Andrew wrote:The Biblical account of mankind's origins contradicts archaeological, paleontological, and logical evidence. Do you really think that there were enough people to build the pyramids 2,000 years after mankind's origins? How did Cain build a city and where did his wife come from if he was really only a second-generation human being?
That one made me laugh.
You don't have the evidence you claim. (That might be why you still haven't given it.)
(By the way, no, I don't believe "were enough people to build the pyramids 2,000 years after mankind's origins". It would never occur to me to involve Egypt with what the Bible treats as a Mesopotamian event.)
Andrew wrote:When do you think the pyramids were built then (BTW, 2,000 years is rough; I'm not trying to be precise or more than approximately accurate)?
Neither does 40,000 BC or paleantology, but that didn't stop you.
Genesis tells the story of how a flood once came to southern Iraq. So as you can see, it's really the pyramids that have nothing to do with it. You're welcome to rewrite the story however you wish; but when you're ready to know what the book actually says, you'll have to put away your toys and come listen.
The first modern humans arose roughly 40,000 years ago. The Genesis account names the first two humans as Adam and Eve. You asked how I could accept the idea of two ancestors of the whole human race but not accept the Biblical account literally. I said that there was no way the author of Genesis could have known the exact events of 40,000 years ago. You say that the human race is only 6,000 years old. I ask how that is possible if the pyramids were built only two thousand years after that--who built them then? You say that we're only talking about Mesopotamia now and Egypt doesn't play into things at all. I think I know what you're getting at, but it doesn't make sense. The Genesis account is obviously not literal, even if it describes Mesopotamian events only. It just doesn't work.
Andrew wrote:The first modern humans arose roughly 40,000 years ago. The Genesis account names the first two humans as Adam and Eve. You asked how I could accept the idea of two ancestors of the whole human race but not accept the Biblical account literally. I said that there was no way the author of Genesis could have known the exact events of 40,000 years ago. You say that the human race is only 6,000 years old. I ask how that is possible if the pyramids were built only two thousand years after that--who built them then? You say that we're only talking about Mesopotamia now and Egypt doesn't play into things at all. I think I know what you're getting at, but it doesn't make sense. The Genesis account is obviously not literal, even if it describes Mesopotamian events only. It just doesn't work.
Problems with your statements:
--You don't have adequate proof of human existence 40,000 (that's why they call it a theory).
--You failed to make a connection between this and Adam and Eve (or anything else in Genesis).
--You failed to show that humans 40,000 couldn't know or write or use oral tradition to record their own history for us
--You misquoted me (I say the first humans appeared 8000 years ago, the Bible says 6000)
The reason why I don't make sense to you is because you're laboring under so many false assumptions. You have no clarity of thought, therefore you have no clarity of expression.
Andrew wrote:Do you really honestly think that Genesis was written 40,000 years ago, or that its authors knew the events of 40,000 years ago? I don't think so. Note that you make the same assumptions in some of your posts.
This is not what I would call an intellectual response.
Normally, what you would do is make reference to some kind of evidence that your claim is reasonable. You can't duck the subject by attempting to stretch time 34,000 years beyond what the Bible claims. That's known as a strawman argument.
40,000 minus 34,000 equals 6,000. I did not misquote you. If you cannot see the connection between the appearance of human beings and Adam and Eve, then you must be suffering from memory loss, since you saw the connection in the post I just quoted:
"You can't [...] stretch time 34,000 years beyond what the Bible claims."
There you go. You think the Bible claims that humans have only been around for 6,000 years. The Bible says the first humans were Adam and Eve. Humans have been around for much, much longer than 6,000 or 8,000 years, whichever you want to stick with, so Adam and Eve, as I shall call them out of convenience, came long before human memory. Thus, the Genesis story cannot be literal.
