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Most people realize that the people who wrote the bible in the past, believe that the people believed what they wrote. That's not the real issue. I would have gladly wrote the same letter that Barr wrote if you would have asked me. Quoting Barr as an authority gives the impression that he supports the fundimentalist view of the literal bible, and he does not.
A few hundred years ago doctors believed that bleeding a patient cured disease, but that wasn't true. No one doubts the sincerity of the doctors of that time, but science and knowledge changes.
Your post brought an important point to the whole debate. You believe that a literal interpretation of genesis is absolutely necessary for the belief of Christianity to be true. Therefore you only interprete science to fit the bible version of creation and history. Many of the articles in AIG make this arguement in their conclusions, like in the recent article on the speed of light, time and the vast distances between stars and galaxies in the universe. There scientific arguement was hopelessly weak and meaningless, but then in the conclusions the author stated that you must believe this or genesis and the whole foundation of Christianity belief is false.
This issue of time and science is an important one and the classic proof is the vast distances between the galaxies, time and the speed of light. The arguement presented by AIG recently to squeeze billions of years into a few thousand was hopeless beyond belief.
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I had no intention of making Barr look like an authority on this issue. (Sorry if I did, I didn’t know what Barr thought about the issue of the truth of the Bible) He was not alive at the creation of the earth. I think that Barr is an authority on Old Testament scripture and Hebrew. The only entity in existence at creation was God. He is an authority on such matters. Genesis 1-11 is one of his personal letters on the creation of the earth.
Language and the meaning of language is a subject which can be studied more easily and conclusively than science and medicine. Would you agree that that the meaning of the words in Genesis chapters on creation and the flood intended to mean that creation took 6 days, that the flood was world wide? Or do you mean to say that because scientists thought that bleeding people was a good idea that we might be incorrect about the meaning of Genesis? I hope we have some common ground.
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Originally Posted by
Therefore you only interprete science to fit the bible version of creation and history.
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I think I agree with you on this but it depends on what you mean “interpret”. I do not manipulate numbers, or stay ignorant about evolutionary issues. I do believe that no data cannot fit the thousands of years time scale that the Bible suggests.
I didn’t know that AiG was trying to squeeze billions of years into thousands. I don't think that they think this is necessary. They believe in thousands of years, which fits the bibles thousands of years fine (no squeeze necessary).