Genesis 1-11

This will be a theological, historical, and scientific study
Imagine with me, what would a Bible without Genesis look like?

The origin of sin would be missing

We wouldn't know who was to blame or if the world as it now is was God's perfect plan

Israel's beginnings

We wouldn't know why the Bible focused on Israel so much or why they had been picked or what made them unique

Marriage

We wouldn't know what God's ideal plan was

Things we need Genesis to explain:

Where sin came from
God's choice of Israel
Marriage between one man and one woman
That we are made in God's image
Where death came from
Why we wear cloths
How the world was made
Where languages came from
Satan is our enemy
God uses angels (Genesis 3:24)

What were you taught about how the world and people came to be the way it now is? (not what you believe, just what you were taught growing up)

God?
Evolution?
Mixture?

Where I am coming from (presuppositions):

I believe that the Bible is both infallible and inerrant which means that I believe that the Bible is completely, 100% true and accurate

That being said, it can be taken out of context, twisted, and altered from it's intended meaning

I take the Bible at face value unless context, grammar, or some other internal indication is given that it should not be taken so
I believe that since the Bible is true it is never in conflict with reality and therefore science and the Bible will not contradict each other if both are properly understood
I believe that since God's Spirit gave men the words to write down as scripture, it is God's eyewitness account and therefore more accurate than man's guesses about the past

Genesis as a whole

Who wrote Genesis?

Moses

This has been believed until modern times by some anti Christian liberal scholars
I won't bother going through all the verses, but the Bible is full of references to Moses writing the Law which often refers to the first 5 books collectively
It also contains many quotations which cite Moses as the author

Unknown

One objection to Moses writing it is that he could not possibly have known what happened before he was born

John didn't know what was going to happen over the next 2000+ years but he wrote about it in Revelation
God has all knowledge of the past, present, and future so because it was divinely inspired Moses was given the knowledge beyond his experience

Moses just repeated stories or unknown sources and legends to write genesis

Even if he had access to older sources he was still writing Scripture and therefore the Holy Spirit would never allow anything untrue to be written
So at best it is possible that He was the inspired editor of previously written documents

Regardless of who wrote it, it is divinely inspired

2 Peter 1:21
Defend

2 Timothy 3:15-16

Reject

2 Corinthians 10:5

Is the Bible a scientific textbook?

No
The Bible, and Genesis, is a book of history, not science

When Jesus and the prophets quote genesis and other Biblical books they quote them as if it the events really happened

Since the Bible is not a science textbook does that mean it can be factually wrong about science?

To answer this let me give you another scenario

Let's say Jesus clearly stated that 2+2=5

Can we explain this statement away by saying that the Gospels are not arithmetic textbooks?

So if there is a clear scientifically false claim in Genesis then it can not be Scripture unless:

It can be explained through context

"This is a parable: …"

It is observational language

In one of my University textbooks I read about how the sky lights up in a sunset

I can not discredit that book by saying that the sun did not rise but rather the earth was spinning
So likewise I can not condemn Joshua for stating that the sun and moon stood still

Science and its limits

Miracles

Science describes the way God made the universe run under normal circumstances without outside influence
Miracles describe the way God interacts with the normal way things work
Example:

Science would say that a ball rolling on a flat surface would not suddenly turn unless an outside force acted upon it such as my finger

And there is no law in science saying that outside forces can't affect the normal motion of that ball

If God exists then there is no truly isolated system. He can always impact the natural order of things
Miracles do not violate science but rather add God as an outside force

Historical science

Science studies the repeatable, history studies the unrepeatable
The combination of the two is only as good as its weakest link

The whole Bible is theology

Everything written is meant to teach us about God and how to live
That being said, the Bible is also a book of history

Take the story of Jesus being born

We know that this was to teach us that God loved us and that He needed a perfect man to deal with sin and so on
However, just because we are to learn from that event about who God is, does not mean that Jesus being born was not a true historical event
If the Bible is just made up stories that convey truths, then it is untrustworthy since leads us to believe it is factual

Is Genesis 1-11 factually true or just telling us a good story that conveys a true message like a parable?

Arguments against treating Genesis 1-11 as historically accurate:

Moses couldn't have know what he was writing about

Support:

Moses couldn't have known what happened in the time period of Genesis which starts before man exists and ends 300 years prior to Moses being born

Counter:

Psalm 103:7 Just as John wrote about the future in Revelation, so God directly dictated to Moses what happened in the past

Genesis 1-11 doesn't match science

Support:

It contains miracles such as turning dust into a human and creating things nearly instantly

Counter:

Jesus was born from a virgin, walked on water, and rose from the dead. Are we going to reject those two because they don't seem very scientific either?

Support:

Most scientists have figured out how the world came to be and Genesis isn't compatible

Counter:

Shouldn't we trust the Bible over man's fallible ideas

Support:

The Bible is full of stories, who says Genesis is any different?

Counter:

Genesis 12-31 tell us the true historical facts about Abram and the beginnings of the real nation of Israel. If Genesis 1-11 were just a story the Bible would indicate the switch as it does everywhere else

Genesis 1:1

"In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth."
Lets look at the first part of that sentence: "In the Beginning God created"

This is actually only 3 words in Hebrew

"breshit" (the prefixed 'b' means 'in", so breshit="in beginning")

Several months ago we did a study on time in the Bible and discovered that time is a created thing

This makes God's eternality not just infinite time but beyond time
He existed before time did. In fact He made time

John 1:1

In the NT we learn that Jesus was with God in the beginning

How long ago was that Beginning according to the Scriptures?

What would you guess?

Here are some previous estimates people have made (PPT)

My method of calculating ballpark figure:

Creation to Adam

6 days

Adam to the flood

1656 years +-10years

Add up all the ages of people in Genesis 5

Notice how there can't be time gaps even if there are people gaps

The uncertainty comes from uncertainty as to whether 130 years means born on the 130th birthday or born the day before the 131st birthday

Flood to Abraham

352 years +-10 (2008 +-21 years after creation)

Add up all the ages of the people in Genesis 11:10-28

Abraham to moving to Egypt

290 years +-3 (2298 +-25 years after creation)

Abraham to Isaac is 100 years (Genesis 21:5)
Isaac to Jacob is 60 years (Genesis 25:26)
Jacob entered Egypt at 130 (Genesis 47:9)

Moving to Egypt to leaving Egypt

430 years +-0 (2728 +-25 years after creation)

Exodus 12:40-41

Leaving Egypt to beginning work on Solomon's Temple

280 years +-1 (3208 +-27 years after creation)

1 Kings 6:1

Beginning work on Solomon's Temple to division under Solomon's son Rehoboam

37 years +-1 (3245 +-29 years after creation)

Solomon reigned for 40 years (1 Kings 11:42)
Solomon started building in his 4th year (1 Kings 6:1)

Division to exile

345 +-20 (3590 +-50 years after creation)
This is more complex

If you add up all the lengths of the kings who reigned it would be about 430 years
However, by harmonizing the lines of the kings of Israel and the kings of Judah, it seems that there must have been some coregencies (where a father and son ruled together in transition)

Exile to 2022

Today we are 6200 +-52 years after creation

Creation was around 4178 BC

Jeremiah 25:1

This is the third last king before the exile and historian scholars (including the Annals of the World) calculate this date to be 588BC

"bara" (create)

This word only occurs in scripture when describing something that God creates

It is never used to describe what man creates

This act of God creating the universe

Sets Him apart from other false gods

1 Chronicles 16:26

Gives Him ownership of the universe

Psalm 95:3-5

Gives Him ownership over us

Isaiah 45:9

Did God create 'ex nihilo' (out of nothing)?

The word bara does not restrict us to that view although it is compatible with it and nothing is mentioned to have existed prior
This view is later confirmed throughout Scripture

Romans 4:17
Hebrews 11:3
Psalm 33:6,9
Amos 4:13

"elohim" (gods)

It is a plural word for God but bara is a singular word (to be grammatically consistent it could have used the singular equivalent 'baru'
If you asked a traditional Jew about this it might go something like this

Why do you capitalize the word God?

To show reverence and to distinguish Him from other lesser gods

In Hebrew instead of capitalizing the first letter we make it plural for those same reasons

Some Christians believe that Genesis 1:1 points to God being a trinity

After all, why not use the singular equivalent 'yachid' to teach an absolute unity (only one)

Yachid is not used in the OT to describe God

This would be confirmed by:

Genesis 1:26
Genesis 3:22
Genesis 11:7

Deuteronomy 6:4

"echad"=one
Genesis 1:5 two times are described as "echad"
Genesis 1:9 plural waters are described as "echad"
Genesis 2:24 two people are described as "echad"
Elsewhere in the OT

Ezra 2:64 an assembly of people are described as "echad"
Ezekiel 37:16-17 two sticks are described as "echad"

How would the plurality view respond to the Jewish claim?

Although there are some examples of plurals of intensity such as behemoth in Job 40 there does not seem to be any example of the 'royal we' in the Bible
PPT quote from linguist Dr Charles V Taylor
It seems to be anachronistic to apply this tradition to the Bible

God's plurality is actually vital if God is who He claims to be

God claims to never change

Hebrews 13:8
Malachi 3:6
James 1:17

God claims to be love

1 John 4:8
1 John 4:16

A non-plural god such as Islam's Allah could not be love prior to creation since love requires a recipient

Although Allah could love after he created other thing, he could not prior

However, the Bible teaches that Jesus and the Father were always existent together and therefore God could eternally love and it can be truly said that He never changes

Moreover, the Spirit was also part of the Godhead so not only did God experience an individual love but also a familial and collective love

The heavens and the earth

Genesis 14:19, 22
2 Kings 19:15
Psalm 121:2
In OT Hebrew you could combine two opposites in what is called a 'merism' to make an all encompassing single concept (Show PPT first)

We do the same today

The shop is open "day and night" means all hours of the day, not just during the day and night but not dusk
They looked "Far and near"
They searched "high and low"
She cared for the "young and old"

There was no Hebrew word for universe which is why this reism is needed to describe everything that God created

Some people view this verse as a chapter heading/summary

This way it is possible, although never hinted at, that God made the earth multiple times over an indefinite period of time and kept resetting it into the formless void we read about in verse 2. And that this makes Genesis 1:2 and following God's latest attempt at creation.
However, chapter titles/headings don't end with the word 'and'

Genesis 1:2

I want to mainly focus on what Genesis teaches rather than what some claim it teaches

Partially because I do that with all of Scripture, and to keep this from taking forever
However, if you know of alternative readings please tell me and we can address them

To give you an example, I don't see any clear indication that this is to be read poetically or only for its spiritual truths, and those who do that and try to avoid the plain sense of the text often end up with more problems than solutions

Those who do will interpret darkness as "spiritual darkness" since the big bang requires energy and light from the very beginning

But then God is responsible for creating something that is not good
Just because it is now associated with evil does not mean that it was before the fall

The snake was created good, not a symbol of satan

Formless and void

Imagine a blob of playdough

It has not yet been formed so it is formless

Darkness over the face of the deep

What does 'deep' often refer to in the Bible?

Exodus 15:5

The same word is translated here as 'floods' (depths is another word)
2 Peter 3:4 (talking about scoffers)

Notice that this is exactly what Evolution teaches

2 Peter 3:5

So it seems that God first created a blob of water

Genesis 1:3

I think that this verse is self explanatory

God spoke and things came into being exactly as He said

Again, if you view Genesis through purely spiritual interpretation you will assume that God, who had first made evil, now created good to counter it

However I believe that good proceeds evil and will ultimately outlive it
1 John 1:5

Since God is light would the spiritual interpretation claim that God made Himself?

Psalm 33:6,9
Also note that there is no source for this light (like the sun). It just exists

Revelation 21:23

Genesis 1:4

Did God create darkness?

Isaiah 45:7

Why 'good' instead of 'perfect'

There is a Hebrew word 'tam' that is usually translated 'perfect' or "without blemish"
Some argue that because 'tam' is not used it implies that God's creation was flawed right from the beginning of time as evolutionist insist (more on that later)
Let's look at the word 'tam' in the Bible

Why is Genesis 25:27 the only exception?

According to the NET Bible and other sources, the reason was that Jacob and Esau were being contrasted in this verse and the translators didn't think that 'perfect' was a good word to contrast with 'hunter'

Notice who is called 'perfect'

We know from Romans 3:23 that all have sinned and therefore no one is perfect
So actually using the word 'tam' would not imply total absolute sinless perfection in Genesis 1

Genesis 1:5

What does naming things imply is Scripture?

Genesis 1:26
Genesis 2:20
Genesis 2:23

Parents

Exception: Matthew 1:20-21

Joseph was not the father of, and therefore God was responsible for Jesus

Rulers

Daniel 1:7

Kings

2 Kings 23:34
2n Kings 24:17

Psalm 147:4
Matthew 16:18

It seems that in the Bible, when someone names something it is an exercise of authority over it

Here we have the first use of the word 'day' in Genesis

I assume that the watery earth was spinning in order to cause the day/night, evening/morning phenomenon

And that God was producing the light from a certain location in time/space

"And there was evening and there was morning, the first day"

ASV gets the particulars correct:

Verse 5: And God called the light Day, and the darkness he called Night. And there was evening and there was morning, one day.
Verse 8: And God called the firmament Heaven. And there was evening and there was morning, a second day.
Verse 13: And there was evening and there was morning, a third day.
Verse 19: And there was evening and there was morning, a fourth day.
Verse 23: And there was evening and there was morning, a fifth day.
Verse 31: And God saw everything that he had made, and, behold, it was very good. And there was evening and there was morning, the sixth day.
Verse 2: And on the seventh day God finished his work which he had made; and he rested on the seventh day from all his work which he had made.

Evening and morning:

When does the day start for us (evening or morning)?

Morning

When does the day start for Traditional Jews?

Evening (sunset)
Why do they start the day in the evening?

Probably because evening comes first in this Biblical phrase "evening and morning"

However, the OT is not consistent on this point

Genesis 19:33-34
Judges 6:38
Judges 21:4
I did a quick search for the phrases "day and night" and "night and day" in a few translations and found that "day and night" occurs roughly twice as often as the reverse in the Bible

Around 28 vs 13

It is possible that the occurrences in Genesis 1 are point to God speaking and creating at mid-day which was followed by evening and then morning, after which He repeated the process

What does day mean?

Remember one of my presuppositions

"I take the Bible at face value unless context, grammar, or some other internal indication is given that it should not be taken so"

How does anyone determine what a word means?

Dictionary
What if there are multiple definitions for a word?

Context

The Hebrew word for day is 'yom'

It has basically the same meanings as the English word 'day'
"In my Father's day it took 3 days to travel from Edmonton to Toronto, driving during the day"

Definitions:

Indefinite period of time
24 hours
~12 hours (daylight)

ESV stats from going through BibleWorks search engine with Link Stemming:

Evening + morning + numeric + 'yom'

Evening + morning without day occurs 28 times outside Genesis 1

Always normal length day

Evening + morning with day occurs 9 times outside Genesis 1

Always normal length day

Night + day occurs 120 times outside Genesis 1

Almost always normal length day
Exceptions:

Psalm 77:2
John 9:4
1 Thessalonians 5:2, 5

Principles of Biblical argumentation

The burden of proof is on the novel theory

For instance, I shouldn't have to prove that the Bible claims that Jesus was virgin born. It should be the job of the skeptic to explain away what the Bible seems to plainly teach.

Jonah 1:17

The existence of an exception does not prove or even suggest an exception

Just because sometimes the word fast means "to not eat" does not mean that the fast man doesn't eat

Comparison of Genesis 1 to the rest of Scripture

Other passages with a similar context

A list of days

Numbers 7:10-78

Yom + number

Genesis 30:36
Exodus 24:16

Yom + Evening & morning

Numbers 9:15
Deuteronomy 16:4

Dating methods

Again, remember one of my presuppositions:

I believe that since the Bible is true it is never in conflict with reality and therefore science and the Bible will not contradict each other if both are properly understood

Both nature and Scripture have the same unchanging author and therefore should be in agreement

Can modern dating methods be trusted?

Let's say you see a pot with water pouring into it

How would you determine how long water has been pouring into it?

You would measure the speed at which it is pouring and use math to determine how long it would take at that speed to get to the present amount of water
So let's say there were 60ml of water and the water was pouring into it at 20ml/minute

How long has the water been pouring into the pot for?

What if I told you that although 3 hours is the correct math that you were still wrong?

You have just made a load of assumptions:

What if there had been water already in the pot before I started?
What if there is a leak in the pot?
What if I had started pouring the water in quickly at first and just turned it down to a trickle?

All dating methods measure the current amount of something that changes in quantity over time and as this illustration shows, all dating methods a filled with assumptions and therefore convey more about what the calculations assume rather than what the accurate date is
If you assume old earth assumptions you will get old dates, if you assume young earth assumptions you will get young dates

Genesis 1:6-7

Expanse

Genesis 1:17-18
Notice that the sun moon and stars are in the expanse between the two bodies of water
So the way I imagine it, the earth (which is only water right now) is in the center of the universe which has a perimeter of water surrounding it
Where in the universe is the earth?

Again it comes down to presuppositions

If you believe that this world came about by random chance then you would not think it very likely that the earth is in the center of the universe
If you believe that God created the earth and that man is the peak of His creation then you may assume that the earth is in the unique position at the center of the universe

Observation:

There appear to be an equal number of stars in every direction

Assuming random location

The universe must be infinitely large

Assuming center of universe

That is what we'd expect to observe from the center

Even if we are in the center, although it would seem unlikely the atheist would not think it impossible
And even if Christians find out we are not near the center it would not contradict Scripture or be outside the possibilities of what God may have done
As you can see, these scientific discussions are more philosophical than factual

But unlike the world, the Christian has Scripture and therefore we have access to more facts

The canopy theory was a great idea but I don't believe it holds water :)

Psalm 148:14 describe far away objects and describe the waters as even further than the heavens
The next two verses say that these things (including the water presumably) continue to exist and have not collapsed
Also, Psalm 148 was written after the flood

Genesis 1:8

Why doesn't God call the second day 'good'

In my opinion:

Genesis 1:10,12
Notice that on day three God mentions that it was good twice
On day 2 God had not yet fully separated the waters
In verse 10 He calls the water good because it was now completely separated and completed His work with water

Genesis 1:9-10

What causes earthquakes?

The ground is moving
What if there was only one land mass before the flood?

It seems possible from this verse but I do not believe that it is specific enough to say anything for sure

Where did the dry land come from?

2 Peter 3:5

It seems probably that God formed the ground out of water

*Share about visiting DINOS Centre in Innisfail
Proverbs 18:17

The proverbial caveman

I am going to tell you about the cave man which the evolutionist claims proves that man evolved from an animal and slowly evolved to the intelligent being that he is now
My purpose is to show you that the evidence that modern man gives is not convincing unless you assume an evolutionary beginning as are many of their supposed proofs
We are told that he would knock his wife out with a club

I don't know of any evidence for this
The evolutionist believes in this because according to them man had not developed morals

However, not even the animals do this

In fact, we are usually only told what the caveman did outside the cave, for which there is very little evidence. But what about what he did inside the cave, for which we have real evidence?
What you won't find in the cave is a club notched with dents from the females he clubbed
We are told that the cave man was a savage brute but the one thing that we know he did was paint

The cave man engaged in the delicate and patient work of creating art

And crude drawings do not suggest that he was part animal but that he was man. For animals do not just draw poorly--they don't dray at all. But art is the signature of only one being; man.

