The internet as metaphor.

[The Accountant, OBE, KC]

Howard Jacobson ties Brexit in with Eden and shows his understanding of the Garden of Eden story.

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2018/oct/21/even-as-we-rail-at-our-leaders-we-fail-to-address-our-own-manifest-flaws

Interesting perspective in this article.

Religious belief does not appear to be much help in removing these flaws in ourselves - in the Garden of Eden, the religious belief of Adam and Eve seems to have not helped prevent their flaws surfacing. I think being aware that your own perceptions may be your reality,  but not necessarily the reality of others, and tolerance of other people's perceptions might help achieve a less fractious discussion of issues.

I also think people are more open about issues now and the information is quickly disseminated through the internet so it appears as if flaws that always existed before the advent of the internet, suddenly appear more widespread and problematic. 

I agree social media has made it easier to bring together a mob to drown out alternative voices and perspectives, and many people do not always seem to act responsibly and thoughtfully when using the internet.

[Walt Zingmatilder]

Interesting perspective in this article.

Religious belief does not appear to be much help in removing these flaws in ourselves - in the Garden of Eden, the religious belief of Adam and Eve seems to have not helped prevent their flaws surfacing. I think being aware that your own perceptions may be your reality,  but not necessarily the reality of others, and tolerance of other people's perceptions might help achieve a less fractious discussion of issues.

I also think people are more open about issues now and the information is quickly disseminated through the internet so it appears as if flaws that always existed before the advent of the internet, suddenly appear more widespread and problematic. 

I agree social media has made it easier to bring together a mob to drown out alternative voices and perspectives, and many people do not always seem to act responsibly and thoughtfully when using the internet.

I'm wondering whether there was ever a time in which the internet was exclusively used for unimpeachable purposes.

Returning to the Eden metaphor I suppose I am flagging up the limits of the metaphor, Eden having been paradisal although there is the sense of a rapid falling out whereas we all came to the internet flawed.

That doesn't mean though that the internet was not nobly conceived or notionally an opportunity for pure goodness......or does it?

[jeremyp]

You are the one suggesting God needs a Garden not me

Your Bible -  your holy book - says God stuck Adam in the garden to look after it. Not me. 

so you ought to be justifying thatI would have thought.

God moves in mysterious ways.

All your biblical quote tells us is that we were placed in a relationship with God and nature which we have to cultivate or maintain.

No it doesn't. It specifically says God put Man in the Garden of Eden to maintain it. He wasn't even allowed an apple as a reward.

I'm sure you agree we have to maintain nature...and haven't made a good fist of it.
Why are you not prepared to do the same with God.

We certainly do have to maintain God. He is a figment of our imagination after all.

If man is not to look after his environment, what alternative is there? Are you suggesting the pillaging or neglect of the environment is a good thing?
[/quote]
The alternative is to go extinct. It's inevitable anyway, in about a billion years, the Earth will be incinerated by the Sun as it expands.

[Walt Zingmatilder]

Your Bible -  your holy book - says God stuck Adam in the garden to look after it. Not me. 
God moves in mysterious ways.
No it doesn't. It specifically says God put Man in the Garden of Eden to maintain it. He wasn't even allowed an apple as a reward.
We certainly do have to maintain God. He is a figment of our imagination after all.

If man is not to look after his environment, what alternative is there? Are you suggesting the pillaging or neglect of the environment is a good thing?

The alternative is to go extinct. It's inevitable anyway, in about a billion years, the Earth will be incinerated by the Sun as it expands.

Does the bible use the phrase stuck Adam in the Garden?

Why is that a sinister thing anyway?

I think even you might agree that the Bible never refers to God Evil Overlord. You don't think you've confused the bible with Marvel comics?


God is a figment of the imagination? Positive assertion that. You know what you have to do.


Does that mean Invisible pink unicorns are a pigment of the imagination?

[jeremyp]

Does the bible use the phrase stuck Adam in the Garden?

This is hysterical. Only a post or two ago, you were saying

"All your biblical quote tells us is that we were placed in a relationship with God and nature which we have to cultivate or maintain."

which it doesn't. That's your interpretation. But now, you are insisting that we take everything absolutely literally.

I think even you might agree that the Bible never refers to God Evil Overlord.

Did the god of Genesis genocide the whole of humanity bar eight people in a flood or did he not? A simple yes or no will suffice to answer.

God is a figment of the imagination? Positive assertion that. You know what you have to do.

"God exists" is a positive assertion but I'm not confident that you know what to do.

It is, however, pretty well disproven that the god described in Genesis did not exist. The World was not created in the way that Genesis described. There was no global flood. Humans didn't live to be nine hundred years old. The whole thing is a clear work of fiction, including the gods in it.

