In the beginning God made the heavens and the earth

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Cristo Rei

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This is pure conjecture.

I wouldn't have expected such a statement from u.

1/ Conjecture is conclusion formed on the basis of incomplete information... Do u have all the information? Are you all knowing?
Have u been shown the gates of heaven and hell or understand the mysteries of the cosmos? If so please share.

2/ Truth begins at conjecture, at enquiry. Without it, truth would never be found.
Truth cannot be found without conjecture unless your claiming to have all the knowledge which none of us do.

3/ I admitted it is conjecture in the first place. I think iv said something along these lines about 4 or 5 times now.
Perhaps u would prefer all enquiry into the matter to cease and everyone to adhere to your view.

Seeing none of us has complete knowledge (unless u claim otherwise) it is irrational and illogical to be claiming such infallibility.

Please see the Ten Commandments for confirmation

I can't see how that claim is refuted by that. Please explain

Is that your counter argument? I was expecting something a bit more thought provoking from yourself and more of an open dialogue as well
 

Cristo Rei

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@Backlit Im a bit confused on what u said.
To confirm...
U believe it was done in 7 days.
U believe Satan was the serpent on that 7th day.
U believe a war would last longer than 7 days.

Can u see my confusion? How then is Satan able to be there on the 7th day?

Then there is the question about the light on the 1st and 4th days and meaning of "prince of this world"
 

Cristo Rei

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"In the Beginning" in Hebrew is all one word...and a bit of a stretch for most translators who are loathe to put more than a word for a word translation but none would suffice. But we, in view of the entirety of scriptures, know that God here just created the construct of time. There wouldn't be any beginning without God. (There won't be an end without Him either.)
God is timeless.
God created the Heavens and the Earth.
The words used in Hebrew here (contrary to popular opinion) are not a complete sentence. The reader is left dangling in want of a material used to create the Heavens and the earth out of. "Bars" is the root verb in Hebrew and demands a material...

I can bara a wooden table, a marble table or even bara a paper table...but here in this fragment there is no materials used in the construction of the Heavens and the Earth.

He explained this
  1. Genesis 1:1 is a complete stand-alone sentence in the Hebrew. The word "creation" ("bara" - Heb.) is not used again until God made the living creatures.
  2. The rest of Genesis 1 uses the word "asah" which means "to build or make out of existing materials". That means, except for the living creatures, everything done in Genesis 1:2 onward is with materials that were already in place
I can ponder on the different perspectives and interpretations here
Where you say its an incomplete sentence he calls it a stand alone sentence. Could it be evidence that some time passes after 1:1?
Where ur left asking what materials did he use he says thats the difference between creating and building.
He goes on to explain the difference "bara" and "asah" and that "bara" is only used in the first verse while "asah" is used from then on.

This is were the knowledge of Hebrew translation is beneficial...

Can u explain "bara" and "asah" and how they were used?


The Earth (and universe) was shapeless and void and the Spirit of God was hovering/shaking over the face of the waters.

Ok...God hasn't created water yet in this narrative...so how can there be any water?
Unless the scriptures are saying something else not readily understood by our westernized mindset.

How about that in the ancient near eastern mindset that "Water" is a symbol for Law and that this hovering/shaking over the face is God picking each and every natural law that is going to govern this universe. God is intimately aware of all of them. He is in the rule's face as it is sometimes said

This is the part i thought u misunderstood.

Genesis 1:2, when literally translated is; "But the earth became a chaos, and empty; and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters." This strongly indicates that the earth was in good order and something catastrophic happened

The condition of being covered by water and in darkness strongly suggests God's judgement, especially when the heavenly lights were still in place

So he's saying that its like a figure of speech, a metaphor, and that it indicates evil. "formless and empty, darkness was over the surface of the deep". Is God the author of darkness and emptiness?

U made a good point "God hasn't created water yet in this narrative...so how can there be any water?"
Ok if we take it literally, are told when water was created... It occurs to me now that is was already there... Isn't it?

You could say that creating earth includes the water, air and elements.
You could say that a length of time passes after 1:1, like we suggest.
But can u say that water was created on the 2nd day??? It doesn't specify that so id have to say no

Thats interesting but. He never says when water was created , instead it is treated as a given...
Now thats got me thinking about other things as well, unrelated to this.