He may have taken a pleasure in beating women as well as in drawing animals but all I know is that the drawings record the one but not the other

We are told that the caveman wore no clothes when the only evidence we have are a few fragmentary pieces of bone. In reality it is impossible to deduce since the cloth would long be gone. Or perhaps he had no flesh since that has not been found either.

Perhaps he even loved perishable things such as weaving and embroidery

After all, one of the few things we do know is that they liked to decorate their caves

We are told that the cave man's most advanced tools were the club and the chisel

I have seen modern man make crude drawings on rocks and trees, often in the form of their initials

If scientists visited those sites a few thousand years later would they assume that our most delicate tools were nails and knives or that our language only involved printed capital letters and crude drawings of hearts and arrows?

The pictures don't even suggest that the caveman ever lived in the cave

I have been in modern houses with the walls covered in crude sketches of animals called a nursery
How do we know that the cave was not where the man camped when he wanted to be alone and hunt?
How do we know that he was not just an explorer who enjoyed drawing on stones just as we enjoy etching our initials into tree bark?

My point to all of this is:

Historical scientists speculate a lot and often miss the obvious
They make their conclusions seem factual but don't be afraid to challenge their presuppositions

Genesis 1:11-13

I once heard the question "When is the best time to plant trees" and the answer was "twenty years ago"

The joke comes from the fact that plants and trees take a long time to grow

Did God just plant seeds or did He create fully developed vegetation?

Did God create man as a baby or as a fully grown man?

It seems likely that God made the vegetation fully grown from the start

So the plants were immediately able to obey God's command to yield seeds and fruit
In fact it seems that God created everything fully formed from the start like light, water, dirt, etc

Even though God created the universe from water (2 Peter 3:5) it seems like it instantly changed substance just like when dust became a man

Are plants alive?

My science textbook said that to be scientifically alive most or all of the following must be true:

Growth
Reproduction
Heredity
Stability
Energy
Cellular
Responsive

The Bible

Animals

Genesis 1:24

Humans

Genesis 2:7

Breath

Genesis 7:22

Blood

Genesis 9:4

Plants and insects are never referred to as "living creatures" or alive in any way

Psalm 37:2

Notice that it does not say that plants die
So to eat a plant or chop down a tree is not an act of killing since no life is being taken

If Adam chopped down a tree on the day he was created would there have been tree rings?

If yes then it would seem that God was trying to trick us by making a new creation seem like an old one
If no then God made the world mature but did not try to fake an old look

Age is an assumption

When angels appeared in the Bible they looked like adult men (say 30) but they had been alive for much longer and the body was perhaps brand new
When Jesus (and in the future ourselves) get a new body it will be matured yet brand new
And when God creates a New Heaven and a New Earth it may be fully developed and yet new without us having to wait millions of years
Adam was created as an adult but I don't believe he had a belly button or memories of a past that didn't exist

So at first glance Adam would have looked full grown but upon further examination he would be found to be brand new

Since God tells us the age of His creation then making it mature does not make Him deceptive

"After their kinds"

This occurs 10 times in Genesis 1:11, 12, 21, 24, 25
This is different from evolution which proposes that living things were made from other kinds of living creatures
We may look more at the word 'kinds' later but it is basically the same type of animal/plant
It is interesting to note that although plants, birds, and animals were commanded to reproduce after their kind, Adam and Eve were just told to reproduce

This makes mankind unique and of all the exact same kind which makes sense since we all have the exact same ancestors in Adam and Eve

Genesis 1:14-19

Because evolutionists require a sun before plants Hugh Ross and others like him believe that the sun, moon, and stars were hidden from the earth by a thick fog until this time

Not only is this fanciful but it is also grammatically incorrect. The word used is 'create' not 'appear' (which was used of the dry land in vs 9)

This out of logical order adds to the proof that Genesis was not made up by human intuition
What is the God-given purpose of the sun, moon, and stars?

Calendar

Separate day from night (bright for part of the day and dark for the rest)
Divide years (equinox)

Signs

Job 38:31-33

Constellations (groups of stars)

Psalm 19:1

God's glory & creation
1 Corinthians 15:40-41

Jeremiah 31:35-36

How long Israel will last (future)

Seasons

Why does the earth have different seasons?

It is tilted so therefore God created the earth from day one tipped on its axis

Psalm 8:3-5

Deuteronomy 4:19

Even though they are so awesome we must only worship the far more magnificent creator of the sun, moon, and stars

The sun is classified as a star but it is fairly unique

It is brighter than 90% of the stars in our galaxy
It is exceptionally stable in that it's solar flares are 100 to 100 million times less than most stars

The moon

What color is it?

It is mostly black but it looks white because it reflects the light of the sun

What practical purposes does it have on earth?

Provide some light at night
It causes tides which cleanses the ocean's shores and keeps the ocean currents going to prevent the ocean from stagnating
We use it to generate electricity and dilute sewage

Stars

The Hebrew word for stars is broader than our word in that any small bright heavenly object such as meteors (shooting stars) or other planets
How many stars are there?

Jeremiah 33:22

This verse seems to suggest that there are not an infinite number of stars since we know that there are not an infinite number of grains of sand which corresponds with the idea that the universe is not infinitely large
With the naked eye we can see about 3,000 stars and astronomers would argue about the exact number
Galileo saw about 30,000 stars
There are a guessed 10^22 stars in the universe that we can see so far

Size of stars PPT

As incredible as the stars are for God they must have been easy for Him because He just says "and the stars"

Stars change

We know that stars are burning up and slowly changing but some change faster than others
Sakurai's Object

Recorded to be a white dwarf about the same size of the earth but much denser (1 tonne per cm^3)
In 1996 scientists noticed that it was a bright yellow giant 80 times wider than the sun (500,00 million times the volume it once had)
In 1998 it expanded into a red supergiant 150 times the diameter of the sun
By 2002 the star had lost so much debris that it was invisible even to the most powerful optical telescopes although infrared can still pick it up

Astrophysicists don't understand how the first stars were created

Their theories usually involve other stars having already existed

How can we see stars from billions of light-years away?

What is a light-year?

It is the distance that light can travel in one year (approximately 5.88 trillion miles or 9.5 trillion km)
Evolutionists have the same problem since they think the universe is 13.8 billion years old
Solutions proposed:

Perhaps God made the light in transit

But wouldn't that be deceptive since we are seeing things that never really happened

Perhaps when God stretched out the universe on day 2 the process spanned multiple days and is perhaps still expanding so that by day 4 the stars were not that far away yet (PPT)
Einstein's theory of relativity says that time is not constant

Atomic clocks on satellites 20,000 km run 42 microseconds faster than on earth per day
But because the satellites are traveling at about 12,000 km/hour they run 5 microseconds slower than if they were still which totals 38ms/day faster (GPS)

so maybe light has had enough time to make it even if our earth clocks show not much time has passed

Dr Russell Humphrey's model of the universe uses gravitational time dilation to explain how we see stars from the moment Adam was created and Dr John Hartnett's different model uses the expansion of space as the time warping factor which eliminates the need for dark matter and dark energy as well (Which are one of the 'gods' that evolution must believe in to make their theories work)

Genesis 1:20-23

Remember that I think biblical Hebrew has different rules for what constitutes life so that while in our thinking plants are alive, in the Bible they are not treated as such

Notice in verse 20 that this is the first time we are told God made something alive
So also when it comes to categories of animals
We divide animals into fish, mammals, and reptiles

A shark is a fish but a whale is a mammal
A hippopotamus is a mammal but a crocodile is a reptile
An eel is a mammal but a fish is not

The Bible divides animals into sea creatures, land creatures, and air creatures

God made every animal on this day

There are animals that God created that probably don't exist today

Leviathan

Job 41:1-2,5,7-8,10,13-23,30-32
I imagine a huge crocodile like animal
It seems from the description and context that this is a real animal

Psalm 74:13-15 speaks of a multi headed leviathan but I imagine that it is talking about something different just as Daniel 7 speaks of winged lions and such

However, there are also animals that exist today that He did not create

I could cross a dog and a wolf and make a new bread that has never existed before
It is likely that there were less animals at the beginning

Through cross breading, and perhaps some miracles, there are now more varieties today
Just as God gave us thorns due to the curse it is possible that he caused certain animals to be created/modified later on too

Where did the flying creatures fly?

It might seem obvious but since we had discussed how the expanse includes outer space does Genesis 1:20 imply that the flying creatures fly in outer space?

Actually, the same word that is translated 'face' in Genesis 1:2 (twice) is also in v 20
So flying creatures were to fly on the face of the expanse as the NKJ has it

Genesis 1:24-25

What are examples of the livestock (sheep, cattle), creeping things (lizards) beasts (lions, elephants)
Notice that God did not create them out of nothing

He formed land animals from the earth
What else did God not form out of nothing?

Man (Genesis 2:7)
Woman (Genesis 2:22)
Birds (Genesis 2:19)
So basically all living things except for fish which makes me wonder if they were also made from something
Some have suggested that God put us in charge of them because they are derived from the earth

1 Corinthians 15:39

Here Paul is affirming that birds, fish, and animals are different kinds of creatures

And in context he is saying that after we die our new body will be a different kind than the one we have now

Could insects be included in "creeping things"?

Some fly and some do not so I do not know which day they were created
Exodus 20:11 implies that they were made on one of the 6 days of creation
The Bible does not seem to classify insects as animals

Insects are often omitted when referring to animals
Genesis 7:15 (,21-22)

God saved animals with flesh that breathed which excludes insects from the ark

Since Genesis 1-2 does not mention insects I do not know on which of the six days they were created

There are actually many things that God does not tell us about making

Colossians 1:16

Genesis 1:26-27

Up till now God has always said "let there be" "and there was"

But now God is discussing future creations "let's make" "and He made"

What is the significance of that?

Planning
Uniqueness

This image of God makes humans relationship with God closer than anything else God created
What exactly does it mean to be made in God's image and likeness?

These two words in Hebrew seem to mean exactly what they mean in English and are synonyms of each other
Whatever it is, it must be something that we have and the animals and rest of creation do not have or at least fully have since they are never mentioned as being in the image of God
Suppose you were a gifted sculptor

If I asked you to make a statue in my image you could probably do that
What if I asked you to make a statue in the image of air, what would the difficulty be?

Air is invisible

1 Timothy 1:17

God is invisible

Perspective 1

You could say that I resemble my dad visually, but I also resemble him in some of my mannerisms, voice, thoughts, etc.

It has been suggested that God has communicable attributes (love, will, discernment, morality, language) which He has passed on to us and incommunicable attributes (knowing everything, being all powerful, self-existent) which we do not have
Just like the former example with the statue

If you made a statue of me it would probably replicate my physical features but it would not be made of the same materials or have the ability to think or talk

There is a sense in which everything God makes is in His image if it is based on attributes

Romans 1:20
So man is made in God's image to a larger degree than anything else

Perspective 2

Another way of seeing it is to note how this word is used in other places

Numbers 33:52
1 Samuel 6:5,11
2 Kings 11:18
2 Chronicles 23:17
Ezekiel 7:20
Ezekiel 16:17
Ezekiel 23:14
Amos 5:26

These images represented false gods

So to be made in God's image is to represent Him (to others)

Perspective 3

Colossians 1:15

Jesus is the image of God
2 Corinthians 4:4

But it is more complex than that

Genesis 5:3

Every child is made in the image of their parent
So just as I have been made in the image of God and the image of my parents, so Jesus was made in both the image of man and the image of God

Or perhaps rather He was the originally planned image of God and man's image was patterned after Him

In fact, Adam was the only human being who was only made in God's image and no other

Does the Bible teach that our image has been tainted by sin?

I cannot find any direct verse. If you know of one please tell me
One could say that since God never sins, when man started sinning we became less like God and therefore resemble Him less and therefore are a more distorted image of God

On the other hand, it is possible to have attributes that God does not share and yet still be fully in God's image

For instance Psalm 121:4 vs Genesis 2:21
So since our image is not affected by the fact that God never sleeps but man does, is it possible that our image is also not affected by the fact that God never sins but man does

Genesis 3:22 suggests that although sin made us less like God in our actions, we are more like God in our knowledge

Ramifications

Genesis 9:6
James 3:8-10
Matthew 22:15-22

Man belongs to God because we bear His image

Future

1 Corinthians 15:42-48

Our current bodies will be transformed to be like Jesus' resurrected body

1 Corinthians 15:49

Notice that our image will also change
Currently we have the image of Adam and the image of God

In the future we will have the image of Jesus and the image of God

But not Jesus as Spirit but rather Jesus' humanity and God's [divinity]

2 Corinthians 3:17-18

It seems that although only in resurrection will Adam's image be fully replaced, we can experience some of the changes in this life too!
Colossians 3:9-10
1 John 3:2
And this makes sense since children are in their parent's image and we are God's children

Marriage and divorce

Genesis 1:27
Genesis 2:24
Matthew 19:3-9
When Jesus was asked about divorce He went back to the pattern established by God of joining one man with one woman
Although it is not recorded that God explicitly make it a command at that point, it was His original design and desire

Does anyone know what the dominion mandate is?
Genesis 1:28

In the creation story from Genesis 1-3 what did God bless?

Men & women

Genesis 1:22,28

Seventh day

Genesis 2:3

The next time where blessing is mentioned is when God blessed Noah and Noah in turn blessed the Lord (Genesis 9:1,26)

And that is followed by Abraham

"Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth"

How was this to be done?

I believe that the rest of scripture teaches that this should be done through sexual relations in the context of marriage

This seems to be a command that can be obeyed/disobeyed

Is it a sin to not participate in this command today?

Theories:

It is everyone's duty to get married and have children if they can
If a person does not marry they should not populate the earth
This was changed in the NT to a spiritual focus of populating the earth with children of God
If you get married, have kids; but if you remain single that is fine too
Other?
Now that this command has been fulfilled it is no longer binding

This would prevent overpopulation

I have really been wrestling with this and would like your help to understand these verses which I once thought I knew
*Example of recently being confused by a parable and Jonathan Attrill helped me out
*I wish I had taught on this last year when I understood this verse, but now that I have studied it I'm not so confident :)
What does subdue mean?

Numbers 32:22

God subdues the land of Israel
Numbers 32:29
Joshua 18:1

2 Samuel 8:11

David subdued nations

2 Chronicles 28:10

(subjugate) Slaves are subdued
Nehemiah 5:5

(forcing)

Jeremiah 34:11

(subjection)

Jeremiah 34:16

(subjection)

Esther 7:8

(assault) Haman subdued Esther

Micah 7:19

(tread) God subdues our sins

What does rule/dominion mean?

Leviticus 39-43

Don't dominate people ruthlessly
Leviticus 25:46,53

Leviticus 26:17

Bad people will dominate God's people when they are punished

Numbers 24:17-19

Jesus will dominate evil cities

Would you say subdue and dominion have roughly the same meaning or do you find an important distinction?

To me they both roughly mean to rule over someone/something
What would your summary definition be?

What did Adam subdue? (Close Bibles first and then look afterwards)

The earth

Notice that subdue refers to the earth while dominion refers to the animals
This could refer to the entire earth or just dry ground (Genesis 1:1,10)

What did Adam have dominion over?

Fish
Birds
Livestock
Living things
I would summarize it as animals in general

What did Adam not have dominion over or subdue?

God
Other people (his wife)
Sun, moon, and stars
Earth (unless subdue is the same thing)
Plants
Weather
Perhaps water depending on your definition of 'earth'
So to call this verse a "creation mandate" is not entirely accurate since it is not over all creation

And as we shall soon examine, the word 'mandate' may not be the best either

This verse has been used as a proof text for many different ideas:

Aliens can't visit the earth since that would take away from us being in control
Man is morally allowed to clone animals
We must have good stewardship over the environment

Is dominion a command to be obeyed/disobeyed or is it a God-given position

If it is a command (Genesis 1:28 "And God said"):

Adam could have sinned in many ways:

Not eating the fruit
Not exercising dominion
Not populating the earth

So when I see a bear and I run, perhaps I'm sinning?

If it is a God-given position (Genesis 1:26):

It would be a fact rather than an obligation to obey
There is no punishment stated for disobedience as there was with eating the forbidden fruit
So when I see a bear and I run, I am not exercising my rightful position over the bear

Reconciling the two

When the Israelites sinned were they still God's chosen people?

So it is possible to be God's child yet not act like it at times

Remember how king Saul was anointed king (1 Samuel 10:1) but he went and hid among the luggage (1 Samuel 10:22)

He was positionally king but experientially he was not ruling

I think that God put Adam and Eve in a rulership position over the animals and then commanded them to act on their God-given position

Were Adam and Eve good rulers?

Before they ate the forbidden fruit they were sinless and therefore perfect rulers
But by sinning they became corrupt rulers and the world became rebellious to its God-given ruler

Thorns and thistles
Animals attacking people
And so there became a civil war as happened in France between the rulers (man) and the subjects (animals)

It is possible that when they were perfect rulers they were in perfect control of nature just as the second Adam (Jesus) was in perfect control over nature and could calm storms and such)

Do we have that same dominion as Adam?

I have not been able to find any verse (unless you can think of one) where God says that we are no longer to have dominion over animals and subdue the earth
On the other hand our relationship to animals has changed

Genesis 9:13

Noah was given a similar command but the dominion was replaced with fear
And we can now eat animals

It is also a possibility (unless I am reading too much into this)

Jesus (who is the last Adam) has taken our place as ruler

Psalm 8:4-6

This seems to be speaking of mankind

Hebrews 2:6-9

Perhaps God gave Jesus the dominion Adam originally had since He was a perfect man

That may or may not imply that it was removed from us

What difference does this make practically speaking?

If the supposed "creation mandate" teaches that we must look after the world like a gardener looks after a garden, then we are serving the animals and are here for their benefit
However, if it means that we are to rule the animals justly then it is they who are for our benefit and we can look after them because they are under us rather than because they are over us

A passing note on Genesis 1:28

*Example of Revelation 13:8 saying "whose names are not written in the book of life of the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world." (KJV) but it should be "Everyone whose name has not been written before the foundation of the world in the book of life of the Lamb who was slain." (ESV and most other translations)

The KJV renders an ambiguous statement in a less likely way

The KJV and ASV render this verse as "Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth"
This has led some people to believe that the earth had previously been filled and had been wiped out and now God wanted it re-filled
The Hebrew word does not mean re-fill but rather fill as most modern translations render it
But the KJV and ASV are not so much in error as they are misunderstood

A few centuries ago the prefix 're-' did not mean 'again' as it often does today, but rather emphasized the verb

Research does not mean search again, but rather search completely

Genesis 1:29-30

There is a scientific law called the "law of conservation of mass-energy (the first law of thermodynamics is a specific case of this law specifically dealing with the conservation of heat and energy)

Basically, if you burn a log, the mass changes type but there is not less matter in the universe
Or if you turn on a light, the energy in the form of electricity turns into energy in the form of light and heat
In other words, you cannot add or subtract energy or mass from the universe

This is why a perpetual motion machine is impossible

This theory used to be 2 separate laws

The law of the conservation of mass and the law of the conservation of energy
But when Einstein came up with his theory of E=mc^2 scientists realized that mass and energy were connected

Evolution believes in this theory because it always works in the lab

However their problem is how did the universe come into being from nothing and not gain energy or mass?

