Oops, She Did It Again

[volgadon]

Bolded by me. Sounds interesting. Could I get a CFR on that please? (unless one's already been requested).

In addition to Calmoriah's link, if you can find a copy, Barlow's book on Mormons and the Bible discuss this at length.

[Bill “Papa” Lee]

This is the most recent article on the Worlds Without End blog. I thought that Bridget Jack Jeffries did an amazing job with this article. Definitely well worth the read.

Valerie Hudson is the subject of the article.

She was let go once from an (as a mod) anti-Mormon board for being too nice to the Mormons...true story. Of course my version is a paraphrase. You can read about in her own words. Edited May 14, 2013 by Bill “Papa” Lee

[SamIam]

Certainly sounds like a blame game to me, "the woman thou didn't give, brought me..."

The notion expressed as "accepting personal responsibility" would have been better accomplished without drawing attention to the actions of others. This is, after all, a literary account, not a transcript, so we must pay sentence structure particular attention. In Adam's case, his confession comes third and last in the sequence of giving, beginning with God who gave him the woman who gave him the fruit. In other words, I did eat, but only because the woman gave me the fruit, and YOU were the one who gave her to me in the first place. Adam is softening his own guilt and responsibility by portraying himself as the recipient of actions others have initiated. Eve's chain of guilt is shorter, and leaves out God, her confession, too, only comes after describing someone else's actions. I am well aware of the temple portraying things differently, which needn't surprise any, as they are different narratives.

While I commonly have some difficulty with Stone's interpretations of things, I am not often inclined to disagree with Volgadon but now that they venture similar opinions what choice do I have. Still I believe my explanation of things will make sense to Volgadon for his Jewish background.

In the way of scripture, it is easy to miss the essence of what is truly occurring here. I first have to agree that there is no reason to impugn acts of guile on either Adam or Eve. However, the few short verses that describe this event are sufficiently vague that we are missing the full import of the event and we are judging the material on a incorrect pshat or basic/simple rendering of the text without considering higher implications of imagery.

This is a judgment cycle. Not just a story. The owner of Celestial Law, God the Father, has found two of his subjects in breach of the law of his kingdom. Thus he convenes a hearing in which to consider the evidence against the parties before he can provide a just rendering of judgment.

The question of the court to which God seeks answers is as follows:

Who told thee that thou wast naked? Hast thou partaken of the fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil, of which we commanded thee not to partake?

Adam as the first party questioned steps forward and presents his perspective on the situation. He provides a succinct, precise presentation of the facts of the matter. His wife tempted him with the fruit but acting under the influence of the command to stay with his wife he made a choice that he thought was the least of two evils.

Eve had partaken of the fruit against both of Gods commands (don’t eat, be fruitful). She does not deny Adam's testimony that she did bring it to Adam or that he did eat under consideration of being fruitful. Eve’s testimony recognizes that she was influenced by the serpent.

Satan’s testimony is he knew exactly what he was doing and he became the stumbling block that led Adam and Eve to transgression.

It is imperative that we maintain a sense of Adam and Eve’s innocence and guileless state as we consider upon the judgments rendered by God the Father who is the advocate of the Celestial Kingdom in behalf of all that reside there. If they were truly trying to deceive God, or manifest guile in displacing blame then the judgments could not manifest the degree of distinctions that are part of the individual penalties as all would be liars. When we impugn their integrity in even the least degree it is not Adam and Eve we impugn; it is the justice and judgment of God that we call into question. It comes down to whether his judgments are just or not and it is a strong indictment to level at God the Father.

1.) Adam and Eve are essentially equal in their understanding of the law. It is a clear commandment but having no sense of good and evil they cannot imbue their actions with sufficient understanding to assign much culpability.

2.) Adam is tempted by Eve, However, Adam makes a decision not on being tempted but in making the best of a bad situation. His intent is as pure as can be mustered in a state of innocence. He decides that he can at least keep the second law delivered by the voice of God though the first must be sacrificed for the greater good. In so doing in a partial way he somewhat redeems Eve's decision which appears to have disregarded either law.

Eve, is genuinely tempted by Satan. She entertains the idea by listening to his voice, she discourses with Satan, he compels her to not worry about God’s laws delivered by his voice and she forsakes them both temporarily without proper consideration.

Satan is not tempted in the least but acts according to the desires of his heart. He explains he knows what he is doing and pretends to additional knowledge that I do not know the full implications of in that he claims it was done on other planets. The question in my mind being does he fully understand the complete ramifications or only 75% of the ramifications of his actions. We are told elsewhere "that Satan not knowing the will of God acted as he did.

