Belief In Literal Adam/eve Required To Comprehend Atonement

[pogi]

Even so, the resurrection of a single person living in Palestine in the early First Century is unfalsifiable. It may be unlikely, but it doesn't outright contradict science. 

 

It actually contradicts the science of biology and physiology in about every way possible. 

 

He rose from the dead after 3 days and become an immortal being. 

Edited September 22, 2015 by pogi

[TheSkepticChristian]

It has not been clearly demonstrated.  It is not possible to clearly demonstrate this.

 

False.  CFR that science has demonstrated any such thing.

 

 

It depends. If you believe that Adam and Eve were the first two humans, then you can demonstrate with reasonable certainty that it is false. Of course, you can think of other philosophical possibilities, but they are not useful.  

[bluebell]

What I am saying is behavior that we consider sinful can be fully and completely explained by the particulars of evolution of life on earth. Whatever rules you want to say govern salvation or damnation are another matter, and are of course subjective in nature. 

 

Elder Holland's point is that one cannot understand the Atonement without a belief in an actual fall.  So far he seems to be right in that there is no way to explain the need for an Atonement using natural laws, right?

[TheSkepticChristian]

It actually contradicts the science of biology and physiology in about every way possible. 

 

He rose from the dead after 3 days and become an immortal being. 

 

If molecular nanotechnology is possible, it will make miracles. I agree with Gray that the Resurrection is not falsifiable.

 

 

Edited September 22, 2015 by TheSkepticChristian

[pogi]

If molecular nanotechnology is possible, it will make miracles. 

 

Of course!  Jesus was using molecular nanotechnology...that explains everything!

[SeekingUnderstanding]

It actually contradicts the science of biology and physiology in about every way possible. 

 

He rose from the dead after 3 days and become an immortal being. 

 

The ressurection (and atonement) of Jesus is a religious claim and is not testable or falsifiable. It is outside the realm of science. A literal Adam and Eve that existed 6,000 years ago that were the only ancestors of all people living today is very much in the realm of science. To accept a literal Adam and Eve requires the rejection of modern biology, archeology, and history. To believe in a literal Adam and Eve, you have to believe that God constructed a lot of evidence to make it look like Adam and Eve were a myth just to mess with us. Christ is a matter of faith. Believing in Adam and Eve requires a rejection of vast fields of science. 

[Robert F. Smith]

It depends. If you believe that Adam and Eve were the first two humans, then you can demonstrate with reasonable certainty that it is false. Of course, you can think of other philosophical possibilities, but they are not useful.  

I was thinking of genetics, not philosophy.

[Robert F. Smith]

The ressurection (and atonement) of Jesus is a religious claim and is not testable or falsifiable. It is outside the realm of science.

Correct.  One cannot use science or logic to prove the Resurrection.

 

A literal Adam and Eve that existed 6,000 years ago that were the only ancestors of all people living today is very much in the realm of science.

I know of no reason to posit Adam & Eve 6,000 years ago, and such an assumption is anti-scientific.  Please stick to science and logic here.

 

To accept a literal Adam and Eve requires the rejection of modern biology, archeology, and history.

No, it does not.  To accept a literal first man and woman with paternal and mitochondrialDNA is certainly a scientific, testable claim.

 

To believe in a literal Adam and Eve, you have to believe that God constructed a lot of evidence to make it look like Adam and Eve were a myth just to mess with us. Christ is a matter of faith. Believing in Adam and Eve requires a rejection of vast fields of science.

Of course it doesn't, unless you adhere to a lot of traditional gobbeldygook folklore.

[pogi]

To accept a literal Adam and Eve [resurrection] requires the rejection of modern biology, archeology, and history. To believe in a literal Adam and Eve [resurrection], you have to believe that God constructed a lot of evidence to make it look like Adam and Eve were [the resurrection was] a myth just to mess with us. . 

 

You say that one would have to reject history to accept Adam and Eve.  Adam and Eve is one of the oldest oral histories that exist today, shared by many religions.  Perhaps you are the one rejecting history?

[Robert F. Smith]

DNA does not tie us all back to one man and woman who lived 4000 years ago. If they are literal how does one explain that many of us still have Neanderthal DNA? How does one explain the Australian aborigines who when the Europeans went to Australia they found them living in their isolation as they had been for 40,000 years?

a literal Adam and Eve requires we all are tied to two people who lived 4000 years ago, or perhaps 8 if you literally beleive the Noah story.

4000, 8000, 40,000.  Another guy on this board is talking 6000.  Actually, this is all nonsense.  Australian "aborigines" are fully human immigrants, as are the rest of us, and all of us can fully cross-breed (as we did anciently with Ainu, Neanderthals, Denisovians, et al.).  Our best information currently is that humans appear at around 300,000 to 400,000 years ago,  http://news.sciencemag.org/archaeology/2015/09/dna-neandertal-relative-may-shake-human-family-tree .

