The Creation and Feeding of Ravens
by Jack Hoehn, March 11, 2015: So no more speculation and hypothesizing. Let’s do a little nature study in the Bible.
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Look at the birds of the air;
they do not sow or reap or store away in barns,
and yet your heavenly Father feeds them.
Matthew 6:26
Consider the ravens:
They do not sow or reap, they have no storeroom or barn;
yet God feeds them.
And how much more valuable you are than birds!
Luke 12:24
Who provides food for the raven
when its young cry out to God and wander about for lack of food?
Job 38:41
The eye that mocks a father and scorns to obey a mother
will be picked out by the ravens of the valley
and eaten by the vultures.
Proverbs 30:17
Your carcasses will be food to all birds of the sky
and to the beasts of the earth,
and there will be no one to frighten them away.
The LORD will smite you with the boils of Egypt
and with tumors
and with the scab and with the itch,
from which you cannot be healed.…
Deuteronomy 28:26,27.
What is the price of two sparrows–one copper coin?
But not a single sparrow
can fall to the ground
without your Father knowing it.
Matthew 10:29.
I know every bird in the mountains,
and the insects in the fields are mine.
Psalm 50:11
PREDATORS
Supporting creation, my North Pacific Union GLEANER features, for 2015, 52+ pictures of The Wonders of God’s Creation.[1] 15 of those pictures are of wonderfully designed and created predators, animals created to prey on other animals. We admire the fox, cougar, bear, eagle, heron, coyote, and owl and admit that they are not clumsy or deformed vegetarians struggling to make do with an animal diet because nothing else plant-based is available to them.
The owl has feathers intelligently designed precisely to let it fly slowly and silently across fields in stealth not to capture mushrooms, but rodents. And the design is not only for slow, but also for silent, with special features on the leading edge that muffle sounds. Stealth bombers from the Creator’s workshop. The fox and bobcat and cougar are designed to kill and eat. Only the bear could do pretty well as an omnivore and thrive on a plant based diet, and even that would be hard without catching fish.
RAVENS
And then there are the Ravens, Corvus corax or its close relatives. The Biblical Hebrew is some places oreb “black” and hayit “screecher” but the Greek corax suggests “sate, glut, feed full, to tear, ravage, or pluck” showing its function as eating dead things, a flying garbage collector. I pity the prophet of God (the one translated to Heaven without seeing death) who was fed by these carrion collectors.[2] Now we are not to eat ravens[3], but they are clearly intelligently designed to eat our carcasses and other dead flesh.[4]
God feeds the ravens.[5] And knows when the hawk catches the sparrow. “Then the young lions roar for their prey, stalking the food provided by God.” Psalm 104:21.
How can these predators and carrion feeders be Wonders of Creation? Aren’t they wonders of the Fall? Why are there so many intelligently designed fangs and stings and teeth and talons? Did they all suddenly evolve minutes after Eve ate the forbidden fruit? There were ravens on Noah’s ark, friendly ones that would do Noah’s search and rescue operations for him, flying back and forth until the ground was dry enough for him to stay away after seven weeks of flying (enjoying, no doubt, a lot of flood-induced carrion).
CREATED BEFORE THE FALL?
If God did create ravens and owls and vultures and other intelligently designed predators on Day 5 of His Creation Week, does that not tell us something about death before the fall of man?
Ellen White once spoke on why God created pigs.
“ As for pork, I never have anything to do with it because God tells me not to touch it, and He knows best. It is a scavenger. Its only use is to gather up filth. God does not want us to become scavengers to the scavengers.”[6]
If the pig’s “only use” is to gather up filth, to be a scavenger, and God created pigs on His sixth Creation Day before mankind’s fall, what was the pig doing before the fall?
If nothing died on earth before Adam’s sin, what were pigs for? If there was no Great Controversy going on between light and darkness, between Christ and Satan, between love and hate, between good and evil, during the creation, who created intelligently designed things to control overpopulation, to destroy vermin, to scavenge the carnage of battles creation Day after creation Day?
CREATION AS CONTROVERSY
As you know, if you have read my article in the print edition of the most recent edition of Adventist Today,[7] I believe that understanding the Great Controversy between Christ and Satan as preexisting the creation of earth, and continuing during each great Creation Day, then I can understand why God in mercy created garbage collectors like ravens and pigs. Why in love, to prevent Satan-inspired overpopulation of rodents and vermin, he would create Intelligently Designed owls as stealth bombers.
Why cougars and lions and tigers were needed to deal with the sick or wounded and prevent overpopulation by herbivores. And why nature was subjected to bondage to the fight going on in this universe between good and evil.
THEATRE OF THE UNIVERSE
When I was a teen, a series of programs and a book were published as “EARTH THEATRE OF THE UNIVERSE.” I think the idea was right on. That now on this earth other created intelligences can watch and see what Satan’s principles and what God’s principles look like when allowed freedom to work themselves out. Although at the time that book was published, I thought it started as Adam and Eve left the gates of Eden. But the evidence in the natural world suggests that this Great Controversy has been going on since Day One of God’s Creation Week. Darkness and Light have been on demonstration.
In that light I can accept that Intelligently Designed carnivores and scavengers such as lions and ravens were created by God to demonstrate the difference between life and death, between murder and love, between living by predation and living with cooperation, in this laboratory of Good and Evil called earth.
Satan was here on earth from Day One of Creation. I am sure he has been working things with his own super-intelligence to support his suggestion that by the genes acting selfishly, life will succeed. God has either set up the experiments to elegantly test that supposition, or permitted Satan some manipulative freedoms to make his points. I don’t see God creating viruses or plagues or cancers. They all clearly are satanic manipulations of bacteria and cells. But I can understand how God in mercy might create pigs to clean up the filth, ravens and jackals to remove the corpses, and owls to control plagues of rodent vermin. Scavengers and predators can be Intelligently Designed creations made in wisdom and mercy and love for dealing with the results of a cosmic Great Controversy being played out on this earth. When Queen Esther went before her king, she didn’t ask him to stop the attacks on the Jews; she asked him for permission for the Jews to defend themselves. Likewise, when Satan launches an attack on God’s passive and plant-eating creatures, some of them may have to fight back with tooth and claw. The thorns are there to protect the rose. The dog must bite to protect his owner from the wolf.
