Adam was the first man…or was he?
Religion has taught us one story while in school we learn of another. Both seem to contradict each other but is it really a contradiction? Why are we willing to accept the idea of an ultimate creator but deny one of its creations? If God is the creator of everything then that includes science right?
Proverbs 30:5-6
5 Every word of God proves true;
he is a shield to those who take refuge in him.
6 Do not add to his words,
lest he rebuke you and you be found a liar.
Believers take comfort in this particular scripture and accept it on faith that man will not add to, change, or tamper with “God’s Word” in any manner. How do we know it wasn’t placed there by authors who knew all of it was a lie? The thought of this makes some of us extremely nervous. The very foundation of a belief system shaken because of a silly thing called science.
If God is the Creator of All, why does it even matter? People have a problem accepting the practicality of Darwin, but he may have been on to something. He speaks of man evolving physically from Neanderthals, Cro-Magnons, and Homo Sapiens blowing the lid off traditional thought of one source. Could there be elements of Darwin’s theory in Scripture?
Genesis 1:26
Then God said, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness. And let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over the livestock and over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.”
According to science unforseen circumstances catapulted man to the top of the food chain. Is it hard to assume then, life didn’t go on as ‘God was creating it’ just as it does today or that we wouldn’t be able to tether a dinosaur to a leash?
Genesis 2:1-3
1Thus the heavens and the earth were finished, and all the host of them. 2And on the seventh day God finished his work that he had done, and he rested on the seventh day from all his work that he had done. 3So God blessed the seventh day and made it holy, because on it God rested from all his work that he had done in creation.
Can Christians accept this particular verse as proof that ‘humans’ were just created in first chapter and not anyone in particular? It would definately explain the gaping hole between the first verse and second verse of chapter 2 and why the story seems to repeat itself. We have all the proof we need that Earth existed long before man whether it be six days or six millenia, so maybe consideration should be made for the language used instead of depending on a literal translation.
Most of us have depended on the expertise of someone else to translate and interpret various texts so that we may obtain meaning. What needs to be understood is more is involved in the process than matching word for word. What happens to ideas when there is no literal translation from language to language? What about comparative and relative language that is translated literally when an interpretation should be made because of cultural or regional differences? Will our descendants think we have magical powers while reading our texts in the future because of statements like He left in a flash or She appeared out of no where?
Were colloquialisms and regional dialects even considered? Could raining fire and brimstone be interpreted as an active lava flow descending from a mountain into an occupied valley, a pyroclastic explosion with a superheated debis field, or a combination of the two? It was enough to scare the life right out of Mrs. Lot.
Genesis 2:7
7 Then the LORD God formed the man of dust from the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living creature.
Ecclesiates 3:18-20
18I said in my heart with regard to the children of man that God is testing them that they may see that they themselves are but beasts. 19For what happens to the children of man and what happens to the beasts is the same; as one dies, so dies the other. They all have the same breath, and man has no advantage over the beasts, for all is vanity. 20All go to one place. All are from the dust, and to dust all return.
Beast? Did I read that correctly? No advantage over the beasts…vanity? What is the major difference between man and beast?
Isaiah 52
1Awake, awake, put on your strength, O Zion; put on your beautiful garments, O Jerusalem, the holy city; for there shall no more come into you the uncircumcised and the unclean.2Shake yourself from the dust and arise; be seated, O Jerusalem; loose the bonds from your neck, O captive daughter of Zion.
We can plainly see from Isaiah the meaning of dust is not necessarily dirt from the ground but maybe knowledge of God’s law and the meaning of creation. So what does that say for Eve? Scripture tells us she was created from Adam’s rib. Maybe she was a cousin or from a neighboring tribe, but Eve would have had to been enlightened or well on her way being described as a suitable help-mate for Adam.
Ezekiel 37:1-6
1 The hand of the LORD was upon me, and he brought me out in the Spirit of the LORD and set me down in the middle of the valley; it was full of bones. 2And he led me around among them, and behold, there were very many on the surface of the valley, and behold, they were very dry. 3And he said to me, “Son of man, can these bones live?” And I answered, “O Lord GOD, you know.” 4Then he said to me, “Prophesy over these bones, and say to them, O dry bones, hear the word of the LORD. 5Thus says the Lord GOD to these bones: Behold, I will cause breath to enter you, and you shall live. 6And I will lay sinews upon you, and will cause flesh to come upon you, and cover you with skin, and put breath in you, and you shall live, and you shall know that I am the LORD.”
This has a familiar tone for fans of the historial novel The Clan of the Cave Bear by Jane Auel. Ayla is a Cro-Magnon five-year old orphaned in the aftermath of an earthquake. Too young to care for herself, she adopted by a Neanderthal tribe driven from their cave by the same earthquake. It maybe fiction, but this story depicts the physical, social, and psychological differences between the species as the child grows to womanhood giving the reader a clue as to how life may have been for an awakening Adam and Eve.
This brings new meaning as to what could have happened in the garden doesn’t it? There is scientific proof the different species of man coexisted together, but is there biblical proof? Adam and Eve were expelled from the garden because they ate of the tree in the midst of the garden. What kind of tree?
Ezekiel 31:3-9
3Behold, Assyria was a cedar in Lebanon, with beautiful branches and forest shade, and of towering height, its top among the clouds. 4The waters nourished it; the deep made it grow tall, making its rivers flow around the place of its planting, sending forth its streams to all the trees of the field. 5So it towered high above all the trees of the field; its boughs grew large and its branches long from abundant water in its shoots. 6All the birds of the heavens made their nests in its boughs; under its branches all the beasts of the field gave birth to their young, and under its shadow lived all great nations. 7It was beautiful in its greatness, in the length of its branches; for its roots went down to abundant waters. 8 The cedars in the garden of God could not rival it, nor the fir trees equal its boughs; neither were the plane trees like its branches; no tree in the garden of God was its equal in beauty. 9I made it beautiful in the mass of its branches, and all the trees of Eden envied it, that were in the garden of God.
Tree is an obvious metaphor for a country or city-state within an empire (forest). We learn from scripture the serpent tricked Eve into committing a sin she later shares with Adam. A violation so grave they are immediately evicted from (the empire-forest) Eden. Adam would have build his own nation as did Cain after he murdered his brother.
This new revelation of Adam makes me wonder. What happened to the other ‘trees’ in the garden? Is science our proof that God really does exist?
