I would say that what we are seeing in the Gulf coast is what lead to so many religions having a "God/gods wiped out humanity with a flood" story. I know that many European and Asian religions had this, so did the Aztecs and other early Americans.
Floods happen all the time, and they can be devastating. We are the most powerful nation ever and we can't stop Mother Nature. What chance does a stone-age or bronze-age culture have?
Myths exist at a different level of reality than science although both have the same objective: making sense out of the universe. Myths aren't true or false. They either have meaning or they don't and so long as they have meaning they haven't been refuted.
There are many ways of considering the Bible creation story. Some people understand as a story of seven days. I don't. I tend to see the Genesis creation story as telling me that
1) things change
2) there's an order to the universe
3) human beings screw up sometimes
4) there's still hope
Well, apart from Friedman's higher critical garbage (and I say that as someone trained in higher criticism), I'd have to say that this is pretty good.
"Myth" (which, despite the attempts to say otherwise, implies the meaning of "fancy falsehood") or "religious discourse" (as I'd probably prefer to describe it) work differently than scientific or historical discourse. Simply put: Genesis is not a geology, physics, or biology textbook, and it should not be treated as if it was.
If you read a history book, and you read that Lincoln died of a gunshot wound to the head, you don't consider that to be false because, actually, the gunshot wound wasn't immediately fatal, and that the real cause of death was likely starvation of blood to the critical portions of the brain that control the vital functions, or alternatively clotting destroying brain tissue in that area. You recognize that this is a history book, and that the actual medical details are probably both unknowable at this late date and irrelevant to the issue at hand, and so you ignore the small scientific inaccuracy.
Similarly, if you read a historical aside in a science book about Edison's creation of the electrical infrastructure, do you necessarily throw the science in the book away because, technically, Tesla created much of the technology behind modern electrical infrastructure, and Edison (and his companies after him) fought him on it until Westinghouse ended the debate? No. You recognize that this is a science book, not a history book, and you feel confident that Maxwell's equations work like the book says despite the horrible injustice done to Tesla (as some might describe it).
Similarly, the creation stories do not have to line up with some evolutionary time frame, or some idea of the chronology of the fossil record. Scientific inaccuracy does not take away from the central facts of the accounts: among others, that God created the world, and that the creation of humanity was different in kind from the creation of the rest of the world. Do either of those facts change because the story says that birds came before reptiles, and current evolutionary theory says otherwise? Of course not.
Despite the objections about "myth," I have to say--most likely early tales of Genesis were written down from verbally passed-down stories. And they can therefore not be treated any different from other stories like that. They're going to diverge from each other, and there'll be multiple versions, until someone writes them down. Once written they stabilize.
Although I happen to think Friedman and others are correct that there were probably two or more earlier written documents that formed the basis of the current book we have, I can't prove it. The question would be: would anyone's faith be shaken if one or more of those documents were found? Why?
Nowhere does the Bible say--nowhere--that God put his personal seal of approval on the book of Genesis. These are just the oldest surviving remnants of those ancient tales.
Consider the number I just typed. The "first" number is "4," yes? Let's say I use my mouse to put the pointer before the 4, and type in "123."
What it would look like is
123456.
Which number is "first?" Well, if you ask which is first in the sequence that's now present, it's "1". That does not change, however, the fact that the first number I typed was "4".
If I had just done that without explaining what I had done, there would be NO way for you to know that I had actually typed "4" first.
One thing I've often considered is that God is, you know, God. He can do freaking anything. (Kinda in the definition.)
So he creates Man and Earth, see. Just took 7 days. Then he decides, like a Creator, to put in a little backstory, so creates millions of years and fits it before Man. He can do that because, you know, Master of Time and Space and all that. There are no contradictions because he's just that good at what he does.
Why do that? He's God. Like he told Job, he doesn't need to explain how he does things.
But we humans can't see events from outside time. Just like if I had just typed out 456 and then added 123 in front of it before posting this comment, you can't tell which "really" came first. Only the sequence it is now.
Andy, that's an interesting idea. The fanboy in me enjoys the notion of God retconning reality.
Good essay, Dean. If anyone wants to do a search, the notion that the "days" of Genesis represent longer periods is often called the day-age theory. It was the favored explanation at the Christian school I attended in the 70s and 80s, so I've always had a soft spot for the idea.
Nowdays I'm content to believe that God initiated the universe and "tilted" the natural laws of His creation toward the goal He wanted. Yeah, it smacks of Intelligent Design, but the way I think of it places God one step farther removed from the process, with makes physics and biology and evolutionary processes a part of the plan rather than something God selectively circumvents to realize his design.
