Genesis 1: YOM as 24 hour days or periods of time

[Michelle (Michelle Ols)]

@thoughtful

That absolute got me frustrated.

I am sorry I made you frustrated, Valerie. That was not my intention. I do appreciate your participation on this forum and your thoughtful comments.

@thoughtful

If you interpret Genesis 1 and 2 to be mostly metaphorical or figurative, I don’t see how you don’t come to the conclusion that God did NOT want His people to know the actual process until science explained it to us in our age. That’s part of why I think that interpretation is not one that holds up as the only interpretation. Sure Genesis 1 can be figurative of building a temple, but that’s not all it is for me and for most Christians throughout history.

Its likely I’m misunderstanding what you are saying here, but I do not see how it is even possible for God to explain the actual process of creation in such a short text. It has taken me decades of studying science to have even a very basic, minimal understanding of what might have had to have happened during creation. I very much looking forward to learning what actually happened when we get to heaven.

There is also the possibility (curious if anyone else would agree this idea), that perhaps the order of creation described in Genesis 1 is different than what modern day science says for a reason: perhaps so that we now in modern times do not misread the text as being a science description and thereby miss some bigger point being made within the text. The temple theory (which you alluded to) is an interesting idea for what that bigger point could be. I’m not sure if I fully agree with this idea, but it is interesting to see how the Biblical text contrasts with other Ancient Near Eastern descriptions of creation, which assume that the world was haphazardly/mistakenly created by various gods at battle with each other. In contrast, the Biblical text states that a single God, the only God, created the universe as a place for humanity to live, because He wanted to create us, because He loves us and wanted a relationship with us.

I do agree with you that there should be a historical Adam and Eve, so I do not think that the text is merely figurative/metaphorical. It is hard to make sense of the rest of the Bible referring to them as historical figures if they did not actually exist.

On other threads I also think that you have pointed to other theological challenges that arise as you move away from a literal, young earth, interpretation of Genesis. The theological challenge of death before the Fall is one that is more difficult to address. In my mind, having a historical Adam and Eve in an old earth model helps with that challenge, but I could see how that might still not be fully satisfactory to you.