3.) Adam did eat the fruit. Eve did eat the fruit. Satan did tempt them to achieve a means to his own ends without regard to Gods will which he took no time to ascertain though means was available to him and the knowledge which required the effort of finding out God’s will was his.

Culpability is predicated upon 3 things

1.) Depth of knowledge of the law

2.) Tempting others or being a stumbling block

3.) Personal actions / works

With all of the testimony in place, God assigns judgments based on degrees of culpability of the three participants. His decree includes levels of penalty. All three are judged worthy of spiritual death. Why? I won’t elaborate on personal observations but I will provide this quote that I think is very impressive in what it may allude to:

And the Lord God commanded Adam, saying, Of every tree of the garden eating thou mayest eat. But of the tree of whose fruit they who eat (become) wise to know between good and evil, thou shalt not eat: for in the day that thou eatest thou wilt be guilty of death.(*Targum pseudo Jonathon, http://uwacadweb.uwy...et/ts/PJgen.htm)

Adam gets a break for having tried to do the best thing in keeping the second law. He tempted no one and was thus never a stumbling block but still he did eat. Thus he is placed at the head but his life is going to be demonstrably more difficult.

Eve also ate and she hearkened unto Satan’s voice and potentially breached both commandments. She is placed beside Adam but required to give heed to his counsel as he seeks the Lord. Additionally, perhaps we might extrapolate that since she failed to consider being fruitful before the fall, she was not likely going to forget about it thereafter as it was going to become a much greater challenge and handicap.

Satan, knowing full well what he was doing has actually done the most evil thing of all. It is not only that he tempted Eve and thereby caused the downfall of Adam and Eve, but that he knows full well that because of his efforts innocent blood will be required to be spilt in order to redeem the two innocent children that God has been required to judge. The Old Testament is very clear on the only acceptable penalty for intentional shedding of innocent blood. Thus his decree is that he will be permanently held accountable as complicit in the shedding of innocent blood without reservation. His decree of death is permanent.

If one was to analyze carefully the penalty aspect of the avenger of blood and the manslayer discourse in Deuteronomy 19:4-12 and Numbers 35:30-32 one can determine both levels of culpability and how Adam and Eve are given a probationary opportunity because of their innocence while Satan is given the death penalty because of his lack thereof.

Thus a place of refuge is provided and Adam and Eve dwell therein. The shedder of innocent blood is turned over to the Avenger of Blood, whose obligation is to avenge the wrongful death of his kin, and the shedder of innocent blood, the murderer, receives a just penalty of death. Yet Adam and Eve are safe from the avenger as long as they maintain a very close relationship with the High Priest in the city of refuge and find their salvation (freedom from a death sentence) when the High Priest dies (considered an atonement) and they are returned to the land of their inheritance.

Hopefully, this will make sense.

Edited May 15, 2013 by SamIam

[volgadon]

Brock, I will consider your thoughtful points and respond.

[Damien the Leper]

From a FB post by David Bokovoy recently:

“In 2007 Elder Bruce C. Hafen and his wife Marie attempted to use [Gen 3:16] as evidence of egalitarian governance by an appeal to the underlying Hebrew preposition bet, the word translated as ‘over’ in ‘he shall rule over you.’ In the August 2007 Ensign, the Hafens, aided by a BYU professor of Hebrew, argue:

'Genesis 3:16 states that Adam is to ‘rule over’ Eve, but this doesn’t make Adam a dictator. . . . Over in ‘rule over’ uses the Hebrew bet, which means ruling ‘with,’ not ruling ‘over.'

"Since then it has been repeated several times by LDS political scientist Valerie M. Hudson, including in the April 2013 Ensign...

"The impossibility of this translation, and the extent to which the plain sense of the text is ignored, highlights a growing discomfort, even among the ranks of General Authorities and conservative scholars, with bald-faced gender hierarchies in scripture. The only hermeneutic motivating this translation is the need to resolve the dissonance between text and modern sensibility by so thoroughly recasting the most blatantly hierarchical proof text of the Bible to legitimate the Church’s stance on egalitarianism."

----Cory Crawford, "The Struggle for Female Authority," Dialogue (Summer; 2015): 12-13.

I thought this worth sharing on an oldie but goodie.

[Calm]

Hey, the biblical leaders did it to justify how they viewed women, so why not now.  

