the reason why I’m emphasizing the “plain meaning” is to demonstrate exactly your point…

if the “plain meaning” is important…I think to read Gen. 1 actually renders something different than what the “plain meaning” has been asserted as being.

Scholarship doesn’t support a purely Mosaic authorship. I don’t doubt a Mosaic core to the texts, but to say that Moses wrote every word in the form we have it today is, IMO, naive. It doesn’t take into account historical scholarship.

My point about ANE lit is that these texts were not written with a competing cosmology, but within the dominant cosmology of the day.

The OT reveals an interesting negotiation of competing understandings of the divine and the divine realm.

but you and I will have to just disagree…

=)

actually…they didn’t die…unless you spiritualize an “instant spiritual death” from the plain meaning of the text.

God says “for when you eat of it you will surely die.”

The serpent says “You will not surely die”.

One of the two was lying (or, at the very least being deceptive, which is – *ahem* – a form of lying). I know which one I would place my bet on.

As Paul notes, the consequences of sin is death, so apparently eating the apple DID cause them to die.

You can’t argue for Trinity in Gen. 1.
It doesn’t take into account the cosmology of the Ancient Near East supported even in the biblical texts themselves. You can read it back into the text subsequent, but it’s not the “plain meaning of the text”.

The whole “plain meaning of the text” thing, though, is pretty much the literalist (ultra-conservative) treatment of the entire Bible, which is not hermeneutically sound, either.

Considering that it was Moses who recorded the Torah (Genesis-Deuteronomy), and monotheism WAS well-established by that time (see the shema, Deut 6:4-9), you do have a basis for the paradox of plurality/oneness in Genesis 1.

Also…your whole “Satan” is the divine prosecutor argument is based completely on the ancient cosmology of the ANE–i.e. multiple gods, a royal court of divine beings surrounding Yahweh…etc. etc.

Which is the same imagery given in all references to cherubim, in Job, and Revelation. With the “Satan as divine prosecutor” narrative, I am not suggesting a scientific, cross-cultural truth, but rather the cultural understanding of Satan at the time the Bible was written. As in all ANE literature, the narrative image is just as important as “the plain meaning” – and in fact, often sharpens the focus of what “the plain meaning” is…

So, IS Satan in the role of “accuser/prosecutor”? The folks who wrote the Bible and who first hear it thought so, and much of the judicial/penal imagery treats him this way, as well. Is this is scientifically how Satan works? We don’t know, because the Bible wasn’t written to be a modernist, scientific document…

They died later physically, but it could be just as clear that the “die” meant to Eve “drop dead after taking a bite”….

also…the serpent said: “God doesn’t want you to eat it, cuz you’ll be like God and God has a problem with that”.

What happened after the confrontation?

God says…”Look! they’re like me…cast them out of the garden so they won’t eat of the tree of life”.

Clearly, the implication is that God did have a problem with them being like God.

The serpent didn’t lie.

Elohim assuming that God is plural and One means you have to assume a fully developed monotheism when this text was written…

biblical scholarship doesn’t bear that out…I have some good books from non-liberal theologians (in case you’re worried) who affirm this.

You can’t argue for Trinity in Gen. 1.
It doesn’t take into account the cosmology of the Ancient Near East supported even in the biblical texts themselves. You can read it back into the text subsequent, but it’s not the “plain meaning of the text”.

Also…your whole “Satan” is the divine prosecutor argument is based completely on the ancient cosmology of the ANE–i.e. multiple gods, a royal court of divine beings surrounding Yahweh…etc. etc.

I would say too that the disturbing thing is that in the Garden the serpent wasn’t really lying.

I would disagree – he told enough of the truth to be believable, but he added in a lie:

And the LORD God commanded the man, “You are free to eat from any tree in the garden; but you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for when you eat of it you will surely die.“ (Gen 2:16-17)

contrasted with Satan:

“You will not surely die,” the serpent said to the woman. “For God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.”

nc:

Just like the assumption that the “let us make” in Genesis is a subtle reference to the “Trinity”….

Well, let’s take a look at Genesis 1:1 –

In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.

Here, the word for “God” is Elohim, which is plural, whereas God (singular) would have been El. So, I would say that in the original Hebrew, Genesis 1-2 is less than subtle in expressing the idea that God is somehow One, but also plural…

And I think that would be a can of snakes.

“I would agree with this sentiment, as well, that the importance of such things is secondary.”

Chris – every time I feel as though you’ve walked to far out on a limb, and I’m ready to publicly dismantle your subjective surmises, you dismantle me with wisdom.

As a brother, though, I must keep attempting to find something with which to accuse you, that is God’s calling. You are very slippery!

Just like the assumption that the “let us make” in Genesis is a subtle reference to the “Trinity”….

I know…another can of worms.

I think this is because it’s not really what God wants us to focus our attention on. If it was, He would have made it clear.

I’m sure “angelogy” and “demonology” are interesting to study, but a lot of it, I’m sure, is just assumption or speculation. Kind of like the thing about Satan originally being an angel with the purpose of accusing, it’s very likely, and makes a lot of sense, but still just an assumption. Even what nc said about the serpent–it’s assumption, too, that the serpent was Satan.

I guess what I’m saying is, we know what we need to know about the devil and angels, and the rest of it God doesn’t really want us to dwell on.

I would agree with this sentiment, as well, that the importance of such things is secondary.

As for Satan being the serpent, we are pretty safe to assume that the NT writers assumed (ex. Rom 16:20), particularly by John – Rev 20:2

He seized the dragon, that ancient serpent, who is the devil, or Satan, and bound him for a thousand years.

So, probably the best we can do in understanding angels is 1) by seeing what is in Scripture as authoritative (other sources cannot contradict it); 2) study what Jesus and his disciples would have been taught about angels (of which we have a rather large library, per the discovery of the Dead Sea scrolls). And, even then, we can only assume these things to be a probability and not a certainty.

It looks like, according to what you wrote, that originally man’s “sin” would have been to choose chaos, in which case Satan could have “accused” him. But he would have done this without Satan tempting him. Is that what you’re saying?

We don’t know if he would have done this without Satan’s tempting Eve. It becomes a game of hypotheticals.

Do you have any scripture that supports this?

It comes back to names – Satan’s means “accuser” (remembering that names reveal character within scripture), which is also the equivalent of “prosecutor” (considering the Hebrew judicial system).

His role is further revealed in the text of Job, where we see that his role as “accuser” is played out in his treatment of Job.

We also see this played out in Zechariah 3, where Satan is specifically given the role of accuser (with even the play on Satan’s name, meaning “accuser”) of the high priest, Joshua/Jeshua (spelled the same as Jesus’ name) – where we also see Zechariah’s messianic prophecy (and perhaps the basis of Jesus’ name – as the perfect High Priest).

As for extra-biblical sources, the two primary ones are Enoch and Jubilees (which are both quoted by NT writers, and were the primary source document about angels in the first century).

I demonstated to you that your underlying concept of God not using his own personal name was incorrect by showing you several places that it was used in Scripture; you never replied after I showed you that.

Hogwash. You demonstrated nothing, but your own typical hyper-critical, hypothetical obtuseness… You didn’t show or prove anything worth a reply… (It’s kind of like my 5-year-old son ‘proving’ and ’showing’ me that the moon was made of green cheese because I got tired of the exercise in futility…)