Prefall Death

[Don Fanucci]

I can not find in scripture where anything dies before the fall. Can you show me where it is?

Psalm 104:19-21 He made the moon for the seasons; the sun knows the place of its setting. 20 You appoint darkness and it becomes night, in which all the beasts of the forest prowl about. 21 The young lions roar after their prey and seek their food from God.

v20-21 clearly make the initial seven days of creation the time frame, within which the lions exist and actually use the darkness to hunt.

No, it does not clearly state that, otherwise it would be in Genesis. What this is is David reflecting on God, nothing more.

Why does it need to be in Genesis. Are there no references to Genesis that mention something in addition to what was written in Genesis? Alternatively, would you argue that David's reflection is erroneous--ie, lions really didn't have animal prey?

[Guest]

Thank You Lord Jesus For Your Holy Book So Accurate And True

Thank You For All The Critters So Wonderfully Made And The Sky So Blue

Thank You For Your Precious Holy Blood Shed For My Salvation Forever True

In the LORD put I my trust: How say ye to my soul, Flee as a bird to your mountain? Psalms 11:1

____________

Um no. The lions hunt in the normal nighttime this is not a reference to the creation. Invalid arguments do not make your case very well. You show that you are driven by emotion not logic.

Psalm 104:19-21 He made the moon for the seasons; the sun knows the place of its setting. 20 You appoint darkness and it becomes night, in which all the beasts of the forest prowl about. 21 The young lions roar after their prey and seek their food from God.

v20-21 clearly make the initial seven days of creation the time frame, within which the lions exist and actually use the darkness to hunt.

And what is their prey? Plants? I don't think so. However, there is further evidence in an earlier discussion I had regarding Adam having to name the animals. The Hebrew name for lion is rooted in a word for violence. Would that really refer to how lions graze? How about the derivative for Eagle (to lacerate)? Would eagles really lacerate plants.

Oh

And to every beast of the earth, and to every fowl of the air, and to every thing that creepeth upon the earth, wherein there is life, I have given every green herb for meat: and it was so. And God saw every thing that he had made, and, behold, it was very good. And the evening and the morning were the sixth day. Genesis 1:30-31

My

Every moving thing that liveth shall be meat for you; even as the green herb have I given you all things. But flesh with the life thereof, which is the blood thereof, shall ye not eat. Genesis 9:3-4

Does Man's Thinking Ever Get It Wrong

The wolf and the lamb shall feed together, and the lion shall eat straw like the bullock: and dust shall be the serpent's meat. They shall not hurt nor destroy in all my holy mountain, saith the LORD.

Then Again When The Evidence Clearly Stares The Unbeliever In The Face

Knowing this first, that there shall come in the last days scoffers, walking after their own lusts,

And saying, Where is the promise of his coming? for since the fathers fell asleep, all things continue as they were from the beginning of the creation.

For this they willingly are ignorant of, that by the word of God the heavens were of old, and the earth standing out of the water and in the water:

Whereby the world that then was, being overflowed with water, perished: 2 Peter 3:3-6

And The Power Of Jesus Is Still Mocked

The four and twenty elders fall down before him that sat on the throne, and worship him that liveth for ever and ever, and cast their crowns before the throne, saying, Thou art worthy, O Lord, to receive glory and honour and power: for thou hast created all things, and for thy pleasure they are and were created. Revelation 4:10-11

By The Begiled

Now the serpent was more subtil than any beast of the field which the LORD God had made. And he said unto the woman, Yea, hath God said, Ye shall not eat of every tree of the garden? Genesis 3:1

Worldwide

And I saw a great white throne, and him that sat on it, from whose face the earth and the heaven fled away; and there was found no place for them. Revelation 20:11

Is There Any Hope?

And they were astonished out of measure, saying among themselves, Who then can be saved?

And Jesus looking upon them saith, With men it is impossible, but not with God: for with God all things are possible. Mark 10:26-27

____________

Believe

He was in the world, and the world was made by him, and the world knew him not.

He came unto his own, and his own received him not.

But as many as received him, to them gave he power to become the sons of God, even to them that believe on his name:

Which were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God.

And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, (and we beheld his glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father,) full of grace and truth. John 1:10-14

And Be Blessed Beloved

Love, Joe

[Guest shiloh357]

The explanation of what happens if Adam eats the fruit from the tree of life, "you shall surely die" pretty clearly demonstrates that the reference to death is spiritual death, not the end of biological existance. As I indicated, unchecked multiplication is not compatible with life. Also see my post to oneight referencing lions hunting prey in response to no predatation.