NEW DAY DAWNING
God knows when the sparrows fall, but He does not yet stop it. He is waiting for something. Perhaps He is waiting for someone like you or your great-grandchildren? Perhaps there are principalities and powers we do not know who are yet to be won. Perhaps God is truly, as some of our theologians suggest, open about the future and working with us, until we decide enough is enough and agree to bring the battle to its end. He has granted us great freedom, and determining the end may be in our hands by His design.
Perhaps He waits for us to ordain women! I don’t know, and neither do you. But until then, in mercy, dead sparrows and doves and nuthatches disappear because of intelligently designed scavengers and predators, as they have on each Creation Day that started in darkness, but ended in light, and each earth day since then.
We have no reason to not keep expecting the dawning from our present age of darkness to the New Day when predators will be de-clawed and scavengers will be given better food to eat. If lions will thrive on straw, who knows if owls couldn’t learn to silently, slowly search for mushrooms or wild strawberries?
And if ravens flying to and fro looking for carcasses from Noah’s flood might not learn in a New Heaven and a New Earth that nuts, grapes, lychees, and rambutans taste better than eyeballs?
[Readers who don’t have a copy of the Winter 2015 Adventist Today print magazine, with Dr. Hoehn’s article and many others in it, can order a copy from Adventist Today, P.O. Box 1135, Sandy, OR 97055-1135 as long as supplies last. Or phone an order to (503) 826-8600 to start your subscription to this important independent publication supporting and encouraging progressive Seventh-day Adventist thought and practice. $29.50 per year in the USA; less for multiple-year subscriptions.]
COMMENTS: are welcome and will be read, but may be shortened, deleted, or edited by the author to keep them on topic and constructive.
FOOTNOTES:
[1] https://gleanernow.com/gallery/2015/images-creation-2015
[2] 1 Kings 17:4-6, Elijah.
[3] Clean and Unclean birds, Deuteronomy 14:11-17.
[4] Psalm 79:2, Jeremiah 16:4 and many more verses.
[5] Job 38:41
[6] E.G. White, Sermons and Talks, Volume 1, page 13.
[7] Jack Hoehn, “The Greater Controversy—How Ellen White’s Insights May Help Coordinate Geologic and Biblical History,” Adventist Today, Winter 2015, pages 14-21.
I’m almost sure that the pictures of the ravens feeding the prophet in Uncle Arthur’s Bible stories were bringing him peanut butter sandwiches.
Ironically, those ravens must have fed Elija with some meat stolen from King Ahab’s lunch. God must have brought to Elijah the best food available in that time of famine. But months before taking him to heaven, God taught Elijah that a few vegetarian food is sufficient, and even better.
Very good Jack. Death before the fall is a greatest difficulty.
There are certainly hints that there was death before the Fall, as you rightly point out, of God having the battle the chaos by dividing the day from the light, the water from the land etc. Other examples come to mind include:
– Eden was God’s solution but Adam’s expulsion into the wilderness suggests outside of the garden there was already death.
– The tree of life brought immortality. But that was only in one very localised spot. Outside the Garden where there was no tree there was presumably no immortality.
– God asked Adam to “subdue” the earth and the animals in it. But why do that if everything was perfect? What was the work in the Garden, if not to extend its reach against the encroaching wilderness?
Perhaps Adam wasn’t the original cause of the original fall because that was Satan. Rather, Adam was the solution to Lucifer, but Adam failed. Jesus had to then come as the Second Adam.
I think Christians instinctively oppose evolution for a good reason. They oppose it because the Divine Image, which is us, is devoted to battling the corruption of Lucifer. This is after all why we were originally created. Thus, we oppose Darwinism on scientific grounds whereas in truth we should be opposing Darwinism on theological and philosophical grounds.
There is nothing in the Bible to even suggest that suffering and death for sentient creatures existed before the Fall. To the contrary. The Bible says that such did not exist before the Fall of mankind. After the “creation week” we are told that God described all that He had just made in this world as “good” and “very good”. No one would describe any world in which sentient animals suffer in the most horrible ways “good” – certainly not a good God. The Bible doesn’t claim that God only created the garden oasis on an otherwise pre-existing planet with living things that Satan already controlled. That’s not what it says at all. The Bible claims that God created the entire planet from a formless state that was entirely empty of life or the ability to support life. And, when He finished creating the entire world with all the living things that it sustained, He claimed that it was “very good”.
So, let’s not pretend here that we can harmonize the Darwinian notion of billions of years of suffering and death for sentient creatures with the claims of the Bible. There’s simply no way. There simply is no harmony here.
Maybe that’s the answer to where Cain found his wife, when he ran away from his home. There must have been other people and civilizations on the earth before Adam and Eve and their beautiful Garden were created.
Jack,
You wrote: “I pity the prophet of God… who was fed by these carrion collectors.” I definitely had not considered the story with the reality about the Raven that you provided. One thing I’m looking forward to seeing in God’s new creation is the real purpose for which predators were created. I’m sure it is going to be amazing to see and learn about.
Bravo for an attempt to unite science and Biblical theology.
They can be united, but I don’t think this is the way.
But let’s begin with the obvious. In connection with its function as POLEMIC against the Enuma Elish, the text begins very precisely with an adverbial clause, not a prepositional phrase.
We know the correct rendering is correct for three reasons I will give below. The text reads
When Elohim began to create the sky and the land (NOT “earth”!), the land/ground/country was TOHU WE VOHU.”
Now “tohu” and “vohu” are synonyms, and the use of multiple synonyms in a single place is intensification in Semitic. The few places these words are used should suffice to show their meaning. not “FORMLESS AND VOID” WHICH IS LITERALLY IMPOSSIBLE FOR ANY MATERIAL OBJECT, LARGE OR SMALL!
TOHU: “A ruined waste, utter barrenness or emptiness, ANY PLACE EXHIBITING CHAOS” as in the Wilderness of Judea, habitable only to wild creatures and demons. Also, of previously ruined cities, also a wasteland. Dt 32:10, 1 Sa 12:21, Jb 6:18, 12:24, 26:7, Ps 107:40, and VERY significantly Is 24:10, 29:21, 34:11, 40:17,23, 41:29, 44:9, 45:10,19, 49:4, 59:4, Jr 4:23.
