While I was studying Genesis 1's account of creation I noticed something that didn't seen right. Back in verse 27 of Genesis 1, I saw the creation of man in the image of God. I want to stop right there and point out something that I found interesting while I was studying this verse. The Hebrew word translated as "man" is H120 in the Strong's. Now that is all well and good until I noticed that the name "Adam" was from the Hebrew H121. So what is the problem? If you don't speak Hebrew you would never know that these two words are the exact same word. Strong decided to give the one word two different reference numbers even though it is the same word. That is a problem. How do you know when you should translate one as "Adam" and one as "man". It is a highly subjective decision process that can be very easily mistranslated based upon someone's opinion of what they think it means. I hope you understand the problem. You see I for one believe after searching the Bible for occurrences of these words that sometimes they did it right and a couple of times I believe they did wrong. Uh oh!
Look at verse 27 and see what changes if I change the one word. "So God created Adam in his image, in the image of God created he him, male and female created he them". Nothing super dramatic changed. Was it completely different, not really. The original said "man" my version said "Adam". But since they are the same word in the Hebrew which one is right? Verse 27 actually contains a major contradiction or puzzle. Did you notice it? It said at first God created him, and then it says God created them. I really haven't gotten to the creation of the woman even though she is mentioned for the first time in this verse. As I get into chapter 2 of Genesis we will begin to see that it really is just a more in depth look at some specifics that occurred in chapter 1. More detail is given to us and a more in depth look at some very huge subjects such as God's definition of marriage.
Getting back to the puzzle of verse 27 what is the solution to the contradiction? This is why I believe the word should be "Adam". When God created the male and the female God called both of their name "Adam". It use to be common practice for women to take the name of their husbands when they got married, so that they were both called by the same name. When we get to chapter 2 of Genesis we will see why more clearly. So why did God call both of them Adam? Maybe we should stop and say did God call them both Adam? There is actually a confirming scripture that says this later in Genesis. Look at this verse in Genesis 5:2:
Genesis 5:2 Male and female created He them; and blessed them, and called their name "Adam" in the day that they were created.
It is amazing what the Bible says when you look at it. This verse is speaking about the account we just read in Genesis 1:27 but this time it is worded correctly and stated accurately. These are the kind of little quirky things that you just need to become aware of when you read and study the Bible. The translators were men and they sometimes made mistakes. Every translation has some problems, but none that can't be solved by studying.
Thursday, October 29, 2009
Sunday, October 25, 2009
Genesis 3:1 Was there a Talking Snake in the Garden?
Was there a talking snake in the Garden of Eden? Did a snake slither up to Adam and Eve and start a conversation with them to deceive them? I'm sure most of you have seen the paintings of the temptation, the naked man and woman holding an apple with the snake near by. We've all heard this story taught this way in Sunday School as a child. However, is this what the Bible says? Do we take every scripture literally in the Bible? Do we know when to take something literally and when to know that it is just a symbolic reference. Too many Christians want to take everything completely and totally as if the Bible was written in a text book style. But the problem is that the book is not a textbook and it contains many, many mysteries, puzzles and hidden truths that are not self-evident on surface only reading of the text. The Bible is written in a multitude of literary styles and God purposely hid many of the truths not from us, but for us to find. So here is the challenge how do you encode secrets for someone to find without using a standard encryption system. The government encrypts information to keep it out of the hands of other governments. Web sites encrypt credit card and customer information to keep it out of the hands of criminals. What we can see is that God obviously had an enemy that was trying to steal information and use it against us. So God encoded the text and the message within so that He could reveal it at the appropriate time, which I believe is now.
So the question remains was there a talking snake in the garden? I'll have to tell right now that there is absolutely no way based upon scripture that there was a physical talking snake. You see where I stand so let's find out why. Here is what the beginning of Genesis 3:1 says to us, read it very carefully and then I'll explain it.
