The Origin Of (Our) Species

[Coreyb]

Can you believe in macro evolution, particularly the part about the the evolution Homo sapiens, AND believe in a literal Adam and Eve? Do you? How do you manage? Do you synchronize the two beliefs or compartmentalize them?

[Stargazer]

Yep!  I believe in both, and I expect that in the end they will be shown to be fully compatible. 

 

Much of scripture is figurative anyway.  I don't believe that God caused the sun to actually stand still in the sky during that one battle; I believe that it was a figure of speech.  I don't believe that God created Eve by using a rib taken from Adam; I believe this was a figure of speech and a teaching tool.  I might believe that fire from heaven destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah, but it's more likely a figure of speech, i.e. it was a small comet or something.  And the earth was not created in 6 24-hour periods.  That was figurative, too.

[Coreyb]

Yep!  I believe in both, and I expect that in the end they will be shown to be fully compatible. 

 

Much of scripture is figurative anyway.  I don't believe that God caused the sun to actually stand still in the sky during that one battle; I believe that it was a figure of speech.  I don't believe that God created Eve by using a rib taken from Adam; I believe this was a figure of speech and a teaching tool.  I might believe that fire from heaven destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah, but it's more likely a figure of speech, i.e. it was a small comet or something.  And the earth was not created in 6 24-hour periods.  That was figurative, too.

So would you say that you compartmentalize the two, at least for the time being in order to make them work, or do you have a theory about how they might go together?

[Stargazer]

So would you say that you compartmentalize the two, at least for the time being in order to make them work, or do you have a theory about how they might go together?

 

Oh, I guess I have a theory.  Sort of.  I don't really compartmentalize them, because I am not a literalist when it comes to scripture. 

 

Anyway, my theory is that God thought it wasn't in the human species best interest to give Moses 21st Century PhD-level courses in evolutionary biology, physics, and chemistry just so He could tell Moses that He created the Universe and everything in it, especially Man.  So Moses could then go on to invent dynamite, the internal combustion engine, and penicillin back in 2000 BC or whenever it was.  So God gave Moses a figurative overview of the whole thing.

 

I don't understand those people who try to make Creation to be literally what is written in Genesis.  It's nuts.

Edited February 27, 2015 by Stargazer

[Freedom]

Can I believe in Abraham and still believe in evolution? Can I believe in Beethoven and still believe in evolution? 

The story in genesis is a temple story, not a record of the creation of the earth. Adam was the beginning of a covenant people

[Rivers]

Oh, I guess I have a theory. Sort of. I don't really compartmentalize them, because I am not a literalist when it comes to scripture.

Anyway, my theory is that God thought it wasn't in the human species best interest to give Moses 21st Century PhD-level courses in evolutionary biology, physics, and chemistry just so He could tell Moses that He created the Universe and everything in it, especially Man. So Moses could then go on to invent dynamite, the internal combustion engine, and penicillin back in 2000 BC or whenever it was. So God gave Moses a figurative overview of the whole thing.

I don't understand those people who try to make Creation to be literally what is written in Genesis. It's nuts.

This is how I see it. It is best to not view the Bible as a science book.

If there was literal Adam and Eve, they can be viewed as the first spirit children of Heavenly Father to receive bodies. But this raises a host of more questions.

Edited February 27, 2015 by Rivers

[The Nehor]

Can you believe in macro evolution, particularly the part about the the evolution Homo sapiens, AND believe in a literal Adam and Eve? Do you? How do you manage? Do you synchronize the two beliefs or compartmentalize them?

I synchronize them. My explanation sounds absurd though. I am not sure if it is right but I get the feeling I am in the right ballpark.

[MormonFreeThinker]

I don't understand those people who try to make Creation to be literally what is written in Genesis.  It's nuts.

 

 

[Stargazer]

 

So what?

[The Nehor]

So what?

Why the sudden jump amongst Republicans within 5 years?

[Uncle Dale]

Roman Catholic priest-scientists have a way of resolving the seeming

problem. And I suspect that they have made quiet use of similar conclusions

for ages gone by (they just didn't say much when their arch-bishops were

lecturing the faithful about how the flat earth was the center of creation).

 

Having made reference to the flat earth advocates, we might also recall

that some of them have pointed to biblical passages in support of their

arguments -- and even more so, in the case of geo-centrists who thought

a firmament held the stars in place in a half-globe over the flat earth.

 

The Bible (and large segments of the Judeo-Christian population of this

planet) has been fully compatible with these explanations.

 

But we live in a modern era, and not everybody on the planet can

simultaneously begin the Sabbath on Friday eve, when two stars are

first visible in the fading twilight -- doesn't work, living upon a globe.