VOHU: “Anything empty, void, waste” Note especially Isaiah (again!) 34:11 where the two terms are used exactly as in Gen 1:2, and Jr 4:23 where again we see them used exactly as in Gen 1:2.
Thus: “WHEN ELOHIM BEGAN TO CREATE THE LAND AND THE SKY, THE LAND WAS IN UTTER CHAOS.”
How do we know this was the correct reading:
1. The ancient Hyper-conservative Masoretes, beginning in the 4th century AD “pointed” the text, or inserted vowels. The first word was a challenge: was it a prepositional phrase “In the beginning” OR an adverbial clause: “When Elohim began to create…”
They opted for the adverbial because
1. It was the traditional rendering, and that is what they set out to preserve. (It correctly answered the opening line of the Enuma Elish.)
2. The KJV traditional rendering results in horrible theology. In the beginning, we are told in that rendition, God created the land and the sky. The result was UTTER CHAOS. IT IS AS IF THE MASTER OF THE UNIVERSE MADE A HUGE BLUNDER ON HIS INITIAL ATTEMPT AND HAD TO COME BACK AND FIX THE LITERAL MESS HE HAD MADE.
Of course, the Masoretes would have nothing to do with such an abusrd and fallacious theology.
3. The verbal construction we find in the KJV and its many children is gramattically impossible in correct Hebrew. And the First Creation Story is hyper-correct Hebrew. It is a simple matter to reverse overwrite Genesis 1:1,2 from English back into Hebrew, and what you get is to independent clauses with two separate verbal forms which are NOT the ones in the text. Textual criticism also says that the wording as it stands is the correct reading.
CONTINUED TO BRIEF SUMMARY
TWO independent clauses. (I really do know the difference between two and to, too.)
(None of this is new. It has been known for centuries.)
Summary: the First Creation Story says that at the time God created the human race and ITS ASSOCIATED ANIMALS that the pre-existing earth was in utter chaos. This is step one in uniting sound Creation Theology to sound science about the earth before mankind.
And by “mankind” we mean that form of homo erectus that we reading this are part of. This reading does not imply that Elohim did not make the land. Only that it was in utter chaos when he made man and associated animals.
PPS — And by pre-existing “earth” we cannot read “planet earth” as moderns do automatically, I would be centuries before the ancient tripartite cosmos was related to the vastly different concept of “planet” which is why we must note that “eretz” means “land/ground” wherever and whenever it isused.
Step 2: The SECOND Creation Story (Gen 2:4 ff) also presumes the kind of life/death/life cycle in nature that we are familiar with. And that cycle was BEFORE sin entered.
Adam and Eve (here actual individuals, not just male and female) are in the Garden “in the eden” and are told their duty is “to labor in/til” it. And further, “to watch over/supervise” it.
That would certainly include pruning and while no weeds were present, it would involve culling and many other things that the Hebrew readers of the Second Creation Story would be very familiar with.
But there is much more before we can speak adequately to the prehistory of geological earth in the perspective of the developing Great Controversy. While the approach that the massive death (five major die-offs and a vicious “cycle of the fittest” cannot be ignored!) was an assumption in advance that man would sin, this novel approach is not, I believe, the one supplied by Scripture.
Again, no one is concerned with non-sentient death. In other words, it’s quite obvious that the death of a carrot isn’t the same thing as the death of a sparrow or a cat or a dog or any other sentient creatures that can consciously suffer. According to the Bible such suffering and death did not exist in the universe until the Fall of mankind. No one, not even God, would call such a world “good”. The Bible’s description of a God who takes note and feels pain when even a humble sparrow falls wounded to the ground is a far far more attractive picture of God than the one suggested by the article above…
Why did God include plants in his curses? Now, thorns and thistles. Were there thorns and thistles before the curse?
God was simply describing the natural course of decay that would result over time… which includes the devolution this world toward predatory and parasitic plants and animals over relatively short periods of time. And, in the New Testament, Jesus also includes the concept that Satan was active in the deliberate creation of some of these features as well – noting that, “An enemy has done this” (Matthew 13:28).
If God created the world with death before sin, is He going to recreate the New Earth in which He promises eternal life for humans, with death? Are the animals going to eat each other? Are humans going to eat meat? I don’t think so. I see a picture of animals living peacefully with children leading them. (Isaiah 11) The Bible promises no more death and sin. It says He will wipe away our tears. That tells me God cares for us. Why would He create a world with death before sin? I don’t think any of us desire to live in a world of sin, death and suffering.
I don’t think God created a world with death before sin. But you are considering only a small part of a large story.
And by the way, faulty analogy and faulty logic. What is going to happen in the new earth has no bearing on what did happen in the old earth. They are CONTRASTED not comparable.
God created a perfect world where sin and death were possible, but not guaranteed. In the new earth, He will restore His perfect model in a recreated world where sin and death are still possible, but because of the experience here, will not happen again.
Animals that were created not to eat each other began to do so only after sin and perhaps they adapted to the task. All animals of different shapes and sizes were created for God’s pleasure, and ours. Some animals became carnivorous after sin and God designated them to control the populations and cleanup the environment. But there will be no carnivorous creatures in the new earth. The lamb will lie down with the sheep… etc.
As for a world outside of Eden where death was occurring before Adam and Eve sinned (because only inside the garden did they have access to the tree of life), God does not need a tree to give eternal life to any creature. The tree of life is a symbol–it is not a magic tree and its fruit is not a magic potion.
I do not know how long after leaving Eden people began to kill each other and animals began to eat each other. We do not know how long it was before Cain killed Abel. But with people living hundreds of years and a slow decay of life, I believe it was also a slow decay of morality culminating with God deciding to destroy it with a flood. There was no dual system inside Eden and outside of Eden.
Oops, the lamb will lie down with the lion
“The lamb will lie down with the lion” but the lamb won’t get much sleep.
God did not create demons; He created good angels only. God did not create predating animals. They must have adapted to new conditions. If species of the same genus or family are divided (some being omnivorous and some carnivorous), why could not have adapted some genera to the predating lifestyle? Wild species (wolf, dingo) are often predators. But their domestic relatives are omnivorous. Compare the wild cat with the domestic cat. Domestic cats today have forgotten to prey on mice. It is better to suspend our speculative reason, where information is not sufficient.