Let's do some close analysis of the exact wording of this verse. This is what the Holy Spirit said to me when I studied the verse and it changed my perspective dramatically when I saw it. I read this verse and the Holy Spirit asked me this question, "Did you notice that didn't say 'other'?". I immediately knew what He was talking about. When I studied Geometry in High School, I remember a part of the class dealt with "sets" and "set theory". Do you understand what a set is? A set is a grouping of related items. Within sets you can also have subsets. Then you can have multiple sets with some common or overlapping members that are in more than one set. For example, a set could be Animals, under that could be a subset of mammals, under that could be a subset of birds, fish, land animals and on and on. Each set or subset is a grouping of related items. In other words every member of the set has the same characteristics and can be easily identified as belonging to the group. So why did I go through all of that math explanation and overview? Do you see it? What would change if you added the word "other" to the verse? Read this and see what changes:
Now do you see it? What comprises the set "beasts of the field"? What are members of that set? Isn't a snake one of those beasts of the field that the Lord God made? So what happens when you take out the word "other" like the verse really says. The conclusion has to be that the serpent was not a member of that category of the made or created creatures of the field. In other words, there was no physical talking snake based just upon reading and understanding this verse correctly. So let's find some other scriptures that help us to confirm what I just taught you. Here is one verse that I know most don't immediately associate with Genesis, but it is related even though you've never seen it.
What are we talking about that occurred in Genesis 3? Of course we are talking about the temptation of Adam and Eve by the serpent. So what does God tell us about temptation in 1 Corinthians? He says every time we are tempted by the enemy it is a common occurrence. In other words it is natural, not supernatural. Did you realize that it is illegal for Satan to tempt you supernaturally? Have you ever seen a talking snake? I've been to many zoos and if there were any talking snakes, I didn't see any. No you see a talking snake would be a supernatural temptation and that would not be common to man. We can therefore conclude that this would be illegal and if Satan can't tempt you this way, he can't tempt Eve that way either. This scripture is an example of a universal truth. In other words this scripture applies across the board to every person in the human race. There are some scriptures that only apply to Israel, there are some scriptures that only apply to men, some to women, some to the church, some to whatever. However, there are those scriptures like this one that will apply to everyone. These represent spiritual laws and God enforces these. The Bible says God watches over his words to perform them and this would be an example.
Have you ever been tempted by Satan? Sure you have whether you admit it or not. How did he come to you and try to tempt you? It was in your mind, by using your thought life to tempt you to do something that you shouldn't, say something you shouldn't, or whatever. If Satan tempted you this way, then he tempted Eve this way. Do you think we can find any scripture to confirm this? Of course we can if we look:
It is amazing what the Bible says when you look for it and understand it and apply it to Genesis 3 correctly. You see this verse is written to the church and it said Eve was deceived by the serpent because of his trickery. But did you notice how he did it? It was in Eve's mind, not a talking snake in the garden. Satan is still the subtle deceiver and he works and operates in the same way that he has always worked. He tries to deceive you in through same avenues in your mind. That is why we are instructed in the Bible this way:.
Apparently our minds are still the battle grounds for the enemy and we are responsible to police them and exercise our authority to keep the enemy out of them.
Now we have a problem for those who want to take every scripture literally. You see the problem is that the serpent is a purely symbolic reference to a spiritual being not directly named or identified in the book of Genesis. However, that does not mean God did not identify who the serpent was later. We just have to find it:
We can see from this verse in Revelation the true identity of the symbolic serpent is given to us to be Satan, the deceiver. This verse also contains another symbolic reference and calls Satan the great dragon. Apparently Satan's strength and ability has increased substantially at the end more than he had at the beginning. You can see why God used a symbolic reference in both places. By comparing these two symbolic references we can gain additional information about this enemy. So we just learned a valuable lesson, of why we can't take everything in the Bible literally. Then we also learned that we can't study any book of the Bible independently in a vacuum. We must use the Bible to interpret the Bible. We must see what God's says about the subject in other places because He always provides additional information that is critical for us to see in order to correctly understand what is being taught.
That is why I can say with confidence that there was no physical talking snake in the Garden of Eden!
So the question remains was there a talking snake in the garden? I'll have to tell right now that there is absolutely no way based upon scripture that there was a physical talking snake. You see where I stand so let's find out why. Here is what the beginning of Genesis 3:1 says to us, read it very carefully and then I'll explain it.
Genesis 3:1 Now the serpent was more subtle than any beast of the field that the Lord God had made.