Their solution is to invent dark matter and dark energy (neither of which have ever been observed either directly or indirectly)
Think of it like anti-matter or anti-energy
So that as energy and matter increase in the universe, anti-energy and anti-mass decrease

Christians also believe in this theory because it always works in the lab

However, because the Bible teaches that God is infinite, He is able to create matter and energy and yet remain infinite just and infinity-a billion is still infinity
Ironically, the atheists why consider God a myth end up needing to make up two mythical things of their own to help explain the universe in which they live

*Experiment

(Give everyone a m-berry pill to suck on)

Light a candle
Take a tall glass
1/4 cups of vinegar in it
Add 1 tsp of baking soda
Although the substance is changing, there are still the same total amount of atoms and energy. I did not create mass or energy out of nothing
Pour "air" over candle
Explanation

Carbon dioxide is heavier than air
A flame needs oxygen to burn

Give everyone a shot of vinegar and a lemon wedge to try eating

This changes your taste buds
Imagine if God made all that animals and people to love the taste of healthy fruits and vegetables

Perhaps that is how it once was and perhaps God will restore that to us later

What diet were Adam and Eve on?

A vegetarian diet

Where all plants allowed?

Some plants such as ferns and mosses do not produce seeds

Such plants were allowed for animals but not for humans

However, animals were allowed to eat every plant regardless of whether it produces seeds (Genesis 1:30)

When did people start eating meat?

Genesis 9:3-4

This is when God first gave mankind permission to eat animals

Genesis 6:12-13

What were the accusations God had of the people?

Corruption
Violence

It is possible that pre-flood people sinned by eating (or at the very least killing) animals

When did animals start eating meat?

The Bible does not mention giving them permission at any specific point

We know that they now eat other animals and the Bible records that
Some think it was at the same time as humans
Others think that it might have been immediately after Adam and Eve sinned
And even if they didn't eat other animals, they might have killed them for protection, sport, etc.

What is a biblical perspective on carnivorous animals? (meat eaters)

Mosquitoes

Have you ever wondered why God could have possibly created mosquitoes?
Could Adam and Eve have been truly happy in the garden of Eden with mosquitoes?
In at least certain species, only female mosquitoes eat blood

The males (and other species) eat nectar from flowers

The reason some females need blood is because it is more nutritious

And females need more nutrition than males since they reproduce

So originally God probably made all mosquitoes nectar eaters (plants) but now due to either a lack of nutrition produced in plants or a higher need for nutrition by female mosquitoes, they now eat blood

Lizards

Of the 17 scientific families, only 1 of them is strictly meat eating

This makes it very likely that at one time perhaps none of them were

Dogs

A large portion of dry dog food is meal/cereal
Coyotes

During the summer coyotes eat grass, fruit, and berries

Even though these animals have teeth that we think of as meat-eating they eat vegetation

Bats

The Vampire Bat is the only species of bat that eats blood
The rest of all bats either eat insects or fruit

Bears

Bears can survive well on both fruit and meat
The Panda Bear only eats bamboo

Lions

There was a lion that got a lot of press quite a while back

Its mother had injured it just after birth so a human family raised it
They documented that at 10 weeks if they gave the lion a bone it would vomit whatever was in her stomach
Even a 4 years old they could not get it to eat meat even though they kept trying

So perhaps lions are not the meat-only animals we commonly think they are

Most organisms are vegetarians

Even most carnivorous types of animals have traces of vegetarian ancestry

The future

Isaiah 11:6-9
Isaiah 65:25
I showed you a picture last week revealing the fact that the only time a lion lies down with a lamb today is when it is a piece of mutton :)

This diet means that God created people and animals not to kill

This is a lot better than the idea that God used pain, death, and suffering in a perfect world and thought it was good

Genesis 1:31

This phrase has come up several time but what is different about this time?

"Very good"
Why "very good"

Perhaps because man was created
Perhaps because everything was completed

Another special thing about day 6:

One day, a second day, a third day, a fourth day, a fifth day, a day the sixth, a day the seventh

Genesis 2:1

Remember when I described the law of the conservation of mass-energy

In this verse God is saying that He has put all the mass and energy that is needed in this universe
John 1:1-3

The Bible teaches that only God (through Jesus) created everything that exists

The law of the conservation of mass-energy supports this verse

Genesis 2:2-3

Isaiah 40:28
So then why did God rest?

Exodus 31:12-18

To establish a week

Why is a day as long as it is?

1 rotation of the Earth

Why is a month as long as it is?

Roughly 1 rotation of the Moon around the Earth

Why is a year as long as it is?

1 rotation of the Earth around the Sun

Why is the week as long as it is?

It is how long God took to make the universe with an extra day to rest
Perhaps this is why God took so long to create the universe

I believe that God could have created it in a split second if He wanted to but He did it this way for our benefit

Exodus 20:8-11
Exodus 31:15-17

To give us a Sabbath

I do not know if Adam, Noah, Abraham, or anyone prior to Moses observed the Sabbath or were commanded by God to do so
And if they did do so it might have been more a concept of resting rather than a Saturday all-day event

Genesis 2:4

What does the phrase "these are the generations of" mean?

It comes from the Hebrew word 'toledot'
There are 11 toledots in Genesis
Although most scholars would disagree with me, I think that a toledot is an introductory heading rather than the more popular view that it is a closing line.
"What followed from"

Lord God (YHWH-Elohim)

This phrase occurs 35 times in the OT, 19 of which are in Genesis 2&3
Chapter 1 only used Elohim

What could the change imply?

YHWY is God's personal name so this change expresses that the powerful God who created everything is also someone we can relate to personally

"In the day"

The more ambiguous meaning of the word day in this context has not influence on the meaning of the same word in clearer contexts in chapter 1

The NIV takes this understanding and translates in "when" including in 2:17, 3:5, 5:1

The ESV is not consistent in its translation of this phrase

Genesis 2:5

This verse rewinds the narrative to some point before man was created

What is the latest day that this might be referring to?
Man is not created yet so it must before the end of day 6
Compare the words used for 'plants' in Genesis 1:11 compared with Genesis 2:5

Notice how Genesis 1:11 uses very general, all-encompassing words while Genesis 2:5 uses very specific, narrow words referring to shrubs of the field and plants of the field (farming plants)
This seems to suggest to me that we are referring to a time between day 3 when God made plants and day 6 when God made man

Analogy: why would God say the Hippopotamus wasn't made yet if no animal had been made, instead it would make more sense if God said that because all the other animals were already created
God also delayed in making women when He made man so it would not be odd if He did not make all plants at the same time

Furthermore, God seems to have a pattern of creating the universe with a lack of something to demonstrate its need (woman, rest, farming)

It seems that these plants do exist at the time of vs 5, yet only in seed form

Notice that they only hadn't "sprung up", not that they hadn't been created yet
This explains why the end of vs 5 says that the reason was because of a lack of rain (and a farmer)

Genesis 2:6

What does your translation call the water?

Most say mist

Job 36:27 also uses mist

However, more contemporary ancient Babylonian texts use this word to mean subterranean springs or waterways, springs, or some sort of underground water system

When was the first time it rained?

Some say not till Noah's flood

Genesis 2:5 says it hadn't rained yet
Genesis 7:12 is the first time rain is mentioned in the Bible
Genesis 9:13 is the first time a rainbow is mentioned in the Bible

However, just because something is not mentioned does not mean it doesn't exist

Just as a command to keep the Sabbath is not mentioned till the time of Moses does not mean that God had never privately commanded it, so it is possible that Noah's flood was not the first time it had ever rained
All we know is that in this time before man was created it hadn't rained yet
As for the rainbow, God often uses preexisting things and gives them new symbolism such as bread and wine which predated the Lord's Supper

In fact it would make sense that there was rain from a scientific point of view

In the 1656 years between Adam and the flood a lot of water probably evaporated and formed rain clouds

Genesis 2:7

What is the name of the first man God created?

Adam

What is the Hebrew word for man?

Adam

So how can we distinguish the two?

I haven't checked with many translations, but I think the ESV does a great job of this
In this verse it uses 'ha-adam' (the adam). This refers to man, when the article 'the' is not used with the word 'adam' then the ESV translates it as a proper name and thus capitalizes the A

Formed from the dust

The word for formed is the same word used of the potter in Jeremiah 18:2 (not that the potter 'formed' but rather the word translated 'potter' itself

It also points to the intimate, zoomed in, special attention to detail that God is showing in this part of creation

This has led some people to believe that since Adam was not made from nothing, so too was the rest of the universe
Did God create 'ex nihilo' (out of nothing)?

The word 'bara' in Genesis 1:1 does not restrict us to that view although it is compatible with it and nothing is mentioned to have existed prior
This view is later confirmed throughout Scripture

Romans 4:17
Hebrews 11:3
Psalm 33:6,9
Amos 4:13

Dust is a good translation since the word describes fine particles rather than a solid clump of clay as I often (falsely) imagine it

So if you see a clay statue made in the image of a man know that God made man out of dust which no one can use to make a statue

Breathed into his nostrils the breath of life

1 Corinthians 15:45,47

Man was formed and then given life

This personal act of God sets his relationship with God apart from the rest of creation
What is the breath of life?

Was it human air
Was it the Holy Spirit who is associated with wind/breath
Was it something that God gave animals too?

Genesis 7:15

Revelation 11:10-11

This is a breath rather than the breath
It made a lifeless body live just as Adam's lifeless body was breathed to life

I unfortunately should mention that this verse has been used in the past (most notably by US President Bill Clinton) to advocate for abortion since babies in the womb don't breathe

*See the study on abortion for more information on how to rebut this argument

The man became a living being

Different translations use soul or creature
This phrase is also used of animals

Genesis 1:20, 24

After God imparted life into Adam, how do subsequent generations get life?

There are two options, either God creates life/gives us a soul (whatever terminology you want to use), or life gets passed on from our parents
I personally believe in life being passed on but am open to different opinions/correction

Genesis 2:2

God has finished creating new things

Genesis 1:31

God does not create sinful natures or anything less than "very good"

Romans 5:12

This would explain how we got sin (God did not create us sinful)

Genesis 2:8

Another common misconception

In vs 7 man was formed and given life
And now, only after being made presumably elsewhere, he is placed in Eden

Eden

Eden means 'delight' in Hebrew
The garden was in Eden, not called Eden
Other references to Eden

2 Kings 19:12

Not the same Eden

Ezekiel 28:12-19

Could this be referring to satan?

Where is Eden located?

It says it was in/towards the east which we often associate with Israel (Middle East)
In 2019 Hurricane Dorian went through the Bahamas and I assume that it would be hard to find where specific gardens were located

The same is true with Eden since a global flood destroyed the earth

More on the location in future verses

Genesis 2:9

This is expanding on vs 8 where God 'planted' the garden
Since it was planted, yet the trees sprung up and we are still in the 6th day (Genesis 1:27,31), it would seem to happen miraculously fast

Perhaps this way Adam could learn how plants grow since he was the chief farmer/gardener in the world at that time

There were many trees but it focuses on two of special importance

These trees were either symbolic or magical

If they were magical then they had supernatural side effects
If they were natural then God made supernatural side effects happen when they ate it

1 Corinthians 11:28-30

The drink was not supernatural, but rather God was acting in connection with the food

The tree of life

This tree was not forbidden to eat from

Genesis 2:16-17

Romans 5:12

Why would God give a tree of life to a man who would not die if he never sinned?

Genesis 3:22

The tree literally made its partakers immortal

God could not have given it just in case Adam sinned since God prevented Adam from eating it the moment he did sin
God could have given it for purely symbolic reasons
I personally prefer the idea that God ordains both the means and the end and that God's method of keeping a sinless Adam alive was to give him a fruit that would prolong his life

This would lead me to believe that Adam was never self-sufficiently immortal since He would have had to rely on a certain tree for immortality

References to this tree

Proverbs 3:13,18

Wisdom is personified/treeified as a tree of life (not 'the' tree of life)

Proverbs 11:30
Proverbs 13:12
Proverbs 15:4

Will that tree reappear?

Revelation 2:7
Revelation 22:1-2

Also water of life

Revelation 22:14
Revelation 22:19

The tree of the knowledge of good and evil

We have looked at merisms before:

In OT Hebrew you could combine two opposites in what is called a 'merism' to make an all encompassing single concept

Genesis 24:50
Genesis 31:24
2 Samuel 14:17

Does "knowledge of good and evil" means the ability to differentiate between right and wrong?

*I don't really know what it means exactly myself, so maybe others can help
1 Kings 3:9

We do not have a perfect ability to determine between right and wrong

Judges 17:6, Proverbs 14:12

Sometimes we think something is right when it really isn't

Wasn't Adam able to tell that disobeying God's command not to eat the fruit was wrong?
Perhaps it was a personal/intimate knowledge of right and wrong (almost like the euphemism of Adam knowing his wife)

However, does Genesis 3:22 allow for this since God also has that knowledge?

Didn't Jesus know between good and bad while on earth and yet He was sinless?

What if the knowledge God has comes from within Himself and is therefore infallible. And when we are given the same ability to know right and wrong from within ourselves which is fallible and therefore inaccurate

This seems to be what would have happened anyways, whereas the text seems to suggest that the tree/God actually did something to them, otherwise the tree is useless

Perhaps they were just very naive like children with limited knowledge and the tree opened up their eyes to countless more evils

Where did the idea of an apple tree come from?

The Latin Vulgate's translation of Genesis 2:17 translates evil as 'malum' and the Latin word for apple is 'malum' (with a long vowel 'a' denoted by a line above it (called a macron))

On a comforting note:

Although the tree of life is mentioned in Revelation, the tree of the knowledge of good and evil is never mentioned again which is part of a larger study on whether we can lose our salvation in eternity
If God hadn't removed the tree of life in Genesis then it would have been possible to live forever in sin and since death was required to pay for sin we could never have been forgiven (in my understanding)

A third tree combining them both?

1 Peter 2:24

Jesus (the last Adam) is also connected to a tree
The cross was a tree of life to us, but perhaps a tree of the knowledge of good and evil to Jesus

Galatians 3:13, Revelation 22:3

There is a ton of parallels and contrasts between these three trees
The tree of knowledge of good and evil brought a curse on the world and the tree of Christ brought freedom from that curse and became like a tree of life to us

In a sense, life has always been and will always be found by means of a tree

Adam and Eve stole fruit off of in in the sense that it was not theirs to have, and two thieves were also near the third tree
Adam got kicked out of Eden but because of the third tree we can enter eternity with God

Genesis 2:10-14

Rivers like this unnamed river are very rare

Most rivers join together to form larger rivers (PPT)
The process of a river splitting is called "river bifurcation"
According to Wikipedia:

There is a river called Divide Creek near Kicking Horse Pass on the British Columbia/Alberta border which is also the border between Yoho National Park and Banff National Park

After following the Continental Divide of the Americas for a short distance, the creek forks, with one side draining through the Bow River east to Hudson Bay and the Arctic Ocean, and the other side draining west to the Pacific Ocean by way of the Kicking Horse River.

Where do rivers usually start?

In relatively high elevation such as mountains or hills or from springs
This seems to suggest that Eden was probably located at a high elevation, perhaps even a mountain

Isaiah 11:6-9
Isaiah 65:25
Some have used these verses to suggest that Eden was on a mountain

Although I don't know how strong this argument is, just imagine the view if it were true

Either some/all of these rivers exist today or they do not

If they exist today then we can guess where Eden is
If they do not exist today then we have no idea
Suppose they do exist today

Do these 4 rivers come from a common river/area

Both the Tigris & Euphrates rivers come from the same general area (although not a common river)
Pishon & Gihon do not currently exist

Moses is attributed with writing Genesis so why would he mention all these places if they were not around when he wrote it
Would angels still be guarding that area?

Suppose they do not exist today

There is no river in the Mesopotamia area that splits into 4 rivers and goes where the text suggests
Moses might have been explaining the geography/topography pre-flood and therefore the rivers would have been buried/modified

Ezekiel 31:18

This could hint at Eden being buried

We don't find any area that angels guard today
Noah might have named the Tigris & Euphrates because they brought back memories to him of the original rivers

Genesis 2:15

Adam was not the first person to work

God had already been working for almost a week and was about to take a day of rest

Now Adam is also called by God to work as a gardener
Genesis 2:18

Eve was also given a job as soon as she was made

Was Adam given work before or after the fall?

After and therefore work is not a curse but rather something God considered "very good"
It was God's perfect plan in a perfect world that man work
This seems crazy to us but that is because sin affected man and his work

How did the fall change work?

Genesis 3:17-19

The pain, difficulty and exhaustion that work brings is the result of the fall which means that prior to the fall work was easy, light, and delightful as God originally intended

Not only has sin caused work to change but also people

Slavery, lying, strained relationships, unfair practices, greed, and envy are some of the ways that sin has affected others whom we may work with or for making it harder to work with and for them

Future of work (see study on work for more details)

What about the parables that Jesus told of people looking after a little on earth and when the master comes back they are put in charge of even more

Could it be that when Jesus comes back and sees us doing a good job that He will give us more responsibility rather than an eternal vacation?
Remember that Jesus was faithful as a carpenter on earth and is now preparing a place for us in Heaven (John 14:2)

Genesis 2:16-17

This is a very clear command

There could be no excuses/confusion so that Adam would be without excuse when he sinned
It was also a rule of commission rather than omission

Sins of omission are things that we should do but don't such as the sin of not praying
Sins of commission are easier to avoid because they must be deliberately done

This helps explain why the punishment would be so great

"You shall surely die"

But when Adam sinned he didn't die, did he?

Could it just be spiritual death?

Romans 5:12

This seems to indicate that physical death is related with Adam's sin

One interesting rabbinical explanation:

Psalm 90:4

Therefore Adam could live for a thousand years out of pity

Genesis 5:5

But Adam only lived 930 years of the 1,000 God had given him
The remaining 70 were given to David

2 Samuel 5:4
Otherwise he would have been stillborn

There isn't any biblical support for these leaps in logic

Resolving this from the Hebrew

Read vs 17 from CJB translation

"except the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. You are not to eat from it, because on the day that you eat from it, it will become certain that you will die."

I have read from several independent and trustworthy sources that a literal translation would be "dying you shall die"

The emphasis is on the certainty of the event rather than the immediacy which is why they add the word 'surely'
Even with the tools at my disposal I am not able to verify that this is more likely, nor do I know why translations don't change it to this if it is the more natural and accurate reading

This phrase does occur in 1 Kings which might give us some insight

1 Kings 2:36-37

This is the same phrase as the one we are studying in Genesis
1 Kings 2:38-41

How long do you think this took?
My bible notes say it was about 48km

1 Kings 2:46

Another suggested example of death before death

1 Samuel 15:35-16:1

Samuel mourns for Saul as if he were dead even though he wasn't yet physically

I will let you judge if these examples build a convincing case or not

Another attempt at resolving this has been to see it as death being a slow deteriorating process which began on the day Adam sinned

Just as we think that a tree that is chopped down is dead (even though it was never alive), it takes time for that physical death to culminate in observable and definite death

Did Adam know what death was?