Did God create dinosaurs who were carnivores? From where did they originate?
Since “God did not created predators” where did carnivourus animals come from as their digestive system is made exclusively for flesh foods?
Why are two plant eating animals, cows and horses, not both “clean”?
Domestic cat food usually contains meat. They still love to catch mice; and when offered raw meat, the become ravenous.
We don’t have all the answers and for those that are not, too many assumptions are made without evidence.
Both the Bible and Ellen White are pretty clear that there was no death before the Fall for sentient creatures. Of course there was “death” for plants, or at least parts of plants, and other non-sentient creatures. No one cares if I eat a carrot or if I fry a billion bacteria over a Bunsen burner. However, everyone cares, even God, when a sentient creature suffers – even one as seemingly insignificant as a sparrow.
Also, consider that the reason that lions are carnivores doesn’t have to be because they were designed to be carnivores. After all, carnivores require a less complex digestive system compared to herbivores. In other words, carnivores are degenerative from their original ideal state.
But what about those long sharp teeth? Did they evolve? Mendelial variation allows for a great deal of variety of size and shape of teeth and many other morphologic features based on the pre-created genetic potential of the original parental gene pool. Also, novel low-level functions, such as antibiotic resistance or the evolution of the relatively small single-protein enzymes within various forms of venom can be realized very quickly in a population that experiences positive selection pressure along these lines.
In short, there simply is no reason to doubt the claims of the Bible that there was no death for sentient life before the Fall of mankind – anywhere in the universe.
For more info on the potential and limits of evolutionary change, to include the origin of carnivores and parasites, see my website at: http://www.DetectingDesign.com
Where is there evidence that carnivores were ever herbivores?
There’s lots of evidence that herbivores will become carnivores if their food supply is suddenly limited and all that is available is the option of eating meat to survive. This has been documented by real time observations…
Where did the Bible say this exactly. Please be very specific.
And note what Genesis 1:1 actually says.
And are you then one who thinks dinosaurs and men lived together on this planet?
I absolutely believe that any creatures that have ever existed on this planet have existed in the presence of man since before the week of creation, there was nothing and all of the creatures were created on the same day. If there were dinosaurs, they existed after that day and man has existed on this planet every day since that day.
Yes, that is the common fundamentalist belief. Are you suggesting God created dinosaurs?
Dear JM,
To answer your question regarding the existence of dinosaurs simultaneously with men, I am inserting a section of my upcoming book, a commentary on Revelation from the creation stand point. In this case, Revelation 12:
“Were dinosaurs in Noah’s ark? When we speak of the ark, we usually think of adult animals being housed for over a year. I have thought about nine reasons why the animals in the ark were young and small, opening the possibility that dinosaurs were in the ark too:
1. The Bible uses the word nests in the description of the ark, indicating that the creatures taken by Noah were young.
2. They would need less food
3. They would produce less waste
4. They would be less aggressive
5. They would need less space
6. They would be easier to handle
7. They would adapt better to the new environment
8. Noah and his family would have more free time (feeding and cleaning less) and more fun with the animals during the long stay in the ark.
9. Being young, the animals would have more reproductive years left to repopulate the planet.
The Bible does mention creatures that do not resemble any creature alive that we know of today. They are called leviathan and behemoth. In some passages, the translators used the word serpent.
The description of these creatures in the book of job indicates that they were terrible and inspired fear. That is why John is presented with the image of a dragon to represent Satan- complete with tail. The first one that Job mentions was the behemoth.
“Look at Behemoth, which I made along with you. It eats grass as cattle do. Look at the strength in its back muscles, the power in its stomach muscles. It makes its tail stiff like a cedar. The ligaments of its thighs are intertwined. Its bones are bronze tubes. They are like iron bars. Behemoth is the first of God’s conquests. Its maker approaches it with his sword….Though the river flows powerfully against it, it’s not alarmed. It’s confident even when the Jordan rushes against its mouth. Can anyone blind its eyes or pierce its nose with snares?” (Job 40:15-19,23,24 God’s Word).
Which animal could be as formidable as the behemoth? Certainly, it was not any known today, as some declare erroneously that it was a hippopotamus. I have never seen a hippo with a tale like a cedar. Then the book of Job mentions the leviathan:
“Can you pull Leviathan out of the water with a fishhook or tie its tongue down with a rope? Can you put a ring through its nose or pierce its jaw with a hook?… Can you fill its hide with harpoons or its head with fishing spears?… Certainly, any hope of defeating it is a false hope. Doesn’t the sight of it overwhelm you? No one is brave enough to provoke Leviathan. Then who can stand in front of me?…I will not be silent about Leviathan’s limbs, its strength, or its graceful form. Who can skin its hide? Who can approach it with a harness? Who can open its closed mouth? Its teeth are surrounded by terror. Its back has rows of scales…
that are tightly sealed. One is so close to the other that there is no space between them. Each is joined to the other. They are locked together and inseparable. When Leviathan sneezes, it gives out a flash of light. Its eyes are like the first rays of the dawn. Flames shoot from its mouth. Sparks of fire fly from it. Smoke comes from its nostrils like a boiling pot heated over brushwood. Its breath sets coals on fire, and a flame pours from its mouth. Strength resides in its neck, and power dances in front of it. … Its chest is solid like a rock, solid like a millstone. The mighty are afraid when Leviathan rises. Broken down, they draw back. A sword may strike it but not pierce it. Neither will a spear, lance, or dart. It considers iron to be like straw and bronze to be like rotten wood. An arrow won’t make it run away. Stones from a sling turn to dust against it. It considers clubs to be like stubble, and it laughs at a rattling javelin. Its underside is like sharp pieces of broken pottery. It stretches out like a threshing sledge on the mud. It makes the deep sea boil like a pot. It stirs up the ocean like a boiling kettle. It leaves a shining path behind it so that the sea appears to have silvery hair. Nothing on land can compare to it. It was made fearless” (Job 41:1-33 God’s Word). This is definitely not the description of a crocodile as some suppose. It was a ferocious creature, for sure now extinct that inspired terror and was indomitable.
