Feedback archive → Feedback 2012

Interpreting the early chapters of Genesis

In today’s feedback, CMI’s Lita Sanders and Don Batten answer questions about how to interpret specific points within the early chapters of Genesis.

Flickr: Ian B-M

S.V. from New Zealand writes:

Lita Sanders responds:

Dear S.,

Since we don’t have access to the Tree of Life and can’t test its effects, we can’t know precisely what its function was. However, there would be considerably more to immortality than simply keeping the telomeres from getting shorter (cancer cells can divide forever, after all, and that isn’t considered a good thing). Mutations (both inherited genetic mutations, and somatic ones accumulated throughout one’s lifetime) would have to be prevented. There would also have to be no possibility of infectious or ‘lifestyle’ related diseases such as atherosclerosis or other degenerative diseases that were not repairable merely by ‘cells dividing). And it’s hard to think of how a fruit could confer invulnerability—the ability to not be injured by any accidents, etc.

For these and other reasons, some of us lean toward a symbolic view of the Tree of Life. This view says that like the bread and wine of the Lord’s Supper, the Tree of Life was an actual tree with a symbolic meaning; access to it symbolized Adam’s perfect relationship with God and continued immortality. Conversely, the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil wasn’t poisonous or evil in and of itself; the fruit itself didn’t confer death. Rather, the only way that Adam could eat of the tree was in disobedience and rebellion, so eating the fruit brought death not because the fruit was deadly, but because the rebellion was deadly.

Others of us lean toward an actual function of the Tree of Life in granting immortality, though it’s difficult to say exactly what that was. One reason is that God removed Adam and Eve from access to the Tree ‘lest they eat and live forever’. This would suggest that God designed the Tree to grant life in some sense, and it would do so even after Adam and Eve had sinned. Also, when it re-appears in Revelation, its leaves are ‘for the healing of the nations’, and we will eat of its fruit, suggesting that it will have some positive health-giving function even in a perfect creation where there is no death or pain or suffering (though again it’s difficult to say for certain how such things will work).

Either view of the Tree is consistent with a biblical view of creation, because both are consistent with how God has worked elsewhere in Scripture, and we’re really not given enough information to decide between the two views decisively.

Sincerely,

Lita Sanders

Wayne T. from Australia writes in response to article Who created God?, and comments interspersed from CMI’s Dr Don Batten:

This is the age-old starlight and time chestnut. We are well aware of this. See: How can we see distant stars in a young universe? and further reading at: How can we see light from stars millions of light years away? But did you know that the standard ‘scientific’ model of the origin of the universe, the big bang, has its own starlight travel problem? See: Light-travel time: a problem for the big bang

You do not give any references for your claim that “Some Jewish texts do not associate verses 1, 2, and 3 in the same temporal sense”. I know of no Jewish sources that do any such thing. Indeed, all known Hebrew texts of Genesis 1:1,2,3 are the same and the Hebrew construction is clear to anyone who knows biblical Hebrew. This and your argument about the Hebrew for create (bara) are answered in detail here: Gap theory revisited. Our standard treatment of the ‘gap theory’ (which is what you are proposing) also deals with the grammatical construction that absolutely rules out the idea you propose: What about gap theories?

Furthermore, Orthodox Jewish tradition is absolutely clear that there is no temporal disconnection between the first verse and subsequent verses. Please see: Creation days and Orthodox Jewish tradition.

I hope this helps you to see that there is no ‘wriggle room’ here at all to allow ‘deep time’. But allowing for ‘deep time’ also leads to accepting that the rocks and fossils are also very old and then you have death and suffering in the world that God called ‘very good’. This also undermines the Gospel. But please read the above articles that spell this out. This is no esoteric debate merely about the age of things; it affects the goodness of God, the historical basis of Jesus’ death and resurrection and what they mean, as well as the doctrine of future things.

Yours sincerely,

Don Batten

Chris C. from the United States writes:

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CMI’s Lita Sanders responds:

Dear Chris,

We know that the modern crops of wheat, barley, rice, and corn which form staples of human diets all around the world were created by cultivating existing created plants to be more suitable for human consumption—with bigger grains, more grains per stalk, etc. These plants are dependent on rain (as any farmer will tell you!) and people to take care of the crops. So there were no ‘plants of the field’ like corn and wheat in the same sense that there were no Chihuahuas and Great Danes—the crops required human cultivation in the same way that today’s modern dog breeds resulted from careful selective breeding. Interestingly in the context of the Genesis narrative, this sort of working the soil was a result of the Curse—in the Garden of Eden, Adam had easy work tending the fruit there, there’s no indication of hard agricultural labor. So perhaps 2:5 should be seen in light of 3:17–19.

See this paper from Journal of Creation for more information.

Sincerely,

Lita Sanders

Chris C. responded: