God’s glitch in Eden. A & E had to break God’s second command to accomplish the first

Discussion in 'Religion' started by Greatest I am, Jul 27, 2013.

  1. sideshowbob Sorry, wrong number. Valued Senior Member

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    You're misusing the word "desire". If the rabbi has a point to make, tell us what it is in your own words.
     
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  3. arauca Banned Banned

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    Can you not accept the tree of life as a metaphor of a writer ? why do you have to make such an issue. Or is it that that like to bad mouth god and you find all sort of pretext to do it.
     
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  5. Greatest I am Valued Senior Member

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    Pretext?
    No.

    How he is portrayed as an immoral genocidal son murdering prick?
    Yes.

    How can you not bad mouth such a prick?

    Where in hell are your morals.

    Regards
    DL
     
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  7. Greatest I am Valued Senior Member

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    Desire drives choice and choice must know and decide between good and evil.
    Without knowing the good and evil of an issue, one cannot choose wisely.

    Sex has good and evil aspects and if one does not know good and evil one cannot know about sex.

    A & E found out when their eyes were opened.

    Regards
    DL
     
  8. Rav Valued Senior Member

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    Hold on. What do you mean you "didn't say that"? You didn't say that there was no desire involved in their sexual encounters? But then you go on to talk about how sex doesn't require desire?

    But more important than all that is the question of why you are even trying to engage in garden of eden narrative apologetics while simultaneously holding that it makes no sense to deny the fact of evolution. So I'd say that rather than being clear, you're being decidedly unclear.

    So tell me, are you speaking with conviction here, or just playing games?
     
    Last edited: Jul 29, 2013
  9. wegs Matter and Pixie Dust Valued Senior Member

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    If I could interject and I can't "speak" for sideshowbob, but I "think" he is meaning one of two things:

    1) Adam and Eve had desire, but it wasn't considered evil prior to their "sin"

    or

    2) sex prior to their sin was less about desire and more procreative in nature.

    I grew up Catholic, and the Catechism of the RCC teaches that a married couple should only have sex if they are open to life. It is taught to this day, that sex should always be "ordered" with this end in mind. It goes without saying, the RCC's view on sex outside of marriage.

    Who compiled the first bible? The RCC. Celibate priests. Hmmmm!

    So, I don't take Genesis as literal but rather a potential metaphor. For the main reason that the origin of man dates back long before Adam. The supposed date of creating Adam only came some 6000 years ago. In order to accept Genesis as literal, a believer would have to pretend that the origin if man dates back to a mere 6000 years ago. Um, yeah.

    Pertaining to sex...To think that God would create something to eventually become something He would view as evil is a stretch, even for me, as a believer.

    I have faith, but that doesn't mean I abandon my ability to reason.

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    So...that is my "take" on what sideshowbob is driving at. But, I digress; I could be wrong.
     
  10. wegs Matter and Pixie Dust Valued Senior Member

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    One other sticking point I have is...

    Adam and Eve "seem" to be in a monogamous relationship. Why would their desire for one another be seen as evil, suddenly? I think the tree of knowledge is a metaphor for cause and effect and an example of God giving man free will. Okay, but they weren't doing anything wrong.

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    They seemed committed to one another, so the story seems to paint God as having a problem with sex, a natural act that He created.

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  11. Greatest I am Valued Senior Member

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    Did your all knowing God not know what Satan would become when he created him?

    He knew enough of the future to hate Esau while he was in the womb and had not yet done good or evil.

    Regards
    DL
     
  12. Greatest I am Valued Senior Member

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    With your --- more intelligent than the usual theist's --- views, how can you call yourself a believer?

    Regards
    DL
     
  13. Rav Valued Senior Member

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    Hence my earlier inquiry into the nature of sexual intercourse between two physiologically modern human beings who supposedly didn't or couldn't experience sexual desire. It's one thing to merely present a broad speculative outline and quite another to make a truly compelling case that is also both scientifically and scripturally consistent.

    The truth of the matter is that half-arsed apologetics just irritate me because really, they're a dime a dozen. Even if we could ignore all the non-christian religious fundamentalists out there who will dispute the validity of Christian apologetics in favour of their own, we still have a plethora of inconsistent and even conflicting denominational Christian views concerning precisely how biblical narratives should be interpreted. So I trust you'll forgive me for saying that the most reasonable conclusion is that people are simply just making shit up, and shouldn't that offend our sense of philosophical integrity? And again, what is sideshowbob even bothering with this for if he accepts the modern evolutionary synthesis, as he clearly implies that he does? There's just no credible way that you can meld a literal interpretation of genesis with that. And if we're abandoning a literal interpretation of genesis why try to insist that you can have anatomically modern humans who procreate in a way that is actually less human than nonhuman apes, and presumably the common ancestor of both too. I mean really, show me any ape without sexual desire.
     
  14. Rav Valued Senior Member

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    This is an excellent point. Why are sin and sex and even just nudity somewhat synonymous? I've never really understood that.

