God Is Not The Creator, Claims Academic

[eagle_eye222001]

Radical idea. Probably a publicity stunt or something. I wonder if this theory is reconciled with other parts of the Bible where we see echos of God being primal and creating stuff like John 1:1-3 and Isaiah 45:11-12. Some people in the comments pointed that out. Although a problem with this radical idea is that we are stuck at square one with how we ultimately got her. Actually the more I think about this the more ridiculous it sounds.

________________________

[b]God is not the Creator, claims academic[/b]

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/religion/6274502/God-is-not-the-Creator-claims-academic.html



Professor Ellen van Wolde, a respected Old Testament scholar and author, claims the first sentence of Genesis "in the beginning God created the Heaven and the Earth" is not a true translation of the Hebrew.

She claims she has carried out fresh textual analysis that suggests the writers of the great book never intended to suggest that God created the world -- and in fact the Earth was already there when he created humans and animals.

Prof Van Wolde, 54, who will present a thesis on the subject at Radboud University in The Netherlands where she studies, said she had re-analysed the original Hebrew text and placed it in the context of the Bible as a whole, and in the context of other creation stories from ancient Mesopotamia.

She said she eventually concluded the Hebrew verb "bara", which is used in the first sentence of the book of Genesis, does not mean "to create" but to "spatially separate".

The first sentence should now read "in the beginning God separated the Heaven and the Earth"

According to Judeo-Christian tradition, God created the Earth out of nothing.

Prof Van Wolde, who once worked with the Italian academic and novelist Umberto Eco, said her new analysis showed that the beginning of the Bible was not the beginning of time, but the beginning of a narration.

She said: "It meant to say that God did create humans and animals, but not the Earth itself."

She writes in her thesis that the new translation fits in with ancient texts.

According to them there used to be an enormous body of water in which monsters were living, covered in darkness, she said.

She said technically "bara" does mean "create" but added: "Something was wrong with the verb.

"God was the subject (God created), followed by two or more objects. Why did God not create just one thing or animal, but always more?"

She concluded that God did not create, he separated: the Earth from the Heaven, the land from the sea, the sea monsters from the birds and the swarming at the ground.

"There was already water," she said.

"There were sea monsters. God did create some things, but not the Heaven and Earth. The usual idea of creating-out-of-nothing, creatio ex nihilo, is a big misunderstanding."

God came later and made the earth livable, separating the water from the land and brought light into the darkness.

She said she hoped that her conclusions would spark "a robust debate", since her finds are not only new, but would also touch the hearts of many religious people.

She said: "Maybe I am even hurting myself. I consider myself to be religious and the Creator used to be very special, as a notion of trust. I want to keep that trust."

A spokesman for the Radboud University said: "The new interpretation is a complete shake up of the story of the Creation as we know it."

Prof Van Wolde added: "The traditional view of God the Creator is untenable now."

[Jesus_lol]

oh yeah i saw that earlier, was interesting. what i was wondering about is, if she is right and it all checks out, whats gonna change? there is a possibility it is the best translation, will people accept it?

[Archaeology cat]

Hmm, I'd like to hear what the Hebrew scholars have to say about it. I'll have to look in my Brown-Driver-Briggs later, too. I don't claim to know a lot of Hebrew, but I'd like to see what the lexicon says.

[Laudate_Dominum]

Where's the news?
Obtaining the doctrine of [i]creatio ex nihilo[/i] (as we know it) from Gen 1 is pretty eisegetical considering how metaphysically loaded the doctrine is. Did the people at the time when Gen 1 was first put to parchment have a cosmology that included the categories necessary to articulate a doctrine of creation [i]ex nihilo[/i], or was the understanding of Divinity as the fundamental orderer and ruler of the cosmos the highest view of God that they could muster? Did they conceive of reality in ontological and analytical terms, or in a more primitive, synthetic and symbolic way?
What I find more shocking is Christian theologians in the post-hellenistic age who conceive of God as material because of their implicit cosmology (and yes, this does exist).

I wonder how the Mormons will run with this. lulz.

[Laudate_Dominum]

[quote name='Jesus_lol' date='12 October 2009 - 02:26 PM' timestamp='1255371967' post='1984019']
oh yeah i saw that earlier, was interesting. what i was wondering about is, if she is right and it all checks out, whats gonna change? there is a possibility it is the best translation, will people accept it?
[/quote]
I could be wrong, but I don't think many modern scholars consider, "in the beginning God created the Heaven and the Earth," to be the best translation in the first place.