Death did not occur till after sin
God must have programmed Adam with words and their meanings from the start so maybe Adam had a theoretical knowledge of it just as a little child might

Genesis 2:18-20

"Not good"

Genesis 1 contained 6 "and it was good" statements and 1 "it was very good" statement
Here we have the phrase "it is not good"

What do you think "it was good" has meant up till now and what does this phrase mean by contrast?

I believe that it means incompleteness

At the end of this day it was called "very good" according to Genesis 1:31
Sin has not affected the world
God created the world for a short period without a woman on purpose, and I don't believe God does anything bad or poorly

In what way was man alone?

He had God
He had animals
He didn't have someone else like himself

What was not good about being alone?

No procreation
No human relationship
No marriage
Hebrews 10:24-25

"A helper"

The word helper in English often denotes a lower position

"I hired a helper"

God is called our helper (same word in Hebrew)

Psalm 33:20
Psalm 146:5
Although not used exclusively of God, the Hebrew Bible refers to God as our help or that our help comes from God about 15 times

Therefore we can never view women as doormats or less than men
Help is therefore often referring to getting help for something we could never accomplish by ourselves

"The Lord God had formed every beast of the field and every bird of the heavens"

Do your translations have the word "had" in it?

According to Genesis 1, which was created first, man or animals?

Animals

Notice that the word "had" would resolve the apparent contradiction

However, is it in the Hebrew?

Scholars debate it
The NET bible with its translator notes says that the verse directly contradicts Genesis 1 but they prefer reading it without the 'had'
I compared the top 35 English translations and only 6 translations have it and of the 6 the only ones I am familiar with were the NIV and the ESV
Personally, because it is debatable I prefer the ESV and NIV on this verse to remove the contradiction

Others see it as creating another set of animals and birds

The naming of animals

In Genesis 1:28 God made man rulers of the earth, animals, and plants

And naming is a sign of ownership

So here God is having Adam act as ruler over the animals
How long would this have taken?

Remember, it had to be done within that same day
I believe that it could be easily done by Adam

Adam was created perfect and probably had an incredible mind so he wouldn't have had to give each name a long think
God brought the animals to Adam so he didn't have to find them

I personally imagine them forming a line waiting for their name before running off

There were probably less animals then
He did not name all animals

Fish and insects for instance were not named

Also reptiles (creeping things)
Also "beasts of the field" is more specific than "beasts of the earth" in Genesis 1:24

Doing a bit of math, if Adam had to name 2500 animals taking 5 seconds a name with a 5 minute break every hour to get a drink, he could have done it in 4 hours and 2 minutes

There was no helper fit for Adam

This too adds to the idea that helper cannot just mean a hard worker like a horse or something

None of the animals, even collectively, were a suitable helper for Adam

This would have demonstrated to Adam that there was no animal that could serve as a physical, emotional, intellectual, or spiritual companion for him
*You know how some sins transcend time and others do not. For instance, Adam did not have to obey certain laws that came through Moses just as we do not have to. I had a lecturer in YWAM who suggested that Adam committed bestiality in order to know that he was not compatible with them.

I believe that Adam only named the animals

Genesis 2:21-23

What is a modern example of deep sleep?

Anesthesia
In 1847 Dr James Young Simpson was the first to use chloroform as a general anesthetic on a human

He used it on a woman in childbirth to alleviate the pain

This was supposedly seen as bad by others who believed that women were supposed to have painful births because of the fall
How would you respond?

Jesus went around healing and countering the effects of the fall including death

This can mean side or rib although it is plural indicating that Adam had multiple of them
Where did the flesh go?

In place of the rib
We don't even know if God cut Adam open

If He did, then both the first and last Adam have wounds on their sides

This makes even Eve a descendant of Adam

From the first man came the first woman
And from women now come men
1 Corinthians 11:8-12

Matthew Henry's Commentary on Genesis 2:21 it reads: "[T]he woman was made of a rib out of the side of Adam; not made out of his head to rule over him, nor out of his feet to be trampled upon by him, but out of his side to be equal with him, under his arm to be protected, and near his heart to be beloved."
Rib myths

Some people have attacked the Bible at this point because men and women have the exact same number of ribs

How would you respond?

Men who lose a finger don't have sons or daughters with only 9 fingers
Later in Genesis God had Abraham perform a certain amputation but that did not cause his descendants to be automatically circumcised

In recent times surgeons have discovered that if the covering membrane is left intact (it is a part of ribs that often sticks in our teeth when we eat), the rib will grow back

Thoracic surgeons (chest organ surgery) often remove a rib to make it easier to operate
People who need bone grafts often have the same rib removed more than once to avoid unnecessary scarring

Introducing them together

According to what I have read, there is more excitement in Hebrew than English portrays in vs 23

Man and woman

In Hebrew these words are similar as in English

Ish (man), and ishshah (woman)
In German the words are mann (man) and Frau (woman)

In Luther's German he invented a new word for woman (mannin)

Genesis 2:24

Adam and Eve's marriage is the precedent for all marriages to follow

One man with one woman (heterosexual monogamy)
Marriage is a very good thing established by God

We will look at polygamy when we study Lamech in chapter 4

What is the first thing that the man should do?

Leave both parents

In what sense did Adam leave his father and mother?

God is the only one who can possible represent Adam's parents

In what sense did Adam leave God?

He didn't leave Him relationally (fully)
He didn't ignore God from then on
Matthew 15:1-6

It doesn't men we don't honor our parents or help them

I think that just as in a sense Adam had to leave God to be with Eve, the same happens with God in every marriage to a certain degree

1 Corinthians 7:32-34

Isaiah 44:24

In a sense we are all formed by God (the word formed in that verse is the same as in Genesis 2:7
So in the same way that Adam had to leave God in order to be married, so do all future married men and women

And as bad as that sounds, when I think of a man like William Carey (known as the father of modern missions) who was uses mightily of God in India, he did so at the expense of his marriage and I don't think that was right. I believe he was abandoning his God given responsibility to be united to his wife and it would have been better if he had never gotten married since in marriage he vowed to commit to her and then left her.

There is a downside to being married, not just upsides

Singleness is not a sin, or even to be frowned upon

Jesus was single
Paul advocated for it

Two big lessons I have learned since being married are that marriage is better than I could have imagined and singleness was better that I realized

I studied up a lot on marriage in the Bible as I was preparing for my own marriage. But since being married I have begun to study singleness, and there is a 50% chance that I will one day be single again

Misunderstanding about singleness

It is harder to be single than married

Matthew 19:3-12

When the disciples say that being married sounds way harder than remaining single Jesus does not disagree

For some being single may be harder and for others being married may be harder as Paul deals with in 1 Corinthians 7

Singleness means no intimacy

The biblical alternative to marriage is celibacy
But celibacy does not mean loneliness or even a lack of intimacy

And likewise, marriage and even sexuality does not necessarily provide intimacy
2 Samuel 1:26
Some couples will say that they are married to their best friend, but other couples are not

Proverbs gives many descriptions of what a friend should be and sadly many marriages do not have that level of friendship

You might think that family goes deeper than friendship because our culture uses the words that way

"I received a friend request on Facebook"

Proverbs 18:24 indicates that friends can be closer than family because they choose you rather than being stuck with you

What is the second thing the man should do?

Hold fast to his wife

The modern Hebrew word for glue is derived from this word (same letters but different vowel points)

One flesh

I believe this refers to sexual intimacy
Adam and Eve were perfect symbols of this since they literally shared the same flesh since Eve was made from a part of Adam's body

Jesus and this passage

Matthew 19:3-9
Mark 10:2-9
Notice how in both passages as well as others God says that he made people male and female from the beginning

If evolution were true then God would have made a single living organism in the beginning rather than two humans with two genders
PPT

Mark 13:19
2 Peter 3:4
Luke 11:50-51
These verses only fit the Biblical timeline

Genesis 2:25

Public nudity was good in God's sight
Why is this no longer true?

We will see that sin opened their eyes and gave them shame and from then on cloths were required

In a way, cloths are a recognition of sin and a society that denies the existence of sin will not see the importance of being covered

In between Genesis 2&3

Genesis 1:1

If God created everything, does that mean that He created evil as well?
My opinion

Holes are created by removing, say, dirt from an area

There were not created at creation but rather created by necessity when the good dirt God made gets tampered with

Sin too is not a thing even though it is real
That is why you can't have a jar of evil
John 3:4

God created a perfect law and sin is the absence of that law

James 1:14-15

It seems that we can create sin by desiring things contrary to God

So by creating everything good, the potential for evil existed

Did Adam and Eve have a free choice to sin or not to sin?

I see no reason from reading Genesis to assume otherwise
But this actually means that God gave Adam and Eve an ability that He does not have

God is limited in some ways

Perhaps He is self-limited, but regardless there are things He can not do

2 Timothy 2:13

In university I knew of people who did that very thing that God apparently can not do

Habakkuk 1:12-13

God can not look at sin but I can

1 John 1:5

There can be no darkness in God but there is in me

Hebrews 6:18

God can't lie but I can

God gave Adam and Eve the free will to go against their own perfect nature even though God Himself can not
I do not think that we have the same free will that they had

Romans 6:6-7
I think that sin put us in bondage which implies a loss of freedom and only once we are redeemed are we able to regain the freedom God created humans with so that we too can now do what is contrary to our fallen nature

The fall of satan

Ezekiel 28:11-19

The first part of the chapter deals with the prince of Tyre and then switches to the king of Tyre
Some people believe that this is referring to satan

Revelation 12:4

Some people believe that this is referring to satan and demons

Revelation 12:7-9

Some people believe that this is referring to satan before Genesis 3

Jude 1:6

This is an example of a verse that has been used to describe the origin of satan and demons but can not since these sinful angels are locked up

Genesis 1:31

I believe that satan was created perfectly good

He must have fallen after the 6th day since on the sixth day everything God had made was very good (including satan)
Genesis 2:2-3

There isn't a hint of the universe no longer being very good which inclines me to think that the fall of both satan and man came after the creation week

When did the fall of man take place?

What did Adam and Eve do every evening?

Genesis 3:8

Does this seem to imply a daily routine?

If it does then we can assume that they did not sin for at least a few days
Otherwise this does not give us any timing detail

When they were created God told them to be fruitful and multiply

They were perfect so they would have obeyed this command
This would seem to indicate that they were not in the garden long since they had perfect bodies so they would have been able to conceive within the first menstrual cycle and Cain was born after the fall and clearly had a sinful nature

Yet again, before we jump into Genesis 3:1, I want to look at the relationship in marriage between a man and a woman

Christians generally fall into two camps

Complementarianism and egalitarianism
Complementarianism

Spouses are equal in nature but with a hierarchy of roles

Egalitarianism

Spouses are equal in nature and equal in roles

Inferioritism is not a Biblical view (I think I just made that word up)
Which view do you believe is best supported in Scripture?

I personally think it is important to be in relative agreement on this point when in a serious relationship

Personally, I am a complementarian

Typically I have heard people point to Genesis to show that Adam and Eve were created equal and then point to Ephesians 5 to show that wives should submit to their husband

But since you are probably familiar with those arguments, I want to look at other cases outside of marriage

Ephesians 6:1

Children and parents are equal in nature but with a hierarchy of roles

Ephesians 6:5

Employees and employers are equal in nature but with a hierarchy of roles

The party in authority also has responsibilities of course since those under them are equal in nature

Ephesians 6:4
Ephesians 6:9

I think that there is a clear distinction between equality of nature and submission in roles illustrated by the Trinity

John 10:30

Jesus shared the same nature as the Father

Philippians 2:6-7

He took on a lower role even though He was not lower by nature
Luke 22:42

Jesus submitted to the Father

Luke 2:51

Here Jesus, who was by nature higher than his stepfather, accepted His God-given role to be under the authority of another
This seems to be a very clear case of Jesus as superior submitting to those infinitely inferior to Him by nature for the sake of obedience to God

Even, and this is not a Biblical example, the 2nd paragraph of the US Constitution of Independence it reads that all men are created equal but some must submit to others holding a higher office such as the president or a court judge

Genesis 3:1-3

Was the serpent more than just a snake?

Revelation 12:9
Revelation 20:2
I assume that satan indwelt the snake just as God spoke through Balaam's donkey

How was the snake described?

"More crafty than any other beast of the field"
If I was told that I am more crafty than anyone else in Barrhead, is that a complement or an inditement?
In the Bible this word seems to be a good thing but in the wrong hands it is bad

In bad hands it is a bad thing

Jon 5:12
Job 15:5

In good hands it is a good thing

Proverbs 12:16
Proverbs 12:23
Proverbs 13:16
Proverbs 14:8
Proverbs 14:15
Proverbs 14:18
Proverbs 22:3
Proverbs 27:12

Of the 10 times it is used outside of Genesis 3:1 the two uses in Job are negative and the 8 uses in Proverbs are positive
Because God made all the animals 'good' the snake was also made good with the good characteristic of being crafty but satan chose to indwell it to use that characteristic to his advantage

Satan's words

From Genesis 2:4 to Genesis 3:1 God is always referred to as LORD God which is His personal, intimate name but now that satan enters the picture we go back to God (elohim)
Comparing God's original statement with satan's question, what did satan twist?

He made God's law seem more severe than it was

Comparing God's original statement with Eve's answer, what did Eve get right and what did she get wrong?

She was correct about God's generosity in giving them every tree but one
She was correct about the penalty for disobedience
She was incorrect about not being able to even touch it

So far satan has twisted God's word which is wrong and now Eve has added to God's word. But contrary to popular opinion and what I was taught growing up, I do not think that Eve did anything wrong in what she said.

My defence of Eve (up to this point)

This couldn't have been a sin since the first sin is clearly eating the fruit and even

Matthew 15:19

This verse could be used to say that the decision to eat of the fruit was the first sin but Genesis 3:1 proceeds even this

Who was originally given the command from God?

Genesis 2:16

Who told Eve?

Presumably Adam

As a complementarian, I believe that it was within Adam's rights to give Eve an extra command to keep her safe

Traditional Judaism is famous for building fences around the law to keep people from breaking it

For instance, if the law says no taking the Lord's name in vain, they might make a rule banning the Lord's name from being uttered at all

As long as the fences are secondary to the actual law, I do not see the harm in it
Obviously it can go to far but at a basic level I think it can be good

"Don't fall off the cliff"

"Don't go close to the cliff"

"Don't get hurt or break things"

"No running in the house"

"Don't cut yourself"

"Don't play with the knife"

Genesis 3:4-5

John 8:44

Satan is the father of lies

This may have been the first lie satan told but it is very possible that he had told other lies prior to God and/or angels

Satan is also the first murderer since his lies lead to the death of Adam and Eve and all their descendants

This makes him the biggest mass murderer in history

What is Satan accusing God of?

Lying about the consequences of sin
Selfish, wanting to be the only one with all knowledge

Genesis 3:6

What were the three things that made her want to eat the fruit

The tree was good for food
A delight to the eyes
Desired to make one wise

Maybe but should look into it more:

1 John 2:15-16

Desires of the flesh
Desires of the eyes
Pride of life

Luke 4:1-12 (don't have to read it)

What did satan tempt the last Adam with?

"Command this stone to become bread" (Desires of the flesh)
"To you I will give all this authority and their glory" (Desires of the eyes)
"Throw yourself down from here" (Pride of life)
I don't know if the last one seems forced, but there seems to be a parallel here between the woman and the last Adam

Where was Adam during this whole event?

The last part of the verse says that he was with her although some commentators argue that he only joined her at the end after her conversation with the snake

The difference between their sins

2 Corinthians 11:3

The woman was deceived into eating the fruit

1 Timothy 2:13-14

The man sinned knowingly, committing open rebellion which is far worse

Why did Adam choose to sin?

Was it because he loved Eve and wanted to partner with her and support her decision?

Have you ever heard of the epic poem "Paradise Lost" by John Milton (1600's)?

I have never read it. It consists of a 10 or 12 books (depending on edition) with over 10,000 lines
Quote from book 9: "Adam at first amaz'd, but perceiving her lost, resolves through vehemence of love to perish with her; and extenuating the trespass, eats also of the Fruit: The Effects thereof in them both; they seek to cover thir nakedness; then fall to variance and accusation of one another."

If he did then idolatry would have been His first sin rather than eating the fruit

Who was to blame? Adam or Eve?

Obviously they both sinned, but does that does mean that they were equally responsible?

Hosea 6:7
Romans 5:12,14,15,17,19
1 Corinthians 15:21-22

Why is the blame put on him when he wasn't the first to sin?

Perhaps he was the first to sin in his heart
Perhaps because of his role in marriage he was ultimately held responsible

Genesis 3:7

Genesis 3:5

Satan added a little bit of truth to his lie. In many ways it was only a partial lie

Adam and Eve had lived in blissful innocence up till now

But now they realized that they were naked
Have you ever seen little kids running around naked?

In a similar way, although they know they are not wearing anything their eyes are not opened to their nakedness
It would have been an even greater innocence in Adam and Eve's case since they had never seen anyone else wearing cloths

They immediately wanted to cover up which implies shame or vulnerability or embarrassment, etc.

What is nakedness linked with in Scripture?

Shame

1 Samuel 20:30
Micah 1:11
Isaiah 47:3

Although most married couples would not find it traumatic to be naked with their spouse, perhaps it was just the sudden realization of their sexuality and lust that made them react like that
"And they sewed fig leaves together and made themselves loincloths"

The word for sew is only used 3 other times

Job 16:15
Ecclesiastes 3:7
Ezekiel 13:18

Why fig leaves?

They can be very large (up to 8"x10")
Perhaps it was handy for them at the time

The word for loincloth is used in Isaiah 3:24, 2 Samuel 18:11, 1 Kings 2:5, and 2 Kings 3:21 to describe a belt

It can be safe to say that it would have at least covered their midsections

Genesis 3:8

Their relationship with God was immediately broken and they made a futile attempt to flee from God
"Cool"

What does your translation use?
In Hebrew the word used is 'Ruach' which means Spirit or wind

Some translations use words like 'breeze' or 'wind'

A less popular view is that God came in a powerful windstorm to confront the Adam and Eve

I do not believe that the verse indicates whether this was a habitual evening stroll or not
Apparently they could hear God coming

Perhaps He was in human form
Perhaps He was in a noisy windstorm

Is it possible that God was in human form before Jesus came?

