There had always been a sophisticated tradition dating back to at least St Augustine of Hippo (354–430), with interpretations that some have considered "plainly at variance with what are commonly perceived in evangelicalism as traditional views of Genesis." Some have even erected it to "a critical tradition"[25] which in fact it was not. The Jewish tradition has also maintained a critical thread in its approach to biblical primeval history. The influential medieval philosopher Maimonides maintained a skeptical ambiguity towards creation ex nihilo (which is not said in Genesis, but in Maccabees II, which he did not consider as canonical) and perhaps considered the stories about Adam more as "philosophical anthropology, rather than as historical stories whose protagonist is the 'first man'"[26]though it is possible he simply used the anthropological implications more often than he refrred to the historical facts. Greek philosophers Aristotle,[27] Critolaus[28] and Proclus[29] held that the world was eternal. This may have influenced Maimonides, while St Thomas Aquinas considered this an opinion Aristotle was wrong about. These philosophers being Pagans of course implies they were not themselves engaged in interpreting Genesis, they were only sth which some interpreters (Christian or Jewish) took note of and had to think about.
Source: Wiki : Historicity of the Bible
a linea Genesis: Literal vs. Symbolic Interpretation
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Historicity_of_the_Bible#Genesis:_Literal_vs._Symbolic_Interpretation
What did I change?
| New readings | Was before | |
|---|---|---|
| There had always been a sophisticated tradition dating back to at least St Augustine of Hippo (354–430), with interpretations that some have considered "plainly at variance with what are commonly perceived in evangelicalism as traditional views of Genesis." Some have even erected it to "a critical tradition"[25] which in fact it was not. | There had always been a critical tradition dating back to at least St Augustine of Hippo (354–430), with interpretations "plainly at variance with what are commonly perceived in evangelicalism as traditional views of Genesis."[25] | |
| Reference 25 is to a paper by an Earth Scientist, someone really not qualified to speak about exegetic traditions by his training, however qualified he might be from private studies. As an Old Earth believer, a believer in the methods he uses as he uses them, and presumably a Christian of a sort, he has a bias to deny that Genesis was interpreted as literal truth by the Church Fathers. Here is his article:
THE CONTEMPORARY RELEVANCE OF AUGUSTINE'S VIEW OF CREATION Davis A. Young Dept. of Geology, Geography & Environmental Studies Calvin College Grand Rapids, Ml 49506 http://www.asa3.org/ASA/PSCF/1988/PSCF3-88Young.html I ask you to note the Department. Not Theology. Not Latin. Geology, Geography & Environmental Studies clearly qualify as Earth Studies, not as historical, exegetical, Classical, Medieval, or any other way Patristic studies. By the way, if anyone wants to make a similar quip against my observations on exact sciences, I'll offer it. If I am in any way qualified to speak on them, it is not by my university training, but by private studies, not as an expert, but as an outsider using logic, common sense and using what experts say (the little I know of it) in a critical and creative way. Precisely like Davis Young claims St Augustine does with Holy Writte, ecept that I will not consider what experts say as being tantamount to Holy Writte. | ||
| The influential medieval philosopher Maimonides maintained a skeptical ambiguity towards creation ex nihilo (which is not said in Genesis, but in Maccabees II, which he did not consider as canonical) ...
| The influential medieval philosopher Maimonides maintained a skeptical ambiguity towards creation ex nihilo ...
| |
| The impression is given (intentionally or not) that Maimonides had found "creatio ex nihilo" in Genesis and been sceptic about it.