Let's do some close analysis of the exact wording of this verse. This is what the Holy Spirit said to me when I studied the verse and it changed my perspective dramatically when I saw it. I read this verse and the Holy Spirit asked me this question, "Did you notice that didn't say 'other'?". I immediately knew what He was talking about. When I studied Geometry in High School, I remember a part of the class dealt with "sets" and "set theory". Do you understand what a set is? A set is a grouping of related items. Within sets you can also have subsets. Then you can have multiple sets with some common or overlapping members that are in more than one set. For example, a set could be Animals, under that could be a subset of mammals, under that could be a subset of birds, fish, land animals and on and on. Each set or subset is a grouping of related items. In other words every member of the set has the same characteristics and can be easily identified as belonging to the group. So why did I go through all of that math explanation and overview? Do you see it? What would change if you added the word "other" to the verse? Read this and see what changes:
Genesis 3:1 Now the serpent was more subtle than any "OTHER" beast of the field that the Lord God had made.
Now do you see it? What comprises the set "beasts of the field"? What are members of that set? Isn't a snake one of those beasts of the field that the Lord God made? So what happens when you take out the word "other" like the verse really says. The conclusion has to be that the serpent was not a member of that category of the made or created creatures of the field. In other words, there was no physical talking snake based just upon reading and understanding this verse correctly. So let's find some other scriptures that help us to confirm what I just taught you. Here is one verse that I know most don't immediately associate with Genesis, but it is related even though you've never seen it.
1 Corinthians 10:13 There hath no temptation overtaken you but such as is common to man:
What are we talking about that occurred in Genesis 3? Of course we are talking about the temptation of Adam and Eve by the serpent. So what does God tell us about temptation in 1 Corinthians? He says every time we are tempted by the enemy it is a common occurrence. In other words it is natural, not supernatural. Did you realize that it is illegal for Satan to tempt you supernaturally? Have you ever seen a talking snake? I've been to many zoos and if there were any talking snakes, I didn't see any. No you see a talking snake would be a supernatural temptation and that would not be common to man. We can therefore conclude that this would be illegal and if Satan can't tempt you this way, he can't tempt Eve that way either. This scripture is an example of a universal truth. In other words this scripture applies across the board to every person in the human race. There are some scriptures that only apply to Israel, there are some scriptures that only apply to men, some to women, some to the church, some to whatever. However, there are those scriptures like this one that will apply to everyone. These represent spiritual laws and God enforces these. The Bible says God watches over his words to perform them and this would be an example.
Have you ever been tempted by Satan? Sure you have whether you admit it or not. How did he come to you and try to tempt you? It was in your mind, by using your thought life to tempt you to do something that you shouldn't, say something you shouldn't, or whatever. If Satan tempted you this way, then he tempted Eve this way. Do you think we can find any scripture to confirm this? Of course we can if we look:
2 Corinthians 11:3 But I fear, lest by any means as the serpent beguiled Eve through his subtilty , so your minds be corrupted from the simplicity that is in Christ.
It is amazing what the Bible says when you look for it and understand it and apply it to Genesis 3 correctly. You see this verse is written to the church and it said Eve was deceived by the serpent because of his trickery. But did you notice how he did it? It was in Eve's mind, not a talking snake in the garden. Satan is still the subtle deceiver and he works and operates in the same way that he has always worked. He tries to deceive you in through same avenues in your mind. That is why we are instructed in the Bible this way:.
2 Corinthians 10:5 Casting down imagination and every high thing that exalteth itself against the knowledge of God and bringing into captivity every thought to the obedience of Christ.
Apparently our minds are still the battle grounds for the enemy and we are responsible to police them and exercise our authority to keep the enemy out of them.
Now we have a problem for those who want to take every scripture literally. You see the problem is that the serpent is a purely symbolic reference to a spiritual being not directly named or identified in the book of Genesis. However, that does not mean God did not identify who the serpent was later. We just have to find it:
Revelation 12:9 And the great dragon was cast out, the old serpent called the Devil and Satan, which deceiveth the whole world: he was cast out into the earth and his angels were cast out with him.