    Interestingly however you do tend to see a lot of religious people characterizing such things in terms of worst case scenarios. You also see things like men with pedophilic tendencies becoming priests in an effort to quell their sexual desires through devotion to God. And people with sexual disorders have almost certainly been around since forever so it wouldn't surprise me at all to find that to some extent at least the characterization of sex as something that somehow runs contrary to righteousness has been pushed by those who have had particular problems with the nature of their own urges.
     
  15. wegs Matter and Pixie Dust Valued Senior Member

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    Even... female apes.

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    I totally agree. When was the bible compiled? Not that long after Jesus' death...comparatively speaking.
    So...they just didn't know about alternative theories. But for any Christian to pass off Genesis as a literal historical account of the origin of man (now that we know more/better)...either is a simpleton or is lying to himself. Or maybe just doesn't care, and says...it's all a "mystery of faith."

    The theory of evolution while still "just" a theory has pretty convincing evidence that points to a process that brought mankind to where we are right now. (We are still evolving)

    One does not have to abandon faith in a Creator to believe it. My opinion.

    More to follow...typing on an iPhone is ugh.

    Rav, I enjoy your writing. It's very thought provoking.
     
  16. wegs Matter and Pixie Dust Valued Senior Member

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  17. sideshowbob Sorry, wrong number. Valued Senior Member

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    Having sex does not require "knowing" about sex. Have you ever seen The Blue Lagoon? Adam and Even could have had sex before eating the fruit, like the children in The Blue Lagoon, without having any idea what sex was - just doing what came naturally, without any "desire", like throwing a rock.

    The word "desire" is not used until Genesis 3, after Adam and Eve had eaten the fruit. They aquired desire along with knowledge.
     
  18. sideshowbob Sorry, wrong number. Valued Senior Member

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    I didn't say, "without anything that even resembled sexual desire and/or pleasure?" Certainly, sex would have caused pleasure. They (could have) started out by doing something that was fun, like throwing a rock, and (would have) continued doing it as long as it was fun. There didn't need to be any, "I'd sure like to f**k that," beforehand.

    I said that desire, in the Biblical sense, was not necessary, just as it is not necessary in animals. Desire, in the Biblical sense, comes only with knowledge. That's the point of the story.

    It has nothing to do with "apologetics". I'm just pointing out what the story says, the same way I would point out what The Wind in the Willows says.

    Are you suggesting that I have to believe the Bible is true before I can discuss what it says?
     
  19. Greatest I am Valued Senior Member

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    Please let me add to this O P with the following.

    I think Ayn Rand had a well-written discussion of this exact topic:

    What is the nature of the guilt that your teachers call his Original Sin? What are the evils man acquired when he fell from a state they consider perfection? Their myth declares that he ate the fruit of the tree of knowledge—he acquired a mind and became a rational being. It was the knowledge of good and evil—he became a moral being. He was sentenced to earn his bread by his labor—he became a productive being. He was sentenced to experience desire—he acquired the capacity of sexual enjoyment. The evils for which they damn him are reason, morality, creativeness, joy—all the cardinal values of his existence. It is not his vices that their myth of man’s fall is designed to explain and condemn, it is not his errors that they hold as his guilt, but the essence of his nature as man. Whatever he was—that robot in the Garden of Eden, who existed without mind, without values, without labor, without love—he was not man.

    http://aynrandlexicon.com/lexicon/original_sin.html


    -----------------------


    I will also add this clip from Christopher Hitchens.

    The key phrase I want you to hear is his reference to a creator God -----

    “ we are created sick and ordered to be well.”

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kTUxcxHLdrM

    Regards
    DL
     
  20. Greatest I am Valued Senior Member

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    3,740
    Exactly.
    They had none previous to that.
    Without desire to do something, you will not do it will you?

    Let me try to walk you through the logic.

    Does sex and sexual desire have both a good and evil side?

    You will answer yes to this of course.

    Did A & E have any knowledge of good and evil before they ate of the tree of knowledge?

    No.

    Then they could not engage in sex as it has good and evil aspects and they did not have that knowledge.

    Knowledge drives desire and without knowledge of sex, they could not desire it. Right?

    If you have no knowledge of how to fly a plane, can you fly a plane?

    This is not rocket science my friend.

    Regards
    DL
     
  21. billvon Valued Senior Member

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    21,635
    Earthworms have no knowledge of good and evil. They engage in sex.
     
  22. sideshowbob Sorry, wrong number. Valued Senior Member

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    7,057
    Let me try to walk you through your "logic".

    Does throwing rocks have both a good and evil side?

    You will answer yes to this of course.

    Did A & E have any knowledge of good and evil before they ate of the tree of knowledge?

    No.

    Then they could not engage in throwing rocks as it has good and evil aspects and they did not have that knowledge.

    Knowledge drives desire and without knowledge of throwing rocks, they could not desire it. Right?

    Maybe they could not "desire" it, but they could do it.

    Sex isn't rocket science or aviation. It is, quite obviously, something that can be done without the knowledge of good and evil and it is done without the knowledge of good and evil by every species on earth except for man.
     
  23. Greatest I am Valued Senior Member

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    3,740
    Prove this.

    Regards
    DL
     

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