[Archaeology cat]

[quote name='Laudate_Dominum' date='12 October 2009 - 07:42 PM' timestamp='1255372941' post='1984026']
I could be wrong, but I don't think many modern scholars consider, "in the beginning God created the Heaven and the Earth," to be the best translation in the first place.
[/quote]
I'm pretty sure you're correct about that, as I remember my Hebrew professor mentioning that.

[Didymus]

how does this passage show that God is not the Creator? She claims at one point that Genesis doesn't show the beginning of Creation, but rather the beginning of a narrative. It seems quite evident that the [b]only[/b] statement she would ever be able to prove is that Genesis does not have a full Creation account, not that God didn't create the world.

[Catholictothecore]

She is so brilliant, she deserves (you guessed it) and Nobel Peace Prize.

I don't mind her fidning this stuff quite as much as the assumption that it's going to chagne everything. My guess it that, in actualltiy, it will change nothing except for a vocal few. Hmm...

[rkwright]

smells of elderberries for Sola Scirtura people!

Tell me where the Bible says God created the world...

[Laudate_Dominum]

[quote name='rkwright' date='12 October 2009 - 03:46 PM' timestamp='1255376816' post='1984041']
smells of elderberries for Sola Scirtura people!

Tell me where the Bible says God created the world...
[/quote]
Good one.

[Laudate_Dominum]

[quote name='Didymus' date='12 October 2009 - 03:09 PM' timestamp='1255374588' post='1984035']
how does this passage show that God is not the Creator? She claims at one point that Genesis doesn't show the beginning of Creation, but rather the beginning of a narrative. It seems quite evident that the [b]only[/b] statement she would ever be able to prove is that Genesis does not have a full Creation account, not that God didn't create the world.
[/quote]
I wouldn't worry about it. Critical peer review will put her claims about [i]bara[/i] to the test, but either way this would not mean that "God is not the creator," I hate the news sometimes.

[StColette]

[quote name='eagle_eye222001' date='12 October 2009 - 02:10 PM' timestamp='1255371020' post='1984011']
________________________
She said she eventually concluded the Hebrew verb "bara", which is used in the first sentence of the book of Genesis, does not mean "to create" but to "spatially separate".

She said technically "bara" does mean "create" but added: "Something was wrong with the verb"

[/quote]

So bara doesn't mean to create but at the same time it technically does mean create?

[quote]
"God was the subject (God created), followed by two or more objects. Why did God not create just one thing or animal, but always more?"[/quote]

So because Genesis says that God created more than one object then He didn't create?

[quote]
She concluded that God did not create, he separated: the Earth from the Heaven, the land from the sea, the sea monsters from the birds and the swarming at the ground.

[/quote]

According to the Lexicon I have badal means separate and is the one used in Genesis to describe God dividing things from one another.

AV - cut off 6, divide 3, decree 2, cut down 1, snatch 1; 13

1) to cut, divide, cut down, cut off, cut in two, snatch, decree
1a) (Qal)
1a1) to cut in two, divide
1a2) to cut down
1a3) to cut off, destroy, exterminate
1a4) to decree
1b) (Niphal)
1b1) to be cut off, separated, excluded
1b2) to be destroyed, cut off
1b3) to be decreed

According to my Lexicon there is only one word that means "create" and that word is Bara and is the word found in the sentence in question

1. to create, shape, form
1. (Qal) to shape, fashion, create (always with God as subject)
1. of heaven and earth
2. of individual man
3. of new conditions and circumstances
4. of transformations
2. (Niphal) to be created
1. of heaven and earth
2. of birth
3. of something new
4. of miracles
3. (Piel)
1. to cut down
2. to cut out

[Apotheoun]

[quote name='Catholictothecore' date='12 October 2009 - 01:18 PM' timestamp='1255375094' post='1984036']
She is so brilliant, she deserves (you guessed it) and Nobel Peace Prize.[/quote]
Interestingly, it can be said that Obama got the Nobel Peace Prize "doing (out) of nothing."

[Laudate_Dominum]

[quote name='Apotheoun' date='12 October 2009 - 04:14 PM' timestamp='1255378489' post='1984054']
Interestingly, it can be said that Obama got the Nobel Peace Prize "doing (out) of nothing."
[/quote]

[Apotheoun]

[quote name='Laudate_Dominum' date='12 October 2009 - 02:04 PM' timestamp='1255377890' post='1984047']
I wouldn't worry about it. Critical peer review will put her claims about [i]bara[/i] to the test, but either way this would not mean that "God is not the creator," I hate the news sometimes.
[/quote]
The doctrine of creation [i]ex nihilo[/i], as I see it, is simply meant to convey the truth that God did not fashion the cosmos out of something that exists autonomously in relation to divinity.