. That is the only way that the inerrancy and infallibility of Scripture could be maintained. The Jewish scribes who copied the Torah believed that every letter was given by God.

And Moses wrote all the words of the LORD, and rose up early in the morning, and builded an altar under the hill, and twelve pillars, according to the twelve tribes of Israel. (Exod 24:4)

I agree. but this has nothing to do with whether MOses edited or authored Genesis. It is a small issue in the scheme of things.

 

[Enoch111]

I agree. but this has nothing to do with whether MOses edited or authored Genesis. It is a small issue in the scheme of things.

Actually this is a major issue. Either Moses simply wrote down exactly what he was required to write, or he edited and altered what he was given by God. The difference is between inerrancy and non-inerrancy. Theological liberals reject inerrancy. Bible-believing Christians hold that to be a fundamental doctrine. Jesus said "Scripture cannot be broken" (loosened, dissolved, or destroyed).

 

[Ronald Nolette]

Actually this is a major issue. Either Moses simply wrote down exactly what he was required to write, or he edited and altered what he was given by God. The difference is between inerrancy and non-inerrancy. Theological liberals reject inerrancy. Bible-believing Christians hold that to be a fundamental doctrine. Jesus said "Scripture cannot be broken" (loosened, dissolved, or destroyed).

Well I am a full believer in inerrancy, aqnd have taugfh so all of my 42+ years as a teacher! But whther He copied and wrote under inspiration from past materials or God fed Him ancinet history(though Moses would have known much of it as it was constantly rehearsed to the peop[le of Israel) is unimportant. whichever way He compiled Genesis, it was inerrant in its original autograph. I just believe He was guided by God with preexisting materials to pick and choose what god wanted.

 

[post]

Moses would have known much of it as it was constantly rehearsed to the peop[le of Israel

Moses wasn't raised as an Israelite. he grew up in Pharaoh's palace as a prince, and didn't even realize their plight until he was an adult. then he ran away to the pagan land of Midian -- when he returned, after meeting Christ in the burning bush, the Israelites didn't accept him.

 

[Ronald Nolette]

Moses wasn't raised as an Israelite. he grew up in Pharaoh's palace as a prince, and didn't even realize their plight until he was an adult. then he ran away to the pagan land of Midian -- when he returned, after meeting Christ in the burning bush, the Israelites didn't accept him.

Well He did spend 40+ years with His people from deliverance to His death.

 

[BibleStu]

Romans 5 tells us that sin and, poignantly, death entered the world through Adam. In Genesis 3, with the cursing of the dust. 1 Corinthians 15:26 calls death an 'enemy'

Shouldn't we say therefore it's error to think that God created a death system before the fall and called that system with no sin but saturated with and built on death, "good" ?

I address this more in the Gen 2-3 Q&A. Animals were created for us. Their death carries less of the moral significance of ours. Romans speaks of human death and redemption; it requires an inference unsupported by any other details of the context to think he also meant animal death too. How could animals “be fruitful and multiply” without crowding the earth to bursting, without death? Finally, it is widely thought the reason for Adam’s immortality was specifically the fruit of the Tree of Life. Few if any animals had access to it.

 

[Curtis]

It makes no sense to me that photons have momentum with no mass. But oh well..

I love how the illustration of a bowling ball sinking into a rubber sheet, which would require gravity to pull it down into the mat, is used to explain how mass of objects

I address this more in the Gen 2-3 Q&A. Animals were created for us. Their death carries less of the moral significance of ours. Romans speaks of human death and redemption; it requires an inference unsupported by any other details of the context to think he also meant animal death too. How could animals “be fruitful and multiply” without crowding the earth to bursting, without death? Finally, it is widely thought the reason for Adam’s immortality was specifically the fruit of the Tree of Life. Few if any animals had access to it.

Because it’s a big planet, and had no oceans before the flood, so there was a lot of land area for animals to multiply in.

If memory serves, scriptures are clear that there was no death in the world before it was cursed when Adam fell - and as proof of that, when all is restored back to Edenic condition, the lion goes back to being an herbivore and eats straw, and there will be no more death again.

Besides that, God knows the end from the beginning and knew Adam would fall and creation would be cursed with death, long before animals overpopulated the earth - which is why the plan of salvation was in place from beginning - and Jesus is called the lamb slain from the founding of the world.

 

[post]

It makes no sense to me that photons have momentum with no mass. But oh well..

you're 100% right; me either

Einstein's nobel prize wasn't for his relativity theories, but for 'the photoelectric effect' --- he showed that photons can knock particles out of thin gold sheets, demonstrating that they have momentum, which implies they have mass. this is how we got the mass-energy equivalence relation, E=mc^2

the nature of physical light in the created universe is amazing, and an enormous mystery. it's a parallel to the mystery of God having become human, the mystery of Christ -- the whole wave/particle duality, mass-like vs. massless photons, all of this is maybe only serving to humble us, because it's practically inexplicable.
i haven't been trying to frustrate you, brother -- just having conversation about things that are ultimately too high for either of us to really understand. i hope you understand that? ♥

 

[Curtis]

you're 100% right; me either

Einstein's nobel prize wasn't for his relativity theories, but for 'the photoelectric effect' --- he showed that photons can knock particles out of thin gold sheets, demonstrating that they have momentum, which implies they have mass. this is how we got the mass-energy equivalence relation, E=mc^2

the nature of physical light in the created universe is amazing, and an enormous mystery. it's a parallel to the mystery of God having become human, the mystery of Christ -- the whole wave/particle duality, mass-like vs. massless photons, all of this is maybe only serving to humble us, because it's practically inexplicable.
i haven't been trying to frustrate you, brother -- just having conversation about things that are ultimately too high for either of us to really understand. i hope you understand that? ♥

I like discussing science with a believer, so that’s absolutely not a problem!