God's understanding of Quantum mechanics and physics is way beyond any scientific community's dreams

Hahaha off course... Our feeble minds have unlocked only a fraction of knowledge i think...
I love it when scientists make a discovery that dumbfounds them, it happens all the time.
It just shows that our knowledge is only finite while His knowledge is infinite

Now... about these "Days".
A "day" is to God what is thousands of millenia to us. Remember time itself is freshly made. So...God calling it a "day"...I'm not really in a place to disagree...He is God after all...but those words "evening" and "morning" frame the night time when hidden things happen. Also they mean "chaos" and "clarity/order" respectively. So it's a backhanded way of saying that God brings order out of chaos.

So do u think its 7 literal days?

Your interpretation into chaos and order is what he delves into as well...
So God shone His light in order to clear the chaos and bring order... U believe
I would ask myself how could there be chaos and darkness immediately after God created it?
And if Gods light flushes out this chaos and darkness isn't it possible this chaos and darkness was orchestrated by Satan?

The poetry of Genesis is lost on us poor schmucks who can't read and think in hebrew. But it's beautiful poetry conveying lots of ideas and thoughts in an extremely few amounts of words...
Paper and ink weren't recoded as being invented for a long time. Egyptian hyrigliphics are one of the first written languages. (Ugarit and one other are around the same time period)
So...when the Jews are running about in the Wilderness they were using the Torah as a guide to learn reading, writing, arithmetic, and history and of course the Law. Child and adult alike were getting an edumakateshun.
Considering what they once were treated like (property) and now getting the very best and most complicated technology on the planet....huge stretch.

Job 38 is interesting as we're told the angels rejoiced when God laid the foundation for earth.
So we can confirm the angels were already there before earth


Also worth considering what the "prince of this world" could mean?
Prince. So is Satan son of God? How?
Of this world. But God created this world and Jesus is his son. How does Satan inherit it then?
Its puzzled me for a while. His explanation also appears to explain this

Ye so a few things there. U have me thinking about the water. I hope u give the light thing some thought cos if u think Gods light flushed out the darkness and chaos then i would ask where did the chaos come from, couldn't it be Satan?


It seems to me to be the most probable explanation and im a little surprised no one has heard of it...
To discredit it i would need a good counter argument for the light on days 1 and 4
How Satan manages to be there on day 7

Does anyone really have the whole truth? Many will claim to but i very much doubt it.
My understanding of scripture isn't great, its a work in progress
 

Enoch111

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I can't see how that claim is refuted by that. Please explain
The fourth commandment tells us that God created the entire universe in six days, and rested on the seventh day. Which AUTOMATICALLY excludes a creation before creation. Which also AUTOMATICALLY excludes Lucifer as some sort of ruler prior to Adam in a Pre-Adamic earth.
 

Brakelite

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@Backlit Im a bit confused on what u said.
To confirm...
U believe it was done in 7 days.
U believe Satan was the serpent on that 7th day.
U believe a war would last longer than 7 days.

Can u see my confusion? How then is Satan able to be there on the 7th day?

Then there is the question about the light on the 1st and 4th days and meaning of "prince of this world"
The war was in heaven. The war had been progressing likely a long time. Satan/ Lucifer/dragon was cast out of heaven after the creation of earth and man....
KJV Revelation 12:12
12 Therefore rejoice, ye heavens, and ye that dwell in them. Woe to the inhabiters of the earth and of the sea! for the devil is come down unto you, having great wrath, because he knoweth that he hath but a short time.
Satan then used the serpent as a disguise (remember 'dragon' is metaphorical) to deceive Eve. That was then when the war between Christ and Satan came here, and has been continuing ever since. That war hasn't yet ceased. And it won't stop until the second coming... After the turmoil of the last days convinces everyone that satan's ideas of kingship have failed. Then all will confess Jesus as Lord.
 

JohnDB

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Ok...
"The Earth didn't become formless and void...it was formless and void.

And then on top of this the Hebrew word for "the deep" or "waters" is done in one Hebrew word said as Tehovm. It means those things too but it mainly means "abyss" and the place of chaos. (Without law and order)

"Springs of the deep" in the Noah's flood story...the deep there is Tehovm as well.

In Egyptian society there was a huge difference between law/order and lawlessness/chaos.
They were as polar opposites as life and death...and that connotation was often inferred.

If you lived inside a city in Egypt you had to live by the laws (and there were a bunch) and you had a nice life with access to jobs and food and citizen rights.

Outside the cities there is chaos because of the lack of law...but living in the wild is almost impossible. They also were regularly at war with the Cushites who were considered lawless barbarians. The Israelites were often building extensive fortifications along the Nile to protect Egypt from the Cushite barbarian horde.
 

