[quote]pushharder wrote:
[quote]TheBodyGuard wrote:
…But I do know that most BIBLICAL SCHOLARS will admit the story is allegorical…
[/quote]
False. You “know” of no such thing.[/quote]
Your mama. Do you want references?
[quote]pushharder wrote:
[quote]Spartiates wrote:
[quote]cueball wrote:
Irish, sorry, i’m allowing this thread to become a your right, I’m wrong thread. I’ll stop.
But I will throw this topic in for discussion. Genesis 3 does not explicitly state that Lucifer was the serpent or that he spoke through the serpent. Where then does the widely held assumption come from that it was? Is there scripture elsewhere that explains this?
Is it because of Revelation 12:9 that this view is held?[/quote]
It’s only widely held amongst Christians. The other faiths that incorporate the books of Abraham don’t see it that way. Nor does Satan = Lucifer (NT) = “The Devil”. It was really Christian apocrypha that put that all together, and made up the Heaven/Hell/War story. And then even as a Christian you have to put a like the idea, and put more faith in Revelations than the rest of the Bible to really buy into it. And who wrote Revelations anyway? Many people I think just assume it was John the apostle, but it wasn’t, it was another John. Just some John, who through Early Church politics got his book into the cannon. For the first 1300 years of the canonized Bible’s existence no one but poets found the book interesting, and many of the Church scholastics (many of whom are Catholic Saints) regarded it as “semi-cannon”. It was really the protestant reformation that got people interested in it.[/quote]
The fact that no book called “Revelations” even exists instantly disqualifies your take on this matter.[/quote]
it doesn’t disqualify a think. the root issue was regarding Satan…do your homework on references to satan et als. you know damn well what the discussion is about but you choose to nit pick and eat around the edges.
[quote]Spartiates wrote:
[quote]pushharder wrote:
The fact that no book called “Revelations” even exists instantly disqualifies your take on this matter.[/quote]
Sorry: “Revelation”
We’re going to have a semantic argument about translating Greek? Or which version of the Greek to translate? Or we could avoid ad hominem attacks all together, and either ignore me, or respond to the post.[/quote]
He’s good at that.
[quote]pushharder wrote:
[quote]TheBodyGuard wrote:
[quote]mse2us wrote:
[quote]BackInAction wrote:
Why did God create the serpent in the first place (especially with the capabilities it had)?
Here’s an analogy: Say I have a kid and he turns 13 years old. At the house, we are all sitting around when I show him a playboy. I tell him “you cannot look at this or touch this, it is mine and mine alone”. I leave the room, but send in my brother in law who I know likes to tell my kids to do things they shouldn’t. He tells him “it’s okay to read, why would he have put it there in the first place”. When I come back and find out my kid has read it, I blame him INSTEAD of playing my brother in law. I kick my son out of my house.
See why the Adam and Eve story doesn’t make much sense? I know my 13 year old boy would die to see the playboy. So what do I do? I send in the brother in law to just make sure he fails. God did the same thing with the creation of the snake.
[/quote]
That analogy does not fit with what happened in the Garden of Eden.
First of all a Playboy magazine to a 13 year old kid going through puberty is and enticement because it is restricting a natural desire to be attracted to pretty women. That would be unfair. God did not prohibit them from performing any natural desires or functions. Again, when they got hungry all they had to do was eat from any other tree until they were satisfied. The forbidden tree was not the only tree available to eat from so the restriction was not the only source of food like the one Playboy being the only source to satisfy a 13 year old’s desire.
Two, as you stated in your analogy you know that the 13 year old is dying to see the playboy. In other words he already knows about Playboys and already has a desire to look at them. Adam and Eve did not know anything about the tree. God did not explain the tree’s significance. The tree had food on it and they could have gotten that food from any other tree. That’s why that was such a fair test because it was not overly restrictive in any way. Adam and Eve weren’t dying to eat the fruit from the forbidden tree like the kid in your analogy is dying to see the Playboy.
Third, the Bible doesn’t state that God told them the restriction and then sent Satan in the garden to intentionally test them. No, Satan did this completely on his own. God may have known that Satan was going to do that and if he did he wisely let the situation play out so that the issues about God’s sovereignty and whether humans can rule themselves could be raised and then God could completely and throughly address them.
Forth, the snake was just a mouth piece or puppet Satan used to tempt Eve. The spirit being that became Satan the Devil who was created long before Adam and Eve is the one to blame.