 

Edited to add "interbreed" as well as cross-breed.

Edited September 22, 2015 by Robert F. Smith

[SeekingUnderstanding]

To accept a literal Adam and Eve [resurrection] requires the rejection of modern biology, archeology, and history. To believe in a literal Adam and Eve[resurrection], you have to believe that God constructed a lot of evidence to make it look like Adam and Eve were [the resurrection was] a myth just to mess with us. . 

 

You say that one would have to reject history to accept Adam and Eve.  Adam and Eve is one of the oldest oral histories that exist today, shared by many religions.  Perhaps you are the one rejecting history?

Accepting resurreciton does not require the rejection of any modern biology at all. Science can not and does not comment on the resurrection. Can you cite any science papers anywhere that discuss or refute Christ's ressurection? Consider this a CFR.

 

Adam and Eve is an old oral myth. All cultures have them. I simply reject one more than you.

[SeekingUnderstanding]

Correct.  One cannot use science or logic to prove the Resurrection.

 

I know of no reason to posit Adam & Eve 6,000 years ago, and such an assumption is anti-scientific.  Please stick to science and logic here.

 

No, it does not.  To accept a literal first man and woman with paternal and mitochondrialDNA is certainly a scientific, testable claim.

 

Of course it doesn't, unless you adhere to a lot of traditional gobbeldygook folklore.

I love your perspective. Once we go back hundreds of thousands of years who knows. Perhaps God did set aside a single pair of "pre-Adamites" and made them human. I don't think this is the literal Adam and Eve Elder Holland was reffering to though.

[Gray]

Elder Holland's point is that one cannot understand the Atonement without a belief in an actual fall.  So far he seems to be right in that there is no way to explain the need for an Atonement using natural laws, right?

 

That's true, but at the same time the "Fall" event is also not required in order to explain the need for an atonement. It is simply one of many possible explanations. 

[Gray]

It actually contradicts the science of biology and physiology in about every way possible. 

 

He rose from the dead after 3 days and become an immortal being. 

 

While it's unlikely, you can't rule out the possibility that it happened, or that such a discrete event might be possible under unknown circumstances. 

 

We know, however, that the human race does not originate with a single mated pair of homo sapiens. 

[bluebell]

That's true, but at the same time the "Fall" event is also not required in order to explain the need for an atonement. It is simply one of many possible explanations.

I'm not aware of another explanation that fits with LDS doctrine on the Atonement.

[Gray]

Doctrinally, the Atonement is not a theory, it's a fact.  

 

You misunderstand - there are several theories of atonement. They include ransom theory, moral influence theory, satisfaction theory/penal substitution. The moral influence theory requires no literal resurrection. 

 

Second, in our religion the Atonement does posit a resurrection so assume that no matter what i say, its with the assumption that we are talking about LDS theology.  Elder Holland is talking about LDS theology so let's stick to that since it's the topic of the OP.

 

I don't think we need to be so narrow in our discussion. 

 

Third, per the scriptural record, it was not the resurrection of just one person in Palestine, but many.

 

Even so, the resurrection of a group of unknown persons 2000 years ago remains unfalsifiable. 

 

Fourth, whether or not the story is 'falsifiable' (leaving out the obvious argument on whether or not a actual Adam and Eve is falsifiable because that has certainly not been decided), does that change the fact that the resurrection also does not hold up to scientific scrutiny?

 

The resurrection of Jesus is not a scientific question, as it's not testable via scientific means. The origin of humanity is a scientific question, and all available evidence contradicts a literal reading of the Genesis myth. 

[Gray]

I'm not aware of another explanation that fits with LDS doctrine on the Atonement.

 

No other explanation is consistent with orthodox LDS doctrine, but at the same time there are many conceivable alternate explanations for the atonement. We are not limited to merely orthodox explanations in this discussion. The question we're debating is whether belief in a literal Adam & Eve is required to comprehend the atonement. I would argue that a figurative Adam & Eve work just as well. 

Edited September 22, 2015 by Gray

[Robert F. Smith]

I love your perspective. Once we go back hundreds of thousands of years who knows. Perhaps God did set aside a single pair of "pre-Adamites" and made them human. I don't think this is the literal Adam and Eve Elder Holland was reffering to though.

That wasn't the subject of Elder Holland's talk.  He was speaking to the basis of the Atonement, quite a different matter.

[Robert F. Smith]

.......................................................................

.............................all available evidence contradicts a literal reading of the Genesis myth. 

So what sort of reading of Genesis do you prefer?  And what does "Genesis myth" mean to you? Edited September 22, 2015 by Robert F. Smith

[CV75]

The fall of Adam is most certainly a mythical event. But can you demonstrate why sin and death and hardship cannot be explained without the fall?