We can see from this verse in Revelation the true identity of the symbolic serpent is given to us to be Satan, the deceiver. This verse also contains another symbolic reference and calls Satan the great dragon. Apparently Satan's strength and ability has increased substantially at the end more than he had at the beginning. You can see why God used a symbolic reference in both places. By comparing these two symbolic references we can gain additional information about this enemy. So we just learned a valuable lesson, of why we can't take everything in the Bible literally. Then we also learned that we can't study any book of the Bible independently in a vacuum. We must use the Bible to interpret the Bible. We must see what God's says about the subject in other places because He always provides additional information that is critical for us to see in order to correctly understand what is being taught.
That is why I can say with confidence that there was no physical talking snake in the Garden of Eden!
Why is the Bible so Hard to Understand?
Here is a topic that might raise a huge debate. Is the Bible hard to understand? Can you read the Bible cover to cover and know exactly everything that it says? There are many that I have heard who think that you can. However, I believe based upon the number of divisions, dominations, unbelievers and atheists in the world, it is clear that the Bible is very, very difficult to read and understand. So why is this such a delicate subject? I think it could be partially because there are so many people in the world that have learned something that they think is in the Bible and are holding fast to it like there is nothing else to learn. I see this all over church denominations, they learned something great a hundred years ago and they stopped learning. God brings along someone new with a new revelation of something that He wants to teach his people, and we have idiotic denominations preaching these people are of the devil, they are all heretic teachers. If only they would be open and receptive enough to study and find out if it was true before they condemned it, most of them would have to ask God to forgive them and then they would have to change their minds.
So why is the Bible so difficult to understand? The Bible is a highly unique book written by over 50 different authors in many different writing styles. But that is not what makes it complex to understand for you see the entire book is really by one author and He is God. God used different men to write down what He wanted to say but it all goes together in harmony. So what is the difficulty? Here is a scripture that helps to explain at least part of the problem, if not the majority of the problem.
There are some really strong words given to us here and this verse contains the primary reason why even many Christians don't understand the Bible. You see this verse doesn't say it is talking about an unsaved man, just a natural man. What is a natural man? If you look up the word it means one that is dominated by their senses. In touch with how they feel more than what they believe. The Bible speaks of a carnal mind being an enemy to the things of God (Romans 8:7). A carnal mind is a mind that is dominated by the flesh and not the spirit. So we begin to see a pattern to the problem. The unsaved world doesn't have a clue that they are a spirit living temporarily in a human body so there is absolutely no way they would ever be able to understand the Bible. It is only after we let Jesus come into our hearts that we can begin to see and understand the Words of God.
So then what do Christians need to do to become more spiritual and less flesh dominated? That is another point of controversy but I'll tell you what happened to me, because I can't speak with any authority about what happened to you. I was saved, I believe as young child in Vacation Bible Schools and Christian Summer Camps. I was raised in Christian home and my father was a pastor of several churches. However, as I grew up I drifted away from the things of God and became flesh dominated and controlled. I married and we had kids and finally through a series of events that occurred, God had my complete attention. I began to seek God for more of Him and started asking to be filled with His spirit. Before, all of this I really never understood the Bible, didn't like to read the Bible and didn't care about anything that was in it. However, God answered my prayer and filled me with the Holy Spirit and all of sudden the Bible came to life and the words on the pages spoke with meaning, power and authority. A new awareness of God, a knowing God on a deeper level, an actual personal relationship with God occurred. So many people read the Bible to learn about God, when God really is more interested in them knowing Him first. So that was a quick testimony of my story and how God was able to change my heart and as a result while I don't know everything, He has certainly been able to teach me a lot more than I use to know. God is capable of teaching you whatever you need to know, but the problem is not with God, the problem is always with us being able to change and receive from Him. It is a complex world we live in, we were created by a highly complex God who has developed complex rules and systems that He operates within. The idea of an omnipotent God that places limitations upon himself and what He can do, is probably offensive to many religious minded people. But, I didn't create the systems, the rules, the guidelines, the laws that He imposes upon us and himself. We are required to figure out how He operates and change to fit His requirements, we should all know and understand, that God will not change to fit our requirements
So why is the Bible so difficult to understand? The Bible is a highly unique book written by over 50 different authors in many different writing styles. But that is not what makes it complex to understand for you see the entire book is really by one author and He is God. God used different men to write down what He wanted to say but it all goes together in harmony. So what is the difficulty? Here is a scripture that helps to explain at least part of the problem, if not the majority of the problem.