This is a more fitting analogy (not a perfect analogy).
Say if one owned a winery and had many acres of land to run his winery business. An in-law is going through hard times so the owner invites him to live on his land and work for him. The owner gives him his own living quarters and supports him financially with anything he needs. Since this is the owners business and his property he naturally want the in-law to obey and listen to what he has to say but the owner is not 100 percent certain he will. To see if he will listen to the owner decides to test his loyalty right away. The owner have a magic bottle of wine that will enable the person who drinks it the ability to start and run a successful wine business. So the owner takes his in-law down into the wine cellar where there are thousands of bottles of wine. The owners magic bottle is sitting on the table. The owner doesn’t tell him the significance of the bottle so that when he looks at it looks just like the other thousands of bottles on the shelves. The owner then tells him that when he gets thirsty he can take any bottle of wine he wants except the bottle on the table. He also tells the in-law the penalty for drinking wine from the bottle on the table is being kicked out. At this point this is a very fair test because the owner is not being overly restrictive because there are thousands of other bottles he can drink from when he gets thirsty, he doesn’t know the significance of wine and not drinking wine from the bottle on the table is the only restriction.
Later, one of your sons comes in and says to the in-law. “Is it really so that you can’t drink any wine at all?” The in-law then says “no I can drink from any bottle except for the bottle on the table because if I do I will get kicked out.” The son then says “that’s a lie he will not kick you out. The owner knows that if you drink from that bottle you will have the ability to run the business better than he can.” At that moment the in-law then begins to desire that wine so that he can take over the business and run it better than the owner. He desires that wine because he can’t get the same affect from any other wine except for the wine on the table. The in-law then gives into temptation and drinks the wine. When the owner approaches him and ask him why he drank the wine, instead of saying sorry and asking for forgiveness he say “Your son who you introduced me to said I should drink the wine so I drank it.” At that moment you would call your guards in and kick both the in-law and the son off your property.
This is similiar to what happened in the Garden of Eden.[/quote]
ding ding ding ding ding…here is at least one person that believes in the LITERAL tale of adam and eve. [/quote]
I am another. It is the easiest, most straightforward, logical way to interpret it.
It essentially was when the theory of MACROevolution came around and started to gain acceptance that some Christians started to scramble and “de-literalize” the book of Genesis in a desperate attempt to reconcile the two world views.
There certainly is allegory in the Bible. The Bible is rich with it. None of it precludes the literalism. Rather they go hand in hand. It’s an exquisite design by the Author.
The above does not mean that visions and dreams mentioned in the Bible happened literally. Where the Scripture intended a non-literal interpretation it specifically said so.[/quote]
emmmkay. so there was Adam, Eve, A garden, a talking serpent and a tree…literally?
[quote]BackInAction wrote:
[quote]IrishSteel wrote:
[quote]BackInAction wrote:
[quote]pat wrote:
[quote]BackInAction wrote:
Then did God give Satan free will? The thing I’m confused about is I thought only humans had free will (which separates us from angels). So how could have Satan rebelled unless he was made to do so?[/quote]
As far as I know the angles do have freewill. The angelic part separates us from angels. [/quote]
Hmmm, searching only made this more confusing:
“Islam is clear on the nature of angels in that they are messengers of God. They have no free will, and can do only what God orders them to do. Angels mentioned in the Quran and Hadith include Gabriel (the angel of revelation), Michael (Brings food), Israfel (The horn Blower; signals of the end), Izraail/Azrael ( the angel of death.), Raqib (Writes good doings), Aatid (Writes bad doings), Maalik (Guardian of Hell), Ridwan (Guardian of Heaven), Munkar and Nakir (Interrogater afterlife).”
-Wikipedia
Anyone know the answer to this. If angels don’t have free will, this leads me to believe God created Satan for the sole purpose of disobeying him and influencing others.[/quote]
LMAO - right - Islamic doctrine proves your point about a Christian doctrine . . . wow![/quote]
Irish, I’m asking a serious question. And in case you didn’t know (since it’s obvious you don’t), Islam and Christianity worship the same God and are based on the same stories.[/quote]
Wrong as the day is long - they do not worship the same god - had this discussion earlier and though mohammed took some details from Judaism - they are two completely separate faiths
[quote]IrishSteel wrote:
[quote]BackInAction wrote:
[quote]IrishSteel wrote:
[quote]BackInAction wrote:
[quote]pat wrote:
[quote]BackInAction wrote:
Then did God give Satan free will? The thing I’m confused about is I thought only humans had free will (which separates us from angels). So how could have Satan rebelled unless he was made to do so?[/quote]
As far as I know the angles do have freewill. The angelic part separates us from angels. [/quote]
Hmmm, searching only made this more confusing:
“Islam is clear on the nature of angels in that they are messengers of God. They have no free will, and can do only what God orders them to do. Angels mentioned in the Quran and Hadith include Gabriel (the angel of revelation), Michael (Brings food), Israfel (The horn Blower; signals of the end), Izraail/Azrael ( the angel of death.), Raqib (Writes good doings), Aatid (Writes bad doings), Maalik (Guardian of Hell), Ridwan (Guardian of Heaven), Munkar and Nakir (Interrogater afterlife).”