JohnDB

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Also Tehovm is another euphemism for the deep sea...

As in Jesus walked (put under his feet) the sea of galilee.
 

historyb

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In the beginning God made the heavens and the earth...

Do u take the the 7 days literally? If so then how could Satan already be tempting Eve on the 7th day? There was a big war in heaven and Lucifer was cast out along with 1/3 of the angels. A war typically goes for longer than 7 days, right? And the snake is Satan? So?

I know Catholics can or not, which when I was Catholic vexed me but I kept silent. Now my Church as well as Orthodox do believe it is all real. Here are some great articles on the Orthodox perspective:

The Orthodox Church believes that God the Father is the “Creator of Heaven and earth and of all things visible and invisible.”

To create means to make out of nothing; to bring into existence that which before did not exist; or, to quote the Liturgy of St John Chrysostom once more: “to bring from non-existence into being.”

The Orthodox doctrine of creation is that God has brought everything and everyone which exists from non-existence into being. The Scriptural description of creation is given primarily in the first chapter of Genesis. The main doctrinal point about creation is that God alone is uncreated and ever-existing. Everything which exists besides God was created by Him. God, however, did not create everything individually and all at once, so to speak. He created the first foundations of existence, and then over periods of time (perhaps millions of years, see 2 Pet 3.8) this first foundation of existence-by the power which God had given to it—brought forth the other creatures of God:

Let the earth put forth vegetation . . . let the waters bring forth swarms of living creatures . . . let the earth bring forth living creatures according to their kinds . . . (Gen 1.19, 20, 24)

Thus, although God is certainly the creator of everything. He acts gradually in time and by means of things previously made by Him to which He has given life-producing potencies and powers.

According to the Orthodox Faith, everything that God makes is “very good”: the heavens, the earth, the plants, the animals, and finally man himself (Gen 1.31). God is pleased with creation and has made it for no other purpose than to participate in His own divine, uncreated existence and to live by His own divine “breath of life” (Gen 1.30; 2.7).

By the Word of the Lord
the heavens were made,
and all their host by the
breath (or Spirit) of His mouth.
He gathered the waters of the sea as in a bottle;
He put the deeps in storehouses.
Let all the earth fear the Lord,
let all the inhabitants of the world
stand in awe of Him!
For He spoke, and it came to be
He commanded, and it was made!

(Ps 33.6–9)

In the above-quoted verses as well as in the account of Genesis we must notice the presence and action of God’s Word and God’s Spirit. God the Father makes all that exists by means of His Divine Word—“for He spoke and it came to be”—and by His Divine Spirit who “moved upon the face of the waters” (Gen 1.2). We see already a glimpse of the Holy Trinity to be fully revealed in the New Testament when the Word becomes flesh and when the Holy Spirit comes personally to the disciples of Jesus on the day of Pentecost.

We must make special notice as well of the goodness of the created physical world. There is no dualism in Orthodox Christianity. There is no teaching that “spirit” is good and “matter” is bad, that “heaven” is good and the “earth” is evil. God loves His entire material creation with His eternal love and, as we shall see, when the physical creation is mined by sin He does everything in His power to save it.

Loving the whole of His good creation, God the Father dwells within the world that He has made because of His goodness and love for man. The omnipresence of God is one of the divine attributes of the Creator particularly stressed in Orthodox Christian teaching. This fact is directly affirmed in the prayer to the Spirit of God which is used as the opening prayer of Orthodox worship:

O Heavenly King, the Comforter, the Spirit of Truth, who art everywhere and fillest all things. Treasury of Blessings and Giver of Life! Come and abide in us. And cleanse us from every impurity. And save our souls, O Good One!

The fact that Christians pray: Our Father who art in heaven . . . (or, literally, “in the heavens”) is also an affirmation of the fact that God is present everywhere, for wherever men move on the face of the earth, over the seas or in the air, the heavens surround them with the presence of God. The Lord Jesus Christ, in order to have men realize that the true God, His Father, is not bound to one or another particular place, as were the pagan gods, teaches men to pray to the Father “in the heavens.” For the one true and living God is present to all, over all, embracing and encompassing all with His heavenly care and protection. The God who is “over all” is also “through all and in all” (Eph 4.5). By His Word and His Holy Spirit, God “fills all in all” (Eph 1.10, 23).