1 Corinthians 2:14 But the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God for they are foolishness unto him; neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned.
There are some really strong words given to us here and this verse contains the primary reason why even many Christians don't understand the Bible. You see this verse doesn't say it is talking about an unsaved man, just a natural man. What is a natural man? If you look up the word it means one that is dominated by their senses. In touch with how they feel more than what they believe. The Bible speaks of a carnal mind being an enemy to the things of God (Romans 8:7). A carnal mind is a mind that is dominated by the flesh and not the spirit. So we begin to see a pattern to the problem. The unsaved world doesn't have a clue that they are a spirit living temporarily in a human body so there is absolutely no way they would ever be able to understand the Bible. It is only after we let Jesus come into our hearts that we can begin to see and understand the Words of God.
So then what do Christians need to do to become more spiritual and less flesh dominated? That is another point of controversy but I'll tell you what happened to me, because I can't speak with any authority about what happened to you. I was saved, I believe as young child in Vacation Bible Schools and Christian Summer Camps. I was raised in Christian home and my father was a pastor of several churches. However, as I grew up I drifted away from the things of God and became flesh dominated and controlled. I married and we had kids and finally through a series of events that occurred, God had my complete attention. I began to seek God for more of Him and started asking to be filled with His spirit. Before, all of this I really never understood the Bible, didn't like to read the Bible and didn't care about anything that was in it. However, God answered my prayer and filled me with the Holy Spirit and all of sudden the Bible came to life and the words on the pages spoke with meaning, power and authority. A new awareness of God, a knowing God on a deeper level, an actual personal relationship with God occurred. So many people read the Bible to learn about God, when God really is more interested in them knowing Him first. So that was a quick testimony of my story and how God was able to change my heart and as a result while I don't know everything, He has certainly been able to teach me a lot more than I use to know. God is capable of teaching you whatever you need to know, but the problem is not with God, the problem is always with us being able to change and receive from Him. It is a complex world we live in, we were created by a highly complex God who has developed complex rules and systems that He operates within. The idea of an omnipotent God that places limitations upon himself and what He can do, is probably offensive to many religious minded people. But, I didn't create the systems, the rules, the guidelines, the laws that He imposes upon us and himself. We are required to figure out how He operates and change to fit His requirements, we should all know and understand, that God will not change to fit our requirements
Saturday, October 24, 2009
Genesis 1:1 The Missing Word
There is an amazing revelation found in the first verse of Genesis that most have never seen. Unless you can read and write in Hebrew you probably have not seen this before. The fourth word of the Bible is omitted and not translated into English. We can only assume that translators didn't know how to translate the word so they omitted it. You see the problem is that this word is not a word and didn't spell anything that they were familiar with. However it says something that is very profound when you understand what it is.
This word is made up of just two letters in the Hebrew alphabet. The first letter is called the "alef" and second letter is called the "tav". This still doesn't have any significance until you know that these are the first and last letters of the alphabet and that changes everything doesn't it? The verse should read something like "In the beginning the A-Z God created...." in English. Who is the A-Z God? Well of course it is Jesus Christ.
You see the pattern is repeated and explained to us in the book of Revelation. In the first chapter of Revelation and the 11th verse Jesus makes the following statement: "I AM, Alpha and Omega, the first and the last". We can quickly see if we are familiar with the Greek alphabet that Jesus has just identified himself as the creator God. "Alpha" and "Omega" are the first and last letters in the Greek alphabet.
"In the beginning the A-Z God created the heaven and the earth."
This word is made up of just two letters in the Hebrew alphabet. The first letter is called the "alef" and second letter is called the "tav". This still doesn't have any significance until you know that these are the first and last letters of the alphabet and that changes everything doesn't it? The verse should read something like "In the beginning the A-Z God created...." in English. Who is the A-Z God? Well of course it is Jesus Christ.
You see the pattern is repeated and explained to us in the book of Revelation. In the first chapter of Revelation and the 11th verse Jesus makes the following statement: "I AM, Alpha and Omega, the first and the last". We can quickly see if we are familiar with the Greek alphabet that Jesus has just identified himself as the creator God. "Alpha" and "Omega" are the first and last letters in the Greek alphabet.
"In the beginning the A-Z God created the heaven and the earth."
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