John 1:18

No one has seen God the Father

John 1:1-3

Jesus (who is God and can be seen) has always existed so He could have been with Adam and Eve

Genesis 18:1-3
Other examples of people seeing God

Genesis 32:24-25
Genesis 32:28-30

Sin and death get passed on

Psalm 51:5

This could be understood in one of two ways:

Sin is passed on to us at conception
Or David's mother sinfully conceived him outside of marriage

It may also be possible that David's mother had him through a relationship outside of marriage

1 Samuel 17:12-14

David was the youngest of 8 sons
David's father was Jesse
1 Chronicles 2:13-16

David was one of 10 children
Note that Jesse fathered a bunch of boys and their sisters were such and such which may imply that they were half-sisters

2 Samuel 17:25

The sisters came from a different father
Nahash (the father) was an Ammonite (if it is the same Nahash)

1 Samuel 11:1

Psalm 69:8-12

David did not feel a part of his family

According to chabad.org: (https://www.chabad.org/theJewishWoman/article_cdo/aid/280331/jewish/Nitzevet-Mother-of-David.htm)

Jesse had several children
Jesse started doubting his Jewishness due to his grandmother being Ruth
Jesse refused to have more kids with his wife because he didn't think he was a Jew and didn't want her to sin
The maidservant see's the wife's anguish since she wanted more kids
The maidservant suggests following the examples of ancestors (Sarah/Hagar)
Jesse has David through the maidservant
David is seen as an illegitimate child and despised
But God picks David anyway
Just as David was a stone the builders rejected but God made him the cornerstone so it will be with the Messiah

I think that these are analogies that God has put into their culture in order to point to Jesus as their Messiah

Romans 5:12,18-19

It is possible that sin gets passed on through the man

Luke 1:35

Jesus was sinless because He had a sinless Father

Adam got his sin nature by sinning, but we have all sinned because of our sin nature

There are two different views of original sin that are classically held by Armenians vs Calvinists but that is probably a topic for another time (https://www.gotquestions.org/original-sin.html)

Armenian:

People are born with a nature that will lead them to sin but start sinless from conception
2 Kings 14:6

The sin of ancestors (say Adam) did not get passed to future generations

Calvinist:

Hebrews 7:4-9

Levi tithed through his ancestor in "seed form"
So to all future people sinned in "seed form" through Adam

Imagine the shock of becoming a sinner

None of us have ever experienced that although I suppose it might be the opposite of what it was like when we were given a new nature by God
I know that this was written much, much later, but I imagine it would have been what Adam and Eve would have thought in the time following their first sin

Romans 7:15-24

Genesis 3:9

Notice that although the first couple tried to avoid God, God did not avoid them

He has always been the Good Shepherd seeking the lost

1 John 3:20
Hebrews 4:13

Why would God ask a question?
Other questions God asks

Genesis 32:27 (what is Jacob's name?) (vs 30 seems to suggest it was God)
Exodus 4:2 (what is in Moses' hand?)
1 Kings 19:9 (what are you doing here Elijah?)
Job 1:7 (Satan, where have you come from?)
Jonah 4:4 (Jonah, should you be angry?)
Isaiah 6:8 (Who should I send?)
Mark 8:27 (Who do people say that I am?)
Luke 8:45 (Who touched me?)
Luke 10:26 (to a lawyer: what is written in the Law?)
John 5:6 (man on a mat by a pool: do you want to be healed?)
John 20:15 (to Mary Magdalene: why are you weeping?)

When I ask a question it is to glean information

"How was your day?"
"What time should I be there?"
"What do you want for supper?"

When God asks a question it is for our benefit

We do the same to others sometimes

At some point in our lives a teacher probably asked us what 2+2 is

Not because the teacher didn't know but rather for our benefit

What benefit might God's question have had for Adam?

It was more gracious than coming with a thundering rebuke
It brought Adam out of hiding

Genesis 3:10

Adam answered the implied question of "why are you hiding" rather than the direct question
Did Adam hide because he was naked?

He had already covered up his nakedness
It was because of his sin/guilt, not his nakedness

Revelation 6:15-16

I assume that most of these people are clothed

Genesis 3:11-12

Often one sin leads to more sins

God made Adam naked but Adam did not have a full understanding of his nakedness till he ate from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil
The first question seems to be rhetorical since He right away jumps to the second

As often happens when we feel cornered, Adam begins to attack

He blames his wife and he blames God

It clearly wasn't God's fault
Was it Eve's fault?

If my wife tells me to steal a turkey for Christmas, is it her fault if I do?

No
Obviously Eve shouldn't have offered it to Adam, but it was Adam's own choice to sin

Genesis 3:13

1 Timothy 2:14 says that the woman was deceived so this statement is true

Genesis 3:14-19

Notice the order:

Serpent
Woman
Man
This is the same order that they sinned in
This is the opposite order of God's original leadership plan

What is cursed by God?

The serpent (v 14)
Ground (v 17)

When God addressed the serpent, was He referring to the animal or satan?

It appears that it was the animal since the punishment seems to only affect the animal and it is compared with other animals

The serpent

God often asks us questions for our own benefit, not for His

This is why He did not ask the serpent because He wasn't trying to give the serpent any benefit and He knew everything already

If I train a monkey to steal jewelry at a zoo, should I or the monkey be punished?
Exodus 21:28-29

Based on this future law demonstrating God's view on animals harming humans, God sees it fit for any animal that causes human death to be punished

So the serpent had to be punished because it was used in bringing death to mankind

But also notice that the owner of the animal was not liable for the animal's actions

Likewise Adam and Eve (although in charge of the serpent) were not held responsible for its actions (only their own)

What was the serpent cursed with?

How do animals move?

Walk
Crawl
Slither
Roll
Swim
Fly

What did the serpent do before it was cursed?

Perhaps it walked
Perhaps it flew

Isaiah 14:29
Isaiah 30:6

I looked at 14 different famous commentaries on the matter and 3 said that no physical change took place (including John Calvin), 1 said maybe a change took place, and 10 said that the serpent was physically changed from either having legs and a few mentioned the possibility of wings

Leviticus 11:42
"Eat dust"

Psalm 72: 9
Isaiah 49:23
Micah 7:16-17
This is a sign of being brought low and suffering defeat
But it is not just figurative

On the roof of a snake's mouth there is an organ called a vomeronasal/Jacobson's organ (VNO) which can detect the chemical makeup of things somewhat like our sense of smell
However, it requires contact with the material to analyze it which is why its forked tongue flicks in and out getting samples of dust into its mouth to be analyzed (humans cause an air current to bring particles into our nose to smell them using our VNO and Olfactory bulb

Vs 15

This is often considered the first messianic prophecy
First of all, is God still talking to the animal or satan or both?
Assuming it is satan (or both)

Let's identify the beings behind the words

What does "seed" refer to?

Offspring (singular) (Genesis 4:25)
Offspring (plural) (Genesis 9:9)
The use of the word "he" in this verse leads me to believe that it is referring to the singular use

Who does "I" refer to?

Who does "you" refer to?

Serpent/satan

Who does woman refer to?

Reworded:

God will put enmity between satan/serpent and Eve, and between satan/serpent's offspring and Eve's offspring; Eve's male offspring shall bruise satan/serpent's head, and satan/serpent shall bruise Eve's male offspring's heel

It could be just a snake because the snake's body had just been cursed
Or it could be satan because this seems like a distinct relationship that many other animals would share in common with snakes

Many of the genealogies (like Genesis 5) trace themselves through fathers

But this offspring is traced through a mother
Because Jesus was born of a virgin he can only be biologically traced through a mother

When does/has this been fulfilled?

At the cross Jesus was temporarily wounded and satan was permanently wounded in the sense that he lost but Jesus rose again
Romans 16:20, Hebrews 2:14

This seems to indicate that the crucifixion was not the full fulfillment
Revelation 20:10

1 Timothy 2:15

This is a notoriously difficult passage
There are several interpretations of this verse but one of them points towards the Messiah

The word for childbearing actually has the definite article as YLT reads although it is hardly ever translated in this verse (NASB has the definite article but doesn't use the word childbearing which takes away from it a bit)
https://biblehub.com/greek/5042.htm
Pros

It works well in context and solves a lot of problems
The singular 'she' vs the later 'they'

Reasons this may not be the best interpretation

The word saved is future tense which is strange if referring to the past birth of Jesus

Others might counter that salvation will not be fully done till the future

Only woman's salvation is in view yet Jesus saves both men and women
The word 'childbearing refers to the process rather than the product of birth

Other views if people are interested:

Christian women will be saved only if they bear children

Wrong

Despite the curse, Christian women will be kept safe when bearing children

It has little to do with context and doesn't seem to be true to experience

Although experiencing a reminder of sin and the fall in pain of childbirth they can still have confidence in salvation
Although not essential evidence, having children and faith, loves, and self-control are evidence or fruit of salvation
It points to some proverbial saying that has been lost to history in which the meaning of the phrase is not exactly the sum of its words

The woman

God increased Eve's pain during childbirth

She had never experienced childbirth but it would have been painless or at least relatively painless
We know from history that this punishment got passed down to her descendants
Perhaps it involved changing her body (and DNA for passing on purposes)
Or perhaps God only lessened His sustaining power after the fall

The two times the word pain occurs in this verse are actually two different words in Hebrew

The first word translated as pain is the same word used later in vs 17 of Adam
The second word is a related word for pain

According to what I have read, when synonyms are used like this in Hebrew it is to emphasize the word

The Bible mentions the pain of childbirth a few times

John 16:21
Therefore the pain experienced in childbirth is excruciating but temporary

Science thought

During childbirth the body produces endorphins which help with the pain
Perhaps before the fall childbirth would have been a pleasurable experience
But on the other hand, God might have given women endorphins during childbirth to soften the pain

"Your desire will be for your husband, and he will rule over you." (NIV)
"Your desire shall be contrary to your husband, and he shall rule over you." (ESV)
"You will want to control your husband, but he will dominate you." (NET)
What does the word desire mean in this context?

Song of Solomon 7:10-11

Here a man is desiring a woman (same Hebrew word)
This verse makes it seem like a good thing
If this is all it means then the verse would seem to be a blessing, a lovely attraction

Genesis 4:7

Here we have a very similar phrase to 3:16 in the same book
The idea in this verse is that sin had a desire to control Cain

This is a role-reversal type of control since we ought to be in control of sin rather than the other way around

So using this verse to understand 3:16 it seems that the woman would want to control the husband which is a role-reversal and a negative thing

Adam

1 Peter 3:7

I do not think the Genesis 3:17 is saying that it is wrong to listen to one's wife, but rather that it is wrong to go along with her is she tempts a husband to sin

The ground is the second thing to be cursed

Romans 8:18-25
This curse covered the whole earth and has lasted till the present time
Notice the hope that we can have in the midst of living on a cursed ground just like the hope God gave us when He cursed the serpent in vs 15

Thorns & thistles

Thorns are made up of modified leaves, roots, stems or buds
Thistles often have wrinkly leaves
Leaves are most efficient when they are flat

This allows for the maximum exposed surface area to the sun for the least amount of material
However, flat leaves are far more complex than wrinkled ones such as thorns

Flat leaves require careful coordination between the growth in the middle of the leaf with the outside edges
When the coordination messes up, it produces a hard, wrinkled thorns/thistles

In the supposed fossil record, there are thorns before humans but according to Scripture it is the other way around

Eat the plants

Genesis 1:29

God had already told them to eat plants

Genesis 2:8

God had already planted lots of trees for food
But they would soon be banned from going to this garden for food

The difference here is that the plants would come from a field

This would take work unlike the already established garden they were in

Eat bread & sweat

Before it seems that eating fresh plants/fruits was all that was necessary
Now perhaps the plants would not produce adequate nutrition or perhaps they wouldn't taste as good or perhaps just because of a shorter season of growing, bread would have to be cooked for food

Dust to dust

This is very clearly physical death
A huge problem with believing in millions of years is that physical death must have proceeded sin

That would make this statement void of impact since it was nothing new and was the obvious

Even death was a partial blessing since it prevents the even greater evil of living forever in a sinful body

Genesis 3:20

As we have previously discussed, naming implies authority
How many times do you think the word Eve occurs?

2 in Hebrew and 2 in Greek
Genesis 4:1
2 Corinthians 11:3
1 Timothy 2:13

Up till now Eve has only been described by her kind (woman) even though we have used her proper name already for clarity
As the second half of the verse indicates, her name is also a word play just like her husband's name

Eve (khavvah) vs 'to live' (khayah)

Genesis 3:21

What were they wearing before this?

Fig leaves

From this moment (and even before when they sewed fig leaves) humans are to wear cloths

The Bible nowhere requires that the cloths be made only of animal skins

Exodus 28:39 (linen cloths)

Modesty is also commanded

1 Timothy 2:9-10
Matthew 5:27-28

Unlike in Islam where the ownness is on the woman to be modest and not on the men to have pure minds, Jesus teaches that the man is at fault regardless of whether the woman is at fault as well

What is the significance of God's actions?

At least one animal had to die to create these cloths

Perhaps God even did it in front of them to show them what death was and how serious sin is

Hebrews 9:22

Do you think that God forgave them and then used the animal remains to make clothing for them

On my Bible software I did a search for atonement (English)

It occurred 103 times (mostly in Leviticus)
It only appeared in the Old Testament (I looked in the ESV and CJB)
What does atonement mean?

It means to cover
In other words, God provided a coverup for sins
Romans 4:7-8

God covering a person's sins is wonderful even though it is not complete

John 1:29

Jesus didn't provide a better coverup, rather He removed sin completely
Romans 3:24-25

Genesis 3:22

Here again we have plural language

Who could the "us" refer to?

It must either be God and the angels or the Trinity

Which is a better fit?

If angles then is God putting Himself to their level?
The "us" phrases up till now clearly did not include angels (for instance "let us make man in our image")

Genesis 3:23

God had warned Adam of the consequences of sinning and now it was paramount that Adam not be able to thwart them and so make God a liar
There is a bit of a word play in Hebrew here with vs 22-23 by using different forms of the same verb

To get a sense of the word play, here is my version, "Now, lest he reach out his hand and take… the LORD God reached him out from the garden of Eden… from which he was taken."

Genesis 3:24

It must have been shameful to not just get sent out but rather driven out of probably the best developed prime real-estate on the globe
Which direction were they sent out of the garden?

East
It seems to me that when man drifts further and further away from Eden physically, he also drifts further away from it spiritually

Adam and Eve have just gone east (today we might say in English that "they went south"
Genesis 4:16

Cain goes further East

Genesis 11:2

People moved to build Babel
This one is sometimes translated "from the East"

Genesis 13:11

Genesis 12:7-8

Abraham is the first person mentioned in connection with west
Genesis 13:14-15
God wanted to bless every direction because Abraham obeyed God

God didn't just put one obstacle in their way, He put two

Cherubim

Exodus 25:18

This is the very next reference to cherubim and there are again two

I don’t exactly know what a cherubim is except that it seems to me to be a type of spiritual being that guards things

Exodus 25:20

They have wings that meet in the middle (joined)

1 Kings 6:24

2 wings only

They have faces

Maybe God sits on them like a living throne?

1 Samuel 4:4 (could be between or above)
2 Samuel 6:2 (again the locational relationship is not clear)
Psalm 99:1 (again the locational relationship is not clear)
2 Samuel 22:11 (The cherub is being ridden on almost like a horse)

Psalm 18:10

Ezekiel 10:3

They have legs probably

Ezekiel 10:8

Hands (it doesn't mention arms so I assume the hands are attached to their wings as if their wings functioned as arms

Ezekiel 28:13-16

If this is speaking of satan then he is a cherub
He was also a guardian creature
Ezekiel 28:18-19

Could this really be satan back in Ezekiel's day?
And if not, what if it was one of the cherubs that God placed on His holy mountain at Eden?

A flaming sword

Regardless of popular belief, the sword was not held by the cherubim but rather turned independently and distinctly from them
It turned every way, so it wasn't just upright

Perhaps if you got close to it then it would dart rapidly pointing towards you

I sure wouldn't try to get past either of them on their own, never mind both obstacles combined

Previously we have looked at the likelihood of Eden being located on top of a mountain which could explain why only the East side of the garden was blocked since perhaps the other sides were inaccessible on foot

Before we move on to chapter 4 I have two trivial questions

Were Adam and Eve saved?

The Bible does not explicitly say, however:

Hebrews 11:1-2

Hebrews 11 goes on to start talking about Abel's faith rather than Adam's which doesn't look good but it's not close to proof

Genesis 3:20

Adam names his wife in compliance with God's command to have kids which implies obedience to God

Genesis 3:21

God made a covering for them
Cain and Able new that they should offer sacrifices to God so Adam and Eve probably taught them this
Over the course of tonight I will suggest that they had faith that God would send someone to defeat satan which bodes very well with Hebrews 11 and Ephesians 2:8

I don't really know but I am hopeful that they were by God's grace

Did the second law of thermodynamics start when sin entered the world?

The first law of thermodynamics states that the total amount of mass-energy in the universe is constant

I would add "apart from miracles"
Deuteronomy 4:2

Scripture is a parallel example of this

Apart from God creating the Word, it can never be added to or taken away from

The second law of thermodynamics states that the amount of energy available for work is running out, or disorder/entropy is increasing to a maximum

In other words, the universe is changing from order to disorder

Building disintegrate
Bodies decompose
Fuel gets burned up

I think that this law was probably in effect before the fall

Not all types of disorder as defined in this law are bad
Baking a cake is considered disorder because it takes highly ordered ingredients and mixes them together irreversibly, the eggs become a coagulated (solidified) mess, the sugar partially decomposes, etc.

But we would still consider the cake to be a very good thing and the entropy that caused it to be beneficial

Solar heating the earth is a classic case of the second law in action as is:

Breathing (air moving from high pressure to low pressure)
Walking (friction (this keeps us from falling))
Digestion is the breaking down of food
Baking a cake (which every perfect world needs)
Death is also an example though it did not occur till after the fall

I believe that although the second law was in effect prior to the fall, God removed some of His sustaining power from the earth (and perhaps only the earth since it was cursed) at that time

Colossians 1:15-17 (talking about Jesus)

Jesus keeps everything from falling apart

However, I also believe that God can increase/decrease His sustaining power

Deuteronomy 29:5

Genesis 4:1-2

What does it mean that "Adam knew Eve his wife"?

