Adam and Eve

[UsagiTsukino]

I often wonder with often we are finding pre-modern human skeletons. Where does this place, Adam and Eve?

[DBowling]

I often wonder with often we are finding pre-modern human skeletons. Where does this place, Adam and Eve?

Scripture places Adam and Eve in Neolithic Mesopotamia (Genesis 2-4) and Scriptural Genealogies (specifically the Septuagint numbers) also place Adam and Eve somewhere in the 5000 BC to 6000 BC range.
The Scriptural time and location for Adam and Eve (and their son Cain) are validated by Mesopotamian history and archaeology... For instance the city of Enoch/Uruk.

If we look at the Scriptural sequence of events in Genesis, God creates mankind in his image in Genesis 1:26-27.
Adam doesn't appear in the Genesis narrative until chapter 2 which sequentially takes place some undetermined amount of time after God created mankind in his image back in chapter 1.

So from a Scriptural perspective there is no issue with finding human or pre-human skeletons that date prior to the time of Adam and Eve (around 5000 BC - 6000 BC).

[UsagiTsukino]

I ask due to this article

https://www.inverse.com/article/60470-h ... ket-newtab

[DBowling]

I ask due to this article

https://www.inverse.com/article/60470-h ... ket-newtab

God could have created mankind in his image (Gen 1:26-27) 200,000 years ago in Africa per your article.
And then placed Adam and Even in the Garden of Eden (Mesopotamia) sometime later (5000-6000 BC) in Geneisis 2.

There is no Scriptural issue there.

[UsagiTsukino]

I often thought Adam and Eve were the first human beings. I guess the first human beings to make contact with God?

[DBowling]

I often thought Adam and Eve were the first human beings.

Tradition does make that claim...
But Scripture doesn't.

I guess the first human beings to make contact with God?

Precisely...
Adam and Eve were the first people to have relationship with God.

[UsagiTsukino]

So before Adam and Eve was there no sin?

[RickD]

So before Adam and Eve was there no sin?

There had to be sin before Adam and Eve sinned. How do we know? Logic tells us that Satan must have fallen before he tempted Eve. So, he must've sinned sometime before he tempted Eve.

[DBowling]

So before Adam and Eve was there no sin?

Rick is correct...
We don't know when, but Satan rebelled against God sometime prior to the time of Adam and Eve, because he was there in the Garden of Eden tempting Adam and Eve prior to the Fall.

However, sin did become part of the human condition when Adam and Eve sinned.
Romans 5:12 tells that sin entered the world of men (spread to all men) when Adam sinned.
Genesis 3:22 tells us that Adam and Eve did not "know good and evil" prior to the Fall.

[Kurieuo]

I often wonder with often we are finding pre-modern human skeletons. Where does this place, Adam and Eve?

Scripture places Adam and Eve in Neolithic Mesopotamia (Genesis 2-4) and Scriptural Genealogies (specifically the Septuagint numbers) also place Adam and Eve somewhere in the 5000 BC to 6000 BC range.
The Scriptural time and location for Adam and Eve (and their son Cain) are validated by Mesopotamian history and archaeology... For instance the city of Enoch/Uruk.

If we look at the Scriptural sequence of events in Genesis, God creates mankind in his image in Genesis 1:26-27.
Adam doesn't appear in the Genesis narrative until chapter 2 which sequentially takes place some undetermined amount of time after God created mankind in his image back in chapter 1.

So from a Scriptural perspective there is no issue with finding human or pre-human skeletons that date prior to the time of Adam and Eve (around 5000 BC - 6000 BC).

DB, what would be the number 1 book you'd recommend on recent human origins wrt Adam and Eve?

[DBowling]

DB, what would be the number 1 book you'd recommend on recent human origins wrt Adam and Eve?

These three books have had a significant impact on my understanding of the historical context of the Biblical Adam and Eve.

1. Christian HIstorical
Historical Genesis: from Adam to Abraham


2. Christian Theological
The Lost World of Adam and Eve: Genesis 2-3 and the Human Origins Debate


3. Secular Historical
Legend: The Genesis of Civilisation

[Philip]

Yes, Adam and Eve, the first persons to suffer the consequences of not paying closer attention to the stated Apple terms and conditions!

[Kurieuo]

You don't have a digital copy of the first do you?

With belief in pre-Adamic race, there's so much theology and doctrine involved outside of the beginning of Genesis. It requires an entire system of reading and understanding to be developed, something I'm not sure has been done, but then that could be my own ignorance. No doubt re-interpretations will be developed over the generations to come.

To be honest, it's not something I think is a possible viability. There are many doctrines that hang on all being in Adam and Eve. I understand the attractiveness, if Adam and Eve is restricted to the Neolithic period (which seems likely). What is the be made of the human activity beforehand, while Christians can bury their heads and claim ignorance.

So then, one is left at a crossroad. Accept Genesis is more human than many Christians would like, and more restricted to ANE people by who had limited understanding (or didn't care to mention others), and as such, isn't historically accurate -- or if we're generous isn't historically "complete". This really starts shedding the skin of the doctrine of inerrancy. The other path is that one starts re-interpreting Scripture to try and conform and try absorb this relatively new information re: humanity (just like RTB attempted to with Day-Age).

I feel I went down the path with RTB, and now certain beliefs are unstuck. I'm not about to do it again, and really perhaps too lazy (or busy with other things) to do so. Open to it, but at the end of the day, the writing feels on the wall. Perhaps this is where I tip my hat to information that seems too hard to fit at this point in time.

[DBowling]

So then, one is left at a crossroad. Accept Genesis is more human than many Christians would like, and more restricted to ANE people by who had limited understanding (or didn't care to mention others), and as such, isn't historically accurate -- or if we're generous isn't historically "complete". This really starts shedding the skin of the doctrine of inerrancy.

Let me push back on this a bit...

I don't think understanding the Scriptural historical context of the book of Genesis and Adam and Eve damages the doctrine of inerrancy at all.
The history of Judaism and Christianity is full of examples of people imposing an extrascriptural context or interpretation on Scripture and then equating the authority that extrascriptural tradition with the authority of Scripture itself.

I do not equate shredding the skin of an extrascriptural tradition with shredding the skin of the doctrine of scriptural inerrancy.

The other path is that one starts re-interpreting Scripture to try and conform and try absorb this relatively new information re: humanity (just like RTB attempted to with Day-Age).
I feel I went down the path with RTB, and now certain beliefs are unstuck. I'm not about to do it again, and really perhaps too lazy (or busy with other things) to do so.

I actually believe that RTB is on the right track with most of Genesis 1, and I still consider myself to be a Day-Ager.
I just happen to think that RTB is on the wrong track in regards to the historical Adam and Eve.

[DBowling]

One more quick thing

You don't have a digital copy of the first do you?

Unfortunately I do not, and I couldn't find an online copy either.

However, I did post this lecture by Richard Fischer (author of Historical Genesis: from Adam to Abraham) in another thread.

Historical Adam, the First Man in Biblical History
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XMPW8PrBPsU

This lecture gives a good presentation about the Scriptural and historical context of the Biblical Adam.