Board index ‹ Specific Bible verses, texts, and passages ‹ Genesis

[Cross-Eyed]

If the garden of eden never existed what is responsible for original sin / the fallen world?

I’m thinking specifically from a catholic perspective but other sects are welcome . What did humans do originally to get the original sin?

[jimwalton]

I think the Garden of Eden really existed. I consider Adam and Eve to have been historical (though not the first or only humans). So what they did to "get" the original sin was the assertion that they were the centers of order and the source of wisdom, in direct defiance of God and rebellion against Him.

[Cross-Eyed]

Do you believe in evolution?

I meant the question more for christians who accept it but are still “traditional”

[jimwalton]

I do believe in evolution, though in almost every way I am a conservative evangelical and a "traditional" Christian. About the only places I different from a "traditional" Christian is that I believe in old earth and evolution, and I think the Flood was regional, not global. Other than that, I fall quite easily into the "traditional" category.

So humanity evolved, as science tells us, but when hominids got to the point where they were spiritually capable and morally culpable, God revealed Himself to them. This is Adam and Eve. He took them out from among the other homo sapiens (Gn. 2.15), revealed Himself to them, and gave them souls. I am guessing this happened in about 6000 BC, give or take. That's where the story of the Bible begins. We can talk about this more if you want.

[Whipping Good]

So you don’t believe Australian Aboriginals can be saved? There are countless flaws with trying to erase the historicity of Genesis but for one, if you agree with naturalistic evolutionism and think that Adam was somehow given a soul 6,000 years ago then the aboriginals cannot be saved according the the Bible. Secular reasoning has their evolutionary divergence around 37,000 years ago

[jimwalton]

> So you don’t believe Australian Aboriginals can be saved?

Wow, where did this come from? I didn't say this at all, or hint it, or even sneeze in that direction. If you mean Australian Aboriginals before the modern era, Paul says in Rom. 5.13 that sin is not charged against anyone where they had not received the Law. If you mean Australian Aboriginals now, of course they can be saved. Anyone can be saved.

> There are countless flaws with trying to erase the historicity of Genesis

Where did this come from? I'm not trying to erase the historicity of Genesis. I fully believe in its historicity.

> if you agree with naturalistic evolutionism and think that Adam was somehow given a soul 6,000 years ago then the aboriginals cannot be saved according the the Bible.

I don't follow this logic at all. If God considered them as without souls, then they would die and cease to exist as animals do. If God considered them as having souls, then I leave judgment in the hands of our sovereign, omniscient, and righteous God who will be perfectly fair with them.

> Secular reasoning has their evolutionary divergence around 37,000 years ago

OK, if that's what science says, then that's what we know for now. And exactly, then, what "form" were they? Presumably homo sapiens along some branch of development. It's impossible to know what their road to salvation would entail, but I trust that God will be perfectly fair in His assessments and consequent judgments or salvation. That's up to God, and the Bible doesn't give us any clue what that would be, so I won't voice an opinion on it. I wouldn't presume to speak about such an issue where God has not spoken on it.

[Whipping Good]

I’m trying to point out that you have theological inconsistencies whether you’ve thought them through or not. It’s an important theological principle that Jesus is our kinsman redeemer because we are all connected through the lineage of Adam. If aboriginals aren’t from the bloodline of Adam then Christ’s blood can’t pay for their sins.

Also, science doesn’t say anything.

[jimwalton]

> I’m trying to point out that you have theological inconsistencies whether you’ve thought them through or not.

I'm well aware that's what you're trying to say, but you're incorrect. I don't have theological inconsistencies.

> It’s an important theological principle that Jesus is our kinsman redeemer

You're correct. Jesus is our kinsman redeemer because he's human (Phil. 2.7; Heb. 2.5-18).

> because we are all connected through the lineage of Adam. If aboriginals aren’t from the bloodline of Adam then Christ’s blood can’t pay for their sins.

This is what you have to prove through the Scriptures. Where does the Bible say that you have to be of the bloodline of Adam to be saved? Romans 5.12 says sin entered the world through Adam (except sin was already in the world since Satan had fallen), so Paul means that sin entered the world of men (humanity) when Adam sinned.

Then it says, "and death through sin," which means that death is spiritually imputed to all humanity on the basis of one man's sin, which could easily include the aboriginals and their descendants. I see no inconsistency here. Adam's sin translated to all others (obviously not a biological transference but a theological imputing of sin nature). Adam was an archetype of all humanity, such that when Adam sinned, all sinned.

So you need to Scripturally prove your assertion that "If aboriginals aren’t from the bloodline of Adam then Christ’s blood can’t pay for their sins." I say you're wrong.

> Also, science doesn’t say anything.

This comment is odd. Aboriginal Australians extend back on the island at least 40,000 years, and the DNA analysis shows that they derived from African emigrants. This was not an evolutionary divergence, however, but a migration. That's what the science says.