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Do Genesis 1 and 2 Contradict? [W:178]

afr0byte said:
OK, then how do people know they're experiencing Jesus? People seem to claim that all the time.
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Well ... Most who do that are trinitarians who say Jesus is God, when the describe their experience however, it's generally not that differant than other religious experiences.
 
ecofarm said:
Gen 2 does not say "the Lord formed". It says "the Lord had formed". Past tense alone does not account for the "had" before "formed".
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Depends on which version you are reading. Some have "had" and some don't

NIV _ Genesis 2:19-20
19 Now the Lord God had formed out of the ground all the wild animals and all the birds in the sky. He brought them to the man to see what he would name them; and whatever the man called each living creature, that was its name. 20 So the man gave names to all the livestock, the birds in the sky and all the wild animals.
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NASB
19 Out of the ground the Lord God formed every beast of the field and every bird of the [p]sky, and brought them to the man to see what he would call them; and whatever the man called a living creature, that was its name. 20 The man gave names to all the cattle, and to the birds of the [q]sky, and to every beast of the field, but for [r]Adam there was not found a helper [s]suitable for him.
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p & q: Literally "heavens"
r: Or "man"
s: Literally "corresponding to"

Complete Jewish Bible
19 So from the ground Adonai, God, formed every wild animal and every bird that flies in the air, and he brought them to the person to see what he would call them. Whatever the person would call each living creature, that was to be its name. 20 So the person gave names to all the livestock, to the birds in the air and to every wild animal. But for Adam there was not found a companion suitable for helping him.
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21st Century KJV
19 And out of the ground the Lord God formed every beast of the field, and every fowl of the air, and brought them unto Adam to see what he would call them; and whatsoever Adam called every living creature, that was the name thereof.

20 And Adam gave names to all cattle, and to the fowl of the air, and to every beast of the field; but for Adam there was not found a helper meet for him.
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Young's Literal Translation
19 And Jehovah God formeth from the ground every beast of the field, and every fowl of the heavens, and bringeth in unto the man, to see what he doth call it; and whatever the man calleth a living creature, that [is] its name.

20 And the man calleth names to all the cattle, and to fowl of the heavens, and to every beast of the field; and to man hath not been found an helper -- as his counterpart.
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Orthodox Jewish Bible
19 And out of the adamah Hashem Elohim formed every beast of the sadeh, and every oph HaShomayim; and brought them unto the adam to see what he would name them; and whatsoever the adam named kol nefesh chayyah, that was shmo.

20 And the adam gave shemot to all behemah, and to the oph HaShomayim, and to every beast of the sadeh; but for Adam there was not found an ezer for him.
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"adam" means man; "Adam" is the name of the first man
"adamah" can be either "ground" or "earth"

NRSV
19 So out of the ground the Lord God formed every animal of the field and every bird of the air, and brought them to the man to see what he would call them; and whatever the man called every living creature, that was its name. 20 The man gave names to all cattle, and to the birds of the air, and to every animal of the field; but for the man[c] there was not found a helper as his partner
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1599 Geneva Bible
19 So the Lord God formed of the earth every beast of the field, and every fowl of the heaven, and brought them unto the man to see how he would call them: for howsoever the man named the living creature, so was the name thereof.

20 The man therefore gave names unto all cattle, and to the fowl of the heaven, and to every beast of the field: but for Adam found he not an helper meet for him.
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Seems most of them don't have the phrase "had formed", but it is verse 18 that would appear to indicate that "man" was formed first and then came the animals
18 Also the Lord God said, It is not good that the man should be himself alone: I will make him an help meet for him.
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Verse 19 then begins: "So the Lord God formed of the earth every beast of the field . . ."
 
Somerville said:
Depends on which version you are reading. Some have "had" and some don't
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Thanks.

I'll present a new angle:

The OT was all written about the same time, ~500BC during the exile, as an attempt to record a thousand years of oral history/beliefs. Being all assembled at the same time, those scholars would not have created such a contradiction.
 
ecofarm said:
Thanks.

