Puritan Sailor
Puritan Board Doctor
Huh? Where do you get this?Originally posted by jdlongmire
They were the Pre-Fall remnants of Adam and Eve's line marrying post-Fall humans.
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Huh? Where do you get this?Originally posted by jdlongmire
They were the Pre-Fall remnants of Adam and Eve's line marrying post-Fall humans.
Originally posted by puritansailor
Huh? Where do you get this?Originally posted by jdlongmire
They were the Pre-Fall remnants of Adam and Eve's line marrying post-Fall humans.
Genesis calls these supernatural beings "Nephilim" (translated "giants" in some Bibles), an obscure Hebrew word that may have the nuance of "fallen" beings - http://www.beliefnet.com/story/33/story_3389_1.html
Originally posted by jdlongmire
Originally posted by puritansailor
Huh? Where do you get this?Originally posted by jdlongmire
They were the Pre-Fall remnants of Adam and Eve's line marrying post-Fall humans.
Genesis calls these supernatural beings "Nephilim" (translated "giants" in some Bibles), an obscure Hebrew word that may have the nuance of "fallen" beings - http://www.beliefnet.com/story/33/story_3389_1.html
They would be the epitome of "fallen" ones...
[Edited on 2-5-2005 by jdlongmire]
And how would you reconcile this view with the clear teaching of Scrpture that all men fell in Adam, and have Adams sin imputed to them (Romans 5)?
Originally posted by Contra_Mundum
JD,
The idea of pre-fall children for Adam and Eve is pretty far-fetched.
Originally posted by Augusta
Here is a catholic encyclopedia "New Advent" that mentions what those in the early church thought of the book of Enoch and those after.
Originally posted by Augusta
SIS? Here is where Enoch is quoted in Jude.
Jude 1:14-15 "And Enoch also, the seventh from Adam, prophesied of these, saying, Behold, the Lord cometh with ten thousands of his saints, {15} To execute judgment upon all, and to convince all that are ungodly among them of all their ungodly deeds which they have ungodly committed, and of all their hard speeches which ungodly sinners have spoken against him."
This is a direct quote of 1 Enoch 1:9:
And behold! He cometh with ten thousands of His holy ones
To execute judgment upon all,
And to destroy all the ungodly:
And to convict all flesh
Of all the works of their ungodliness which they have ungodly committed,
And of all the hard things which ungodly sinners have spoken against Him.
Originally posted by jdlongmire
Originally posted by Contra_Mundum
JD,
The idea of pre-fall children for Adam and Eve is pretty far-fetched.
Bruce, no offense taken - especially as this is a non-salvific issue - whether there were children pre-Fall would not have made any difference...the "act" was federally representative and affected all humankind throughout "temporality".
However, I do not think it is a contextually far fetched as you may think...
Genesis 3:20
The man called his wife's name Eve, [Eve sounds like the Hebrew for life-giver and resembles the word for living] because she was the mother of all living.
not all to live, but all living - looks like she did not have, or need a name until after the Fall...probably something to do with the capacity endowed from eating of the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil.
"fallen ones" would also more aptly fit the pre-Fall children in contrast to the "death-born" children...
[Edited on 2-6-2005 by jdlongmire]
Originally posted by puritansailor
This does have salvific implications. If you're going to argue that "pre-fallen" descendents of Adam also had Adam's sin imputed to them, then you have some serious issues here. The Bible states that only Adam and Eve fell, and that Adam's sin is imputed to all his descendents. If their were pre-fallen descendents of Adam, then that means they were already living righteous lives for God on their own. For God to impute Adam's sin to those whom were otherwise living unfallen and righteously before Him, and then corrupt their natures toward sin, completely compromises the uniqueness of Adam as federal head and the justice of God, because He is imputing sin to righteous men unto damnation who were already living holy lives to God.
Bottom line is, even if the books had impeccable credentials (and the don't) they would be of little more use to us than, say, the Apocrypha, the Egyptian Book of the Dead, or other ancient literature. Their reliability would have to rest on the faith we had in the Scriptures, and their conformity to the facts it records. As it stands, what they give us is connectivity at three or four biblical verse references, and (in the case of Jashar) a lot of "fill in the gaps" mythology and legend.
Here's a principle of justice: if your "federal head" is guilty of a crime, but you are not implicated in that crime, you have redress to the superior agent--You get to say "I plead your justice, O King; I repudiate my allegiance which I formerly duly owed to my lord, because of his rebellion, and I pledge it again to you; my life is yours."
If we had no sins of our own to answer for (and all of us do), we would have to make a choice--stick with Adam in rebellion, in which case we would now have our own sin to answer for, or plead the mercy of God not to judge us for our association with Adam, and to request a faithful head. We would not want to remain rebels-by-association. It appears to me consistent with biblical principles reflective of God's character that he would certainly let anyone in such a situation out from under the condemnation.