-Wikipedia
Anyone know the answer to this. If angels don’t have free will, this leads me to believe God created Satan for the sole purpose of disobeying him and influencing others.[/quote]
LMAO - right - Islamic doctrine proves your point about a Christian doctrine . . . wow![/quote]
Irish, I’m asking a serious question. And in case you didn’t know (since it’s obvious you don’t), Islam and Christianity worship the same God and are based on the same stories.[/quote]
Wrong as the day is long - they do not worship the same god - had this discussion earlier and though mohammed took some details from Judaism - they are two completely separate faiths[/quote]
I can’t believe you don’t know what you think you know. They are indeed different “faiths” but they absolutely worship the same God.
[quote]IrishSteel wrote:
[quote]BackInAction wrote:
[quote]IrishSteel wrote:
[quote]BackInAction wrote:
[quote]pat wrote:
[quote]BackInAction wrote:
Then did God give Satan free will? The thing I’m confused about is I thought only humans had free will (which separates us from angels). So how could have Satan rebelled unless he was made to do so?[/quote]
As far as I know the angles do have freewill. The angelic part separates us from angels. [/quote]
Hmmm, searching only made this more confusing:
“Islam is clear on the nature of angels in that they are messengers of God. They have no free will, and can do only what God orders them to do. Angels mentioned in the Quran and Hadith include Gabriel (the angel of revelation), Michael (Brings food), Israfel (The horn Blower; signals of the end), Izraail/Azrael ( the angel of death.), Raqib (Writes good doings), Aatid (Writes bad doings), Maalik (Guardian of Hell), Ridwan (Guardian of Heaven), Munkar and Nakir (Interrogater afterlife).”
-Wikipedia
Anyone know the answer to this. If angels don’t have free will, this leads me to believe God created Satan for the sole purpose of disobeying him and influencing others.[/quote]
LMAO - right - Islamic doctrine proves your point about a Christian doctrine . . . wow![/quote]
Irish, I’m asking a serious question. And in case you didn’t know (since it’s obvious you don’t), Islam and Christianity worship the same God and are based on the same stories.[/quote]
Wrong as the day is long - they do not worship the same god - had this discussion earlier and though mohammed took some details from Judaism - they are two completely separate faiths[/quote]
Judaism, Islam, and Christianity all worship one God, the creator of everything. While they might call him different names and worship him through different ways, they all agree their is one God.
There cannot be three separate “One creator of the universe” gods.
[quote]IrishSteel wrote:
[quote]cueball wrote:
Irish, sorry, i’m allowing this thread to become a your right, I’m wrong thread. I’ll stop.
But I will throw this topic in for discussion. Genesis 3 does not explicitly state that Lucifer was the serpent or that he spoke through the serpent. Where then does the widely held assumption come from that it was? Is there scripture elsewhere that explains this?
Is it because of Revelation 12:9 that this view is held?[/quote]
Actually a very fascinating question - I think Push had touched on this one earlier, but let me clarify a few points and then we can get to some of the passages
First, Eve was not surprised by the serpent speaking to her. If it were an unknown or uncommon practice for a creature to speak, she would have run away in fright. Modern scientist are taking great pains to understand the communications and emotions of animals with some remarkable success. So I do not find it a stretch of logic at all to assume that in the perfect environment of the garden man and animal were able to communicate
Secondly, it dmeonstrates that there was a unique relationship between human and animal in the garden, because the serpent in our day is a poisonous threat - we even avoid the non-poisonous ones just to be safe. Again, holding with the doctrine that sin altered man and all relationships within the rest of creation.
