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Post by Josh on Apr 10, 2016 19:59:46 GMT -8
Read John Walton's "The Lost World of Adam and Eve" recently, primarily because it had a whole chapter by N.T. Wright in it  . Here's an summation: Christianity Today Review. I'd say his take on the historical Adam and Eve is pretty similar to my current perspective, and that's the part I enjoyed the most. In a nutshell, Adam and Eve, not as the first biological humans, but as historical beings whose experience in the garden set the course for humanity. I think his argument that Genesis 1-2 is not about material origins but about God's assigning of roles to pre-existent matter he created surprisingly sound from an "ancient documents perspective", though I think I'd probably stress that the text in many cases might be talking about material and role- origins. |
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Post by gregory on Apr 11, 2016 14:14:02 GMT -8
I don't have access to the whole aritcle, but I have read Genisis in paralel with the Enuma Elish and other ancient middle eastern texts, and to me it seems like God was using the historical worldview of the time to describe aspects of God in relation to the surrounding cultures, rather than describe a literal "how the world was made". For example, creation did not involve killing anyone, God is lord over the sea, and although it is chaotic, it is not a god itself, God the sun and moon aren't Gods but natural objects, etc.
As for the Adam and Eve narritiave, there is not any paralell in the surrounding culture's cosmogonies, and given the strong paralells to the exile story, it is save to assume that the origional purpose was not to describe the creation of mankind and posit a "first sin moment", but rather to act as a commentary on exile, with the garden as the holy land, Judah-Isreal/Jew-Samaritan relations, but written in a way that can be applied to many situations, any that involve a break with oneness with God and/or an exile from your home, among other meanings. see Hosea 6, 1 Corinthians 15, Romans 5, Ephesians 5:29-33. That being said, many parts of the Bible do take both the alegorical and historical views as both valid.
Is the N.T Wright chapter pre 2000 or after? He has since viewed the Adam and Eve story as a non-historical pasage.
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Post by Josh on Apr 11, 2016 21:34:39 GMT -8
I don't have access to the whole aritcle, but I have read Genisis in paralel with the Enuma Elish and other ancient middle eastern texts, and to me it seems like God was using the historical worldview of the time to describe aspects of God in relation to the surrounding cultures, rather than describe a literal "how the world was made". For example, creation did not involve killing anyone, God is lord over the sea, and although it is chaotic, it is not a god itself, God the sun and moon aren't Gods but natural objects, etc. Indeed. Walton lays the parallels out nicely... and the points of departure. Besides general language and genre, one of the big parallels is the ancient focus on the "function" or "purpose" of things found in nature. Thus, God assigning function and purpose to already existent aspects of creation becomes the main focus on the days of Creation. There is discussion on the different nuances of the creation words (bara, asah, etc..) The Adam and Eve story does stand out as pretty unique in comparison to Mesopotamian and Egyptian mythology, but I do see some parallels with Greek origin stories (Pandora, Prometheus), which, though later than Mesopotamian are earlier than the Exile. Of course, much of this centers on when one dates the composition of the Pentateuch (or at least the Genesis portion). Personally, I tend to see it more like: the Exile-era compilers may have emphasized their own already extant tradition of Adam and Eve because they saw parallels of it in their current Exile experience. I think this is more demonstrably true of the slavery/ Exodus account, so there's already a precedent for not completely inventing older stories from "whole cloth" to parallel current experience. Walton's book is 2015, but the NT Wright chapter isn't focused on the historical Adam and Eve. However, I know Wright's Surprised by Scripture (2014) had a chapter on the historical Adam and Eve, and I don't recall him ruling out Adam and Eve as historical. I could be wrong. Another strength of Walton's book is that he deals with the Pauline treatment of Adam and Eve in a pretty satisfying way imo. |
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Post by Josh on Apr 11, 2016 21:43:52 GMT -8
oh, and the reason I'm not totally convinced that Genesis 1-2 doesn't touch a bit more specifically on material origins is simply how close the sequence of creation events matches what we know from science about the development of the early earth-- far closer than any contemporary creation account sequences (2nd century BC or 1st). Could be a hold over from my more "progressive creationist" days, but I still think there's something uncanny about it.
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. Here's an summation: Christianity Today Review. I'd say his take on the historical Adam and Eve is pretty similar to my current perspective, and that's the part I enjoyed the most. In a nutshell, Adam and Eve, not as the first biological humans, but as historical beings whose experience in the garden set the course for humanity. 