It is a euphemism for sexual intercourse

Cain was the first human to be born of a woman

Eve recognized his common humanity and sex by referring to him as a man

I want to offer an alternate translation of this but before I do let me say that although several commentaries would side with me, I don't know of an English translation that does. The NET bible says that it is difficult to translate and mentions my translation idea but says that it is wrong because it is based on the idea that Genesis 3:15 isn't just talking about snakes and women. And as it puts it, this alternate translation requires the fanciful idea that Genesis 3:15 has an allegorical interpretation
The alternate translation:

"I have acquired a man–the LORD."
If Genesis 3:15 is really talking about Jesus then Adam and Eve would have had no idea that it would take so long to be fulfilled and therefore it would be natural her to think that she would give birth to the seed so they mistakenly thought that Cain was the God-Man that Jesus turned out to be

Isaiah 9:6

One support for this translation is that the exact same Hebrew construct occurs in the next verse. So just as brother and Abel are one and the same, so too man and LORD are one and the same
The Jerusalem Targum also renders it similar to this
Martin Luther also translated it this way

If this interpretation and translation is correct, it must not have taken long for Eve to realize she was mistaken because Abel's name means "vanity" (or breath or vapor)

Ecclesiastes 1:2 uses the same word

Siblings

These were presumably the first two children they had
Genesis 5:3-6

Even though chapter 4 is primarily about Cain and Abel God chose to only provide us with the line of Seth about whom we know basically nothing
Vs 4 also mentions that Adam and Eve had other children including girls

This answers one of the common questions "where did Cain get his wife"
Leviticus 18:9

This law was not established till the time of Moses and God must have been ok with sibling incest prior to this time since that was the only way He had provided for them to obey Him in multiplying

There is a footnote in Whiston's translation of Josephus' Antiquities of the Jews which states that according to an old tradition Adam and Eve had 33 sons and 23 daughters

All we know from Scripture is that they had at least 5 sons and 2 daughters

Occupations

Abel was a shepherd and Cain was a farmer
Cain followed after his father's occupation which was necessary for food
Abel looked after sheep and goats (the Hebrew word includes both) which provide milk and clothing
Some have suggested that being a shepherd is a lowly position such as David but there is no reason from the text and this point in history to assume the same view of shepherding
I do not think that they ate the sheep/goats unless they did so in sin

Genesis 1:29
Genesis 9:3-4

Genesis 4:3-5

"In the course of time" is literally translated "in the end of days"
I assume they were adults at this point

What do you think?
Perhaps they had both been sacrificing in a God-honoring way for a long time or perhaps with their parents

The two offerings

The only difference mentioned is that Cain gave an offering of fruit and Abel brought the firstborn of his flock and of their fat portions
Options for why God distinguished between them the way He did

Perhaps they were supposed to sacrifice an animal

This would assume that God had given them instructions and Cain disobeyed
Numbers 15:4

However this sacrifice always came in contact with blood

Hebrews 9:22

Perhaps it was only a matter of faith

Hebrews 11:4
Isaiah 1:11

The type of sacrifice is not the only thing that matters to God

Perhaps it was because Abel brought the best of the best and Cain didn't bring anything special to God

Jude 10-11

Although the Bible is not explicit in what his sin or sins were we know that the Bible warns against repeating Cain's sin

A bloodless sacrifice
Faithlessness
Disobedience

1 John 3:12

This verse suggests that it was Cain's outward action that was sin (as well as his heart presumably)

Notice that in vs 5 Cain knows that God is displeased

Perhaps it was his conscience or God speaking to him
Perhaps fire fell from Heaven as it did on Mt Carmel with Elisha and only consumed Abel's offering
Perhaps they were offering at the east gate to the garden of Eden and fire leapt from the flaming sword onto Cain's offering and not Abel's

We will look at "how the sin committed by the first man led to the second man killing the third"
Genesis 4:6-8

As is so often the case, one sin leads to another
John 3:20

God knows everything
Genesis 4:6

Why does an all knowing God ask questions?
Before you answer that, why do we ask questions?

Because we want to gain knowledge

Why does God ask questions?

I would suggest that it is because He wants US to gain knowledge

Already tonight I have asked many questions

Some were because I genuinely don't know things, but some of them have been for your benefit as well

Questions God asks:

Where were you?

Adam and Eve

Where are you?
Who told you?

Cain

Where is your brother?
Why are you angry?

Abraham

Where is your wife?

Abraham and Sarah

Is anything too difficult for the Lord?

Jacob

What is your name?

Moses

What is in your hand?
Who made your mouth?

Joshua

Why are you on your face?

Balaam

Who are these men with you?

Why do you honor your sons more than me?

David

Where is the house you will build for me?

Elijah

What are you doing here?

Isaiah

Who should we send? Who will go for us?

Jonah

Do you have a right to be angry?

Hezekiah

Is my hand to short?

Disciples

Who do you say I am?

Is it ok to be angry at God?

Before we answer that, is it ok to be angry?

Mark 3:5

Jesus was angry so feeling anger can't be a sin
But at least in this case He didn't seem to act out angrily

Ephesians 4:26

We must be careful not to sin when we feel angry and not to let it last long

Galatians 5:20
Colossians 3:8

Jesus

Matthew 21:12-13
Mark 11:15-18
John 2:13-17
Please not that none of these passages mentions anger

John 2:17 describes the driving force behind Jesus' actions as zeal

James 1:19-20

There is a difference between man's anger and God's anger
I believer that Jesus always produced the righteousness of God and therefore when He got angry it was God's anger that He felt

What are things that you think it is ok to be angry about?
In light of those things, is it ok to be angry at God?

Since the anger of God is the good kind of anger and since a house divided against itself can't stand, would God ever give us His anger directed at Himself?

Vs 7

Notice the similarity to Genesis 3:16
This is the first use of the word sin in the Bible
Sin is pictured as a lion ready to pounce on Cain and overpower him

This imagery could suggest that animal carnivory was now taking place

Notice that it is not recorded whether Can replies to God

Vs 8

Can says something to Abel

What do you think it was?

Does this make it premeditated murder

Matthew 23:29-39

The Pharisees would have never dreamed they could do anything as bad as Cain did yet they asked Pilate to kill Jesus
1 Corinthians 10:11-13

I too would have agreed with the Pharisees that I would never do something like that but thinking that way apart from dependence on God's help to avoid sins is dangerous

In that Mathew passage, why does Jesus say from Abel to Zechariah?

The order of the Bible was different than ours and ended with 2 Chronicles

2 Chronicles 24:20-21
This is also an example of Jesus affirming that all of the OT books which had been firmly established by that time were Scripture

He did not agree with the supposed Saddusaic idea of Torah only or with including the Apocrypha

Genesis 4:9-12

Vs 9

I once heard of a monkey who believed in evolution watch a man come into his cage in the zoo and ask "am I my keeper's brother"
Just as when Cain's parents sinned, God does not immediately act out in justice but rather provides a bit of grace

How would your parents react if one of your siblings killed you?

Having already known the facts, would they start the conversation with "where is your sibling?"?

And God again asks a question that He already knows the answer to

Cain's response is the first outright human lie
And then he asks the first recorded human question

I believe this question is not an honest question

Suppose I stole my mother's necklace and hid it in my pocket

If she asked me, knowing full well I had it in my pocket, where it was and I said "am I in charge of your jewelry" that would be evasion?

Remember that when God asked Adam and Eve about their sin they admitted the sin but played the blame game

But Cain does not admit his sin and therefore there is no need to blame

Vs 10

God asks a rhetorical question followed by personifying blood (which is first mentioned here)
Why blood?

Leviticus 17:11

Psalm 116:15
This statement aligns with the Bible's teaching that a person still exists in some form after death

Abel was the first person in Sheol
God was still the God of Abel even after he died

Luke 20:38
Romans 14:8

Vs 11-12

Genesis 9:5-6

If I were God I might have initiated corporal punishment in Genesis 4 but God doesn't which would have given Cain lots of time to repent

Cain is the first person God directly curses
"You are cursed from the ground" is a great translation because it is equivalently ambiguous in Hebrew

It could mean "your curse will come from the ground"
Or it could mean "you are cursed away from the ground"
Or maybe both
Either way he was going to experience crop failure forever and perhaps partially because of that he would always have to be on the move

Farmers buy land and use it over and over again but bears, who make terrible farmers, have to go from place to place eating what they can find and moving on
He was also probably going to be ostracized otherwise he could have just moved back into Adam's basement and not have had to wander

What other times does the Bible mention the ground opening its mouth?

Numbers 16:31-32 (people belonging to Korah)
Deuteronomy 11:6 (seems like same event, see Numbers 16:1)

Genesis 4:13-15

Vs 13

Is this repentance?

I think it is not liking the punishment rather than feeling sorry for what he did

Vs 14

Cain recognizes that

"You have driven me today away from the ground"

He lost his profession of farming

"From your face I shall be hidden"

He lost fellowship with God

"I shall be a fugitive and a wanderer on the earth"

No permanent home

"Whoever finds me will kill me"

Why would this be the case?

This implies a large population
Everyone at this time was closely related to Adam and Eve and even Abel

So Abel's relatives probably want him dead

People might have just felt that it was good if murderers die for their crime

Vs 15

There is an interesting Jewish tradition I came across online (which means it must be true, https://www.chabad.org/parshah/torahreading.asp?AID=2452033&p=complete&showrashi=true)

They took the word "sevenfold" to mean that Cain could not be killed for seven generations

That makes the 8th generation from Cain the first that could kill him which according to Genesis 5 is Lamech
Genesis 4:23-24
Also according to the Midrash Lamech caused his wives to have miscarriages so that they could fulfil the command to procreate but still end their lineage which was cursed, and besides they knew the flood was coming and the children wouldn't live too long anyway

I don't think there is any scriptural evidence that this is true

The other two options is that 7 means "complete destruction" or "7 times worse"
Although some commentators say that the Hebrew is ambiguous whether the mark was on or in Cain all the translations I looked at say "on Cain"

Why might "on" be a better translation?

If people found him and it was internal they wouldn't be deterred from attacking him
Even the word "sign" is the same word used for putting blood on the doorposts and Rahab's scarlet cord

What do you think the sign/mark was? (The NET bible says that they did not use the word "sign" because it might convey the idea of a wooden sign hung around his neck)

Theories people have suggested (none of which can be proven)

It was internal and reappeared when interacting with others
Mark on his forehead
Horns
Brightly colored coat
Black skin

This has been used by racists
But even if it were true it would make black a sign of protection and grace from God
Plus it would mean that that mark would apply to all his descendants
And this is before Noah who came through Seth (Genesis 5:6) so none of Cain's descendants exist today unless through one of Noah's 3 in-laws

Whatever the sign was:

It was obvious to others
It was gracious of God
Exodus 19:11-12

A Commentator named Hamilton noted that this was first said by God about Cain

Perhaps God wanted Cain to be a wandering reminder that sin costs

Did Cain ever repent?

1 John 3:12

Jude 1:11
Because Cain seems to be a poster boy for evil I doubt he did

Genesis 4:16-17

The name "Nod" means wandering
God said that Cain would be a "fugitive and a wanderer" so why is Cain settling and building a city?

You don't have to be good at agriculture in a city
We don't know if he stayed there for the rest of his life or if he left or was kicked out

Here is an important question because it is frequently used to stump Christians

Who was Mrs. Cain?

I believe there is only one Biblical possibility
Acts 17:26
1 Corinthians 15:45
Genesis 3:20
So because Adam was the first man and all people are his and his wife's descendants then Mrs. Cain must be a female descendant of Adam and Eve
Genesis 5:4

So Mrs. Cain was either a Sister, niece, or grand-niece, etc.

Imagine a woman being willing to marry someone who killed her brother/uncle

The moral objection to incest

Why do moral laws exist?

Why is murder wrong?
Why is homosexual activity wrong
Why is adultery wrong?
Because the moral lawgiver (God) says so
Incest was not outlawed by God until much later but neither was murder (Leviticus 18:10, Genesis 9:5)

So why would one be ok and not the other?

Romans 2:14-15
God did not create people with a blank conscience but rather has given everyone certain laws that we feel with our conscience

Murder, I think, is written as wrong on everyone's heart

However it is not an exhaustive list and incest is one such example at least at that time

Genesis 20:11-12

God blessed this marriage

Given that moral laws are based on God's character

Does His character change?
So do his moral laws change?
Therefore incest is not a morally wrong because it goes against the character of God, but rather morally wrong because it disobeys His command

Example

The first two weeks that Clayton worked with me I did not give him a dress code
After that I did
My character did not change, only my rules
And if he were to disregard that dress code he would not be violating me but rather my words

The biological objection to incest

Closely related people have DNA with much in common between them
Therefore when they produce offspring the mutations in the DNA are sure to be passed
So perhaps God was being consistent in wanting the best for us which at the beginning (when there weren't any DNA mutations anyways) was necessary for life, and later it became more harmful so God outlawed it

Imagine a shepherd with sheep in a field

There are no fences which will represent "thou shalt not"
But then wolves move into the area so the shepherd sets up fences
The shepherd's standards haven't changed

He still loves them but new boundaries are needed to keep protecting them like he had before

Enoch

Why might Cain have named the city after his son?

Perhaps because his son could stay in a city and not be condemned to wander
Perhaps he had to leave so he left it under his son's care and name

Genesis 4:18-24

Vs 18

This is clearly a different Enoch than in Genesis 5:22
Enoch means consecration or dedication
Maybe: Irad means man of the city
Maybe: Mehujael means Elohim makes me live
Maybe: Methushael means man of Elohim or man of prayer
Maybe: Lamech means Warrior or conqueror
Perhaps these names mean that there were some godly people in Cain's line

This conjecture would fit in with the Bible's theme that God's grace can even come to those with evil ancestors

Rahab, Ruth, and everyone to a greater or lesser extent

Vs 19

Matthew 19:4-6

Lamech was the first recorded person to go against this norm
Much of the Bible presupposes monogamy

Exodus 20:17 (wife is singular)

Deuteronomy 17:15-17

Do you take this to mean "no more than one" or "not too many"?

What examples of polygamy are in the Bible and did they lead to good or bad?

Esau (Genesis 26:34-35)
Abraham and Sarah/Hagar
Jacob and Leah/Rachel
David (1 Samuel 25:42-43)
Samuel's dad (1 Samuel 1:2)

1 Timothy 3:1-2

This is for overseers
1 Corinthians 7:1-2

It also applies to everyone

Exodus 21:10

God provided laws regulating polygamy but why didn't he just outlaw it?
Matthew 19:7-8

Was it because of their hardness of heart?

Vs 20

The word for father can also mean "founder" in this case as some translations indicate more than others

This would mean that he invented tents and portable farming which would imply that perhaps Cain hadn't come up with that

Didn't Abel have livestock before this?

Either the skill died off with Abel or perhaps it was the mobile component that was new or perhaps it was just more diversified than just sheep/goats (camels, cows, horses, donkeys, etc.) or perhaps he perfected it
They must have also found uses for animals because they wouldn't have done it just for fun probably

Milking, sheering, pulling, etc.

Vs 21

Jubal invented the lyre (like a harp but smaller and sits in the lap) and the pipe which might have been a flute like instrument
He had to discover how to change the sound, what sounded good together, etc.

Vs 22

The two brothers had a half-brother and half-sister
Tubal-cain invented bronze and iron instruments

He had to learn how to melt and mold them and control very hot fires as well as mine it

Naamah

Notice that Lamech's two wives and his daughter are named which is rare (Genesis 5)
Rabbi Shlomo Yitzchaki (1040-1104) says that she became Noah's wife but there is no support for this claim

Vs 23-24

Is this poetry in your Bible?
Lamech chooses a safe audience
It seems likely that just as Lamech says "listen" to his wives twice and says "hurt me" twice as well, the two references to a man are one and the same young man

This is yet another killing mentioned in the Bible (Abel is the other so far)

The Hebrew leaves the door open for Lamech to be bragging about what he could do rather than what he has already done
Perhaps he killed using one of the bronze or iron instruments his son created
Lamech was 5 generations after Cain and the story seems to still be well known to him and probably his wives
Matthew 18:22

Lamech takes vengeance for a wound and brags about it

Genesis 4:25-26

Genesis 5:3

This is now 130 years after God created Adam and Eve

Who named Seth?

Eve
Women naming children

Genesis 19:37
Genesis 29:32,35
Genesis 30:6, 8, 11, 13, 18, 20, 24
Genesis 35:18
Genesis 38:4

Men naming children

Genesis 4:26
Genesis 5:3,29
Genesis 16:15
Genesis 21:3
Genesis 38:3
Genesis 41:51

Jointly naming children

Genesis 25:25
Genesis 4:25 & Genesis 5:3 indicate that Seth too was jointly named

How could Eve have been fertile after 130 years?

Since at least 1951 it has been believed that women are born with all their eggs and are never renewed or replenished

The theory goes that they start out with 7 million, by puberty there are 3-4 hundred thousand, and they lose about 1 thousand per month which is a little over 33 years' supply

Perhaps women had more and lost less eggs than now
Around 2012 a few independent research teams found that there are stem cells that can reproduce eggs

Enosh means "frail man"

Why would they name him that?
I read a commentary that made a great although unproven theory that the people were recognizing that they were frail and failing and deteriorating which is why they turned to God (2 Corinthians 12:9)

Genesis 5:1-2

Here this is largely a repeat of what Genesis has already said

Genesis 5:3-32

Everyone in the world shares this lineage and none of them died in the flood
Notice how many people could have known Adam personally

What would long life spans accomplish as far as innovation, etc.?
Noah's son Shem could have known Abraham

Genesis 47:8-9

Is it possible to put time/people gaps in this genealogy?
Mathematically you cannot change the total time span in Genesis 5
Some have argued that while 'day' meant longer than a day in Genesis 1, in Genesis 5 a year only means a month

This would make Methuselah 80 instead of 969
This would make Methuselah 16 when he became a father
This would make Methuselah's dad Enoch only 6 when he became a father
Genesis 7:11

They knew the difference between years and months and days

The Sumerian King list from Sumer in Mesopotamia dated to 2000BC has 8 kings with an average reign of 30,150 years spanning a total of 241,200 years

Genesis 5 has an average life span of 858 years spanning 8575 years total

The Bible is not loose in its uses of numbers in Genesis

The numbers add up to their correct sums

I don't know what the original language God gave Adam was

When the people were given new languages at the Tower of Babel could God have left some people with the original language?

If so, then could Hebrew have been passed on through Noah's family?

One supporting thing is that the names in Genesis 5 are all very Hebrew names

Adam (3-5)

Adam was given God's image and he passed on his own image to Seth

Does that mean that Seth was not made in God's image?

1 Corinthians 15:49

God's image was passed down

"and he died" reveals that in God's mercy Adam's sentence took 930 years to complete

Seth (6-8)

Means "appointed"

Enosh (9-11)

Frail man"

Kenan (12-14)

"smith"

Mahalalel (15-17)

"Praise of Elohim"

Jared (18-20)

"descent"

Enoch (21-24)

"dedication"
Same name as Cain's son
He walked with God

Who else had walked with God?
Was it still possible to do after the fall or was it more metaphorical?

Malachi 2:4-6

The priests walked with God

And probably because of this close walk with God he didn't die like everyone else did

2 Kings 2:3-5

Methuselah (25-27)

Either "man of the spear" or "when he dies, it shall be sent"

The second part of his name clearly means "to send"

It has a secondary meaning which is to throw or cast forth

The first part of the name (two Hebrew letters) is where the debate lies

This might mean man or to die

If it is man then his name would mean thrown of man but translators have historically tried to give it an object and so it comes out as "man of the spear" or "man of the dart"
If it means to die then it would mean "he dies it shall be sent"

Jude 1:14-15

Enoch (Methuselah's dad) was a prophet

I have added up all the dates and found that Methuselah dies is 1656 AC (after creation) which is the same year the flood occurs

Perhaps if his name meant "when he dies it shall be sent" it was a prophecy of the flood

Lamech

"warrior" or "conqueror"
This Sethite man was not the same as the polygamous Lamech we read about earlier
The way it is stated breaks the pattern

Up till now the pattern has been A fathers B

But now it says that A fathers a son and called his name B

Lamech makes a prediction about Noah

Did it come true?

