Jeremy Thompson Catholic PhD in Biblical Languages, Programmer, Runner

James has just posted about a show on PBS called the “Human Spark.” It sounds very interesting.  Here is one of James’ comments:

The irony is that young-earth creationists adopt an anti-evolutionary stance for the most part because they feel that evolution threatens human uniqueness and dignity. And yet this show was all about human distinctiveness – but not simply affirming it but also trying to understand when and how we developed some of our unique characteristics.

James has links to the show and to some clips as well.

Posts on Genesis:

Free Bible Experience Audio of the Creation Story

Chris Brady on The Character of God in Genesis 1

Genesis 1.1 and the Importance of Comparing Translations

HERE is a link to a free copy of the Creation story from the Bible Experience audio Bible.  The Bible Experience has a cast of celebrity readers and is currently one of the best selling audio Bibles available.  It is made available through Audible.com.

I will not be blogging anything of my own today considering I am working on my dissertation.  However, I did not want to leave you without any food for thought for today.  HERE is a link to a post by Chris Brady on his reasoning for not using the term “myth” in his series on Genesis 1-2.  I feel like I have been linking to Chris’s posts a lot here lately, but the series on Genesis has just been so good.  And, it has sparked a lot of dialogue with John Hobbins, Daniel McClellan, and now Alan Lenzi among others.  The recent dialogue has really brought out some important issues of how scholars should speak with general audiences.  When speaking or writing for a general audience, should scholars use the word “myth” and try to make sure that people understand that term properly (i.e. it doesn’t necessarily mean that something is false)?  Or, should they jettison the term because of misunderstandings that people have about it?  I have tended to use the term, but to try to make sure that people I am speaking or writing for understand it properly; however, I can understand the opposing view.

HERE is a post by Chris Brady on the character of God in Genesis 1 that is well worth a read.  My favorite quote from the post is:

Given that God is the subject of almost every verb in the opening creation story of Genesis it is surprising that God is never provided with any sort of description or introduction. It is left to the reader to deduce from the text the nature of this creator from the text.

It really would be helpful to have some kind of theological description of God that would precede the creation account.  But, instead we work with what we have and try to describe God based upon what he does in the passage.