Isaiah 27:1 calls this creature a serpent and a dragon just like this chapter of Revelation. “In that day the LORD with his sore and great and strong sword shall punish leviathan the piercing serpent, even leviathan that crooked serpent; and he shall slay the dragon that is in the sea.” So this was a deep sea creature that no man could conquer- unlike a crocodile or a hippopotamus, a creature that could breath fire and smoke, with practically impenetrable and indestructible skin and that only its maker could strike dead. Likewise, no man can fight Satan, who lives among the sea of people, on his own because there is no moral strength in us to fight him. The dragon is too strong for us and only the Lord can destroy him with His double edged Sword.
JM:
Not necessarily, but I don’t think God created every breed of dog, cat, cow, shark, etc. I believe that God created all of the species. Some specialized breeds (calico vs Siamese cats, Spaniels vs Shepard dogs, etc.) have been accomplished by man in control of the breeding. Maybe that is what God meant when He said to “subdue” the earth. I like what Martin has said in this discussion also.
Sean: “Both the Bible and Ellen White are pretty clear that there was no death before the Fall for sentient creatures.”
Where Sean is the text? You have an inference on God’s statement that creation was ‘good’ but not any text that I can see which says what you are claiming: that there was no sentient death before the fall of Adam.
Have you considered God needed to affirm the goodness of creation precisely because there was already death on planet earth, probably outside the garden in the wilderness Adam and Eve were later expelled into?
Let’s not mistake your interpretation of one particular text for what the Bible actually and categorically says or doesn’t say.
What text are you referring to that says that Adam and Eve were expelled into a wilderness outside the garden. Genesis 1 and 2 clearly state that God created a beautiful world with a special garden within it for the residence of Adam and Eve. All of the vegetation created on day 3 was worldwide, not just in the garden.
Yes God created the vegetation around the whole world. But He clearly didn’t create the entire world as a Garden. The Garden was one localised spot.
Why was there a special garden if the entire world was perfect? Where did the wilderness come from? Why did the Garden not become the wilderness – why did God need to expel Adam and Eve into the wilderness?
The Bible specifically describes lions eating straw like an ox in a ideal world (Isaiah 11:6-7 and 65:25). The Bible also describes God as taking notice when a little sparrow falls wounded to the ground (Matthew 10:29). It is quite clear that the Bible describes suffering and death for sentient creatures and an aberration that is outside of God’s will. Certainly such a God would not have described this world as “very good” at a point in time when such death and suffering existed here. And, nowhere in Genesis or anywhere else in the Bible is the world before the Fall described as being subject to suffering and death for any sentient creature… nowhere.
Beyond this, Ellen White says that Adam and Eve had never seen death or decay before the Fall. They’d never seen the death of any sentient creature. Consider in this light that the Garden was not walled off from the rest of the world. Adam and Eve were free to leave it and come back to it at will before the Fall… as were the animals. Yet, they’d never seen death or suffering or even decay before their rebellion…
Sean, given the existence of other dining options and also his demonstrated ability to fast for up to 40 days, why did Jesus eat fish? Why did he help fishermen catch fish, and why did he cook fish for them? Was Jesus unaware of the ideal vegetarian world that you say is clearly taught by scripture?
For some people, occasional flesh food is OK–it’s a personal decision. Jesus also ate lamb–as did every Jew at Passover. But I do not believe flesh food was a regular item in His diet.
Jesus lived in a world that was already Fallen. Such would not have been the case in world before the Fall where the death of sentient creatures did not exist.
What evidence, scientific or biblical supports that death did not exist before sin? Is there a definite time from creating man until he was cast out of the garden? If it was one season, there would have been plant and animal death.
If the supposition that it everything in Creation to man’s expulsion happened in one week, wouldn’t that indicate that the first day following the seventh, man was expelled from Eden? How can that time be known?
The “gan” was most definitely walled off from the rest of the world. You simply illustrate the dangers of reading into the text what it does not say and not knowing the background of such gardens in todays Middle East as well as the Ancient Near East.
The garden was an oasis from which water flowed. you can see in the wilderness areas of the east (and the ruins from the Ancient Near East prove this also) walled areas where the rich had their gardens, usually perfectly square and with towers at the corners symbolizing mountains. In fact, the Taj Mahal is an intended copy of the garden in paradise, and such installations are still all over the East.
Outside the walls is the chaos that Gen 1:1 clearly describes.
Now let’s look at the actual words of Gen 2:4 and following the Second Creation story. Folks love to point out that many very real differences between the two stories, but when read in the narrative form typical of the ancient world, the minor (chronological) differences most disappear.
There are other huge differences that I don’t want to go into here.
Before we actually do a mini-exegesis, let’s be sure that we are NOT TALKING ABOUT A PLANET. You have unconsciously done what is the most common mistake in reading the Bible: you have read your modern concepts into the ancient material.
If God had told the ancients that their tripartite cosmos wasn’t real, that in fact the ground they walked on was an iron ball with some water and sod on it, and that is “hung” on nothing, and that people walked on all sides of it, and yes, the folks on the other side have their feet facing your feet, and no, no one falls off — that would have been the end of the message of Scripture.
The plan of salvation would have been lost in the rage over such ridiculous ideas. GOD GAVE THE BIBLE WHERE PEOPLE WERE ACTUALLY AT, AND SPOKE THEIR LANGUAGE TO REACH THEM.
Now, on to Genesis and the Second Creation Story.
In Gen 2:4 and following we have the creation as Yahweh Elohim (always a person and never distant) did, as distinct from the first story, which pictures “Elohim” commanding things into existence.
Gen 2:4-7 are an OVERVIEW, a simple statement of everything that is about to be described. The text (typical of much ancient writing) moves from the general to the specific.
You need to know that “man” in the First Creation Story is simply “mankind” but as we move through the second story, the play on words becomes very important to the meaning! There is:
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“adam” (mankind) and “adam” (the first man, a particular person) and
“adamah” (the red clay of the ground from which man is fashioned) and
the actual fashioning (yatsar, the verb, is what a a potter does when he fashions pots on his wheel, and in fact the noun for “potter” is yotser, directly related on the same root).
In looking at this we will soon see that certain assumptions that have been made are not in the text. Most of all we need to guard against using the word “earth” which is NOT in the text and which to moderns INVARIABLY MEANS “PLANET EARTH” WHICH IS ABSOLUTELY NOT IN THE TEXT.