 

Getting back to the Catholic thinkers -- the "school men" -- the Medieval 

University of Paris sorts of fellows. Some of them found ways to mentally set

aside a flat earth, a geocentric cosmos, a firmament, etc., and still read

their Latin Bibles (as something other than perfect History and Science).

 

Out of those early searchings for a compatibility between the world as 

we discover it to be, and faith, as we experience it, the RCC geniuses 

paved the philosophical path toward accepting Adam and Eve as being

a symbolic truth, rather than an historical truth.

 

They're still working out the fine points, and it will take a Vatican III and a

Vatican IV, before they have the process and conclusions down pat.

 

Reorganized Latter Day Saints have been able to emulate the Methodists,

a few decades after the Methodists emulated the Anglicans and the Catholics,

so, today, there are thousands of Community of Christ Latter Day Saints

who no longer trouble themselves over whether or not Adam lived as the

Torah (and the JST, for that matter) depicts him to have lived. To them,

an African "Adam" with black skin and rather more hair than is now the

style, might well have lived in the Great Rift Valley, eons ago, sending

down his genes into our bloodlines today. While the JST Adam (that's

the Book of Moses Adam, to the Brighamites) never was immersed in

the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Ghost, just outside of

Eden's barred entrance.

 

That's CoC, though. -- As for the Mormons. I assume their case is hopeless.

 

UD

Edited February 27, 2015 by Uncle Dale

[Uncle Dale]

Why the sudden jump amongst Republicans within 5 years?

 

Many of the educated ones either died off or became Independents.

What percentage of today's research Scientists contribute donations

each election season to that particular party? How many of them bother

to even go out and vote, if they live in a 90% Republican district?

 

 

UD

[The Nehor]

Many of the educated ones either died off or became Independents.

What percentage of today's research Scientists contribute donations

each election season to that particular party? How many of them bother

to even go out and vote, if they live in a 90% Republican district?

 

 

UD

That's what I thought. Glad I am not the only one.

[Uncle Dale]

That's what I thought. Glad I am not the only one.

 

But mostly died off, I'm afraid. The Independents appear to have

roped in only a couple of percentage points worth, of the thinkers.

 

Not that Bible-toting, God-fearing Republicans never think -- I was

once one of that happy Eisenhower-voting "big tent" crew myself.

I thought -- At least, I think I thought. And that was the beginning...

How many such thinkers have there been, who thought themselves

right out of the party of Taft, Dewey and Roosevelt (Teddy) and into 

the waiting arms of the Libertarians, Constitutionalists, Independents

and (dare I say it?) -- the Jefferson-Jacksonian tree-hugging, tax

and spend, female candidate-electing, city-dwellers?

 

Oh well...

 

UD

[Stargazer]

Why the sudden jump amongst Republicans within 5 years?

 

The Three Questions: So what?  Who cares?  What difference does it make?

 

It's probably sample bias.  Either that or those Republicans answering on the side of creationism feel more comfortable admitting it now.

 

Note that the number of Democrats answering on the side of creationism is definitely non-zero.  For what that's worth.

[Bobbieaware]

Yep!  I believe in both, and I expect that in the end they will be shown to be fully compatible. 

 

Much of scripture is figurative anyway.  I don't believe that God caused the sun to actually stand still in the sky during that one battle; I believe that it was a figure of speech.  I don't believe that God created Eve by using a rib taken from Adam; I believe this was a figure of speech and a teaching tool.  I might believe that fire from heaven destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah, but it's more likely a figure of speech, i.e. it was a small comet or something.  And the earth was not created in 6 24-hour periods.  That was figurative, too.

Do you believe the resurrection of the dead is figurative? Considering how God used the incredibly painstaking billions of years process to eventually get around to creating "Adam and Eve" and the human race, does it make any logical sense that he would then abandon his chosen natural process of creation in favor of a miraculous phenomenon that can rightly be considered to be nothing less than a form of spontaneous generation, a notion utterly rejected by science?

For me, it seems more reasonable to believe that if God's chosen method of creation is organic evolution, then the resurrection will be some kind of higher form of evolution that will also take billions of years to accomplish. Given God's chosen method of creation by natural means, It doesn't make any logical sense that a superior race of billions of immortal human beings could be created in a mere instant.

[haggard]

Can you believe in macro evolution, particularly the part about the the evolution Homo sapiens, AND believe in a literal Adam and Eve? Do you? How do you manage? Do you synchronize the two beliefs or compartmentalize them?

Evolution (macro) is a state sponsered and state protected religion. Pure fantasy, not based on scientific method. Now if you want to talk about having faith, please explain the origin of life, time, matter and energy. It's a man made religion based on faith, not science.

 

Here Kent Hovind gives a great summary.