Thus, the Apostle Paul also proclaimed to the Athenians, that whether men realize it or not, “in Him we live and move and have our being,” for “He is not far from each one of us” (Acts 17.27–28). It is this fact of God’s omnipresence in His creation, and our own presence in and to Him, that is witnessed to so beautifully in Psalm 139:

Whither shall I go from Thy Spirit?
Or whither shall I flee from Thy Presence?
If I ascend to heaven, Thou art there!
If I make my bed in Sheol, Thou art there
If I take the wings of the morning and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea,
even there Thy hand shall lead me, and Thy right hand shall hold me.
If I say, “Let only darkness cover me, and the light about me be night,”
even the darkness is not dark to Thee, the night is bright as the day;
for darkness is as light with Thee!

(Ps 139.7–12)

The Orthodox Faith - Volume I - Doctrine and Scripture - The Symbol of Faith - Creation

and

Creation And Holy Trinity
1. We believe that the created world itself is a 'mystery' originating in the sovereign will of God accomplished by the action (energia) of the Holy Trinity. We confess in the NiceneConstantinopolitan creed (325/381) that the Father is the "Creator of heaven and earth and of all things visible and invisible", the Son "He through whom all things were made", and the Holy Spirit, the "Creator of life" (zoopion). Thus, the three persons created together the world, which is the fruit of the common action of the Holy Trinity issuing out of the one essence.

2. As St. Basil the Great said, "We should understand in the creation the original cause of the Father as a founding cause, the cause of the Son as a creative, and the cause of the Spirit as an implementing one." Thus the Father is the "Creator of all things", the Son is the one "through whom all things were made", and the Holy Spirit is the one "in whom are all things". Everything that he (God the Creator) had made ... was very good" (Gen. 1:31), because "first He conceived, and His conception was a work carried out by His Word, and perfectly by His Spirit.

3. Thus, the action of the Holy Spirit, rooted in the Father, is presented as the 'economy' of the Son and the Spirit: the former bringing God's desire into existence and the latter perfecting it in goodness and beauty; the one calling the creation and leading it to the Father, and the other helping the creation to respond to His call and communicating perfection to it. Thus, the creation is the result of the communion (koinonia), close relationship and cooperation of the Holy Trinity. The community of three Persons participates actively in the execution of the whole of God's plan.

Creation "Out Of Nothing"
4. "In the beginning" the Holy Trinity created the world (heaven and earth) "out of nothing" (ex nihilo) and not out of preexistent matter. The world is a production of God's free will, goodness, wisdom, love and omnipotence. God did not create the world in order to satisfy some need of His. Rather he created it without compulsion and without force in order that it might enjoy His blessings and share in His goodness. God then brought all things into being out of nothing, creating both the visible and the invisible.

5. "Out of nothing" (ex nihilo) finds its first expression in the Bible. "Beholding the heavens and the earth, and seeing all that is there, you will understand that God has created it all from nothing" (2 Macc. 7:28). Thus, the creation springs into being or passes into being out of non-being. As St. Gregory of Nyssa affirms, "It begins to be, and the very substance of the creation owes its beginning to change". This transition from non-existence is a change brought about by God's creative Word "who has established the world so that it shall not be moved" (Ps. 93:1).

Orthodox Perspectives on Creation - Society Articles - Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of America
 
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Cristo Rei

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The fourth commandment tells us that God created the entire universe in six days, and rested on the seventh day. Which AUTOMATICALLY excludes a creation before creation. Which also AUTOMATICALLY excludes Lucifer as some sort of ruler prior to Adam in a Pre-Adamic earth.

Fair point it does say that. To automatically rule it out is your choice. I still have unanswered questions.
Where did Satan come from on the 7th day, to manifest himself into a snake and tempt Eve?
 

Cristo Rei

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Ok...
"The Earth didn't become formless and void...it was formless and void.

And then on top of this the Hebrew word for "the deep" or "waters" is done in one Hebrew word said as Tehovm. It means those things too but it mainly means "abyss" and the place of chaos. (Without law and order)

"Springs of the deep" in the Noah's flood story...the deep there is Tehovm as well.

In Egyptian society there was a huge difference between law/order and lawlessness/chaos.
They were as polar opposites as life and death...and that connotation was often inferred.

If you lived inside a city in Egypt you had to live by the laws (and there were a bunch) and you had a nice life with access to jobs and food and citizen rights.

Outside the cities there is chaos because of the lack of law...but living in the wild is almost impossible. They also were regularly at war with the Cushites who were considered lawless barbarians. The Israelites were often building extensive fortifications along the Nile to protect Egypt from the Cushite barbarian horde.