2:7 “SO YAHWEH ELOHIM FORMED/FASHIONED [THE WORD FOR THE WORK OF A POTTER] MAN [ADAM] FROM THE FINE ADAMAH [THE CLAY TO WHICH WATER IS ADDED TO MAKE POTTERY] AND BREATHED INTO HIS NOSTRILS THE BREATH OF LIFE, AND MAN [ADAM, HUMAN BEING] BECAME A LIVING SOUL.”
2:8 “YAHWEH ELOHIM PLANTED A GARDEN [A WALLED GARDEN TYPICAL OF THE ANCIENT NEAR EAST IS WHAT IS MEAN BY “GAN” AND WE LATER DISCOVER IT HAS A GATE AND CHERUBIM ARE PLACED THERE SO THAT MAN MAY NOT ENTER. NO, YOU COULDN’T JUST WALK IN FROM ANY OTHER SPOT: SEE 3:24] IN THE EDEN [UPLANT PLATEAU; THE AUTHOR TELLS US EXACTLY WHERE THIS WAS BY HIS USE OF THIS SUMERIAN WORD] TOWARD THE EAST [FROM HERE, THE COVENANT LAND], AND THERE HE PUT THE MAN [ADAM] WHOM HE FASHIONED/FORMED [AS A POTTER]”
2:9 “AND OUT OF THE ADAMAH [GROUND/FINE RED CLAY] YAHWEH ELOHIM CAUSED EVERY TREE PLEASANT TO SEE AND GOOD FOR FOOD TO SPROUT/SPRING UP, THE TREE OF LIFE ALSO IN THE MIDDLE OF THE GARDEN, AND THE TREE OF THE KNOWLEDGE [PERSONAL BODILY EXPERIENCE] OF GOOD AND EVIL [HENDIADYS, MEANING “EVERYTHING FROM GOOD TO EVIL AND ALL THAT IS IN BETWEEN].”
In verse 10-14 the author tells us that the Garden once stood in the mountains (hence the four corner towers symbolizing mountains in these ancient gardens) where the headwaters of the four rivers were.
He tells us that he knows and we can know, FOR HE DOES NOT BELIEVE THE FLOOD CHANGED THE SURFACE OF THE EARTH. And, in fact, the four rivers all arise from a very small area within a few miles of each other to this day, and one of them still yields gold.
We can go on to deseribe the tripartite universe and how it is reflected in the Bible if necessary. And, it is proves worthwhile, point to the site of the Eden which still exists but alas! has no paradise garden! (We…
PS — This is only a limited part of the story. We have considered the implications of Gen 1:1 as it actually reads above. We have not yet considered the Great Controversy implications involved in what the fossil record shows. There is much yet to be said.
In any case, please understand that I believe both creation stories as written (and how they complement but do not contradict each other) and have not yet said how I think these things came about from a great controversy viewpoint.
But I also think that some of the answers fundamentalist have given only make matters worse.
This is a classic case of a person coming to Scripture with a predetermined belief and finding enough supposed evidence to support what they want to believe. It seems to be very popular today to discard the Word of God for the pressure of the satanic deception of evolution. Yet I am appalled that so many Adventists cannot acknowledge how intense the pressure is on scientists everywhere to conform to the ‘theology’ of godless evolution.
Even while religion is moving quickly to apologize for believing that God is big enough to create a world in six days and embrace the faulty and unfounded views of so-called scientists who themselves refuse to acknowledge blatant evidence that demolished their pet theories, those who choose to believe in a God bigger than humans are scorned as ignorant and uneducated. Frankly I am glad I was not brainwashed with such false education for it destroys the very faith that is meant to save us from the degrading lies of Satan.
The chaos referred to in Genesis one does not imply chaos from repeated cycles of death and life. The creation story is accurate and plain but at the same time refers metaphorically to the chaos in the minds of all intelligent beings throughout the universe resulting from the insinuations against God from the recent attack of slander against His government by the fallen Lucifer.
I postulate (I have a right to do so just as much as anyone sporting long titles after their name) that Lucifer and his followers may well have argued in favor of evolution before this world was even created/organized by God as described in Genesis. And being the kind of God He is, Lucifer may have been given this raw material of a planet to play with all he wanted to prove his theory, but the result was chaos instead of the evolution of life as he now convinces so many of today. When Satan had messed around with no success for as long as it took to make such a mess (not unlike the prophets of Baal on Mt. Carmel), then God comes along to the big mess – both physically and spiritually – and brings light out of darkness (both physical and spiritual), beauty and order out of chaos and life out of nothingness (not death).
But Satan wants religious people today to compromise with his agents who hate God and find comfort in the irrational claims of evolution (not to be confused with legitimate science) to erode the trust of as many people as possible to doubt in both the goodness of God and the power of God.
Truth will be vindicated in the end and all who want to force God into their little boxes of unbelief will be ashamed when the silliness of their arguments as seen as small and filled with unbelief. God is far bigger and smarter and most of all more life-giving than to create a world filled with cycles of life and death. And yes, all the predators have adapted to the conditions they find themselves in revealing that God created the originals with a huge capacity for all eventualities.
A couple more thoughts. As for those extra long teeth on the animals we assume were designed for tearing the flesh of other animals to kill them? It has been observed that those very teeth are ideally designed for puncturing large melons and other large items that are impossible to open with other kinds of teeth. Our presumptions about carnivores based on the shape of their teeth is faulty logic. The reason the predators act the way they do is not proof that God wanted them to participate in killing but is proof that God designed a vast array of possibilities in their genes and DNA so that they could adapt (not evolve) in ways that are amazing. Yes, they were designed for the potential of sin and death, but they were not designed for sin and death. To infer that is to impugn God as a participant in Satan’s schemes and would make God double-minded just as Satan accuses Him of being.
We should be seeking to improve God’s damaged reputation as the life-giver instead of looking for ways to undermine it even further. Why are Adventists of all people ashamed of the true gospel, the truth about God that could liberate us from the fears brought on by the lies of Satan about God being duplicitous? It is time for the true glory of God to come out in the deepening darkness of speculations and human so-called wisdom.
I agree with you FP. Gorillas have some of the largest canines and have a vegan diet.
Why haven’t we seen such rapid evolution or devolution is in e we started keeping really good records 3000 years ago or so. You all claim there was massive devolution in what a few hundred or maybe a thousand years? But where is the actual evidence?