So, JD, in light of this principle of justice, how can we make sense of a pre-fall race of Adamites, living in obedience to God, but condemned. I just think such thinking is doomed to wander farther into unfounded speculations...
Originally posted by Contra_Mundum
Traci,
The phrase "sons of God" has got to be contextually determined. After all the NT uses the same phrase, and uses it to refer to Christians, and not to angels. So, just because we find the phrase used in Job of angels (we think), we cannot thereby say that it has to mean just that in any other occasion of its use.
The book of Jashar referenced above is almost certainly "one of the last compositions of the haggadic lit.[erature] of Judaism... It is believed by some scholars that this attempt to reconstruct the OT Book of Jashar originated in southern Italy. The author was familiar with Italian place names. The Arab.[ic] names in the book are due to the strong influence of Arab.[ic] culture on southern Italy." (Zondervan Pictoral Encyclopedia of the Bible, #3, p.407). This would place it's composition sometime in the early church age. Even if it draws on ancient traditions (a mere guess) there is no way to separate the fact from the fiction. So, the book is basically useless to us as far as reliable information goes.
The book of Enoch is without question Jewish apocalyptic (time period of bracketting our Lord's days on the earth, 200BC-100AD), and it seems that the biblical writer Jude was familiar with it. It is not outside therealm of possibility that it even contained some reliable tradition, including prophecy (which is now preserved in Scripture making Enoch's leftovers irrelevant). However, making use of the book and treating it as an authoritative source are two different things. After all, biblical writers from Moses to Paul referred to extrabiblical literature of their day. More germane to the touchy issue of inspiration is that words Jude actually puts into the mouths of his speakers, Michael and Enoch, are actual Old Testament verses, Zech. 3:2 and Deut. 33:2. In other words, the words he attributes to them are already inspired words.
Bottom line is, even if the books had impeccable credentials (and the don't) they would be of little more use to us than, say, the Apocrypha, the Egyptian Book of the Dead, or other ancient literature. Their reliability would have to rest on the faith we had in the Scriptures, and their conformity to the facts it records. As it stands, what they give us is connectivity at three or four biblical verse references, and (in the case of Jashar) a lot of "fill in the gaps" mythology and legend.
[Edited on 2-6-2005 by Contra_Mundum]
Originally posted by jdlongmire
Here's a principle of justice: if your "federal head" is guilty of a crime, but you are not implicated in that crime, you have redress to the superior agent--You get to say "I plead your justice, O King; I repudiate my allegiance which I formerly duly owed to my lord, because of his rebellion, and I pledge it again to you; my life is yours."
If we had no sins of our own to answer for (and all of us do), we would have to make a choice--stick with Adam in rebellion, in which case we would now have our own sin to answer for, or plead the mercy of God not to judge us for our association with Adam, and to request a faithful head. We would not want to remain rebels-by-association. It appears to me consistent with biblical principles reflective of God's character that he would certainly let anyone in such a situation out from under the condemnation.
So, JD, in light of this principle of justice, how can we make sense of a pre-fall race of Adamites, living in obedience to God, but condemned. I just think such thinking is doomed to wander farther into unfounded speculations...
How do you reconcile the Scripture I quoted as support with your reasoning?
Exodus 34:7
keeping steadfast love for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, but who will by no means clear the guilty, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children and the children's children, to the third and the fourth generation."
How does that fit your principles of Justice? Does this not support my position? Does this not align itself with God's revealed character?
The Fall was Universal - God's Justice demanded that Adam and Eve, as well as their descendants, realized or potential, should have been destroyed instantly. God's mercy and will allowed for them to continue, so the Curse was placed on them as temporal punishment. The result of the Tree of Knowledge would have also been Universal. These are all Universally efficacious events.
So then, ALL would have Knowledge of Good and Evil, the Curse would have gone into effect, and ALL mankind would begin sinning.
...ouch...is that a "nice" way of saying I am dabbling in heresy?...doomed to wander farther into unfounded speculations...
1 Thessalonians 5
21Test everything. Hold on to the good.
[Edited on 2-6-2005 by jdlongmire]
No, as I said above when I mentioned cults, I don't want you feel like I'm laying it down on ya. "Dabbling in heresy" is a strong brew. I don't believe you are doing that, although I do think you are wrong about this, and error is the handmaid to heresy (ultimately). You are asking questions and trying to get a grip on God's truth. That's a process and we all tend to "adjust our grip" over time, sometimes completely turning the thing around or ourselves around before we get it right. Patrick is right too, when he points out there is a genuine tie-in to salvation, although what you've said so far only touches on "hypothetical" people who aren't around anymore anyway....ouch...is that a "nice" way of saying I am dabbling in heresy?