Pentecostal Case of the Genesis Garden Story

For the past three years I have studied the garden story intensely. After all it has become the foundation of our western thought and underpins the rest of our theology. Not surprisingly is that Jewish scholars see Gen. 1 & 2 and explain it very differently. Teachers at the high-end schools such as Princeton teach it differently than I was taught in my pentecostal upbringing. Ken Kerr, author of Timeline of History says there were several million people living in Egypt, Greece and in China when the Garden story was dated at about 3764 B C. But when I went to Lee and to Wheaton no one brought up these other views ( maybe they thought that we couldn’t handle the extra information ) Perhaps in our youth we couldn’t have rightly divided this information but at sometime I think that we have to deal with larger thought patterns. ” When I was a child I understood as a child; but when I became a man, I put away childish things.” I Cor. 13:11

John Kissinger [01/07/2016 2:39 PM]
So Jim Price do you read two creation stories in Gen. 1-2 or one?

Asen Iliev [01/07/2016 3:27 PM]
Asen Iliev liked this on Facebook.

Brent Welke [01/07/2016 3:40 PM]
No. The second is a retelling.

Ricky Grimsley [01/07/2016 4:13 PM]
As long as your views dont contradict Genesis 3:20 KJVS
[20] And Adam called his wife’s name Eve; because she was the mother of all living.
And factors in how adam was able to sin for all of us.

Steven Medlock [01/07/2016 4:28 PM]
Maybe the reason you were not taught these other views is because the schools you went to we’re trying to teach a biblical perspective using the Scriptures as their basis, and didn’t want to bring in “extra biblical” teaching. There are many farfetched outlandish ideas propagated by so-called “high-end” schools.
Where the Bible can be taken literally, it should be taken literally! The recording of creation in the book of generations leaves no wiggle room for anything but a literal reading and understanding.
Also Romans 5:12 says,”Wherefore, as by one man(Adam) sin entered into the world, and death by sin; and so death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned:” If we accept the Bible and it’s literal meaning we can conclude that before Adam there was no death, so there could not have been generations of people equalling millions on the earth.
Why is it so hard for some to accept GOD’s Word as exact way it happened?

Jim Price [01/07/2016 4:29 PM]
I have come to believe that it is the same story told by two different writers. Ch 1, the Priestly writer and Ch 2, the Yahwist brought together at a later date by a redactor. Dr. Harold Bloom puts the writer Yahwist at the time of King Rehoboam.

Ricky Grimsley [01/07/2016 4:36 PM]
Well jesus said moses wrote the torah. Luke 24:27 KJVS
[27] And beginning at Moses and all the prophets, he expounded unto them in all the scriptures the things concerning himself.

Timothy D McCune [01/07/2016 4:38 PM]
Are you saying that there were millions of people living at the same time in these place , while Adam and Eve were in the Garden?

Jim Price [01/07/2016 4:44 PM]
That does not say that Moses actually did the writing.

Timothy D McCune [01/07/2016 4:50 PM]
Adam and Eve are the Founding Parents of us all, there could not have been people living in other parts of the Earth while they were still in the Garden.

Steven Medlock [01/07/2016 4:54 PM]
If there were millions of people on the earth when GOD created Adam, it’s a strange thing that GOD didn’t know anything about it! HE was under the impression that Adam was the first person HE created! I’m sure GOD wouldn’t have forgotten if he had created a bunch of other people! I’m going to stick with believing the Creation story 100% as GOD gave it to us! You can study something 3 years, 30 years, or if it were possible 300 years, but if it’s wrong, no matter how much studying you do, won’t change the fact that it’s wrong! I’ve heard people say,”GOD said it, I believe it, and that settles it!” Actually “GOD said it,and that settles it, whether I believe it or not!”

Ricky Grimsley [01/07/2016 5:02 PM]
When what you learn contradicts the bible then you didnt learn it from the spirit of god. Sure there are areas where we argue, or discuss and we use extra-biblical sources but at the end of the day…John 17:17 KJVS
[17] Sanctify them through thy truth: thy word is truth.

Steven Medlock [01/07/2016 5:18 PM]
There’s one of my favorite poems, I think it says a lot:
The Owl-Critic
By James Thomas Fields (1817–1881)
•••••••
“WHO stuffed that white owl?”
No one spoke in the shop:
The barber was busy,
and he couldn’t stop;
The customers,
waiting their turns,
were all reading
The Daily, the Herald,
the Post, little heeding
The young man who blurted
out such a blunt question;
Not one raised a head
or even made a suggestion;
And the barber
kept on shaving.
“Don’t you see, Mister Brown,”
Cried the youth, with a frown,
“How wrong the
whole thing is,
How preposterous
each wing is,
How flattened the head is,
how jammed down the neck is—
In short, the whole owl,
what an ignorant wreck ’tis!
I make no apology;
I’ve learned owl-eology.
I’ve passed days and nights
in a hundred collections,
And cannot be blinded
to any deflections
Arising from unskilful
fingers that fail
To stuff a bird right,
from his beak to his tail.
Mister Brown! Mister Brown!
Do take that bird down,
Or you’ll soon be the laughing-stock
all over town!”
And the barber
kept on shaving.
“I’ve studied owls,
And other night fowls,
And I tell you
What I know to be true:
An owl cannot roost
With his limbs so unloosed;
No owl in this world
Ever had his claws curled,
Ever had his legs slanted,
Ever had his bill canted,
Ever had his neck screwed
Into that attitude.
He can’t do it, because
’Tis against all bird-laws
Anatomy teaches,
Ornithology preaches
An owl has a toe
That can’t turn out so!
I’ve made the white owl
my study for years,
And to see such a job
almost moves me to tears!
Mister Brown, I’m amazed
You should be
so gone crazed
As to put up a bird
In that posture absurd!
To look at that owl really
brings on a dizziness;
The man who stuffed him
don’t half know his business!”
And the barber
kept on shaving.
“Examine those eyes.
I’m filled with surprise
Taxidermists should pass
Off on you such poor glass;
So unnatural they seem
They’d make Audubon scream,
And John Burroughs laugh
To encounter such chaff.
Do take that bird down;
Have him stuffed again, Brown!”
And the barber
kept on shaving.
“With some sawdust and bark
I would stuff in the dark
An owl better than that;
I could make an old hat
Look more like an owl
Than that horrid fowl,
Stuck up there so stiff
like a side of coarse leather.
In fact, about him there’s
not one natural feather.”
Just then, with a wink
and a sly normal lurch,
The owl, very gravely,
got down from his perch,
Walked round, and regarded
his fault-finding critic
(Who thought he was stuffed)
with a glance analytic,
And then fairly hooted,
as if he should say:
“Your learning’s at fault
this time, anyway;
Don’t waste it again
on a live bird, I pray.
I’m an owl; you’re another.
Sir Critic, good-day!”
And the barber
kept on shaving.
••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••
I’m gonna keep on shaving!!!

John Kissinger [01/07/2016 5:38 PM]
So Jim Price does the presence of two writers and the need to tell and retell the story indicate later writing and/or recording for Genesis? i.e. after the building of the Second Temple when the nation of Israel needed meta-narratives and stories to restore its original national identity?