Richard Lawson: “What text are you referring to that says that Adam and Eve were expelled into a wilderness outside the garden. Genesis 1 and 2 clearly state that God created a beautiful world with a special garden within it for the residence of Adam and Eve. All of the vegetation created on day 3 was worldwide, not just in the garden.”
Yes God created the vegetation around the whole world. But He clearly didn’t create the entire world as a Garden. The Garden was one localised spot.
Why was there a special garden if the entire world was perfect? Where did the wilderness come from? Why did the Garden not become the wilderness – why did God need to expel Adam and Eve into the wilderness?
Hello Stephen. When God created the world, He dedicated the Garden to be the place where He would meet Adam and Eve. We see Him visiting them in chapter 3 of Genesis. When He asked Moses to build a sanctuary, He instructed that it would be a place for Him to dwell among His people. That Garden was a representation of His Sanctuary where the first couple could be in His presence and worship Him. That is why it was set apart, or sanctified, if you will, from the rest of the creation.
When was the sanctuary created? Was it the day the first brick or cloth was woven, or the day it was finished, anointed and inaugurated?
Stephen:
Everyone needs a home to live in. Jesus told the disciples that He would go and prepare a place for them (us). The garden was the special home for Adam and Eve. God did not create them and just send them out into the world and tell them to make a home under a bush someplace. But the garden was not a parallel world or a pure place within a corrupt world. The entire world was created perfect.
How do you know?
did the wilderness preexist adam’s fall yes or no? If no, then how did it suddenly appear straight after the fall? If yes then why straight after the fall, when expelled into it, the bible suggests it is of a fundamentally different quality than the garden, because now Adam has to foil its soil – to fight it to eat?
Why did God make mankind to subdue the world? Again that sounds like fighting words to me. How did other animals have immortality without a tree of life?
Your whole argument against death before the fall rests on God affirming creation as good. But that is a potentially false link and unfounded assumption. Yaweh might be affirming the goodness of creation precisely because of the great controversy struggle against chaos as explained in the first six days of creation.
I feel that this is a circuitous discussion, but…
1. You are the one that says Adam was expelled into a wilderness so I do not have to explain how such wilderness became into existence. I do not believe he was expelled into an inferior environment other than that God had cursed the ground (Gen. 3:17).
2. Subdue does not need to mean fighting. It can simply refer to control through training and guidance.
3. I have stated previously above that I do not believe God needs a tree of life to give eternal life to any creature. The tree is not a magic device and its fruit is not a magic potion.
I don’t know why you are so obsessed with death when everything in the Bible is to lead us to life and the God who does have immortality.
On March 14 at 9:14 am above I answered all of these arguments in detail. You should have read it.
Either you chose not to read what the Bible actually says, or you are reading English as your tenth language and simple terms are too difficult for you?
Please note what the Second Creation Story says, and what the background to these words meant in the Ancient Near East.
Again, the rule is WHAT DID THIS MEAN TO THE AUTHOR AND ORIGINAL AUDIENCE, not what opinion do YOU have of the meaning, especially derived from a translation into a world very different from theirs.
Also, I have commented repeatedly on the actual wording of Genesis 1:1 in this thread and others. Perhaps you should have read that also.
For reasons that I have already given, the traditional “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth, and the earth was without form, and void” is not what the Hebrew says.
How can a material thing be without form? Or void?
On the other hand, if you will read what I wrote, we know exactly what tohu meant. And what vohu meant. And what a hendiadys, the couopling of the two meant.
And we know why the extremely conservative Masoretes did not read the opening word as a prepositional phrase, but rather (correctly) as an adverbial clause, thsu:
“WHEN GOD BEGAN TO CREATE THE SKY/STARDOME/RAQIA AND THE GROUND/LAND, THE LAND WAS TOHU WE VOHU.”
Which means, literally, as resort to other languages and the use of these words everywhere in Scripture:
“WHEN GOD BEGAN TO CREATE THE SKY/STARDOME/RAQIA AND THE GROUND/LAND, THE GROUND/LAND WAS IN UTTER CHAOS.”
Our current mistranslation breeds all sorts of mischief. One is that if you open your English translation (made so fundamentalists will buy it) and read the first verse, it says that in the beginning Elohim created the sky and ground, and they were in chaos.
That would be horrible theology. It is as if the Infinite God took a stab at creating, and the result was chaos. Then he had to come back and fix the mess He had made in seven later days.
Nope.
Controversy:
1. a prolonged public dispute, debate, or contention; disputation concerning a matter of opinion. 2. contention, strife, or argument.
The “Controversy between Christ and Satan”? Where does that glossy description come from? The violence, horrors and all kinds of wickedness which the evil perform is considered a mere “Controversy”?
The Great Controversy is a theme that has been adopted by Adventism to explain its purpose and mission to the world. This term is never used in the Bible but was used by the publishers as EGW’s magnum opus explaining the unique G.C. message to the world.
Of course, Elaine, the CONCEPT runs all through Scripture. The words may not. After all, the Jehovah’s Witnesses (NOT) argue against the clearly-stated deity of Christ by saying that the word “trinity” is never used in Scripture either.
Which is, of course, an irrelevant argument.
Using Dictionary.com is a good way to get an abbreviated answer. You should have gone much further. Their abbreviated answer, which you relied on, is insufficient.
Sean, above you mention “There is nothing in the Bible to even suggest that suffering and death for sentient creatures existed before the Fall.” By “sentient” creatures so you mean Mammals?
OF COURSE THERE IS NOTHING. The Bible was written for us, but not to us. Do you understand that simple concept?
The peoples of the Ancient Near East had no knowledge of the problems of modern geology and the geological column. The usual fundy answer that the flood changed the face of the earth and is the reason that simple deep-ocean forms are found at the top of the Himalayas.
NOT the upthrust of the earth when the subcontinent of India struck Asia eons ago.
(I do not believe in the evolutionary theory as Darwin and his successors teach it, so don’t get in a tizzy.)
The author of the Second Creation Story does NOT believe the surface of the earth was changed at all. He knows EXACTLY where the Garden in “the eden” (a Sumerian word for upland plateau) was and still was in his day. AND STILL IS THERE INOUR DAY.