[Walt Zingmatilder]

This is hysterical. Only a post or two ago, you were saying

"All your biblical quote tells us is that we were placed in a relationship with God and nature which we have to cultivate or maintain."

which it doesn't. That's your interpretation. But now, you are insisting that we take everything absolutely literally.
Did the god of Genesis genocide the whole of humanity bar eight people in a flood or did he not? A simple yes or no will suffice to answer.
"God exists" is a positive assertion but I'm not confident that you know what to do.

It is, however, pretty well disproven that the god described in Genesis did not exist. The World was not created in the way that Genesis described. There was no global flood. Humans didn't live to be nine hundred years old. The whole thing is a clear work of fiction, including the gods in it.

I have to interpret what you mean by stuck in the garden in the light of your interpretation.

I consider your interpretation to be a completely new story rather than an interpretation in which God is an ''evil overlord.''

It is a fairly good bet that the writers did not intend that meaning.


My interpretation is therefore closer to the intention of the writers.


You have not addressed two things. When asked to justify your statement that God is a figment of the imagination you blatantly tried to shift the burden of proof away from yourself and ducked the issue.


In the same way you claimed there was evidence that Rhiannon's version of the story of the Garden of Eden and even though you have been invited to provide it you haven't comeup with the goods.


Finally is it right to excuse mans poor stewardship of the environment by the glib statement that we'll be extinct in the future anyway?


 

[Walt Zingmatilder]

It is, however, pretty well disproven that the god described in Genesis did not exist. The World was not created in the way that Genesis described. There was no global flood. Humans didn't live to be nine hundred years old. The whole thing is a clear work of fiction.

Who said that any of the above was literally true?
I didn't.....you seem to be having an imaginary argument with an imaginary person therefore.
I'm not yet convinced you are any kind of authority on fiction, it's role, how it can be metaphorical, how it can convey truths etc.

[Rhiannon]

I'm not yet convinced you are any kind of authority on fiction, it's role, how it can be metaphorical, how it can convey truths etc.

And your qualifications on this are what?

[Walt Zingmatilder]

And your qualifications on this are what?

Non automatic dismissal of fiction as somehow worthless...

However rudimentary you may deem that to be....it is an advance on Jeremy's position.

[Rhiannon]

Non automatic dismissal of fiction as somehow worthless...

However rudimentary you may deem that to be....it is an advance on Jeremy's position.

I don't think he dismisses it as worthless - in fact he seems to have a pretty good grasp of it.

He just doesn't agree with your interpretation.

[Walt Zingmatilder]

I don't think he dismisses it as worthless - in fact he seems to have a pretty good grasp of it.

He just doesn't agree with your interpretation.

He uses the term fiction in order to disparage and ignores that I am not a literalist on the points he has brought up,

that doesn't suggest either grasp or worth. In fact the complete tone is rather philistine.

[Dicky Underpants]

Let's have it then.

I have to disagree since one can only arrive at that interpretation with massive bowdlerisation of the rest of genesis.

The reverse is true. The story has nothing to do with the rest of Genesis.

[jeremyp]

I have to interpret what you mean by stuck in the garden in the light of your interpretation.

That shouldn't be too hard for you.

I consider your interpretation to be a completely new story rather than an interpretation in which God is an ''evil overlord.''

I consider the story of the Fall as written in Genesis to be a new story based on an older story from Babylon in which the god character is the bad guy and the serpent character is the good guy. It makes more sense that way.

You have not addressed two things. When asked to justify your statement that God is a figment of the imagination you blatantly tried to shift the burden of proof away from yourself and ducked the issue.

I totally justified my statement with respect to the god of Genesis.

In the same way you claimed there was evidence that Rhiannon's version of the story of the Garden of Eden and even though you have been invited to provide it you haven't comeup with the goods.

You never come up with the goods. I don't feel the need to justify anything to you because you do not do me the courtesy of responding in kind.

Finally is it right to excuse mans poor stewardship of the environment by the glib statement that we'll be extinct in the future anyway?

In reality, man has never had any external obligation of "stewardship" of the environment other than his own self preservation. It's only in recent centuries that it occurred to anybody that there was any kind of higher obligation than our own self interest.

The story of the creation in Genesis is obvious fiction and, in fact, gives the message that the environment is there for man to exploit as he wishes. The message might be slightly different when we get to the Fall, but we should not be surprised at that. The whole thing is a confused incoherent mess.

[Dicky Underpants]

I consider the story of the Fall as written in Genesis to be a new story based on an older story from Babylon in which the god character is the bad guy and the serpent character is the good guy. It makes more sense that way.