You can't say that and back it by scripture. We do not know if Adam would of physically dies if he had not eaten, so it also could of referred to a slow physical death, as in aging. You take too many privileges with scripture.

In fact, I am taking far less privilege than you are. Scripture said "you will surely die". He did not. In fact, he lived a very very long time. However, he caused separation from God for which which we all suffer.

That is where you are wrong. The text indicates that Adam DID die spiritually and began dying physically. Physical death is a process. We are all in a state of physical decay. We begin the death march the day we are born.

[Guest shiloh357]

The motivation for why God was associated with death is not germane to the point. The fact that God could and did cause death, and lots of it, as well as suffering, showed he is capable of it, and therefore certainly within his nature. It is indisputable. The countless battles, even the direct causes of death (first born, the flood). I think we are haggling over semantics, it is abundantly clear that God can and did cause great death. If it were not in his nature, he could not do it. This does not detract from him being a loving God at all, but to say death is not in his nature is clearly incorrect.

No it is not in God's nature. God sent the flood as a result of judgmnet not because God is a killer by nature. It was only after God's patience had expired and His holiness could not be compromised that judgment fell. Noah preached to the people for 120 years. Even when God decided to judge them, he gave them a 120-year extension. God's nature is redemptive and He holds out as long as He can. God's judgment comes down to preserve His nature.

Death and Judgment are directly tied to Adam's fall, not to God's character. In fact, you are defaming His character on this therad.

Simply, if Adam and Eve were perfectly created, they would not have chosen to eat the fruit--they failed as humans, and I don't believe they were intended to be made perfect. Just good, consistent with God's plan. They were made in God's image to have fellowship with God, communicate with God, know God, not to be Gods. In fact, are they not immortal as long as they are in the garden? Your contention is that everything God makes is good. My contention is that he makes some things flawed in order to achieve his goal, which is perfection.

You proved me right. You can't find any Scripture to support your position. Adam's failure was not the product of being created imperfectly. It is the result of a choice Adam made. Your point is irrational. Creating imperfection when it is within your power to create perfection is contrary to wisdom and it doesn't fit how God acts. Secondly, you are imposing a "goal" on to God that you have no Scriptural basis to make. God did not purposely make creation flawed in order to make it perfect later. The Bible teaches that everything that is wrong with this world can be tied to Adam's disobedience. You are simply blowing smoke. You don't know God at all.

There is no other way to explain the failure of Adam and Eve and mankind as imperfection. God was both sorry and sad. But again, it was his creation, perfect for his goal, but in order to meet his goal, parts had to be flawed.

As stated before, you don't have anything from Scripture to support that nonsense. You are basically blaming God for the sin in the world. Again, you are defaming His character and that is not something that He takes lightly.

How can you say that imperfection was not engineered into his creation when the creation did in fact become imperfect?

I can say it because I have the authoriy of Scripture on my side. There is no death or decay in the world when sin is not here.

For God to engineer imperfection in to Adam and Eve, He would have made them sinful, but God cannot do that. Furthermore Adam and Eve are created in the image of God and in His likeness. How can God have an imperfect image or likeness?

The capabllity to sin was engineered in--Adam came like that directly from the factory, and like a new product from the factory, he was unblemished. But again, Adam was an imperfect product (the product failed) but the plan was/is perfect.

Sorry, but this is why you are not a Christian. You bascially undercut the plan of redemption by assigning sin to God's account and thus shift the responsiblity for sin from Adam to God. All you do is try to impose your unbiblcal assumptions on the text and frankly, you are really out in left field. You haven't one clue about what you are talking about and you have defamed and slandered God in the process.

So the hebrew word for good and perfect is the same? Curious since Genesis also uses the word "very good" regarding creation, which doesn't translate into perfection.

It carries the same connotation. God is perfect and is not satisfied with less than perfect and would not have used such an emphatic concept as tov meod to express His satisfaction with it if it were imperfect. Sorry, but you are just wrong on every point.

[Don Fanucci]

No it is not in God's nature. God sent the flood as a result of judgmnet not because God is a killer by nature.

Which does not obscure the fact that God was directly responsible for the death of millions, and as I mentioned, he has done it multiple times. The resoning is irrelevant. If you want to change "in his nature", that's fine. I know what you are alluding to. But to say that it is not in his nature when God has been directly reponsible for a multitude of deaths is not supported by scripture. Its like saying that it is not in the nature of John Doe to spank his kids, but if his kids have been spanked many times, John is a spanker--great and loving parent that he may be, it does not change the fact that he spanks when he has to, even if he spanks out of love for his chlidren.

Adam's failure was not the product of being created imperfectly. It is the result of a choice Adam made.