 

http://www.fairmormon.org/perspectives/fair-conferences/2015-fairmormon-conference/christs-emancipation-of-women-in-the-new-testament

 

(I had no clue it was this bad for women in the Jewish culture during Jesus' time)

[carbon dioxide]

I was never under the impression that modern revelation trumped scripture. I don't know who it was that used the Stick of Judah/Joseph verses in Ezekiel to justify the Book of Mormon. Whoever started that rash of reasoning obviously had no training in Biblical Hebrew. There are times that I still have to correct other members when they cite that scripture.

Modern revelation would be scripture.  Modern revelation can trump old scripture if the old scripture does not apply today.  Modern revelation also can explain old scripture whose original meaning has been lost and replaced with an incorrect interpretation.  It is possible that "training in Biblical Hebrew" may not exactly match the original intent of the writer.  The best source in understanding the writings of ancient prophets is God.  God knows what they meant.  He does not consult scholars in Hebrew on the subject.

[Damien the Leper]

Modern revelation would be scripture.  Modern revelation can trump old scripture if the old scripture does not apply today.  Modern revelation also can explain old scripture whose original meaning has been lost and replaced with an incorrect interpretation.  It is possible that "training in Biblical Hebrew" may not exactly match the original intent of the writer.  The best source in understanding the writings of ancient prophets is God.  God knows what they meant.  He does not consult scholars in Hebrew on the subject.

But the training allows us to look through their lense rather than an obfuscated modern imagining. Modern revelation does not get to tell the authors what the authors meant. Such a perspective is dangerous.

[Calm]

But the training allows us to look through their lense rather than an obfuscated modern imagining. 

I am not sure about that since I think we would need to know much more to be sure that we got it right.  Look how often confusion occurs on this board with people right here being able to talk as long as they want on a subject and others still misunderstand them.

 

And it is not like the scholars agree on interpretation or what that lens actually is all the time.  

 

What I think it does accomplish is we are less likely to use a modern imagining and assume they meant the same thing.  

 

I don't see anything wrong with likening scripture to ourselves as long as we understand it may not be the same thing the original writers were talking about.  Modern revelation doesn't really need to tell us what the authors meant.  It needs to tell us what we need now to be able to seek out God more effectively, open our hearts to him and his children and accept the Atonement of Christ as fully as we can now and prepare us to accept it even more in the future.

Edited August 30, 2015 by calmoriah

[Damien the Leper]

I am not sure about that since I think we would need to know much more to be sure that we got it right. Look how often confusion occurs on this board with people right here being able to talk as long as they want on a subject and others still misunderstand them.

And it is not like the scholars agree on interpretation or what that lens actually is all the time.

What I think it does accomplish is we are less likely to use a modern imagining and assume they meant the same thing.

I don't see anything wrong with likening scripture to ourselves as long as we understand it may not be the same thing the original writers were talking about. Modern revelation doesn't really need to tell us what the authors meant. It needs to tell us what we need now to be able to seek out God more effectively, open our hearts to him and his children and accept the Atonement of Christ as fully as we can now and prepare us to accept it even more in the future.

I agree that we can't know all the details but I believe with the information we have and will continue to gain will allow us to see more clearly.

Finding areas where we can identify with scripture is fine so long as we maintain objectivity and try not to project our biases onto the text or the historical context. For example, reading the Exodus narrative through a 21st century LDS lens can distort the picture so we must avoid such problems.

Edited August 30, 2015 by Valentinus

[Calm]

I agree that we can't know all the details but I believe with the information we have and will continue to gain will allow us to see more clearly.

 

You don't think some scholars might become so certain about some aspect that they go down the wrong path and that those of us who listen to them also end up down there and end up being more wrong about what they believed in biblical times?

 

I am not so trusting in progression of knowledge to believe that there aren't going to be some major hiccups along the way, possibly derailing said progression into deep mires of mistakes for quite some time.

[Damien the Leper]

You don't think some scholars might become so certain about some aspect that they go down the wrong path and that those of us who listen to them also end up down there and end up being more wrong about what they believed in biblical times?

 

I am not so trusting in progression of knowledge to believe that there aren't going to be some major hiccups along the way, possibly derailing said progression into deep mires of mistakes for quite some time.

I think some scholars miss the mark. But that's why there are many who can provide us with plenty of information to draw conclusions.

[Calm]

Yeah, but we've got to choose the right ones to listen to if it is going to benefit ourselves.  

[Damien the Leper]

Yeah, but we've got to choose the right ones to listen to if it is going to benefit ourselves.  

Agreed. But we must familiarize ourselves with them all so that we can appropriately discern.