OK - back to the passages, yes it is based on the passages from Revelation. In addition, Satan is credited with being in the garden, being the father of lies, possessing people and presumably creatures - thus it is entirely plausible that he possessed the serpent’s mind or that he in some way influenced the serpent to tempt Eve.
This is a good line of inquiry - hopefull Push can add his thoughts as well.
I will try to locate some the exact passages (man my memory sucks - lol) and post additional thoughts later[/quote]
Hmmm, Alright. As perfect humans I can see how the natural ability to communicate with animals could be part of the explanation. But it still doesn’t place Lucifer at the scene physically or spiritually. Only supports the idea that they could actually talk to snakes.
I’ll try and see what I can find as far as scripture to back up the idea. I would like to find where he is credited with being in the garden. As I would guess, the angels had access to the garden?
The Bible does not seek to prove that God exists or that he created all that exists. Rather, it assumes His existence and that He is the creator of all that exists.
Exodus 3:13-14
“And moses said unto God, Behold, when I come unto the children of Israel, and shall say unto them, The God of your fathers hath sent me unto you; and they shall say unto me, What is his name? what shall I say unto them? And God said unto moses, I Am THAT I AM: and he said, Thus shalt thou say unto the children of Israel, I AM hath sent me unto you:”
Israel had known God as (El or Elohim), they knew Him as Elyon (the Most High), they knew Him as Shaddai (the Almighty), and they certainly knew Him as Yahweh, for as early as the time of Seth, men had called upon the name of Yahweh (Gen 4:26 “Lord,” Gk. “Yahweh”). It was this name that God chose, for it is his only personal name; the rest are titles. Now the Lord took this moment to fully reveal the significance of that Name to Moses. In contrast to all the imaginary gods of the heathen, the Lord of Abraham and his seed was Yahweh (meaning “He is” or “He exists”). Speaking directly to Moses, He said, “I am Who I am.” This affirmed that the One who brought all creation into being has always existed, even before He commanded the origin of the material universe, which therefore had to have been created out of nothing. There was never a time when God did not exist as God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit. He gave this very special, holy Name to Moses. Quoting from God’s own mouth, Moses was to tell them, “He is” (Yihyeh, which in earlier times was pronounced Yahweh, from the verb hawah, which the closely related Aramaic language retained as the regular verb “to be,” namely hawah, meaning “to happen,” “to be,” “be in a personal relationship with.”) Thus…
Hebrews 11:6
“…for he that cometh to God must believe that he is…”
“He is” (Gk. “eimi”) means “to be,” “to exist,” “to live,” “to reside,” or “to occur.” For example, eimi can express “God exists” (literally “is”).
[quote]TheBodyGuard wrote:
[quote]pushharder wrote:
[quote]TheBodyGuard wrote:
[quote]mse2us wrote:
[quote]BackInAction wrote:
Why did God create the serpent in the first place (especially with the capabilities it had)?
Here’s an analogy: Say I have a kid and he turns 13 years old. At the house, we are all sitting around when I show him a playboy. I tell him “you cannot look at this or touch this, it is mine and mine alone”. I leave the room, but send in my brother in law who I know likes to tell my kids to do things they shouldn’t. He tells him “it’s okay to read, why would he have put it there in the first place”. When I come back and find out my kid has read it, I blame him INSTEAD of playing my brother in law. I kick my son out of my house.
See why the Adam and Eve story doesn’t make much sense? I know my 13 year old boy would die to see the playboy. So what do I do? I send in the brother in law to just make sure he fails. God did the same thing with the creation of the snake.
[/quote]
That analogy does not fit with what happened in the Garden of Eden.
First of all a Playboy magazine to a 13 year old kid going through puberty is and enticement because it is restricting a natural desire to be attracted to pretty women. That would be unfair. God did not prohibit them from performing any natural desires or functions. Again, when they got hungry all they had to do was eat from any other tree until they were satisfied. The forbidden tree was not the only tree available to eat from so the restriction was not the only source of food like the one Playboy being the only source to satisfy a 13 year old’s desire.
Two, as you stated in your analogy you know that the 13 year old is dying to see the playboy. In other words he already knows about Playboys and already has a desire to look at them. Adam and Eve did not know anything about the tree. God did not explain the tree’s significance. The tree had food on it and they could have gotten that food from any other tree. That’s why that was such a fair test because it was not overly restrictive in any way. Adam and Eve weren’t dying to eat the fruit from the forbidden tree like the kid in your analogy is dying to see the Playboy.