"Simply put: Genesis is not a geology, physics, or biology textbook, and it should not be treated as if it was."
But it is a series of stories of human history. On a more careful reading the story of Noah does suggest in the face of impending floods of (biblical) proportion one ought to build an ARK or perhaps get other means of tranportation (like transit and school busses) to insure survival. Then again, Noah was instructed to take only two of each species. That is curious.
We now fast forward several millenia. There are now close to 7 billion people on planet, Earth.
Jeff: Luke never says the book of Genesis is "the law," does it?
True, that belief is is an old part of tradition--just like a lot of stuff that isn't actually in the Bible.
The first time in the Bible you can honestly say anything's unequivocally coming straight from God is the 10 commandments, and then the long detailed listings of the law in Exodus and Leviticus. Why call a creation story the law?
Extremely interesting. Thank you. This is probably the best essay I've yet seen on this whole creation vs. evolution controversy by a man who believes in the theory of evolution, indeed a man who honestly identifies himself as an atheist or non-believer in any religion.
Dean wrote:
"None of this has anything to do with science. It's mythology. That's not a dismissive thing to say either: mythology is extraordinarily important to the human spirt. We need mythology: it tells us things about ourselves, about each other, about our past, and about our future. It's not insulting to call something mythology. It should just be remembered that it is not science."
True.
and:
"As a non-believing man, I say that these myths are still wonderful and powerful, no different from any other mythology--and that mythology is truthful, powerful, important stuff. There's no reason to gild the lilly that mythology represents by trying to twist it to fit a biology textbook."
True.
I believe that Stephen A. McNallen of the Asatru Folk Assembly (formerly Asatrue Free Assembly) put it best when he said:
"Myth is the language in which the Gods speak to us."
That is abolutely true.
Thank for those links to various creation myths, including the Egyptian myths.
Andy00's analysis of God and time was extremely provocative. God (the Godhead) stands outside of time as we know it, in that higher dimension known as eternity. As somewhat of an aside, the question has been raised here as to how we can have free will if God knows everything, including the future. My thinking of that question is that of the 17th century Spanish Jesuit theologian Luis Molina. He argued that God does not know the future, since there is no such thing as "the" future, as it doesn't exist yet, but rather God knows all possible futures, or "futuribles", depending on what choices we ourselves make in the present. E.g., "If Mr. A chooses B, then C will be the case, but if Mr. A chooses D then E will be the case...."
As I'm seeing it now, there seem to be 4 types or levels of humab knowledge:
1) Science, which deals with inducing abstract generalized "lsws", repeatable patterns, from empirically observed facts.
2) Philosophy, which deals with deducing such patterns or abstract ideas from other ideas.
3) History, which deals with concrete, singular events, what one man or woman did to another at a specific time and place, their motives and the consequences of that action.
4) Myth, which is a story or history of Gods and Goddesses, often interacting with men and women. Mythology takes place in eternity but occasionally intersects with our time.
All of these are necessary. They are separate but sometimes overlap. E.g., the philosophy or history of science. An earthquake, scientifically speaking, is part of the recuring shifts of tectonic plates, but viewed from history it is a cataclysmic event. There is a history of mythology, and mythic events, as I said, at epochal times intersect with our history, e.g., the Virgin Birth of the Christ. Theology is philosophizing about mythology.
Evolution may or may not be true in a purely scientific sense. Philosophically, historically, and mythologically, the myths of the Creation and the Fall ring more true to me.
An excellent look at the Judao-Christian Bible in the context of the Near/Middle Eastern milieu in which it was written is Samuel Henry Hooke's Middle Eastern Mythology (1963). Professor Hooke discusses Mesopotamian, Egyptian, Hittite, Ugaritic, Hebrew, and Christian mythologies, and shows varioua tie-ins and parallels. The eternal Divine archetypes.
As to your question about Genesis being "Law", I believe "Law" is here a translation of Torah, which usually refers to the first five books of the Bible, including Genesis. The entire Old Testament, from what I gather, is called the Tanakh.
I'm pretty sure Dr. Luke meant to include Genesis. If this is the passage I think, then he is talking of the 'law and the prophets' which I've heard is the Jewish term for what we Christians call the Old Testament.
It is possible that he used a commonly understood term for another purpose, in order to obscure his meaning, but I tend toward plain interpretations of the Bible unless good reasons exist not too. In other words, what would an educated Jew of that time, reading his words have thought he meant?