As you have noted, imperfection cannot come from perfection. I agree. Did Adam live a sinless life? Jesus did, why couldn't Adam. Because he was not a perfect creation. He could not be if he later became imperfect. It does not matter how he became imperfect, which somehow you seem to be hanging your argument on. God gave Adam the ability to choose, and he chose wrongly. A perfect creation would not have chose wrongly. The only thing that matters is that Adam had a stage in his life as an imperfect human, therefore, he could not have started out as a perfect human. Only a very good human.

There is no other way to explain the failure of Adam and Eve and mankind as imperfection. God was both sorry and sad. But again, it was his creation, perfect for his goal, but in order to meet his goal, parts had to be flawed.

As stated before, you don't have anything from Scripture to support that nonsense. You are basically blaming God for the sin in the world. Again, you are defaming His character and that is not something that He takes lightly.

I think it would be the false accusations that would really chip him off.

For God to engineer imperfection in to Adam and Eve, He would have made them sinful, but God cannot do that. Furthermore Adam and Eve are created in the image of God and in His likeness. How can God have an imperfect image or likeness?

Is a copy of a masterpiece, no matter how good, the same as the masterpiece? You have clear scripture to answer your question. Jesus was put in a position to choose, just as Adam was. Jesus chose correctly, consistent with his perfect character. Adam had a choice, he chose incorrectly, therefore he could not have been created perfectly from the start, as was God's intention, otherwise he would have said it.

Sorry, but this is why you are not a Christian. You bascially undercut the plan of redemption by assigning sin to God's account and thus shift the responsiblity for sin from Adam to God. All you do is try to impose your unbiblcal assumptions on the text and frankly, you are really out in left field. You haven't one clue about what you are talking about and you have defamed and slandered God in the process.

Only if I subscribe to your baloney, or in other words, your "my way or the highway" interpretation. I said no such thing regarding God sinning. I said, and showed you my reasoning, that Adam was imperfect by design. I note you start the name calling when you can't win an argument, and I note that happens quite a bit no matter who is posting. Shame.

So the hebrew word for good and perfect is the same? Curious since Genesis also uses the word "very good" regarding creation, which doesn't translate into perfection.

It carries the same connotation. God is perfect and is not satisfied with less than perfect and would not have used such an emphatic concept as tov meod to express His satisfaction with it if it were imperfect. Sorry, but you are just wrong on every point.

"Very good" carries the same connotation as "perfect"? Are you serious? Either your Hebrew expertise has failed you, or you are making it up.

Edited May 23, 2011 by Don Fanucci

[OneLight]

I can not find in scripture where anything dies before the fall. Can you show me where it is?

Psalm 104:19-21 He made the moon for the seasons; the sun knows the place of its setting. 20 You appoint darkness and it becomes night, in which all the beasts of the forest prowl about. 21 The young lions roar after their prey and seek their food from God.

v20-21 clearly make the initial seven days of creation the time frame, within which the lions exist and actually use the darkness to hunt.

No, it does not clearly state that, otherwise it would be in Genesis. What this is is David reflecting on God, nothing more.

Why does it need to be in Genesis. Are there no references to Genesis that mention something in addition to what was written in Genesis? Alternatively, would you argue that David's reflection is erroneous--ie, lions really didn't have animal prey?

By the time David wrote this, that is exactly how lions were, and still are. Making something try to fit into Genesis is wrong. There are many places in scripture that tells us that man has a sinful nature, but that does not mean that man was created with a sinful nature.

[OneLight]

The explanation of what happens if Adam eats the fruit from the tree of life, "you shall surely die" pretty clearly demonstrates that the reference to death is spiritual death, not the end of biological existance. As I indicated, unchecked multiplication is not compatible with life. Also see my post to oneight referencing lions hunting prey in response to no predatation.

You can't say that and back it by scripture. We do not know if Adam would of physically dies if he had not eaten, so it also could of referred to a slow physical death, as in aging. You take too many privileges with scripture.

In fact, I am taking far less privilege than you are. Scripture said "you will surely die". He did not. In fact, he lived a very very long time. However, he caused separation from God for which which we all suffer.

I am taking scripture for what it is meant to be. When God said that man would surely die, also means that if man did not sin they could of lived with God forever, for death was never mentioned in scripture until after Adam disobeyed God, not once. Yes, he did live a very long time, but that does not prove that the process of dying did not begin after he disobeyed God. In fact, it points to the opposite, that man would of lived forever in His presence. People start to die once they are born. It takes many over 70 years to die, but they begin at birth. For awhile, they will grow, but there is an end in sight, whenever that may be.