Third, the Bible doesn’t state that God told them the restriction and then sent Satan in the garden to intentionally test them. No, Satan did this completely on his own. God may have known that Satan was going to do that and if he did he wisely let the situation play out so that the issues about God’s sovereignty and whether humans can rule themselves could be raised and then God could completely and throughly address them.
Forth, the snake was just a mouth piece or puppet Satan used to tempt Eve. The spirit being that became Satan the Devil who was created long before Adam and Eve is the one to blame.
This is a more fitting analogy (not a perfect analogy).
Say if one owned a winery and had many acres of land to run his winery business. An in-law is going through hard times so the owner invites him to live on his land and work for him. The owner gives him his own living quarters and supports him financially with anything he needs. Since this is the owners business and his property he naturally want the in-law to obey and listen to what he has to say but the owner is not 100 percent certain he will. To see if he will listen to the owner decides to test his loyalty right away. The owner have a magic bottle of wine that will enable the person who drinks it the ability to start and run a successful wine business. So the owner takes his in-law down into the wine cellar where there are thousands of bottles of wine. The owners magic bottle is sitting on the table. The owner doesn’t tell him the significance of the bottle so that when he looks at it looks just like the other thousands of bottles on the shelves. The owner then tells him that when he gets thirsty he can take any bottle of wine he wants except the bottle on the table. He also tells the in-law the penalty for drinking wine from the bottle on the table is being kicked out. At this point this is a very fair test because the owner is not being overly restrictive because there are thousands of other bottles he can drink from when he gets thirsty, he doesn’t know the significance of wine and not drinking wine from the bottle on the table is the only restriction.
Later, one of your sons comes in and says to the in-law. “Is it really so that you can’t drink any wine at all?” The in-law then says “no I can drink from any bottle except for the bottle on the table because if I do I will get kicked out.” The son then says “that’s a lie he will not kick you out. The owner knows that if you drink from that bottle you will have the ability to run the business better than he can.” At that moment the in-law then begins to desire that wine so that he can take over the business and run it better than the owner. He desires that wine because he can’t get the same affect from any other wine except for the wine on the table. The in-law then gives into temptation and drinks the wine. When the owner approaches him and ask him why he drank the wine, instead of saying sorry and asking for forgiveness he say “Your son who you introduced me to said I should drink the wine so I drank it.” At that moment you would call your guards in and kick both the in-law and the son off your property.
This is similiar to what happened in the Garden of Eden.[/quote]
ding ding ding ding ding…here is at least one person that believes in the LITERAL tale of adam and eve. [/quote]
I am another. It is the easiest, most straightforward, logical way to interpret it.
It essentially was when the theory of MACROevolution came around and started to gain acceptance that some Christians started to scramble and “de-literalize” the book of Genesis in a desperate attempt to reconcile the two world views.
There certainly is allegory in the Bible. The Bible is rich with it. None of it precludes the literalism. Rather they go hand in hand. It’s an exquisite design by the Author.
The above does not mean that visions and dreams mentioned in the Bible happened literally. Where the Scripture intended a non-literal interpretation it specifically said so.[/quote]
emmmkay. so there was Adam, Eve, A garden, a talking serpent and a tree…literally?
[/quote]
[quote]Sloth wrote:
[quote]Spartiates wrote:
And then even as a Christian you have to put a like the idea, and put more faith in Revelations than the rest of the Bible to really buy into it. [/quote]
Why do people try to argue for both side of the debate. Please, don’t speak for us.[/quote]
Sorry, I should have made it weaker:
“It seems that as a Christin one would have to be particularly fond of the Zoroastrianist-like paradigm established in The Book of Revelation, then decide too, that the origins of the book are so unquestionably divine, as to retroactively change one’s reading of the rest of the Bible, and overlay it with a mythology established by an anonymous “John” from the Bible’s final book.”
And then many go on to further fill in the mythology with tales that have their origins 100% apocryphal writings from Medieval Christian traditions and poets.
I guess my point is that Revelation changes the game, and basically requires you to look at everything in the Bible you read before that through a different lens. (I understand that most people brought up Christian, read the Bible for the first time through that lens). Although the NT and OT are not really congruent (Again, you really have to use your Christian lens to make them into one book), Revelation really destroys what little there was, totally redefining the universe.
Example: now a snake from Genesis becomes Lucifer… who now must also become Satan, the prosecuting angle in God’s court (and not evil), in the Book of Job… and in the process totally redefine the meanings of those stories. Just for example.