No, unless death is considered relief from toil (in this life but not the life to come)

Noah

"comfort" or "rest"
Were his sons triplets?

It is important to compare scripture with scripture to gain clarity

Genesis 11:10

Shem was 98 at the time of the flood

Genesis 9:28-29

Noah was 600 years old at the time of the flood

Noah had Shem at 505
Genesis 9:22-24

Ham was the youngest

So presumably Noah had Japheth at 500, Shem at 502, and Ham sometime after that

According to The Book of Jubilees, Noah's wife was named Emzara but as far as I am aware no other document verifies this

Shem

"name"

"hot"

Japheth

"beauty"

There are 3 main ancient texts

Masoretic Text

Used by modern Hebrew Bibles and is the basis behind most English Old Testaments
Named after the Masoretes ('transmitters')

Septuagint (LXX)

Greek translation of the Old Testament
Named after the number 70 since legend has it that 72 men translated it
It was widespread in the days of Jesus' earthly ministry which is why the NT sometimes quotes the OT using this translation

Of the 64 times Jesus quotes the OT

32 agree with both the LXX and MT because the LXX was a good translation
13 differ from both
13 favor the MT over the LXX
6 agree with the LXX over the MT

Samaritan Pentateuch (SP)

Hebrew version used by Samaritans who worshiped at Mount Gerizim (John 4:20-21)

The LXX seems inflated from the truth since Methuselah then lived 14 years after the Flood
The MT was copied with great care and is used for Genesis 5 across all English translations I could find

The dead sea scrolls are part of the MT

There can't be gaps in Genesis 5

The math doesn't allow time gaps
Jude 1:14

Enoch was 7th from Adam as Genesis 5 shows

Why did they live so much longer than we do today?

Perhaps genetics?
Perhaps more nutritious food?
Perhaps a more hospitable climate and less diseases?

Genesis 6:1-4

Genesis 6:3

What does 'My spirit' refer to?

The Holy Spirit (Genesis 1:2)

'shall not abide'

Different translations use different words

ESV: abide
ASV: strive
NET: remain

Two interpretations

No humans would be able to live longer than 120 years old

Rebuttal

People like Noah and Abraham continued to live much longer (see handout)

Rebuttal's rebuttal

Perhaps the judgement was not immediate just like when God told Adam he would die

God would send the flood 120 years later

I have not been able to find out if the flood came 120 years after this but it is possible

Genesis 6:1

In chapter 5 we were focused on the male population we are now focused on the female humans
The word is properly translated 'man' rather than 'Adam' because it is 'ha adam' (the Adam)

Nephilim

This is a transliteration of the Hebrew

The Hebrew word literally means 'fallen ones' (it is related to the verb series 'to fall')

Some older translations used the word 'giant' like the KJV

Luther's German Bible uses the word 'tyrants'
Numbers 13:33

Perhaps the word 'giant' came from this verse which is the only other use of that word in the Bible

Were they the same Nephilim?

Genesis 7:20-23
No
Who said that there were Nephilim/giants?

The 10 spies who gave a bad report

The Bible doesn't mention Israel ever interacting with Nephilim when they went about clearing the land

We should not assume that they told the truth

Perhaps these men exaggerated or even lied
God definitely dealt harshly with them

The word 'giant' might also come from the LXX and some believe that it was translated that way because the Greek giants/demigods were referred to as giants and were also thought to be only partly human

Four views: (https://answersingenesis.org/bible-characters/who-were-the-nephilim/)

Fallen angels view

"Satan and/or his fallen angels bred with human women and had offspring that were called Nephilim"

Fallen angels overtook men view

"Fallen angels and/or Satan possessed men and caused them to breed with women"

Sethite view

"The sons of God were the godly line from Adam to Seth down to Noah, and the Nephilim were fallen children who sought after false gods"

Fallen men view

"Godly men (sons of God) took ungodly wives, and their descendants (Nephilim) followed after the false gods, rejected God, and fell far from God in wickedness"

Fallen angels view

'sons of Elohim' refer to fallen angels (100% angel)
'daughters of man' refer to women (100% human)
'Nephilim' refers to human offspring from human women and fallen angels (50% human, 50% angel)
Strengths:

Job 1:6
Job 2:1
It explains where many ancient religious views after Babel about demi-gods (last part of Genesis 6:4)
Angels are only described as male

Daniel 9:21

This is what the oldest Jewish commentaries such as Josephus wrote
In Genesis 18 two angels who meet Abraham (as well as God) eat food so angels can do physical things and are not merely spirit holograms
Perhaps satan wanted to dilute humanity so as a way of thwarting Genesis 3:15
Supporting passages:

2 Peter 2:1-11
Jude 1:4-8
Nephilim are not specifically mentioned
It is not clearly stated that fallen angels had sexual relationships with women
However "the angels who sinned" (2 Peter 2:4), “who did not keep their proper domain, but left their own abode” (Jude 6), are in the same context as Noah
Both passages compare the sin of these angels with the sin of the people of Sodom and Gomorrah who had "in a similar manner to these, having given themselves over to sexual immorality and gone after strange flesh" (Jude 7)

Weaknesses:

There aren't other examples of fallen angels having human form

Perhaps it wasn't as in the Holy Spirit and Mary or maybe only God can do that

It is unknown if angels and humans have compatible DNA to reproduce
In Greek the phrase "sons of God" refers to humans (Matthew 5:9, Romans 8:14, Galatians 3:26)

In Hebrew it is sometimes human and sometimes a spiritual being (angels)

Matthew 22:30

However these are angels in Heaven rather than fallen angels

Fallen angels overtook men view

'sons of Elohim' refer to men possessed by demons (100% human)
'daughters of man' refer to women (100% human)
'Nephilim' refers to human offspring (100% human)
Strengths:

Luke 22:3, Mark 5:15

Humans can be possessed by demons/satan

Weaknesses:

Demon possessed men do not warrant the title/description 'sons of god'
Why weren't later demon possessed people called Nephilim

Sethite view

'sons of Elohim' refer to the godly line of Seth (100% human)
'daughters of man' refer to the ungodly line of Cain (100% human)
'Nephilim' refers to human offspring (100% human)
Strengths:

It fits with the context of Genesis 5 talking about human families
Hosea 1:10

Here and many other places godly people are referred to as children or sons of God

Weaknesses:

The term 'ha adam' should not be restricted to only Cain and exclude Seth
While Cain and Lamech were ungodly it is very possible than some of their descendants were not
While Seth and Enoch were godly there were people in their line who were not

Noah had brothers and sisters (Genesis 5:30) who were probably destroyed in the flood with the other wicked people

If it was merely interhuman marriage then why refer to one gender as tied to man and another as tied to elohim
Why would the godly intermarry with the ungodly?

Fallen men view

'sons of Elohim' refer to the godly (100% human)
'daughters of man' refer to the ungodly (100% human)
'Nephilim' refers to human offspring (100% human)
Strengths:

Fixes two of the weaknesses of the Sethite view relating to Cain and Seth

Weaknesses:

If it was merely interhuman marriage then why refer to one gender as tied to man and another as tied to elohim
Why would the godly intermarry with the ungodly?

What about the Book of Enoch? (300-200 BC) (Ephraim Isaac, the editor and translator of 1 Enoch in The Old Testament Pseudepigrapha, writes that "1 Enoch is clearly composite representing numerous periods and writers" [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Book_of_Enoch])

Chapter 6:

And it came to pass when the children of men had multiplied that in those days were born unto them beautiful and comely daughters. And the angels, the children of the heaven, saw and lusted after them, and said to one another: ‘Come, let us choose us wives from among the children of men and beget us children.’ And Semjaza, who was their leader, said unto them: ‘I fear ye will not indeed agree to do this deed, and I alone shall have to pay the penalty of a great sin.’ And they all answered him and said: ‘Let us all swear an oath, and all bind ourselves by mutual imprecations not to abandon this plan but to do this thing.’ Then sware they all together and bound themselves by mutual imprecations upon it. And they were in all two hundred; who descended in the days of Jared on the summit of Mount Hermon, and they called it Mount Hermon, because they had sworn and bound themselves by mutual imprecations upon it. And these are the names of their leaders: Samlazaz, their leader, Araklba, Rameel, Kokablel, Tamlel, Ramlel, Danel, Ezeqeel, Baraqijal, Asael, Armaros, Batarel, Ananel, Zaquel, Samsapeel, Satarel, Turel, Jomjael, Sariel. These are their chiefs of tens.

Chapter 7:

And all the others together with them took unto themselves wives, and each chose for himself one, and they began to go in unto them and to defile themselves with them, and they taught them charms and enchantments, and the cutting of roots, and made them acquainted with plants. And they became pregnant, and they bare great giants, whose height was three thousand ells: Who consumed all the acquisitions of men. And when men could no longer sustain them, the giants turned against them and devoured mankind. And they began to sin against birds, and beasts, and reptiles, and fish, and to devour one another’s flesh, and drink the blood. Then the earth laid accusation against the lawless ones.

Jewish tradition may or may not be true

Genesis 6:5-8

What is meant by heart?

Matthew 15:19
In both these cases it seems to show that the Bible at least sometimes uses the word 'heart' for mind

What does your translation say in vs 6 "the Lord ____ that He had made man"

The KJV used the word 'repented' but almost all others do not
Can God have regret or repent?

1 Samuel 15:29 (Malachi 3:6, James 1:17)

1 Samuel 15:11
1 Samuel 15:35

"The statement which God made to Samuel does not mean that God relented or changed His mind, but that God was expressing deep emotional sorrow over Saul’s failure and the trouble that it would bring upon Israel"

Noah found favor…

This is a great example of God's grace
Ezekiel 14:13-14

Genesis 6:9-10

Did he walk with God in the same way that Enoch did?

Genesis 6:11-13

Remember the last time God took a look around (Genesis 1:31)
What were the problems with the earth?

Corrupt
Violent
Ask about movies with sex scenes in them
Since corruption and violence are given as reasons for God destroying the earth, why do we not see them as just as bad to watch?

*I don't mind reading about an affair but I do mind watching a fake recreation of it

Genesis 6:14-17

Noah's responses are never mentioned

2 Peter 2:5

Although he was a herald of righteousness the only words of his that are recorded are in Genesis 9:25-27

I recommend the book "Noah's Ark: A feasibility Study" by John Woodmorappe (1996) which answers a lot of the scientific questions about this ocean-liner sized boat (animal-care methods, food-preservation techniques, animal-handling techniques, etc)
What how could Noah have possibly build such a big boat?

Tubal-Cain was already making metal tools for quite some time
Noah could have hired people
Noah had many years to build the ark, perhaps the equivalent of one of our lifetimes even

'Ark'

This word is also used of the safety water vessel that Moses was placed in but translated as basket in my translation
It is not the same word used of the Ark of the Covenant

Gopher wood

Gopher is a transliteration not a translation because the word only occurs once in the Bible

Cypress seems to be a popular option for commentators
One suggested teak since it has natural oils

Another possibility is that it isn't a type of wood, but rather a way of processing wood, like saying treated lumber

The LXX has God telling Noah to make the Ark 'of squared wood'
The Vulgate has it made of 'smooth wood'
The Chinese supposedly would burry teak to make it harder so some suggest that maybe Noah did something similar

In 2012 a study was done where they soaked wood of various types in fresh and salt water for a year to mimic the Flood conditions

The study concluded: "The bottom line is that the mechanical properties and consequential dimensional stability of gopher wood would not have changed significantly by water immersion (30% maximum), even if it was in salt water and even if there were no pitch to cover the wood. This 30% reduction is not enough to diminish the structural integrity of the ark."

What was to be built inside the ark?

Rooms

Some might have contained multiple types of animals

Pitch

What is pitch made of?

Petroleum/oil

How is oil produced?

According to Google: "The formation of oil begins in warm, shallow oceans that were present on the Earth millions of years ago. ... It is this sediment on the ocean floor that then forms oil over many years. The energy in oil initially comes from the Sun, and is energy from sunlight that is trapped in chemical form by dead plankton."
Some say over millions of year but since oil can be produced quickly in the lab under heat and pressure perhaps some was made during the flood
But that doesn't explain oil pre-flood
Others think that oil comes from the earth's heat and pressure underground and as it migrates towards the surface it is attacked by bacteria making it appear to have an organic origin
Or perhaps God made the earth with oil already in it

But pitch can also be made of pine resin mixed with charcoal as was done for centuries in Europe

Why pitch the boat?

Waterproofing probably
Adds rigidity giving it strength if things collide into it

Ark size

300 x 50 x 30 cubits
How long is a cubit?

Length from fingertip to elbow (varies for each person)
Usually thought to be about 18 inches but other known cubits are longer by a couple inches

Sticking with the popular 18 inches, the ark would have been 450 feet by 75 feet by 45 feet
1.52 million cubic feet
A 40 foot semi trailer is 4420 cubits

343 of them would fit in the ark
Trailers can haul about 22 tons of cargo

The ark could hold as much weight as the water it displaced

If it was in the water a third of the way (10 feet) then it could hold 14,800 tons of cargo
Since a semi-trailer can hold about 300 125-lb sheep, the ark could hold about 102,000 sheep-sized animals

How many decks/levels are there?

3 (vs 16)
Combining their floor space, they could hold a total of 22 basketball courts (7 per level)
So space wise, the ark could hold about 19,000 sheep sized animals according to transport regulations

Seaworthiness

The BBC did a hit piece on the ark were they took a Victorian ship with a mast and such and lots of windows to look out from and determined with computer models that it would break apart at that size

Masts allow the wind to apply force to that 'lever'
Windows weaken the sides and are an unnecessary addition to the ark (most passengers were animals)
The Lontifera from Heraclea was about 400-500 ft long which is recorded to have fought in the Aegean Sea battle in 280 BC

Chinese admiral Zheng He made long voyages with a fleet that included one ship 390 feet long in the 13-14 hundreds

According to Korean naval architects, barges with these proportional dimensions are the most stable and if the ark had 1 foot thick walls of wood it could even withstand 100 foot waves

Also the ark could have been created on higher ground and avoided the high currents before the water rose

2 Peter 3:6

Genesis 6:18-22

This is the first mention of covenant in the Bible

This promise of God that He will make a covenant is fulfilled in Genesis 9:9

God is very specific about who would enter the ark

How many in total?

1 Peter 3:20

There were no additional children

Genesis 7:13
Genesis 8:16
Genesis 8:18
What was to go on the boat besides people?

Two of every living kind with flesh

Land animals
What about:

Plants

They aren't alive according to the Bible

Insects

They aren't specified to be alive according to the Bible

Fish

They aren't included or even promised to have ever kind remail alive
How could salt water and fresh water fish survive?

Fish can survive a range of saltiness

*Personal experience

Freshwater is less dense than saltwater so it can float on top

The phenomenon is called halocline where there is a vertical gradient of saltiness in a body of water

Lots of fish come in both freshwater and saltwater varieties so perhaps they could at one time handle both

Could all the animals fit?

Remember that from before, "Since a semi-trailer can hold about 300 125-lb sheep, the ark could hold about 102,000 sheep-sized animals" according to government regulations

But assuming they were all only one layer deep (no stacking) it could hold about 19,000 sheep

We don't know what 'kinds' exactly means but it most likely falls between the family and genus scientific classifications

I have not counted but when you exclude fish and such there seems to be about 2000 in the family category and about 8000 in the genus category including extinct ones

Assuming the genus category which is the upper bound of the number of kinds of animals, that means that there would have been 16,000 animals on board

The average size of these from what I've read is rat sized (rodents, shrews, rabbits, birds, lizards, etc.)

Only 11% would have been bigger than a sheep including dinosaurs (juvenile animals were assumed for calculations)

According to John Woodmorappe (pen name, M.A. in geology and a B.A. in biology), less than 50% of the deck's floor space would have been occupied by animals allowing for food and water storage

Food supply

Although maybe some of the animals hibernated, Noah was to make sure that he put some of all the animal's foods on the ark
Water may not have been necessary since they could collect rain water every day
According to Woodmorappe, 15% of the ark's volume would have been needed for food and 9% for water

Noah obeyed God

Genesis 7:1-5

Noah's father Lamech had just passed away 5 years earlier and his grandfather Methuselah had probably just passed away
Who was righteous at that time?

Noah
I assume his family as well

God expands the cargo list

Not only 2 of every kind, but also 7 pairs of birds and of every clean type of animal

This would mean that there would be 12 extra birds and an extra 12 x however_many_clean_aniamls_there_were

I assume that the 7 pairs were not in addition to the original pair but I could be wrong

What animals were considered clean?

The Mosaic Law had not yet defined clean animals but I assume, especially since the author of Genesis seems to be Moses, that God must have given the same list to Noah before He gave it to Moses
Leviticus 11:3,9,47

*See excel spreadsheet of animals
So there would have been an extra 120 big animals and maybe extra insects

The clean fish were probably not on board in aquariums

Genesis 6:19

Notice that male and female are mentioned, but what do you have in Genesis 7:2?

Genesis 2:23 uses the same words (man and woman (ish and ishshah))
It is just for that one verse used in regards to land animals, and reverts back to the usual male and female in the next verse referring to birds

Perhaps it is to focus on the mating aspect of the animal pairs?

Vs 4

God now is very specific on when the flood will start
How is 7 days enough time to find or trap and load up all the animals?

I believe God brought all the animals to the ark and they walked on board without fighting

*our donkey being loaded onto trailer

The rain would last precisely 40 24 hour days
God reminds Noah He will blot out every living thing

I think that He has the right to do it because He made them
Romans 9:20-23

Although this is not at all talking about animals, I think the same logic applies

Noah completely obeyed

Genesis 7:6-10

Biblical evidence that the flood was global

Genesis 7:19-23

Notice the words like all, everything, whole, only Noah

Biblical evidence against a local flood

Why have Noah build an ark instead of moving to the other side of the mountains?
Why bring all the animals to the ark?
Why include birds on the ark?
If the local mountains were covered by 15 cubits (26 feet), wouldn't the whole earth have been covered?
Local floods don't last 150 days or take 220 days to dry
Only some people would have been judged unlike what Matthew 24:37-39 and 2 Peter 3:5-6 say
God would have repeatedly broken His covenant promise in Genesis 9:15

Flood models (scientific)

The Bible is our foundation for all flood models
Where the "Bible is silent we are free to use sciences to assist in building models"

But we must not be married to those models or we will soon be widowed

If models are held too much on par with Scripture people may end up doubting the Bible if the model is proven false
We should use science ministerially rather than magisterially

2 Peter 3:3-6

This leads me to believe that there is evidence and science can be used to point to the Bible's reliability

What are examples of these evidences?

Rapidly buried animals

Millions of buffaloes were killed in North America last century but there are very few fossils of them

Present rapid formations like Mount St Helens

On November 14, 1963 an island called Surtsey was formed by a volcanic eruption 32km south of Iceland

The magazine New Scientist in 2006 wrote in an article entitled The Fire-Eater's Island "The island has excited geographers, who marvel that canyons, gullies and other land features that typically take tens of thousands or millions of years to form were created in less than a decade."