The Adam and Eve story does indeed appear to have parallels with the Gilgamesh stories. But the Canaanite myths show even closer parallels. Their matriarchal society's myths with Ashterah as Yahweh's wife appear to have been deliberately reversed by the Hebrews in the creation of their story.
Interestingly, the Ophite Gnostics later reversed the goody-baddy relationship of god and serpent all over again.

[Walt Zingmatilder]

[quote author=jeremyp link=topic=16252.msg752573#msg752573
In reality, man has never had any external obligation of "stewardship" of the environment other than his own self preservation. It's only in recent centuries that it occurred to anybody that there was any kind of higher obligation than our own self interest.


[/quote]
So you finally admit that we are not here to mow Gods lawn .

[jeremyp]

So you finally admit that we are not here to mow Gods lawn .

I said "in reality". We are not talking about reality but the first three chapters of a fiction book.

[Dicky Underpants]

I said "in reality". We are not talking about reality but the first three chapters of a fiction book.

It's interesting to note the paucity of references to the story in the Bible. In the O.T.after the Eden episode, Adam's descendants get a mention in Genesis 5, then there's a genealogical reference in 1Chronicles, and then - zilch.

In fact the New Testament doesn't fare much better. A genealogical reference in Luke and another in the epistle of Jude. Then two references in Paul's letters (Corinthians and Romans) where he obviously seems to think the myth has some importance. One reference in the non-Pauline 1Timothy. Then - again zilch.

[Walt Zingmatilder]

I don't know if the doctrine of total depravity can be piggy backed onto Genesis.
The doctrine is not that humanity is totally depraved in the sense we might understand but that all activities are in someway 'tainted' with corruption or the tendency to corruption.
Surely this is eminently true of the internet which has in its way demonstrated the doctrine in action.

[Walt Zingmatilder]

It's interesting to note the paucity of references to the story in the Bible. In the O.T.after the Eden episode, Adam's descendants get a mention in Genesis 5, then there's a genealogical reference in 1Chronicles, and then - zilch.

In fact the New Testament doesn't fare much better. A genealogical reference in Luke and another in the epistle of Jude. Then two references in Paul's letters (Corinthians and Romans) where he obviously seems to think the myth has some importance. One reference in the non-Pauline 1Timothy. Then - again zilch.

It seems to me that genesis is a potted metaphor for human history.

By what warrant do you seem to be equating wordage with importance?

[Dicky Underpants]

It seems to me that genesis is a potted metaphor for human history.

All of it? It combines so many different styles and points of emphasis, that to regard it as a singular metaphor is ludicrous. If you mean that you choose to regard Chapter 2 as such a metaphor, then that is your prerogative. As has been pointed out, the story has different implications in its earlier origins, and the Gnostics made a completely different metaphor out of it from the one you seem to prefer (which is presumably the Pauline one)

By what warrant do you seem to be equating wordage with importance?

In the Old Testament, it's a reasonable assumption to make. The matter is complicated, but does involve some of the ideas which have evolved concerning the Documentary Hypothesis. The earlier material of Genesis (the Jahwist (Chapter 2) and Elohist accounts were probably combined after the fall of the northern Kingdom of Israel after the Assyrian invasion. Then, in the court of Hezekiah, a scribe obsessed with what he considered to be divine laws, reacted to this earlier material and wrote his own account of the subjects dealt with. This scribe is known as the Priestly Author, and he wrote the account of Creation related in Genesis 1 (no anthropomorphic God, different sequence of events, and importantly - man and woman created in God's image, not woman 'taken from Adam's rib'). It seems this scribe would have liked to reject all the earlier J and E material and replace it with his own account.
Later, in post-exilic times a further redactor decided to reinstate the earlier material with some bewildering and contradictory results (the story of Noah is cobbled together from the two contradictory accounts, as is the 'Matter of Peor' in Numbers). This redactor may well have been Ezra, a speculation which even St Jerome thought highly plausible.

At any rate, though the laws and covenants related at length by the Priestly Author get referred to often by later prophets, the Adam and Eve story doesn't seem to have entered their minds at all. That must signify something.

Okay, as I said, Paul obviously thought Genesis 2 explained the nature of the world and humanity's place in to him, and made the story a major part of his theology. Bully for him. It doesn't resonate with me.
Jesus, in his one reference to creation "He made them male and female" sounds to me as though he was referring to the Priestly narrative of Genesis 1. He was of course taking a hard line on divorce when citing this - not one which liberal Christians may find very sympathetic. And not only Christians.

[Walt Zingmatilder]

All of it?

I suppose it does suggest where we are going in it's catastrophic elements and it's verdict on human nature. But of course it can only go up to when it was written down.