[quote]pat wrote:
[quote]dmaddox wrote:
You have to take Revelation first in context of the time it was written. The John who wrote it was trying to potray the battle between Rome and Christians. The Ceasar Nero’s name if put into numbers comes to the number 666. Nero was killing Christians by the droves. More Christians died in the colleseum than any other religious group or gladiators. If you put Revelation into that context first then it makes perfect sense. Revelation is Apocolyptic in nature as is Daniel so there is a second future meaning that is also put into context. I think this is where the battle of Heaven vs Hell comes into play. [/quote]
You have to take in to the account of each book, the time each was written, it makes a whole lot more sense that way.
I have heard 50 million things that Revalations is supposed to be. As far as I am concerned, they could have left it out. I see it as the least valuable book in the bible.[/quote]
Not trying to be an ass, but was it not the Catholics that put this book into the Cannon? I like reading it, but it is hard to understand. I have to admit that the signs of the time are pointing in that direction.
How do hominids fit in with the Adam and Eve story? Was Adam an ancient ancestor to all of these?
[quote]pushharder wrote:
[quote]IrishSteel wrote:
[quote]cueball wrote:
Irish, sorry, i’m allowing this thread to become a your right, I’m wrong thread. I’ll stop.
But I will throw this topic in for discussion. Genesis 3 does not explicitly state that Lucifer was the serpent or that he spoke through the serpent. Where then does the widely held assumption come from that it was? Is there scripture elsewhere that explains this?
Is it because of Revelation 12:9 that this view is held?[/quote]
Actually a very fascinating question - I think Push had touched on this one earlier, but let me clarify a few points and then we can get to some of the passages
First, Eve was not surprised by the serpent speaking to her. If it were an unknown or uncommon practice for a creature to speak, she would have run away in fright. Modern scientist are taking great pains to understand the communications and emotions of animals with some remarkable success. So I do not find it a stretch of logic at all to assume that in the perfect environment of the garden man and animal were able to communicate
Secondly, it dmeonstrates that there was a unique relationship between human and animal in the garden, because the serpent in our day is a poisonous threat - we even avoid the non-poisonous ones just to be safe. Again, holding with the doctrine that sin altered man and all relationships within the rest of creation.
OK - back to the passages, yes it is based on the passages from Revelation. In addition, Satan is credited with being in the garden, being the father of lies, possessing people and presumably creatures - thus it is entirely plausible that he possessed the serpent’s mind or that he in some way influenced the serpent to tempt Eve.
This is a good line of inquiry - hopefull Push can add his thoughts as well.
I will try to locate some the exact passages (man my memory sucks - lol) and post additional thoughts later[/quote]
I agree.
Key point that I have tried to drive home over and over and over again - the present is not the key to the past.
Uniformitarianism is a hopelessly flawed concept.
If anyone here, and this includes Pat and Sloth, is going to insist that what see today is what has always been then we have a huge, thick, brick wall between us that will never be breached.
When one sees a modern day snake slithering through the grass he is NOT be seeing the type creature that spoke with Eve in the garden. That is crystal clear from Genesis 3. The Genesis 3 serpent was apparently an upright animal. It did not “snake along” on the ground.
Or maybe Satan did what Satan is known to do and simply possessed the animal and spoke through it, somehow not alarming Eve.
The perfect, pre Fall world looked and acted differently than the one we see today corrupted by thousands of years of sin and the Second Law of Thermodynamics - decay.
Because animals don’t talk to people today does NOT mean that in the PERFECT Garden of Eden - before God’s curse - that they never did. To claim that YOU know what happened or didn’t happen in the distant past and under vastly different circumstances based on what you observe in the present is flat out insane.
Open up your minds and THINK for crying out loud. So many of you, believers and non-believers alike have erected a cage for your intellect in this matter. Quit it!
The only thing that is infallible is God and His Word. Surely stupid little sinful Man is not arbiter of all that is Right and True.
People, get your head out of your asses and quit demanding that God had to have done things the way YOU decide He should have. Man through his sin corrupted this world. “Things” are different now. Maybe Adam could speak with many different types of animals; we don’t know.
[/quote]
I agree with you that you cannot assume the present was like the past. But then again, you cannot assume the present was vastly different that the past either unless you have sufficient evidence. There is still no evidence to believe that animals talked to humans and vice versa.
[quote]BackInAction wrote:
There cannot be three separate “One creator of the universe” gods.[/quote]
If the character of the entity is different that it is a different entity - see my longer responses to Body