BobRyan said:
I have no idea what this link is supposed to illustrate apart from a number of arguments I have raised that you have ignored, baseless slurs you have made against some of my sources, and a number of accusations you have made against me that you have still not substantiated.
Actually I have consistently argued that NOAH was not "preaching Darwinism" in Exodus 20:8-11.
I presume this is a typo as I was unaware that Noah cropped up in these verses at all. I for one have never asserted that Noah or anyone else in the OT was 'preaching Darwinism.'
I have consistently argue that even you give NO SOURCE AT ALL exegeting Ex 20:8-11 such that it bends and wrenches the term for DAY in the text between EACH USE OF it -- as "darwinism NEEDS".
The theory of evolution has no need of biblical authority to validate it. Your continued attempt to use the OT as a battering ram against evolutionary theory is pointless and futile.
[quote:6af39]
I have pointed to biblical scholars whose conclusions about the length of creation week days predate the formulation of evolutionary theory and argued that their conclusions
Oddly enough not ONE of them exeget "And EVENING AND MORNING where the xth-day" or even "and Evening and Morning where AN x-th day"...
The most you got was to get a source to address THREE WORDS -- not even an entire sentence!!
Hardly "convincing" due diligence from darwinists who are still whining that I quote ENTIRE PARAGRAPHS from Patterson verbatim and yet darwinists whine about that as though "not enough context to understand Patterson". YET you can not even manage a complete SENTENCE from Gen 1 NOR ANY source at all dealing with Ex 20L8-11 exegeting it in a way bent-and-wrenched to your needs.[/quote:6af39]
I have no needs hanging on Exodus 20:8-11; the needs seem to be entirely your own. And the worth of my sources is not dependent upon your assessment of them. You have pooh-poohed or ignored any source I have referenced that reaches different conclusions from your own about the meaning that may be derived from OT text or the subjective value of exegesis in deriving those conclusions. What is your worth as a critic? What is your worth as a biblical scholar? Why are you the infallible authority I should turn to on questions of interpretation? As far as I can see, like me, you're just some faceless nonentity posting opinion on an internet forum.
[quote:6af39]L.K
As I have explained why I believe exegesis does not lead to incontrovertibly objective conclusions, exegeting Exodus 20:8-11 becomes a pointless exercise.
If you have a MORE OBJECTIVE way to RENDER the text -- do it... finally.[/quote:6af39]
Do you not understand my opinion about this? I have tried to explain it many times. Here we go again. Exegesis presumes objectivity, it does not guarantee it. The act of writing text and the act of interpreting text are both necessarily subjective, even if just unconsciously so. There is no necessarily 'more objective way to render the text' because it is not possible to render the text so objectively that the certainty that can be drawn from that text is definitive. That you dismiss other examples of understanding derived by other biblical scholars who do not appear to agree with you and that you dismiss other biblical scholars' doubts concerning exegesis equally readily does not persuade me of the strength of your position.
[quote:6af39]L.K. said
..... You assume that exegesis provides a value-free tool for determining absolute meaning; I have explained fully and with reasons why I believe this is not so.
Blindly attacking exegesis while applying NOTHing more objective in it's place is not helping your argument they way you appear to imagine to yourself.[/quote:6af39]
I have not attacked exegesis blindly and to continually accuse me of doing so either suggests you have not paid sufficient attention to what I have written or that you prefer to hand-wave it away. I have given ample support for my argument that exegesis has been criticized by biblical scholars, that different religions and different denominations within those religions have disagreed on the conclusions and meaning they derive from exegesis, and that many biblical scholars who have no Darwinist axe to grind do not understand the days referred to in the Genesis creation myth to be actual, literal 24-hour hour days as we know them today. If you have a problem with this, I suggest you take it up with those scholars directly - those of them who still living, that is - as my only interest is in showing that uncertainty exists.
[quote:6af39]Bob -
Did you even show one of your "sources" condemning Exegesis?
L.K
Not necessary. I only showed that those biblical scholars to whom I referred come to differing conclusions about the length of the creation week days from you.
Then once again you missed the point entirely.
I never argue that there is no way EISEGETE whatever you want into the text -- you keep providing example after example of that... we all see it.
I argue that EXEGESIS (i.e. paying attention to ALL inconvenient details IN the text) only yields the reliable objective answer.[/quote:6af39]
It seems to me that your argument can be reduced to the claim that any exegesis that results in a conclusion different from your own is ipso facto eisegesis. This is a circular argument with no intellectual worth. You have no support beyond the text for the conclusions you draw from biblical text; your disparaging of others' conclusions drawn from biblical text is that they do not agree with your own conclusions. How does anyone decide between you? You're all like any other snake-oil salesman claiming to have a panacea for all ills.
All you do in response to that obvious point is -- attack exegesis while offering nothing more objective in its place.
There is nothing more objective, neither is exegesis sufficiently objective to deliver certainty.
[quote:6af39]L.K
You also assume that I think your exegesis of Exodus 20 is absolutely wrong; I do not, I only believe that it is not persuasive and that other understandings of biblical text can be derived by biblical scholars whose knowledge and learning is at least the equal of yours
If you argue that my exegesis of Ex 20:8-11 is RIGHt -- then you might want to elaborate on that point.[/quote:6af39]
The corollary of my conceding that your exegesis may not be absolutely wrong is not that it is therefore right. It is that it may be right, but it may also still be wrong as well.
Bob said -
.... you need to SHOW even ONE scholar actually DEALING WITH Ex 20:8-11 (so far you do not) and SHOWING that they use something OtHER than "eisegesis" to bend it to the usages of Darwinism AS IF Moses meant to REFEFINE YOM mid sentence each time Darwinism NEEDS it.
i.e. just the glaringly obvious point -- remaining.