Also, as to the dual beginnings of Genesis, I have looked at this, and satisfied myself at some years back that it is more in the nature of telling teh same tale from two different pov's or for two different purposes. Now I wish I could remember the details and conclusions better, but I don't.
And I'm skeptical of skeptics. Many aren't that good...this sort I reference, well, at times they make moonbats look clever and just. And just because one guy in a book says something.... well I've heard that the multi-author theory was debunked quite some time ago. There's been a lot of books put out by skeptics that once you get to the meat of their arguements, you're left with a few good points, and muchness of "is that all? Pull-ease" (aka its pretty pathetic, and one is surprised that a book company wasted ink and paper and money), but then perhaps one doesn't make as much money from selling pamphlets as books.
Dean makes a good point about the Bible and its incongruity with Evolution. And about how it could be Myth and still Revelation.
But I'm reminded of the non-existent Hittites who disproved the Bible, until decades later archeologists caught up to the Bible. I tend to think that the Bible will, as it has so many times before, have the last laugh.
And the "Lincoln assasination" example is clever, but not good enough. Death by gunshot wound is accurate. Granted, the other is more accurate, but that does not invalidate the first statement.
No, when the Bible says the Earth is floating on nothing, and that it is a ball, it is speaking accurately. And when it tells of history, well, lets say that the TextusReceptus, the Majority Text is the number one, number two, and almost number three most validated source of literature in the ancient world. Homer's stories come in a far distant second, 11,000 to 3,000 plus.
Historically, one should, in fairness, assume that if the Bible claims something happened, it did, unless one can mount an awesome amount of refutation.
And no I didn't look at your links. I'm just being impatient with the religious "cousins" of moonbats, the type of person who will dodge a perfectly logical interpretation to make up an inconsistency, or trim a text to create a support (kin to Dowdifying).
No one here in this post deserved my fire. Its aimed at poseurs, and sea lawyers (except sea lawyers seem an honorable breed compared to these).
Yes, I know its not in the Bible but it is one of my favorite quotations:
"...eternity becomes known from two characteristics: first, from the fact that whatever is in eternity is interminable, that is, lacking beginning and end, taking terminus as applicable to both; second, from the fact that eternity itself lacks successiveness, existing entirely at once. --- "
Thomas Aquinas.
Evolution on the other hand does not lack successiveness.
My own view is that the plain meaning of "the law" would be laws, not tales. As for prophets: Which prophet wrote the book of Genesis? So far as we can tell, none of them. Which prophet declared the book of Genesis to be scripture, to be the complete literal truth? So far as I can tell, none of them. I suppose you could call Noah or Abraham prophets, but even they are well after the creation stories.
None of the sources I linked are either moonbats or cousins to moonbats. They're either straightforward accountings of various mythologies or, in the case of Friedman, respected biblical scholars. Friedman is hardly the only one to hold his view among accepted and respected biblical scholars, and despite the efforts of some (almost entirely American, almost entirely biblicist-protestant), mostly the views he presents are considered respectable and not particularly wild or heretical by either most Jews or most Christians around the world.
Christian tradition for a very long time was that Moses wrote the first five books of the Bible, but very few people accept that view anymore. At least, not that I'm aware of. Thus raising the obvious question: so who did? And why? And why do we take it on faith (heh, heh) that everything in those first two chapters is literal truth, or was even meant to be read that way? It's not like there's any tale where God came down and dictated all that stuff, or handed a finished book to someone.
I have to admit, I don't like Andy00's version of God.
In that scenario, He gave us a brain and then told us not to use it. Your faith has to trump your intellect. In other words, you have to ignore carbon-dating, the fossil record and He must have created the light from other stars so as to make it seem as if the stars are really thousands of light years away. That seems pretty mean.
But then, using what He said to Job as an example makes sense. He was pretty mean to Job.
The Pentateuch is considered The Law, and its the beginning, and the end of the Old Testament is considered The Prophets. Its like saying from "A to Z".
According to my Scofield Bible notes, Genesis is quoted more than sixty times in the New Testament. This is one of the proofs of canonicity...that an accepted part of the canon treats another book as canon. Good enough?
As to Moses, well yes, it is probably Biblical inerrancy supporters who argue against alternate authors (indeed there is supposed to be some controversy about a NT book authorship, Hebrews??), and Thomas Jeffersonian cut your Bible to size supporters who argue for it. I'll let you guess who I find most persuasive.
