Tons of good stuff here about how to interpret Genesis from an Orthodox perspective. Both it’s relationship to modern science, how to interpret it in light of the Gospels (and the Gospels in light of Genesis), amusing anecdotes about the figures, and one hell of a good recommendation for a book. Interview is with Fr. Pat Reardon, who is one of the best speakers I know of within the Orthodox Church. A must-listen for evangelicals especially who deal with issues like this. It’s kinda long, and if you’re just interested in the perspective on evolution and the flood, that part is kinda short, and kinda in the middle somewhere. But the whole interview is entertaining and fascinating, or at least I thought so!
I was unable to get that audio;
Either it’s not there and I’m retarded,
Or I’m too retarded to find it but it’s there.
Here we go:
If the 6 / 7 days of creation are literal,
Carbon dating is somehow a fuckup,
Or God used really old stuff really fast, but then there’s the fossils and natural earth formations which take a certain amount of time to form, etc. For example stagletites in caves take this and this amount of time to naturally form.
God has a time-machine?
6 / 7 days of creation are non-literal:
Universe didn’t just pop up in a few days.
Ok, animals and humanity:
God gradually created them? Not in a few literal days, at least. Maybe taking adam’s rib was not literal either, or adam made of dust; and instead it meant taking things from the environment and from other entities/bodies, mixing them into something new, so that’s why we’ve got recessive genes, and why some kind of damned alligator tooth gene is inside of birds which did not evolve.
So, either God was doing the mad-doctor thing where he mutates one into another, engineering and fiddleing, with no shortage of failures mind-you [many people and animals alike are born with birth-defect, and biology is in many ways lacking or stupidly designed…] Either way, mankind, animals, trees and all of that are not perfect. So we’ve got a bit of a perfection problem already. And there’s the problem of genetics for genesis, ever since microscopy.
The Flood isn’t a problem.
Floods happen all the time. So we can be really sneaky and underhanded, and indirect and relative and sophisticated about all of that.
Theism and religion was not, WAS NOT made up by nutters.
We’re just personally not smart enough to interpret the arcane texts perfectly right or apply them properly. They’re perfect but we’re not. We’re the dummies, and the bible writers are not the dummies. We’ll have to twist and turn, and maybe even think, research, study, learn, etc. before we can find the truth in this, or add truth to it, or find truth somewhere else then say it was the property of the religion all-along.
Where’s that truth now?
I’ll need ucci to teach me it, because I think he has heard the tons of good stuff, and remembers it. Flood is not an issue, and the days of creation aren’t literal, so my only problem is genes, fossils, etc. What’s up with recessive/dormant genes which relate to an interspecies sort of issue?
Worth the listen if you’re interested in more moderate interpretations of the early biblical narrative. I found especially interesting the references to non-biblical accounts of the flood, as well as Egyptian and Babylonian stories that are similar to Joseph’s.
He mentions that he sees the bible as a historical text, and uses Mesopotamian and Greek flood stories to show that. But what does that say about the creation story? He still seems attached to its inerrancy; even when he calls it poetic, and explains that the ‘days’ cannot be understood, he still enumerates the days’ events, and seems firm about their order. Did I understand that right? Or was the the listing of the days events to show that it must be interpreted symbolically?
Yeah, I think you basically have it. Orthodox Christians see the Bible as being literally true, in the context of how it’s always been understood. So it’s not that the Bible is literally true and the world is 6,000 years old. And it’s not that the Bible is wrong and the creation story is just a dumb little story. It’s that what he was saying about not being able to see those first few days as actual days, is consistent with the tradition of understanding the Bible that’s been around ever since there was a Bible, and reading it in the context of that understanding is what makes it true.
Like, imagine if I told you, “Dude, I totally beat the shit out of that guy.” And you know what I mean, and it’s true, I did. Supposing that people 500 years from now read that sentence, and they are unable to understand it apart from a literal reference to defecation. They would say it’s not literally true, but it IS literally true when accompanied by YOUR understanding of what I meant, which has hopefully been handed down alongside the actual words.
And yeah, I find it interesting that you get moderate views like this, from denomination (GReek Orthodox in this case) with which the word ‘moderate’ would usually not be associated.