And can you show one scholar agreeing with you?
Bob, you may be right and you may be wrong in your conclusions from Exodus 20:8-11; the point is I have no way of being certain that your conclusions are definitive.
What I can be certain of is that other biblical scholars seem to hold the opinion that the days of the Genesis creation myth are not actual, literal 24-hour days as we know them. This alone is sufficient to undermine your argument that exegesis of Exodus 20:8-11 all by itself in some way proves that they were actual, literal 24-hour days as we know them. This has nothing to do with validating or invalidating the theory of evolution, which stands apart from biblical text and is supported or otherwise entirely by observed, measured and tested evidence. If a consequence of evolutionary theory (and much other science) is that a belief that Earth and Universe are less than 10k years old based on an idosyncratic interpretation of OT verse is invalidated, that is a problem for your own 'deny-all' approach rather than for Darwinism.
IF you have something better USE IT to render the text of Ex 20:8-11 otherwise stop rabbit-trailing and simply show that you are able to use exegesis to render the text accurately.
Not possible as we have no means of measuring accuracy in this case; all we have is more or less subjective opinion. What is
your definition of 'accurately'?
[quote:6af39]L.K
I make no usage of Exodus 2; I only contest your certainty about it.
I find it interesting that you never give a source dealing with Ex 20:8-11.[/quote:6af39]
And I find it interesting that you ignore the crux of my argument. You have already shown a propensity to dismiss any opinion that disagrees with your own for no better reason than that it does disagree with your own. At least I acknowledge that you may be right in the conclusions you draw; you, on the other hand, don't even acknowledge the possibility of uncertainty about your conclusions. Why is that?
[quote:6af39]L.K
You were supposed to notice the arguments I am making that address the reasons why I believe your certainty about the objective meaning that can be derived from exegesis....
Ok I see this is a reference to your arguments about why Christians should stop using exegesis because what -- you found NOTHING BETTER (as in fact you have shown nothing to be the "alternative" objective method).[/quote:6af39]
Something better might be to look for evidence beyond the text to support the conclusions you draw from the text. Text is subjectively written and subjectively understood. Consider the awful possibility that you may be a little bit wrong and other biblical scholars who you dismiss so readily may be a little bit right.
[quote:6af39]L.K
1. Why should I quote Exodus 20? Do you think I disagree that the words on the page exist?
2. If by 'deal with what it says' you mean 'agree with my interpretation of what it says', I have given you ample reasons for why I am unhappy with the certainty of your interpretation.
I.e not a SINGLE one of your OWN sources addressing Ex 20 and exegeting it to your favor -- yeah that is "some solution" for it.[/quote:6af39]
Again you assume there is a side that I favour. Let me say again that, if I have a problem with the objective certainty offered by exegesis, what would we gain if I proffered a different supposedly objective certainty to counter yours? No doubt just an argument about whose objective certainty was the least subjective.
[quote:6af39]L.K
3. This is irrelevant rhetoric. Exodus 20 is not evidence against evolutionary theory; it carries no scientific evidential weight whatsoever.
Now we are getting somewhere.
Why then do you dig your heels in on the text that you claim is corrupt? Is this just one long rabbit trail for you?[/quote:6af39]
Again you accuse me of claiming something I have not claimed. I do not claim the text is corrupt, in the sense that the words exist on the page as you have quoted them. As you are aware, all I contest is your certainty about the conclusions they allow you to draw.
My argument has been that the text of scripture is not compatible with Darwinism -- my first exhibit is Ex 20:8-11.
So far your "solution" is to "avoid it at all costs".
The text has no evidential weight because the conclusions you draw from the text are neither testable nor falsifiable. Whether you consider it to be compatible with Darwinism or not is irrelevant both to the validity of evolutionary theory and to the validity of anything other than a YECist interpretation of Christianity. Your determination that the text is incompatible with evolutionary theory is based on your subjective understanding, based on the YECist baggage you appear to bring with you, of what the text means and the implications this has for the days referred in the Genesis creation myth.
Not a good answer even for atheists -- better as an atheist or agnostic to just say "yep it does not agree with Darwinism" and be done with it rather than continually "pretend" that "see darwinism under the covers in Ex 20".
I do not 'see [D]arwinism under the covers in Ex 20'. I see nothing in Exodus 20 particularly that either confirms or condemns evolutionary theory. This is a strawman argument you have created for me entirely of your own making.
[quote:6af39]5. The references I have given you and the arguments I have made have been directed towards supporting the conclusion that Exodus 20 provides no objective certainty as to its relevance to the actual length of the days of creation week.
that is pure bunk. Ex 20 CLEARLY identifies timeline for BOTH the days of Genesis 1 AND the days of the nation of Israel at Sinai "SIX DAYS YOU SHALL LABOR and do all your work... FOR IN SIX DAYS the LORD MADE..."
Impossible to miss. You keep "pretending" that we can not see what is staring us all in the face in that text.[/quote:6af39][/quote]
Except that you have provided no convincing evidence that either the 'days' referred to can in each case only have been intended by the writer to always mean actual, literal 24-hour days as we know them. All you have claimed is that exegesis alone provides this certainty, to which I say, I can't see how you can be so sure that it does and this is why.
And even if you were to establish such an understanding beyond all reasonable doubt, all you would have established is that this is what the writer himself believed. In other words, yet another subjective judgement.
You cannot even establish that the seven days of the Genesis creation myth were not simply conveniently constructed by priests to provide doctrinal concordance with an already existing seven-day week in everyday use amongst the people to whom they were preaching.
The simple truth is that at this stage you do not know what the truth may be - and neither do I.