The headwaters of the four rivers that flowed from Eden all arise within fifty miles of each other. The river so designated still yields gold. See Gen 2:10-14 for his extended comment on this point.
While the Spirit had no need to confuse ancient man with the details they could neither understand nor accept, that is quite different from our modern situation.
That is, there are some exceedingly important spiritual issues that were of NO interest in the Ancient Near East and are never touched in the Bible. THAT DOES NOT MEAN THAT THESE THINGS DID NOT EXIST. Funny that it is only the folks who have to confront the facts by virtue of their profession that seem to understand the crisis this issue has caused.
While fundamentalists go on their merry way, describing that which the Bible definitely does NOT say. You cannot get the age of the earth by adding the numbers in Genesis 5 and 11. (The number sets are different in the Masoretic tradition from the Palestinian textual tradition, and both of them are different from the Egyptian textual tradition.)
And in any case, even if all three major rescensional textual families had the same numbers, that is not how ancient genealogies worked. Lineal genealogies only went down a usual seven or ten generations and then skiped to the final seven or ten genertions.
Since “ben” or “son” also means “descendant” in Hebrew and cognate Semitic languages, it was perfectly possible to skip twenty or third generations and say Number 53 was the son of Number 11. Number 11 was so and so years old when he begat Number 53. (In all cases, the descendant was “in the loins” of the ancestor, and in begetting a child that would lead to the descendant, he was “begetting” that descendant.
In the tripartite universe, the ancients thought that earthquakes were caused when Leviathan stirred up “the waters that are under the earth.” Many more examples could be given of why the ancients had no knowledge of our geology
Darrel, “sentient” usually means “self aware” and “capable of thought” on some level.
The issue raised by the article is whether the geological column suggests that life-forms existed on earth before the creation of man. And if so, why there would be death before there was sin. Since death is the result of sin you can see why that would be a huge issue.
The article gives one answer. The fundamentalist answer would be “Oh, but there were no life forms before man, and man and dinosaurs, etc, were simply contemporary.”
Suffice it so say most geologists, including those who identify themselves as Christians or even SDAdventist Christians don’t believe that the evidence says that.
I believe there is another answer to this conundrum. But more must be said first.
Yes, I am thinking of the Hebrew NEPHESH creatures.
animals that manifest the soulish attributes of mind, will, and emotion
Anyone have opportunity to read John Walton’s book, The Lost World of Adam and Eve?
I’m about half way through. It is a deep and broad review of the subject that includes both Old and New Testament writing as well as a look at the writings on origins at the time the author of Genesis was believed to be living.
In any event, as you and I read Genesis it seems clear that Adam and Eve were created mortal, rather than immortal. Or why would they need the Tree of Life to not die.
Adam and Eve were not created originally immortal, only to be recreated as mortal after the fall. They were simply separated from the Tree of Life, and their natural mortality took its natural course.
Until Modernity, there was no interest in material origins, because there was consensus that God made it all and no one was really interested in how that happened. What they were interested in was what role did God play in their lives and the cosmos.
So when the question that had never been asked was asked, How did the material universe actually come into being?, the answer they found in the Bible was for quite another question.
And we are living with that mistake. And in so living mistakenly believe that special revelation is incongruous with natural revelation.
I haven’t finished Walton’s book, so I am only imagining that he will agree.
It is heartening to see hope that God is not playing tricks on his creation by making natural revelation look impossibly incongruous with special revelation; indeed is not testing his creatures with the measure being whether we will stay true to the Bible at the expense of what we can see and touch.
Indeed, the issue may not be the assumed difference between special revelation and natural revelation, but the issue simply may be our assistance on a misreading of the bible. Obviously(?) God saw no need to answer a Modern question in the Old Testament, perhaps assuming that natural revelation will be sufficient on its own.
Bill:
The Bible clearly states that Adam and Eve, as well as all creatures in heaven and in earth, were created mortal (1 Cor. 15:53-54). Only God has immortality (1 Tim. 6:15-16). But the tree of life is a symbol. To live forever, we need to remain connected to the source of life; God Himself. Adam and Eve died because they severed their connection to the life giver, and we will live forever in a new earth only because we are reconnected to Him.
Water containing all matter was created first. Dividing the waters from the waters was the forming of the heavens/space (Gen.1:6-8). The water with all the matter which was separated from the waters above the heavens/space is the portion which was used to form the earth (Gen.1:9,10). It was that portion of water and matter which had no form as yet which is referred to as being “without form and void” (Gen.1:2). If the words “without form and void” is meant to mean chaos, then what God was creating from the plans within His Mind was not in order and perfect but confusion. That is not the God I know. My God is of a sound and perfect Mind where peace dwells. We need to look at ourselves to see if we are united with God’s Spirit which brings soundness and peace of mind before we arrive at pre-conceived and corrupt ideas about Him.
Why doesgen 1:28 say mankind was to “subdue” the earth. This was God’s original plan before the fall of humanity but after the fall of lucifer.
The Hebrew word kabash doesn’t seem to mean care as some have suggested. strings says it means rather means to force, to violate, to dominate or to tread down.
The other times the word is used it is used in connection with war, such as the children of Israel expelling the Canaanites from the promised land. See num 32:22, 29; jos 18:1 and 2 Sam 8:11.
So again why this subduing vocation for humanity before adam’s fall?
http://www.blueletterbible.org/lang/Lexicon/Lexicon.cfm?strongs=H3533&t=KJV
Moreover to the issue of “subdue” some ask for evidence that the wilderness Adam was expelled into per existed the fall. Well gen 2:5 suggests just that. And note again an allusion to mankinds original vocation to do battle against this wilderness. Gen 2:5 also says the world was barren because there was no one yet to soil the soil. What a curios statement!
And note it is amongst this barren landscape this garden is made in gen 2:7. The trees only seem to come forth in the garden, not the outside world, as explained in gen 2:8-14.
It all points again to the idea that the world was not perfect before adam’s fall but already somehow affected by lucifer’s original sin. Adam was created precisely to fix this problem but failed in that vocation. That is why Jesus had to be the second Adam.
That sort of idea also fits with science, which rom 1 and 2 says is a source of divine knowledge, a lesser light. If two biblical interpretations are possible why would one not take the one that matches science?