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IHFqFP-Li_o

[bluebell]

Can I believe in Abraham and still believe in evolution? Can I believe in Beethoven and still believe in evolution?

The story in genesis is a temple story, not a record of the creation of the earth. Adam was the beginning of a covenant people

How do you reconcile this idea with the doctrine of the fall?

[pogi]

Here is one possible way to reconcile it.  Adam and Eve were the first literal spirit children (offspring) of God to be placed in physical bodies, as descendants of evolution.  They were the first of their kind in that regard.  As the first of their kind, they were innocent, free from sin or death. I don't believe that they were raised by their biological parents.  They may have been given as an offering to God at his request in the garden of Eden, to be raised by the Gods and tempted by the serpent.  Thus begins the story of the fall. 

Edited February 27, 2015 by pogi

[Stargazer]

Do you believe the resurrection of the dead is figurative? Considering how God used the incredibly painstaking billions of years process to eventually get around to creating "Adam and Eve" and the human race, does it make any logical sense that he would then abandon his chosen natural process of creation in favor of a miraculous phenomenon that can rightly be considered to be nothing less than a form of spontaneous generation, a notion utterly rejected by science?

For me, it seems more reasonable to believe that if God's chosen method of creation is organic evolution, then the resurrection will be some kind of higher form of evolution that will also take billions of years to accomplish. Given God's chosen method of creation by natural means, It doesn't make any logical sense that a superior race of billions of immortal human beings could be created in a mere instant.

 

I don't believe everything is figurative, any more than everything is literal.

 

Scriptures tend to be figurative when they seem are describing extremely complex events in extremely simple terms.  The Creation, for instance.  When Jesus is resurrected, however, it may be complex, but it does not in this case seem to be figurative.  It's literal.  He says we get what He got.  Therefore, I don't see this as figurative.

 

But when Jesus says "In my father's house are many mansions" I do not envisage a large physical property surrounded by a tall fence (to keep the riff-raff out), with various 27-room mansions placed here and there amongst the trees.  It's figurative, and the mansions may in fact be Universes.  I look forward to finding out.

[ERayR]

How do you reconcile this idea with the doctrine of the fall?

 

They are going to tell you the fall is symbolic, not literal.  I fear we may symbolize ourselves out of existence.  It is all symbolic.  Matrix anybody.

[JLHPROF]

I do not believe that Evolution is compatible, not only with the creation of Adam and Eve, but with the gospel.

I cannot accept that in a direct lineal descent one generation is considered a lower lesser form of life (outside of the family of God and inelligible for exaltation) and the very next one will be resurrected to the Celestial Kingdom and Godhood.

 

Imagine evolution is true.  We have passed through neanderthal, cromagnon, and then you are the father of "Adam", the first homo sapiens, and the first being eligible for the Celestial Kingdom.  You are basically as intelligent as any father/son.  Just as Christ was in the image of his father, so your son is in your image.  You watched him being born. You loved his mother.  But because you aren't advanced enough you cannot be exalted with him to the top degree of the Celestial Kingdom.  You can never follow him in his progression to godhood, because you are one generation too early for homo sapiens - the children of God.

 

Nope, can't accept such a situation.

[bluebell]

They are going to tell you the fall is symbolic, not literal.  I fear we may symbolize ourselves out of existence.  It is all symbolic.  Matrix anybody.

 

I sincerely hope that no one is going to tell me that.  The doctrine of the Fall is the only thing that makes the Savior necessary.  It is why the scriptures teach the creation and the fall before introducing someone to the Atonement and the Savior.

[thesometimesaint]

I do not believe that Evolution is compatible, not only with the creation of Adam and Eve, but with the gospel.

I cannot accept that in a direct lineal descent one generation is considered a lower lesser form of life (outside of the family of God and inelligible for exaltation) and the very next one will be resurrected to the Celestial Kingdom and Godhood.

 

Imagine evolution is true.  We have passed through neanderthal, cromagnon, and then you are the father of "Adam", the first homo sapiens, and the first being eligible for the Celestial Kingdom.  You are basically as intelligent as any father/son.  Just as Christ was in the image of his father, so your son is in your image.  You watched him being born. You loved his mother.  But because you aren't advanced enough you cannot be exalted with him to the top degree of the Celestial Kingdom.  You can never follow him in his progression to godhood, because you are one generation too early for homo sapiens - the children of God.

 

Nope, can't accept such a situation.

 

That's a lot of unwarranted assumptions. Animals fulfill the measure of their creation. There is nothing in the Gospel that includes or precludes them from being in the Celestial Kingdom.

[MormonFreeThinker]

So what?

 

Your group doesn't like Biological Evolution and CO2 caused climate change. 

Your group likes pseudoscience. 

Edited February 27, 2015 by MormonFreeThinker