I'll present a new angle:

The OT was all written about the same time, ~500BC during the exile, as an attempt to record a thousand years of oral history. Being all assembled at the same time, those scholars would not have created such a contradiction.
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Nope, doesn't work. The most recent scholarly research indicates a much wider spread in the time of composition for the various books found in the Old Testament. There are portions of the first five books that date back to the 12th century BCE although the present form of the Pentateuch was created after the Babylonian Exile period - 597 to 538 BCE

The various books of the Prophets were written between the 8th and 6th centuries BCE. The final form of the Old Testament as we know it probably was created by editing and compiling all of the books sometime between the 5th and 3rd centuries BCE

There are multiple contradictions to be found in the Old Testament. Many scholars think today that Genesis 1 and 2 were written more than one hundred years apart in the 8th and 9th centuries BCE and the tales combined by the post-exilic editors of the 6th century BCE, even though it is evident that they were about two different gods.
 
ecofarm said:
I'll present a new angle:

The OT was all written about the same time, ~500BC during the exile, as an attempt to record a thousand years of oral history/beliefs. Being all assembled at the same time, those scholars would not have created such a contradiction.
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Another hypothesis might be that perhaps they didn't care about the apparent minor contradiction because what actually mattered was not the order of events, but instead it was the lessons contained within the story that actually mattered to them.

That explanation makes the most sense to me. Who cares about the order of the events? There's no lesson there. It's not a history book, it's a book of lessons.
 
Tucker Case said:
Another hypothesis might be that perhaps they didn't care about the apparent minor contradiction because what actually mattered was not the order of events, but instead it was the lessons contained within the story that actually mattered to them.

That explanation makes the most sense to me. Who cares about the order of the events? There's no lesson there. It's not a history book, it's a book of lessons.
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Other parts of the Bible (NT at least) ignore chronology as well, especially the Gospels. I've seen this argument before, regarding the Gospels, but not regarding Gen. Do we have other examples of chronology being ignored in the OT?
 
Somerville said:
Nope, doesn't work. The most recent scholarly research indicates a much wider spread in the time of composition for the various books found in the Old Testament. There are portions of the first five books that date back to the 12th century BCE although the present form of the Pentateuch was created after the Babylonian Exile period - 597 to 538 BCE

The various books of the Prophets were written between the 8th and 6th centuries BCE. The final form of the Old Testament as we know it probably was created by editing and compiling all of the books sometime between the 5th and 3rd centuries BCE

There are multiple contradictions to be found in the Old Testament. Many scholars think today that Genesis 1 and 2 were written more than one hundred years apart in the 8th and 9th centuries BCE and the tales combined by the post-exilic editors of the 6th century BCE, even though it is evident that they were about two different gods.
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What evidence do we have that anything was written (I suppose I should say 'compiled') before 500bc? To my knowledge the Dead Sea Scrolls are the oldest texts we have, and they date only as far back as 300bc.

If each piece was written earlier, why would the scholars/scribes not fix the inconsequential sentence order or verb tense.
 
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ecofarm said:
What evidence do we have that anything was written (I suppose I should say 'compiled') before 500bc? To my knowledge the Dead Sea Scrolls are the oldest texts we have, and they date only as far back as 300bc.

If each piece was written earlier, why would the scholars/scribes not fix the inconsequential sentence order or verb tense.
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For one, we know who the authors were and the time periods they lived.
 
ecofarm said:
Other parts of the Bible (NT at least) ignore chronology as well, especially the Gospels. I've seen this argument before, regarding the Gospels, but not regarding Gen. Do we have other examples of chronology being ignored in the OT?
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There's at least some evidence that the OT cares less about chronology than it does about lessons. There are some chronological issues regarding Saul knowing David between 1 Samuel 16 and 17. The lessons contained aren't affected by such inconsequential chronological issues.
 
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