Personally, I could ask my Baptist brother, the one with multiple Bible masters and a doctorate, but he'd probably just give a horse laugh at the Moses theory. I'm sure my Church of Christ father in law, who's been collecting Bible translations for forty years would be more polite, but still pretty definitive in the negative.
And since I'm lazy and pressed for time, I'll accept that arguement from authority.
The Pentateuch is considered The Law, and its the beginning, and the end of the Old Testament is considered The Prophets.
That would be tradition as held by most Christians, yes. But it's not actually in the Bible.
According to my Scofield Bible notes, Genesis is quoted more than sixty times in the New Testament. This is one of the proofs of canonicity...that an accepted part of the canon treats another book as canon. Good enough?
Good enough for what? It certainly doesn't refute anything I've said.
As for the belief that Moses wrote the Genesis and Exodus--it was Christian tradition for a very, very long time. It no longer is, because evidence and logic simply don't suppor tit. If it gets a horse's laugh, however, I hope that horse has some humility.
Floods happen all the time, and they can be devastating. We are the most powerful nation ever and we can't stop Mother Nature. What chance does a stone-age or bronze-age culture have?
There are many ways of considering the Bible creation story. Some people understand as a story of seven days. I don't. I tend to see the Genesis creation story as telling me that
1) things change
2) there's an order to the universe
3) human beings screw up sometimes
4) there's still hope
"Myth" (which, despite the attempts to say otherwise, implies the meaning of "fancy falsehood") or "religious discourse" (as I'd probably prefer to describe it) work differently than scientific or historical discourse. Simply put: Genesis is not a geology, physics, or biology textbook, and it should not be treated as if it was.
If you read a history book, and you read that Lincoln died of a gunshot wound to the head, you don't consider that to be false because, actually, the gunshot wound wasn't immediately fatal, and that the real cause of death was likely starvation of blood to the critical portions of the brain that control the vital functions, or alternatively clotting destroying brain tissue in that area. You recognize that this is a history book, and that the actual medical details are probably both unknowable at this late date and irrelevant to the issue at hand, and so you ignore the small scientific inaccuracy.
Similarly, if you read a historical aside in a science book about Edison's creation of the electrical infrastructure, do you necessarily throw the science in the book away because, technically, Tesla created much of the technology behind modern electrical infrastructure, and Edison (and his companies after him) fought him on it until Westinghouse ended the debate? No. You recognize that this is a science book, not a history book, and you feel confident that Maxwell's equations work like the book says despite the horrible injustice done to Tesla (as some might describe it).
Similarly, the creation stories do not have to line up with some evolutionary time frame, or some idea of the chronology of the fossil record. Scientific inaccuracy does not take away from the central facts of the accounts: among others, that God created the world, and that the creation of humanity was different in kind from the creation of the rest of the world. Do either of those facts change because the story says that birds came before reptiles, and current evolutionary theory says otherwise? Of course not.
Although I happen to think Friedman and others are correct that there were probably two or more earlier written documents that formed the basis of the current book we have, I can't prove it. The question would be: would anyone's faith be shaken if one or more of those documents were found? Why?
Nowhere does the Bible say--nowhere--that God put his personal seal of approval on the book of Genesis. These are just the oldest surviving remnants of those ancient tales.
Consider the number I just typed. The "first" number is "4," yes? Let's say I use my mouse to put the pointer before the 4, and type in "123."
What it would look like is
123456.
Which number is "first?" Well, if you ask which is first in the sequence that's now present, it's "1". That does not change, however, the fact that the first number I typed was "4".
If I had just done that without explaining what I had done, there would be NO way for you to know that I had actually typed "4" first.
One thing I've often considered is that God is, you know, God. He can do freaking anything. (Kinda in the definition.)
So he creates Man and Earth, see. Just took 7 days. Then he decides, like a Creator, to put in a little backstory, so creates millions of years and fits it before Man. He can do that because, you know, Master of Time and Space and all that. There are no contradictions because he's just that good at what he does.
Why do that? He's God. Like he told Job, he doesn't need to explain how he does things.
But we humans can't see events from outside time. Just like if I had just typed out 456 and then added 123 in front of it before posting this comment, you can't tell which "really" came first. Only the sequence it is now.
Good essay, Dean. If anyone wants to do a search, the notion that the "days" of Genesis represent longer periods is often called the day-age theory. It was the favored explanation at the Christian school I attended in the 70s and 80s, so I've always had a soft spot for the idea.