Now you’re just asserting stuff and dodging the points that actually matter (unless you don’t understand them, which I think is Elder Holland’s point!).

 

Sin and death and hardship can be “explained” any way one wishes, but that is not Elder Holland’s point.

 

Death and hardship are not characteristics of an immortal world. Sin brings no physical corruption to an immortal world. What kind of world do you think we live in?

 

The spiritual creation—the natural creation in the immortal state (Eden), as was the case when Adam’s premortal spirit entered a natural yet paradisiacal body (see scriptures on the physical nature of the spiritual body: Alma 11:45, D&C 88:27, 1 Corinthians 15:44) – precedes the “natural” condition that describes the fallen, temporal, corrupted state. Our corruptible world is an actual place, and its inhabitants are natural in the fallen sense, and got that way through an actual Fall. The corrupted bodies will be raised again into a spiritual body through the Atonement.

[Robert F. Smith]

................................................................................................

 

We know, however, that the human race does not originate with a single mated pair of homo sapiens. 

"We know" this, how?

[pogi]

Accepting resurreciton does not require the rejection of any modern biology at all. Science can not and does not comment on the resurrection. Can you cite any science papers anywhere that discuss or refute Christ's ressurection? Consider this a CFR.

 

Adam and Eve is an old oral myth. All cultures have them. I simply reject one more than you.

 

If science cannot disprove religious claims, it can throw great doubt on them.  As a religious claim, science can do no more than throw great doubt on the story of Adam and Eve.  Is not Adam and Eve a religious claim?  Genesis is no less a religious claim than the resurrection is.  So, why is the resurrection off limits, but not Adam and Eve?

 

What I have been saying is that science has no more ability to disprove Genesis than it can disprove the resurrection.  You site biological evidence etc. against Genesis, well what about the resurrection?  Why is this the untouchable exception?  Can we not use biological and medical evidence against the resurrection?  The only argument I have heard is that the resurrection is untouchable because it "might be possible" under some unknown or unseen circumstance or evidence.  Why cannot the same thing be said about the Genesis story of Adam and Eve?

 

To me, science throws no more doubt on Genesis than it does on the resurrection.  It does indeed throw great scientific doubt on both, but it cannot disprove either.  

 

We know that Christ was crucified until dead, that a spear punctured his lung to remove all doubt.  His body remained for 3 days in a total anoxic state.  Even if Jesus's heart did miraculously start beating on its own after 3 days with no defibrillator, the punctured lung and subsequent infection caused by the unsterile instrument would have killed him shortly after.  Either way, he would have been completely brain dead.  Then you have to explain his immortal state!  There is no scientific if's, and's or but's about it, it is impossible!

 

Science cannot comment on the "resurrection", all it can comment on is the surrounding claims.  In the same way science cannot comment on "Adam and Eve", all it can comment on is the surrounding claims.  And scientifically speaking, both claims are scientifically impossible based on our current understanding.  

Edited September 22, 2015 by pogi

[Zakuska]

A non Literal Adam makes verses such as these Moot.

 

D&C 116 (D&C 27:5-14 & 107:53-56) What Will Happen at Adam-ondi-Ahman? We now come to the least known and least understood thing connected with the Second Coming. It might well be termed the best-kept secret set forth in the revealed word. Before the Lord Jesus descends openly and publicly in the clouds of glory… there is to be a secret appearance to selected members of his Church. He will come in private to his prophet and to the apostles then living. Those who have held keys and powers and authorities in all ages from Adam to the present will also be present. And further, all the faithful members of the Church then living and all the faithful saints of all the ages past will be present. It will be the greatest congregation of faithful saints ever assembled on planet earth. It will be a sacrament meeting. It will be a day of judgment for the faithful of all the ages. And it will take place in Davies County, Missouri, at a place called Adam-ondi-Ahman ( Bruce R. McConkie, The Millennial Messiah, p.578 - p.579). What Does Adam-ondi-Ahman Mean? As near as we can judge -- Adam-ondi-Ahman means the place or land of God where Adam dwelt (Mormon Doctrine, p.19).

[KevinG]

4000, 8000, 40,000.  Another guy on this board is talking 6000.  Actually, this is all nonsense.  Australian "aborigines" are fully human immigrants, as are the rest of us, and all of us can fully cross-breed (as we did anciently with Ainu, Neanderthals, Denisovians, et al.).  Our best information currently is that humans appear at around 300,000 to 400,000 years ago,  http://news.sciencemag.org/archaeology/2015/09/dna-neandertal-relative-may-shake-human-family-tree .

 

Edited to add "interbreed" as well as cross-breed.

 

Bonus points for citing the Denisovians!  I myself am probably a bit Neanderthal.

[Gray]

"We know" this, how?

 

Through the DNA of the human species, through basic principles of evolution (the transition between species is fuzzy), and through the fossil record.