Too speculative for me. What is possible is not what is probable. Detailed evidence would be needed
agreed in principle
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Rather than a defense from you, I’m much more curious if we will find out if there is a scholar wanting to make the case alongside you.
I suppose one major deficiency is that we do not have any of these original tablets to see, but we do have a record of manuscripts. It is an an argument from absence but I think the best the nonexperts like us can do is float the idea and see if any people with far more knowledge pick it up, or want to go deeper. If not, maybe they see a blocker we are missing.
Regardless, I’m not sure challenging @deuteroKJ to a debate on this is going to work out well. We need more of an education from him. I’m not sure we can meet him on equal ground.
@anon46279830 let’s keep exploring and see if and when a scholar can explain the blocker better, or take it up and move the ball forward. I have a feeling you might have better luck with a YEC scholar too. They are reading Scripture in a manner more similar to you. Have you reached out to any of them?
Thank you for acknowledging the agreement where we agree. On this site, where sometimes folks disagree as it would seem just for the purpose of being disagreeable that is a good place to start to improve the culture.
I would say if there was one people group in all of human history who could pull it off, its the Hebrews. Not that others could not. See this fascinating case of an oral tradition which seems to have been passed down for over 10,000 years among the Aborigines. What I am suggesting there is that perhaps there was an oral transmission of the early accounts and then when written language became a thing, the Hebrew language was built around putting accounts such as these into writing. By Abraham? Who knows? But the toledots and that format is consistent with tablets coming from that time and its odd that Abraham doesn’t have his own account among all those given.
I am just brain-storming here, as you did with me on our previous discussion of Genesis 1:26-27 looking for other possible explanations for why it was structured the way that it was. But it would explain the high regard in which the Hebrew text is held. And why it is so awesome with those word plays.
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Have you read Walton’s and Sandy’s Lost World of Scripture? It’s my favorite of the Lost World series. It opened my eyes to oral transmission and the concept authority in the ancient world. Unfortunately, there wasn’t a lot of critique, so I don’t know how accurate some of the info is. A lot of it was new to me.
I agree with you about the culture. It’s like the Four Views books. The critiques always focus on the points of contention, with not much room to show areas of agreement.
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@Ashwin_s one major advantage you have in India is that the Church there has not grown accustomed to political power. Facing real persecution has helped the Indian church understand that the details of how God creates is not an essential teaching. That is why not many people care about ID there, and why you can pursue your interests in this bloodlessly.
In the US we have been cursed with too much power, and this has become a very contentious detail of the debate.
Points of contention between cultures are EXACTLY where you expect wordplays to show up. That’s not speculative. I appreciate your conservative caution, @deuteroKJ , but am surprised that you don’t read it in my positions, too. I am simply plowing a bit of unfamiliar ground, for some. Have you, AT ALL, interacted with the weblinks I provided around the specifics of tablet theory? If not, you’re missing the entire warrant, practically, for what Mark and I are basically suggesting, though we differ in some major areas, still. Conservative caution around the unfamiliar is a good and safe starting point, but not a place to make a nest in, in a life-long quest for truth. Keep digging!
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Some, but not in great detail (though I’ve interacted with tablet theories in the past). It’s not a particular area of concern or interest for me right now. Maybe some day I’ll dig in. Thanks for the links.
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May I suggest it’s more cogent and more foundational than your (apparently, casual) attitude displays? Peace, and looking forward! The Tablet Theory and Hints from the Text of Scripture
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Be nice to the visiting scholars…
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That WAS nice, no matter how it may have sounded.
I have good respect for our “visiting scholar” (I hope you’re a regular, by now, Dr. Turner) and his efforts at giving us cogent questions to answer, feedback and advice…
I just feel obligated to return the favor, when called for!
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Let’s just say we have a different set of challenges as compared to the US. 
Being politically relevant is a blessing and a responsibility.
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I like that idea. Am I correct in saying that the Gap Theory as I understand would negate the need for evolutionary creation/macroevolution? All of your ideas look very interesting and thought provoking. I like that.
That seems to make the very ancient creation totally unrelated to ours.
Gap Theory would make Scripture entirely silent about the time before day 1.
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I have decided not to make this post. I have ask enough questions on this one. God bless you.
The bible indeed, as others said here, meant the listener/reader to understand actual days. In fact rubbing in morning/evening. As precise as could be.
Remember a day to god is not about the sun. On day one god said he was dividing the light from the darkness to created days. yet the sun/stars were created days later.
one might say our DAY is only a special case of a day.
To God light is the origin of the universe and time. To create DAYS he had to do something on DAY ONE.
Day one existed unrelated to our sun or other stars.
This sounds like a somewhat similar approach by Gerald L. Schroeder, The Science of God, in that, Gen 1 is a different perspective than Gen 2. That Gen 1 is told from the time perspective of the beginning in space. Gen 2 and after are told from Earth perspective. Has anybody heard of this? I’m wondering if other scientists think there is merit to Schroeder’s idea.
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Great to hear from you @TaylorS.
The telling in six ordinary days takes the Gen 1 days as ordinary days that refer to larger periods of time. So that is different then the proposal you point to:
I do not think this works. There are no mornings or evenings from space, and it is hard to imagine that the original writers understood what that might even be. I agree that Genesis 1 is a wider view, and evokes cosmological thinking in our mind. This might be that to which the six day telling refers, even though it is the telling that is described in Genesis 1 in ordinary language.
Remember that space and even the notion of a “globe” is outside their view. They did not know this was the structure of the world. I’m not saying they were geocentrist-earthers either. Even in a flat-earth model, there is no morning and evening from a cosmological view. They just do not appear to be describing a cosmological view of the earth.
Yes, I like the idea of the ‘telling.’ It makes sense and I think is worth exploring.
So, I think the idea is that God told this to Moses or whoever wrote it down. Schroeder’s claim is that the six days are a logarithm in the natural log describing the events from time as it would have appeared fro the beginning, looking forward. The time is different because of time dilation and some other factors (that I don’t really understand) like CBMR, gravity, velocity, etc. From that perspective, 15 billion years looks like 6- 24 hr days.
Maybe it sounds crazy to you. It certainly sounds crazy in my explanation. I’m guessing you have not heard of this or Schroeder. I just wondered if his theory has any merit among other scientists. His book was recommended by a professor of mine at SEBTS, but he is a Philosophy guy.
Thanks for entertaining my crazy questions!
Yes, I have.
That just turns out to be false. His math is wrong. I’d steer clear of that as a guide to science. There may be recoverable things in this exegesis. Keep in mind he is Jewish though, so he is not holding Paul in mind as he thinks through this.
Cool. That’s what I was wondering. Thanks!
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