Nowdays I'm content to believe that God initiated the universe and "tilted" the natural laws of His creation toward the goal He wanted. Yeah, it smacks of Intelligent Design, but the way I think of it places God one step farther removed from the process, with makes physics and biology and evolutionary processes a part of the plan rather than something God selectively circumvents to realize his design.
Nowhere does the Bible say--nowhere--that God put his personal seal of approval on the book of Genesis.
Really?
But it is a series of stories of human history. On a more careful reading the story of Noah does suggest in the face of impending floods of (biblical) proportion one ought to build an ARK or perhaps get other means of tranportation (like transit and school busses) to insure survival. Then again, Noah was instructed to take only two of each species. That is curious.
We now fast forward several millenia. There are now close to 7 billion people on planet, Earth.
To be continued---
True, that belief is is an old part of tradition--just like a lot of stuff that isn't actually in the Bible.
The first time in the Bible you can honestly say anything's unequivocally coming straight from God is the 10 commandments, and then the long detailed listings of the law in Exodus and Leviticus. Why call a creation story the law?
Thanks for your thoughtful post in response to my essay request. Moreover, thanks for what you are doing to assist the victims of Katrina.
Cheers,
Dean wrote:
"None of this has anything to do with science. It's mythology. That's not a dismissive thing to say either: mythology is extraordinarily important to the human spirt. We need mythology: it tells us things about ourselves, about each other, about our past, and about our future. It's not insulting to call something mythology. It should just be remembered that it is not science."
True.
and:
"As a non-believing man, I say that these myths are still wonderful and powerful, no different from any other mythology--and that mythology is truthful, powerful, important stuff. There's no reason to gild the lilly that mythology represents by trying to twist it to fit a biology textbook."
True.
I believe that Stephen A. McNallen of the Asatru Folk Assembly (formerly Asatrue Free Assembly) put it best when he said:
"Myth is the language in which the Gods speak to us."
That is abolutely true.
Thank for those links to various creation myths, including the Egyptian myths.
Andy00's analysis of God and time was extremely provocative. God (the Godhead) stands outside of time as we know it, in that higher dimension known as eternity. As somewhat of an aside, the question has been raised here as to how we can have free will if God knows everything, including the future. My thinking of that question is that of the 17th century Spanish Jesuit theologian Luis Molina. He argued that God does not know the future, since there is no such thing as "the" future, as it doesn't exist yet, but rather God knows all possible futures, or "futuribles", depending on what choices we ourselves make in the present. E.g., "If Mr. A chooses B, then C will be the case, but if Mr. A chooses D then E will be the case...."
As I'm seeing it now, there seem to be 4 types or levels of humab knowledge:
1) Science, which deals with inducing abstract generalized "lsws", repeatable patterns, from empirically observed facts.
2) Philosophy, which deals with deducing such patterns or abstract ideas from other ideas.
3) History, which deals with concrete, singular events, what one man or woman did to another at a specific time and place, their motives and the consequences of that action.
4) Myth, which is a story or history of Gods and Goddesses, often interacting with men and women. Mythology takes place in eternity but occasionally intersects with our time.
All of these are necessary. They are separate but sometimes overlap. E.g., the philosophy or history of science. An earthquake, scientifically speaking, is part of the recuring shifts of tectonic plates, but viewed from history it is a cataclysmic event. There is a history of mythology, and mythic events, as I said, at epochal times intersect with our history, e.g., the Virgin Birth of the Christ. Theology is philosophizing about mythology.
Evolution may or may not be true in a purely scientific sense. Philosophically, historically, and mythologically, the myths of the Creation and the Fall ring more true to me.
An excellent look at the Judao-Christian Bible in the context of the Near/Middle Eastern milieu in which it was written is Samuel Henry Hooke's Middle Eastern Mythology (1963). Professor Hooke discusses Mesopotamian, Egyptian, Hittite, Ugaritic, Hebrew, and Christian mythologies, and shows varioua tie-ins and parallels. The eternal Divine archetypes.
As to your question about Genesis being "Law", I believe "Law" is here a translation of Torah, which usually refers to the first five books of the Bible, including Genesis. The entire Old Testament, from what I gather, is called the Tanakh.
Anyway, thank you.
It is possible that he used a commonly understood term for another purpose, in order to obscure his meaning, but I tend toward plain interpretations of the Bible unless good reasons exist not too. In other words, what would an educated Jew of that time, reading his words have thought he meant?