So your basically saying that it doesn't necessarily mean its referring to evil. Ye u could be right

It still leaves with my original question to the 7 days. How is Satan there on the 7th?
 

JohnDB

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So your basically saying that it doesn't necessarily mean its referring to evil. Ye u could be right

It still leaves with my original question to the 7 days. How is Satan there on the 7th?

Ok...
So where are you getting this notion that somehow Satan exists in the seventh day?

I'm not saying that you are wrong...but this is coming from somewhere and I wanted to know.
 

JohnDB

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He goes on to explain the difference "bara" and "asah" and that "bara" is only used in the first verse while "asah" is used from th

He's kinda full of himself. LOL.

The word "bara" is kinda like a prepositional verb...
Except instead of location being needed a material is required.
This is where the whole idea of "something out of nothing" comes from. This verse right here. God telling the scientists to "get their own dirt" joke is centered on this verse.

It's not a difference between creation and forming...that's just nonsense.
I can create a wooden table (I actually did during the quarantine) I can create the lumber needed. I can even plant seeds and grow trees to later harvest the wood from. (Used to be done and was made popular again by CSLewis' books)

Where I started from in the creation process of a table really isn't relevant.

But basically "bara" requires a material to be mentioned and asah does not.

Also... considering how much people screw up scripture interpretation...God used an incomplete sentence to describe what the heavens and the Earth was made out of...no word used saying nothing (someone for sure would turn into something)...not even a word...just a blank and incomplete sentence.
Think an implied "out of" at the end of the sentence.

Then there's the whole speaking thing. "God said" and it leapt into existence. Except for man. God used himself as a pattern and then with his hands formed him and then breathed life into him. A very much more intimate bit of creation than just speaking man into existence. A lot more focus and concentration involved.
 
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JohnDB

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Is he the snake that tempts Eve?
I explained that the serpent in Genesis is something else in a previous post.

I am very careful about "going beyond what is written" with scripture.

John, when writing Revelations suggests in a way that it might be...but that's way off the subject at hand. First things first.

The serpent is cunning.
And Eve got it twice as bad as Adam because God knew that snakes don't talk.

So, when reading this by an ancient Hebrew student in the wilderness...fresh out of Egypt. What would they think when they read this?
 

Cristo Rei

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I explained that the serpent in Genesis is something else in a previous post.

I am very careful about "going beyond what is written" with scripture.

John, when writing Revelations suggests in a way that it might be...but that's way off the subject at hand. First things first.

The serpent is cunning.
And Eve got it twice as bad as Adam because God knew that snakes don't talk.

So, when reading this by an ancient Hebrew student in the wilderness...fresh out of Egypt. What would they think when they read this?

Ah ye i forgot...
It seems that usually the difference in interpretations are what people take literally or metaphorically.
U see this as metaphorical while others don't, same with the disorder and chaos. Could be right and could be wrong
 

Cristo Rei

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He's kinda full of himself. LOL.

The word "bara" is kinda like a prepositional verb...
Except instead of location being needed a material is required.

This is what i was saying, interpretation. Ur reading as a kinda like a prepositional verb while his reading as a verb.
Your little attack on his character doesn't change that fact.

And he spoke about this other word "asah" which u didn't address so... There no certainty here
 
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Cristo Rei

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On a side note im a bit surprised u don't think God can create something from nothing. I thought all Christians believed that

So then your saying this is not the beginning cos God was gathering materials from somewhere before the beginning.
So the beginning is actually before this then that wasn't the beginning after all...
That would be an ontological argument
 
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Cristo Rei

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Short chapters he says... Hehehe u must read some big books and be an efficient reader. With numbers im above average, with language im below average as u can probably tell from my writing.
I read the first chapter and finished it cos im interested when it comes to matters of the evil one. It was interesting, thought provoking.

What is it, like an interpretation?
 

JohnDB

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On a side note im a bit surprised u don't think God can create something from nothing. I thought all Christians believed that

So then your saying this is not the beginning cos God was gathering materials from somewhere before the beginning.
So the beginning is actually before this then that wasn't the beginning after all...
That would be an ontological argument
I'm not saying that at all...
I'm saying that the scriptures say that God created something out of nothing. And that's the purpose behind the first verse.
 
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Cristo Rei

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I'm not saying that at all...
I'm saying that the scriptures say that God created something out of nothing. And that's the purpose behind the first verse.

Ok i thought that was weird... Its easy to misinterpret things online. I find anyway. More used to traditional interaction i guess