DMcG asks: Who has the authority to say how Genesis 2 is 'intended' to be read?

Maybe that's the wrong question. Maybe it should not be a matter of "authority" at all. Maybe is should be a matter of "credibility."

Modern biblical criticism is a fascinating field of study. It starts without assumptions, and leaves no question unasked. And the answers it comes up with, are quite credible. This is quite different from the fundamentalist approach, which considers the Bible as the ultimate authority. This forces the fundamentalists to do all sorts of fancy dance steps to prove the truth of their preconceptions.

Genesis 1 and 2 are two wonderful presentations of creation myths. They are a very strong and valuable statements of the faith the Hebrew people had in their God and their relationship with that God. To try to make these creation stories into some sort of scientific treatise, is ludicrous. Dancing around to try to "prove" the Bible, makes a laughingstock of a sacred document of faith.

I want to repeat what Bill D had to say about religious faith, because I think what he says has a lot of value: Religion is one way of coping and expressing wonder and sharing comforting thoughts about life & death with others....and it is easy to see why humans developed religious feelings. It is hard, though, to see why they cling to demonstrably inaccurate ideas about science as we learn more.

I think there are two sorts of religious people. Bill's first sentence applies to one kind of religious people, and his second sentence applies to the other kind. I think a lot of people, perhaps particularly Americans, have a hard time with abstractions and uncertainties. For them, everything must be concrete and certain. They live their lives by rules and doctrines and obedience and authority, while other prefer to live by principles and questions and explorations and freedom and credibility. Those interested in credibility over authority, don't tend to try to find answers to scientific questions in religion.


-Joe-