Also, as to the dual beginnings of Genesis, I have looked at this, and satisfied myself at some years back that it is more in the nature of telling teh same tale from two different pov's or for two different purposes. Now I wish I could remember the details and conclusions better, but I don't.
And I'm skeptical of skeptics. Many aren't that good...this sort I reference, well, at times they make moonbats look clever and just. And just because one guy in a book says something.... well I've heard that the multi-author theory was debunked quite some time ago. There's been a lot of books put out by skeptics that once you get to the meat of their arguements, you're left with a few good points, and muchness of "is that all? Pull-ease" (aka its pretty pathetic, and one is surprised that a book company wasted ink and paper and money), but then perhaps one doesn't make as much money from selling pamphlets as books.
Dean makes a good point about the Bible and its incongruity with Evolution. And about how it could be Myth and still Revelation.
But I'm reminded of the non-existent Hittites who disproved the Bible, until decades later archeologists caught up to the Bible. I tend to think that the Bible will, as it has so many times before, have the last laugh.
And the "Lincoln assasination" example is clever, but not good enough. Death by gunshot wound is accurate. Granted, the other is more accurate, but that does not invalidate the first statement.
No, when the Bible says the Earth is floating on nothing, and that it is a ball, it is speaking accurately. And when it tells of history, well, lets say that the Textus Receptus, the Majority Text is the number one, number two, and almost number three most validated source of literature in the ancient world. Homer's stories come in a far distant second, 11,000 to 3,000 plus.
Historically, one should, in fairness, assume that if the Bible claims something happened, it did, unless one can mount an awesome amount of refutation.
No one here in this post deserved my fire. Its aimed at poseurs, and sea lawyers (except sea lawyers seem an honorable breed compared to these).
"...eternity becomes known from two characteristics: first, from the fact that whatever is in eternity is interminable, that is, lacking beginning and end, taking terminus as applicable to both; second, from the fact that eternity itself lacks successiveness, existing entirely at once. --- "
Thomas Aquinas.
Evolution on the other hand does not lack successiveness.
I worry about stuff like this.
None of the sources I linked are either moonbats or cousins to moonbats. They're either straightforward accountings of various mythologies or, in the case of Friedman, respected biblical scholars. Friedman is hardly the only one to hold his view among accepted and respected biblical scholars, and despite the efforts of some (almost entirely American, almost entirely biblicist-protestant), mostly the views he presents are considered respectable and not particularly wild or heretical by either most Jews or most Christians around the world.
Christian tradition for a very long time was that Moses wrote the first five books of the Bible, but very few people accept that view anymore. At least, not that I'm aware of. Thus raising the obvious question: so who did? And why? And why do we take it on faith (heh, heh) that everything in those first two chapters is literal truth, or was even meant to be read that way? It's not like there's any tale where God came down and dictated all that stuff, or handed a finished book to someone.
In that scenario, He gave us a brain and then told us not to use it. Your faith has to trump your intellect. In other words, you have to ignore carbon-dating, the fossil record and He must have created the light from other stars so as to make it seem as if the stars are really thousands of light years away. That seems pretty mean.
But then, using what He said to Job as an example makes sense. He was pretty mean to Job.
According to my Scofield Bible notes, Genesis is quoted more than sixty times in the New Testament. This is one of the proofs of canonicity...that an accepted part of the canon treats another book as canon. Good enough?
As to Moses, well yes, it is probably Biblical inerrancy supporters who argue against alternate authors (indeed there is supposed to be some controversy about a NT book authorship, Hebrews??), and Thomas Jeffersonian cut your Bible to size supporters who argue for it. I'll let you guess who I find most persuasive.
Personally, I could ask my Baptist brother, the one with multiple Bible masters and a doctorate, but he'd probably just give a horse laugh at the Moses theory. I'm sure my Church of Christ father in law, who's been collecting Bible translations for forty years would be more polite, but still pretty definitive in the negative.
And since I'm lazy and pressed for time, I'll accept that arguement from authority.
That would be tradition as held by most Christians, yes. But it's not actually in the Bible.
According to my Scofield Bible notes, Genesis is quoted more than sixty times in the New Testament. This is one of the proofs of canonicity...that an accepted part of the canon treats another book as canon. Good enough?
Good enough for what? It certainly doesn't refute anything I've said.
As for the belief that Moses wrote the Genesis and Exodus--it was Christian tradition for a very, very long time. It no longer is, because evidence and logic simply don't suppor tit. If it gets a horse's laugh, however, I hope that horse has some humility.