Mr. "Holding,"

I asked you a question in the "Coach's Quarters--JP vs. Till" section about your view of Genesis. The "Coach's Quarters" is not really the appropriate area for my question so I am asking my question here, but in a more direct forumulation: Do you believe that Genesis is literally true? If you say yes, then would you be kind enough to say when you believe the Adam and Eve incident and the Flood of Noah took place?

I am not asking you these questions because I want to waste time "debating" with you about your religious opinions. My interest is in seeing 1) if you are capable of providing direct answers to fairly straight-forward questions and 2) if you are actually a literal-Genesis, young earth creationist as it appears that you are.

Thank you in advance for providing answers to my questions.

Billy

Jimbo, since JP does not usually frequent this area, I am not even sure he is aware that this thread exists. Have you emailed or PMd him?

My answer to #1 is yes. My answer to #2 is, I don't know and I don't care. My creationist friends say 4-6K. I don't have the knowledge to say yea or nay.

Wow, that was a long thread, Jimbo. What will you do now?

Wow, I feel someone is being rude here. Which which is which i wonder?

Maybe everyone.

why do i suddenly want to throw a kameamea wave?

Potassium is good

I prefer eating my Vegeta-bles.

Ya'll asked for it.

special...special...special...beam....beam....cannon...CANNON! POW!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I think Ryokan has announced his lord of geekdom status. All hail lord Ryokan :dunce:

I prefer to think of myself as a dark lord. But thank you. Its not an easy job.

Mr. "Holding,"

Thank you for your answers. Very interesting. I will have more to say later but for now I have to go.

All the best,

Vim

02-27-2003 @ 06:43 AM
jpholding:

My answer to #1 is yes. My answer to #2 is, I don't know and I don't care. My creationist friends say 4-6K. I don't have the knowledge to say yea or nay.

What specific pieces of information do you feel you lack, in order to "have the knowledge" to make a statement?

Mr. "Holding,"

Jimbo:

"Do you believe that Genesis is literally true? If you say yes, then would you be kind enough to say when you believe the Adam and Eve incident and the Flood of Noah took place?"


"Holding":

"My answer to #1 is yes. My answer to #2 is, I don't know and I don't care."

I stated before that I am not interested in debating your religious opinions. However, I am interested in undertanding your interpretation of Genesis and learning what you base your interpretation of Genesis on. So now that you have stated that you are a Genesis literalist, I have a few more questions I hope you would be kind enough to entertain:

How did you determine that Genesis is an accurate portrayal of history?

Have you tested the claims found in Genesis against any recent research about cosmology, geology, astronomy and biology?

Was there some other process that you went through before determining that Genesis is literally true?

Are you aware that modern science does not support Genesis as an accurate portrayal of history?

What do you think about this? Do you suspect that scientists- including liberal Christian scientists-are engaged in some sort of evil conspiracy against conservative Christians such as yourself?

You say that you do not know and do not care when the events in Genesis transpired. Let me ask you another question, then. As a Christian apologist who is presumably very familar with the Bible, are you aware that the Gospels provide a genealogy for Jesus that goes back to Noah and Adam? Do you think this genealogy is a true genealogy or a fake genealogy?

I appreciate your answers to my questions. Of course you are free to ask me questions in return, but my main interest here is in understanding how you integrate a literal interpretation of Genesis with modern knowledge that appears to be overwhelmingly against such an interpretation.

Later,

Gilbert

03-02-2003 @ 04:11 AM
jimbo:

Mr. "Holding,"



I stated before that I am not interested in debating your religious opinions. However, I am interested in undertanding your interpretation of Genesis and learning what you base your interpretation of Genesis on. So now that you have stated that you are a Genesis literalist, I have a few more questions I hope you would be kind enough to entertain:

How did you determine that Genesis is an accurate portrayal of history?

As in an accurate portrayal of History do you mean in the ANE or in your Modern 21st century ethnocentric view? I cannot speak for JP but I believe that it was History to the ones who wrote it.

Have you tested the claims found in Genesis against any recent research about cosmology, geology, astronomy and biology?