I see it as evidence that millions of years aren't necessary

Genesis 7:11-12

What were the two sources of water for the flood?

Underground and from above

Above ground
The Canopy theory

The canopy theory was a great idea but I don't believe it holds water :)
It is a great example of humans doing their very best to come up with a scientific model that lines up and supports the Bible

But if/when it doesn't line up with the Bible or is found to be false then it should be rejected as an honest and honorable attempt but trust in the Word of God should not diminish
Genesis 1:6-7

How big was the expanse?

Genesis 1:17-18
Psalm 148:1-4
Psalm 148:5-6
These passages were written long after the flood

If the canopy theory was true then the water would no longer be up there

Underground

We all know that there is water underground
One of the most popular biblically compatible views is Catastrophic Plate Tectonics (CPT) as opposed to the popular secular model Uniformitarian Plate Tectonics (UPT)
CPT (based on supercomputer modeling)

The earth started as predominantly a single supercontinent with cold rock regions just offshore surrounding the supercontinent
At the start of the flood these cold rocks began to sink perhaps because of the stress they exerted on the weaker warm mantle crust
As they sank they applied pressure to underground bodies of water causing they to spew out of the ground allowing the rocks to keep sinking and pushing more water out
This would cause tearing of the supercontinent along boundaries which would separate in which case hot mantle material would rise up in the gap
As this hot substance contacts the ocean it would vaporize large amounts of water adding to the rain
Apparently "on either side of the earth in the central Pacific and beneath Africa, are blobs of relatively warm rock, squeezed up as it were like toothpaste"

The temperature differences make sense if it happened thousands of years ago, but if UPT is true then these rocks should not have been able to penetrate the mantle because they would bend if they were moving slowly, and they would have adjusted to the same temperature as the rocks around them

This model also makes sense of past magnetic pole reversals
The faster collisions of plates in the CPT vs the UPT model makes their common assumption about mountains forming from their collisions more plausible

CPT problems

Remember, it is just a model, and let God be true, but every model be proved a liar (Romans 3:4 spinoff)
They aren't sure how so much of the heat dissipated from the underground hot mantle
It could have just been a miracle

Genesis 7:13-16

Verse 16

God shut them in

Why?

He was going to protect them
They didn't have to worry about making sure they were sealed in
It also prevented the wicked from trying to get 'salvation' without repentance

What kind of door was it?

Genesis 7:17-20

15 cubits was enough for the ark to safely go above the mountains

The ark's bottom would have only been 10 cubits below the water
It also would have prevented animals/humans from staying alive at the top of the mountain even if there was a tree on top (which there probably wasn't)

The highest point above sea level today is Mount Everest at 29,029 feet

The top of Mount Everest is marine limestone with fossils of bottom dwelling crinoids
Psalm 104:6-9
It is estimated that if the earth was smoothed out it would be covered with water to a depth of 8,812 feet

Because the sea level was rising the ark would have experiences nearly the same air pressure and hence oxygen regardless of the height

Genesis 7:21-24

This would be the period that most of our fossils come from

Genesis 8:1-4

What does it mean that God remembered Noah?

Did He forget him?
Genesis 19:28-29
Exodus 2:24-25
Jeremiah 2:2
Jeremiah 31:20
Luke 1:54

Would wind be completely responsible for the waters receding?

Using fans can dry things but when the humidity gets high it quits helping much because the air can only hold so much water
Remember that the reason the earth could get covered with water so high was because it must have been relatively smooth

Psalm 104:5-10
By raising mountains and lowering areas the water would run off into the lower areas forming oceans

Where did the ark land?

Mountains of Ararat (notice mountains is plural)
Many think it landed on Mt Ararat which is a dormant volcano with two peaks (Greater and Lesser Ararat) in modern Turkey

It last erupted in 1840

Unconfirmed eruptions may have also occurred in 1780, 1450 and 550 BC

Ararat is a region/kingdom in the Bible

2 Kings 19:37
Jeremiah 51:27

Others suggest it was in an all-together different location

Copied from Answers in Genesis:

Ararat Anomaly

A US Air Force reconnaissance plane took black-and-white images of the northwest side of Mt. Ararat in 1949, revealing a large object that resembles a portion of a ship. The images were made public in 1995 and sparked further interest.

Ahora Gorge

One mile below the peak of Ararat is Ahora Gorge. This site gained popularity when George Hagopian, an Armenian, claimed his uncle took him on top of the Ark as a young boy around 1908. Throughout his lifetime, he proclaimed what he discovered as truth, but he was unable to pinpoint the exact location of his discovery.

Undisclosed NAMI Site

A Turkish guide, Ahmet Ertugrul, supposedly found compartments from the Ark’s interior on the south side of Mt. Ararat. He took photographs in 2008 and reported them to NAMI, a Hong Kong-based ministry.

Durupinar

Heavy rains exposed a large “Ark-shaped” formation in 1948, approximately 15 miles from the summit of Mt. Ararat. A 1960 expedition found only dirt and rocks, but explorer Ron Wyatt went back in the 1970s and 1980s, claiming he found an outline of metal fittings using a “frequency generator.”

Mount Cudi/Judi

Some ancient writers said people could still see the Ark in New Testament times at Mt. Cudi. An expedition found wood in 1953, encouraging further expeditions.

Mount Suleiman

A veteran named Ed Davis claimed he saw the remains of Noah’s Ark while he was stationed in Iran during World War II. Later expeditions claimed to find beam-like rocks on Mount Suleiman

Is the ark still there?

Josephus claimed that it was still around at the time of Jesus approximately
Perhaps if it was on Mt Ararat it was burned in lava
Perhaps since there probably weren't big trees available right after the flood it was used for alters and shelters
Not finding it does not shed doubt on the Bible just as not finding the Mayflower wouldn't cause me to doubt the Pilgrim's voyage

The Mayflower's fate is unknown with some historians believing that it was scrapped for timber

The garden of Eden

I believe that the entire earth's landscape was altered by the flood so whatever was Eden is no longer Eden and nor are there any cherubim guarding it

Genesis 8:5-14

Notice that God has now left Noah to use his own natural means of determining when to leave the ark

There is no recorded command from God on when and how

Noah probably saw the tops of mountains and waited 40 days to let the water go down more
Did the raven return?

It could have rested on mountains

After that (not sure how much time passed) Noah sent a dove which came back with a branch
A week later He sent a dove, perhaps the same one, which didn't return so it clearly found a dry place to nest
About a month later Noah removed the roof and saw that the top of the ground was dry
Almost 2 months later the ground was fully back to normal

Genesis 8:15-19

Now God again gives Noah directions to leave the ark and remove the animals as well
Noah obeys completely

Where does the Ice Age fit in to world history?

The most popular Christian theory is that the water that came from the deep was very warm and therefore the oceans got much warmer which increases global evaporation

At the same time, due to volcano ash from the many eruptions that are believed to have happened during the flood, less sunlight would warm the earth making it cooler

According to Wikipedia when Mt Pinatubo in the Philippines erupted in 1991 it caused global temperatures to drop by about .5 degrees Celsius from 1991-1993

This would cause lots of precipitation over cool areas of the earth forming tons of ice
Over time the oceans cooled and the ash settled allowing the precipitation to slow down and the melting to increase

Genesis 8:20-22

Although Cain and Abel made offerings to God, this is the first time the word 'alter' occurs in the Bible
Noah probably took 1 or two of each clean animal

What do you think?
Proportionally to the animals on earth, this was the biggest sacrifice ever

When God enjoyed the smell, is that figurative of God enjoying Noah's heart and attitude?
Were God's words said out loud and if not did Noah ever know them?
What three things does God promise?

To never curse the ground again

Genesis 3:17
Genesis 5:29

Did Noah bring relief from work?

This did not elevate the prior curse, it only guaranteed no further curses of the ground
Does God curse anything anymore?

Genesis 12:3
Malachi 2:2
Mark 11:21
Matthew 25:41

To never repeat the flood
That the earth's seasonal cycles will go uninterrupted for the entirety of earth's existence

2 Peter 3:13 (Isaiah 65:17, Isaiah 66:22, Revelation 21:1)

Will there be seasons on the new earth?

Man's sin brought about the curse of the ground but in Genesis 8:21 God promises to not repeat that even though the problem persists

So God is restraining His wrath not due to our goodness but rather His longsuffering (Romans 2:5)

Genesis 9:1

Now God is speaking to them rather than just thinking
As far as I know, Noah was done having kids so this was primarily to be accomplished by Noah's sons and their descendants

Genesis 9:2

What advantage is there in having animals afraid of people?

Keeps them from getting hunted easily
Keeps man from interacting with them which could be fatal for humans

Genesis 9:3-4

This is the first time God gives permission to eat meat
There doesn't seem to be any dietary restrictions between clean and unclean animals
What were godly people able to use animals for before this freedom was given to them?

Work, milk, clothing, sacrifices

I don't think they had to eat everything, but they were allowed to just as it is today with meat sacrificed to idols or personal preferences in taste

Romans 14:1-10
Colossians 2:16-23

Acts 15:20

Why no blood?

Health
A picture of Jesus

While the blood of animals covered sins [I think], Jesus' blood takes away sins (Hebrews 10:4, 1 John 3:5, John 1:29)

What do you think of JW's stance that blood transfusions are sinful?
The red stuff in a rare steak is not blood

Genesis 9:5-7

God connects blood with life which is why the idiom of shedding blood refers to death
If a man or an animal kill a human they should be killed by a human

I think this shows the high value of Human life

What was God's reason for this?

We are made in His image

This also implies that God's image was still on fallen man

Christians and Jews have often used this to explain the origins and need for human government/courts/justice
This command seems linked to and a part of the covenant that wouldn't end till the earth is replaced

What things did God set capital punishment for?

Exodus 21:12

Murder

Exodus 21:16

Kidnapping

Exodus 22:19

Bestiality

Leviticus 20:10

Adultery

Leviticus 20:13

Homosexuality

Deuteronomy 13:5

Leading others astray

Deuteronomy 22:24

Prostitution and rape

So is capital punishment still Biblical?

Acts 25:11
Romans 13:3-4
Romans 6:23

When Cain committed murder he was allowed to stay alive but other times God wanted swifter punishment

God still shows grace even though death is His general rule

David committed murder and adultery but God spared his life
The woman caught in adultery was not stoned by Jesus when He made a point about hypocrisy (potentially a true story but not a part of scripture)

Genesis 9:8-17

Who did God establish the covenant with?

All future humans and all living creatures (everything that descended from animals on the ark

That means that God established this covenant with every famer's cows and every hamster in a cage
God cares for animals

Matthew 10:29-31
Jonah 4:11

How long would it last?

Forever (vs 16)

What was promised?

No more global floods

What does God expect of us and animals in this covenant?

Nothing
He had previously made other promises and commands but this covenant is just God promising to never repeat the flood

The rainbow

Who was the rainbow for?

A reminder for God
Does God need reminding?

No but it reminds us that He is remembering

What do you think about drawings of rainbows now that it is claimed as a symbol of sin?

Should Christians still use it as before, or should we fight for it back, or should we give it up?

What is the scientific cause of the rainbow?

"When light enters at an angle into a substance where it travels more slowly, different wavelengths of light are bent differently" causing dispersion. "Since color depends on wavelength, we see the dispersion as a band of different colors".
Rainbows that we think of are most commonly seen when sunlight is dispersed by raindrops but in that case they are also reflected so the colors are reversed and rainbows are only seen when we are between the sun and the raindrops
"According to Google" it is always raining in some part of the world every day

This means that God who is everywhere is constantly being reminded of His promise

Were there rainbows before the flood?

I grew up thinking there were not but now I think there were
If there weren't then God changed the laws of physics (which He can totally do) after the flood
I think He was providing symbolic meaning to the already existing phenomenon of rainbows just like He did with the cross and lambs and bread and wine and many other things

Genesis 9:18-19

Genesis 7:13

3 sons entered the ark

Genesis 8:16

3 sons left the ark
So Canaan was a grandson born after the ark landed

Genesis 9:20-21

Noah started a new occupation to him
The process of making wine was probably well established since people had been alive for over 1600 years before the flood. As well as the concept of drunkenness if too much was consumed
I assume it was grapes, what do you think?
Do you think Noah drank before the flood? And if so do you think he had ever been drunk before?
Psalm 104:14-15

I know of no prohibition to consuming or making wine (Jesus did both those things), but getting drunk is wrong (Ephesians 5:18)
I don't think growing a vineyard or making or drinking wine was a sin. Only the last part when he got drunk

The Bible doesn't hide the faults of its heroes

Who are some other Bible heroes who sinned in a big way?

Was it sinful to be naked in his own tent?

Perhaps the door was open which would make sense of Ham seeing him, or perhaps not and Ham went into the tent looking for his dad

Genesis 9:22-23

How old was Ham?

Ham already had a son so he wasn't super young
Genesis 10:6

If this is in order of age then he had already had 4 kids

What was Ham's sin?

I would think that an accidental and embarrassing glance would not be a sin
Perhaps he stared
Perhaps he enjoyed it or was glad about it
Perhaps it was just that he told his brothers about it in a dishonoring way
Or maybe a combination of these things

Shem and Japheth acted righteously and covered their dad without looking
Suppose a Christian leader publicly sins

In what ways do some people act like Ham and in what ways should we act like Shem and Japheth?

Genesis 9:24-27

The Bible doesn't say how Noah knew what had happened but somehow he did

Perhaps he had vague recollections or perhaps his wife or one of his sons told him

Who sinned?

Ham
Who did Noah curse?

Canaan (Ham's youngest)

Why?

"Perhaps God had already blessed Noah's three sons (9:1), so Noah couldn't countermand God's blessing with a curse"
"Perhaps since Ham sinned as the youngest son, he would be punished with a curse on his own youngest son"
"Perhaps it was an act of mercy, because only one of Ham's sons was affected, not all"
"Perhaps Noah discerned that the evil that had appeared in Ham had developed to a greater degree in Canaan, and would continue to increase through his descendants"

The curse was to be the servant of servants (the low of the low)

In contrast Jesus is the King of Kings and Lord of Lords signifying the greatest of the great

Genesis 9:28-29

Many think that long life spans were due to the pre flood perfect conditions but Noah lived over a third of his life after the flood so I don't think that theory explains much

Genesis 10:1-32 (1 Chronicles 1 is its parallel passage)

Noah had 3 sons
The pattern of this genealogy is Noah's sons, his grandsons from a certain son, some of his great grandsons, and then their languages and locations
PPT
How many grandkids did Noah have?

Vs 2 + vs 6 + vs 22 = 16 recorded grandsons (probably lots of granddaughters too)

Vs 2

Japheth has the most sons in keeping with Genesis 9:27

Vs 3

Here is a great example of lack of information leading some people to certain conclusions and others to uncertainty
Ezekiel 38:6
Hosea 1:3
The name Gomer (same in Hebrew in both places) eventually became unisex
Perhaps he is the Gomer in Ezekiel or maybe it is a different Gomer

Vs 5

Japheth's family spread to the coastland and clan (perhaps great grandson's family) had a separate language and somewhat kept to themselves as their own nation

It seems that they stayed separated due to language barriers which is what God had intended for languages to do

Vs 8-12

There are only two other places where Nimrod is mentioned (one being the land of Nimrod) and no additional information is given
He was a mighty hunter
The ESV says he was the first mighty man on earth

Most other translations say he began to be a mighty man
I doubt the ESV translation because 'began' seems to be the most common meaning of the word, most translations use it, and Genesis 6:4 seems to contradict the meaning of 'first' unless it meant first after the flood

Some have thought that perhaps he defeated dinosaurs and/or dragons
The phrase "before the Lord" is debated

The NET says that it expresses "the superlative degree. In this case one may translate 'Nimrod was the greatest hunter in the world.'"
More commonly as far as I can tell it could mean "in the face of" as in opposed to God

The Jerusalem Targum says, "He was mighty in hunting and in sin before the Lord; for he was a hunter of the sons of men in their languages. And he said to them, Leave the judgments of Shem, and adhere to the judgments of Nimrod. On this account it is said, As Nimrod the mighty, mighty in hunting and in sin before the Lord."

Vs 25

Some have taken this to imply a continental split
It seems more likely based on context that it is referring to the people being divided at the tower of Babel

This is in line with pre plate tectonics discovery commentators said
I don't know if his name was given prophetically or just after the even or on the day of the event even

Genesis 11:1

We now go back in time from chapter 10 where there were already many languages and the people had divided into nations and were spreading out

Genesis 11:2-4

Translations differ on whether they came from the East or were going Eastward
The people are rebelling in the sense of staying together rather than filling the earth which requires spreading out
They built in an area probably lacking rocks which is why they made bricks instead
Some think the tower, which seems to be the focus rather than the city, was a ziggurat (step pyramid)
The tower was to be really tall

Why build a tall tower?

Prestige (making a name for themselves)
Some think it was for astrological worship
Some think it was for escaping floods
Some think the city could protect them against animals and provide storage for food and water

How many people were there by this time?

Noah had 3 sons
They gave him 16 grandsons and assuming 16 granddaughters as well there were an average of 10.7 kids from each of Noah's sons

*Do the math assuming 32 grandkids and 10 kids per couple

Genesis 10:10

Nimrod may have been the leader in this rebellion

Where was the tower built?

A plain in the land of Shinar
The place is called Babel although it is the exact same word as Babylon in Hebrew and some scholars think that the two references in Genesis that translate it as Babel should conform to the normal translation of Babylon that occurs well over 200 times in the Bible

The NIV does this in Genesis 10:10

Daniel 1:1-2

Babylon may very well have been in the land of Shinar

I believe that the word Babel should be replaced with the word Babylon as I have read no convincing reason not to treat the word differently in these two places

Thinking this way does not make a big difference but it may make you think differently about the exile being a return to Babylon, the birthplace of all nations, and coming out of it Israel was reborn

Genesis 11:5-9

Vs 5 seems to indicate that the tower was completed but vs 8 indicates that they had not finished so vs 5 might be meaning "built so far"
I don't think Jesus actually came down in human form, but rather this is a figure of speech which makes fun of man's puny efforts

They were trying to build a tower into heaven but it was so far down the God had to come down to take a closer look

Note that Heaven (see Bible study on subject) can just mean sky/lower atmosphere such as when rain falls from heaven

God's assessment of the situation is that because they all speak the same language they can work together and be able to accomplish a lot more in their rebellion

I think that God must have been looking into the theoretical future because even if there were 100,000 people alive then, we have way more speaking the same language not long after and ever since

Yet because of wars between nations they were all kept in check from each other.

Take Hitler for example

Because we are divided into nations others fought him and he did not accomplish what he wanted
But if the world was unified they could accomplish far more evil

All root languages come from God

He gave Adam and Eve a language and at Babel He gave each clan a different language so they couldn't communicate, and through tongues, He continues this practice
Over time languages and people continued to separate and diversify

This splitting up of groups would have led to closer relatives marrying and therefore they could have rapidly attained distinct so-called racial characteristics yet they are the same race and therefore interfertile
The animals presumably had dispersed long ago right after the flood so now the small groups of people will have had to fight and defend themselves in territory taken over by animals
There are around 6,500 languages today worldwide