The fact is that the concept is not in the text of Genesis, unless you take "beginning" as "absolute and first beginning" which is natural from context, but not grammatically obliging to someone pushing an agenda. And "creatio ex nihilo" is not even in the New Testament, since St Paul does not say God "created from nothing" but that God "created not from visible things". It is in the mother's admonition to future Maccabee martyrs, and in II Maccabees, a book which Maimonides did not find in Masoretic or close to Masoretic Tenach/Tanakh, but which Roman Catholics and Eastern Orthodox find in our versions of Old Testament. So, Maimonides being ambiguous about "creatio ex nihilo" does not make him a critical and creative exegete of Genesis. It makes him a non-Catholic and a non-Easter Orthodox Christian, etc for Christian confessions admitting II Maccabees as a canonical book inspired by God. Which we knew anyway that he was, since he was a Jew. | ||
| ... and perhaps considered the stories about Adam more as "philosophical anthropology, rather than as historical stories whose protagonist is the 'first man'"[26] though it is possible he simply used the anthropological implications more often than he referred to the historical facts.
| ... and considered the stories about Adam more as "philosophical anthropology, rather than as historical stories whose protagonist is the 'first man'"[26].
| |
| Reference 26 is Klein-Braslavy, Sara (1986). "The Creation of the world and Maimonides' interpretation of Gen. i–v". In Pines, S.; Yovel, Y. Maimonides and Philosophy (International Archives of the History of Ideas / Archives internationales d'histoire des idées). Berlin: Springer. pp. 65–78.
I suppose she was the kind of progressive Jew who would jump on an occasion of considering "Rambam" (Ra[bbi]M[oses]B[en](a)M[aimon]) as the liberal theologian she is herself. "Considering x more as y than as z" can either refer to some kind of statement by the one said to do so, "I consider x more as y than as z", or to a study of the texts of someone claimed to have considered so, and then it means when Sara studied Maimonides or any other modern scholar studied any other old writer (who was more scholarly than moderns) she or he found in the old writer x more often used as y than they found x used as z. In other words, I added "though it is possible he simply used the anthropological implications more often than he referred to the historical facts" because of this suspicion. | ||
| Greek philosophers Aristotle,[27] Critolaus[28] and Proclus[29] held that the world was eternal. This may have influenced Maimonides, while St Thomas Aquinas considered this an opinion Aristotle was wrong about. These philosophers being Pagans of course implies they were not themselves engaged in interpreting Genesis, they were only sth which some interpreters (Christian or Jewish) took note of and had to think about.
| Greek philosophers Aristotle,[27] Critolaus[28] and Proclus[29] held that the world was eternal.
| |
| I find no reason to double check the references for the Greek philosophers. For Aristotle I already knew this from reading St Thomas Aquinas. I have no distrust for those who claim Critolaus and Proclus stated same or similar opinion.
I added what I added that readers might not in the future unawares come to believe that Aristotle held any kind of opinion about the text of Genesis or its interprettation. He was simply outside the debate, though he, like later Hutton and Darwin, have come to influence those who are in it. In different ways. | ||
This is the kind of awareness with which I study my contemporaries. I have far more trust in St Thomas Aquinas, Maimonides and Aristotle coming to the question with a scholarly attitude, than I have for Davis A. Young or Sara Klein-Braslavy doing so. Modern Academia has a spirit of scepticism against Bible and naiveté in scholarship contradicting it, which shows in some directly sloppy scholarship about how St Augustine or Maimonides approached the question.
Now, as for Sara, she might later on in the article have added the qualifications I am asking for, or she may not. But for Davis A. Young, I know that type, and that type is one reason I prefer judges of Galileo over Modern Protestants.
I prefer honest though mistaken literalism (at the time I made the preference I still considered Geocentrism to be probably mistaken) over a non-literalism which, however seemingly honest in its philosophical assumptions and theological assumptions (not that I found much honesty even there) is clearly slipshod and dishonest about older scholars with some claim to canonicity of exegesis (like St Augustine for Christians or Maimonides for Jews), because otherwise they do not have the precedence in tradition which more literalminded interpreters very rightly claim to have.
Hans Georg Lundahl
Nanterre UL
St Paphnutius Bishop*
11-IX-2015
* In Aegypto sancti Paphnutii Episcopi, qui unus fuit ex iis Confessoribus, qui, sub Galerio Maximiano Imperatore, dextro oculo effosso et sinistro poplite exciso, ad metalla damnati fuerunt; deinde, sub Constantino Magno, adversus Arianos, pro fide catholica, strenue decertavit; et demum, multis coronis auctus, in pace quievit.
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