Yes, I know what you want out of Genesis you wanted God telling Moses that E=MC2 and all about the Big Bang, Black Holes, etc, etc etc. This is a question that really makes no sense to it's Historical Context.

Was there some other process that you went through before determining that Genesis is literally true?

JP can answer that!

Are you aware that modern science does not support Genesis as an accurate portrayal of history?

See above, it is ridicoulous that God would set there and tell a guy who lived in the Ancient Near East before the advent of the Modern era about science in the way we think of it.

[quoteWhat do you think about this? Do you suspect that scientists- including liberal Christian scientists-are engaged in some sort of evil conspiracy against conservative Christians such as yourself?

hmmm.. I don't think many of us read Hovinid on this site. :Spam:

You say that you do not know and do not care when the events in Genesis transpired. Let me ask you another question, then. As a Christian apologist who is presumably very familar with the Bible, are you aware that the Gospels provide a genealogy for Jesus that goes back to Noah and Adam? Do you think this genealogy is a true genealogy or a fake genealogy?

It is a true Geneology, I personally hold to the position that Francis Schaeffer coined which is "No Final Conflict" which states that when all the evidence is in there will be no conflict between Genesis and Science.

I appreciate your answers to my questions. Of course you are free to ask me questions in return, but my main interest here is in understanding how you integrate a literal interpretation of Genesis with modern knowledge that appears to be overwhelmingly against such an interpretation.

What goes overwhelmingly against the interpretation? The Modern Naturalistic bias? The same bias that cannot explain the empty tomb? :confused: All evidence is interpreted in light of someones bias, it is which bias makes the most since of the evidence.

Thanks for the inquisitive questions. I am sure JP will be able to answer them better than I can. I hold the same position as him I do not know enough about science and I have a hard time taking someone's word for it. It is an area I plan on investigating someday though




Later,

Gilbert [/quote]:rockon:

By His Grace, For His Glory,
Blake

Jimbo:

The reason Holding doesn't answer questions like this is manyfold:

1. His expertise rests mainly on gauging the validity of WRITTEN history, not history gleaned from observations (or the theory on what the observations are supposed to mean, in an endless tautological circle, etc.) of natural phenomena. The closer to the present day the written records of events rests, the more confident one can be of its validity.

2. JP Holding, as well as many other conservative Christians with something to say on creationism, have a fundamentally different set of assumptions, the greatest of which is that there's nothing from preventing God from interacting with the universe at any time period in its existence. Can science, which deals with observable, repeatable phenomena, have a heck of a lot to say on specific events of that type? If it uses the same hedged-around-with-innumerable-qualifications method that reputable scientific journals use, not much.

3. Priorities, priorities, priorities. New methodologies for reading scientific data are discovered every year. New interpretations of classic theories come around every decade. Revolutions in scientific thought come around every century. Given the fact that these shake-ups take up gobs of time and research to hash out the new knowledge and processes gained from them, is it any wonder that apologists for Christianity are going to focus on the history and life of Christ Himself, whose documents and data thereof are readily and widely available, and unlikely to be contradicted by a new theory of historical scholarship (save the type of unthinking popular revisionism whose methods would draw exactly the same criticisms that YOU would make of YECs, and moreso?)

4. Would you choose a naturalistic philosophy that required you to accept all charges of the miraculous, no matter how probable, with unbelief, or would you accept a philosophy that allowed naturalism to 'work' while at the same time allowing for the possibility of interaction in the natural environment from outside the universe? I myself prefer the widest explanatory net.

In essence, it seems to me that you've read Holding's work on Christianity, and found it intellectually convincing. However, in order to avoid a personal decision on that issue, you've decided to push the evolution gambit, which requires a different set of assumptions to accept. However, he, as well as I, have absolutely no trouble with leaving that issue up in the air while dealing with more recent events. After all, accepting Jesus Christ as a personal savior is a decision which has immediate relevance to one's daily life, while accepting the naturalist view of ancient history has practically none. He'd rather expend his mental energy on more tractable topics with immediate possibilities toward improving the state(fitness?) of humanity.