[OneLight]

The explanation of what happens if Adam eats the fruit from the tree of life, "you shall surely die" pretty clearly demonstrates that the reference to death is spiritual death, not the end of biological existance. As I indicated, unchecked multiplication is not compatible with life. Also see my post to oneight referencing lions hunting prey in response to no predatation.

You can't say that and back it by scripture. We do not know if Adam would of physically dies if he had not eaten, so it also could of referred to a slow physical death, as in aging. You take too many privileges with scripture.

In fact, I am taking far less privilege than you are. Scripture said "you will surely die". He did not. In fact, he lived a very very long time. However, he caused separation from God for which which we all suffer.

I am taking scripture for what it is meant to be. When God said that man would surely die, also means that if man did not sin they could of lived with God forever, for death was never mentioned in scripture until after Adam disobeyed God, not once. Yes, he did live a very long time, but that does not prove that the process of dying did not begin after he disobeyed God. In fact, it points to the opposite, that man would of lived forever in His presence. People start to die once they are born. It takes many over 70 years to die, but they begin at birth. For awhile, they will grow, but there is an end in sight, whenever that may be.

I think I can agree with this. But let us suppose that Adam and Eve had not disobeyed. Were they meant to have children, anyway? I know the bible does not say, but I like to think that this is the case, otherwise there would be no point to do a man and a female, with all necessary reproductive devices. Without death that would cause some instabilities after few years. And what would happen to the kids? Would they simply grow until they reach their reproductive age and then stop growing old?

Questions like these I rarely enter into. They are extra-biblical in nature and do no good to anyone. I am sure God, who knows all, had His reasons.

[OneLight]

The explanation of what happens if Adam eats the fruit from the tree of life, "you shall surely die" pretty clearly demonstrates that the reference to death is spiritual death, not the end of biological existance. As I indicated, unchecked multiplication is not compatible with life. Also see my post to oneight referencing lions hunting prey in response to no predatation.

You can't say that and back it by scripture. We do not know if Adam would of physically dies if he had not eaten, so it also could of referred to a slow physical death, as in aging. You take too many privileges with scripture.

In fact, I am taking far less privilege than you are. Scripture said "you will surely die". He did not. In fact, he lived a very very long time. However, he caused separation from God for which which we all suffer.

I am taking scripture for what it is meant to be. When God said that man would surely die, also means that if man did not sin they could of lived with God forever, for death was never mentioned in scripture until after Adam disobeyed God, not once. Yes, he did live a very long time, but that does not prove that the process of dying did not begin after he disobeyed God. In fact, it points to the opposite, that man would of lived forever in His presence. People start to die once they are born. It takes many over 70 years to die, but they begin at birth. For awhile, they will grow, but there is an end in sight, whenever that may be.

I think I can agree with this. But let us suppose that Adam and Eve had not disobeyed. Were they meant to have children, anyway? I know the bible does not say, but I like to think that this is the case, otherwise there would be no point to do a man and a female, with all necessary reproductive devices. Without death that would cause some instabilities after few years. And what would happen to the kids? Would they simply grow until they reach their reproductive age and then stop growing old?

Questions like these I rarely enter into. They are extra-biblical in nature and do no good to anyone. I am sure God, who knows all, had His reasons.

You are right, it is also slightly off topic. But I like to think that death is a necessary ingredient for life, at least in the natural world. And from an atheist point of view death is not so bad after all. For us, the ones who die are the lucky ones, since the vast majority of potential human beings will never have the opportunity to live,either.

I am sorry to hear this is really what you believe. If there is no life after death, and if Jesus did not raise from the dead, then what Paul tells us in 1 Corinthians 15:12-19 is true: Now if Christ is preached that He has been raised from the dead, how do some among you say that there is no resurrection of the dead? But if there is no resurrection of the dead, then Christ is not risen. And if Christ is not risen, then our preaching is empty and your faith is also empty. Yes, and we are found false witnesses of God, because we have testified of God that He raised up Christ, whom He did not raise up

[LuftWaffle]

Hi D-9,

Your cells die all the time, so they need to be continually replaced and your body does this through cell division/mitosis. During cell division the cell undergoes DNA synthesis where it makes a copy of the chromosomes. Problem is that the way DNA synthesis is done leaves the end of the chromosomes off, so every time a cell divides itself it has a little less DNA. Normally it isn't much of a problem because segments of DNA called telomeres are at the ends and it doesn't seem to do much more than protect the rest of the chromosome during DNA synthesis. Now if you live a long time those telomeres are going to get pretty short and eventually your cells cannot divide any more (will undergo cell death) and you will die. Interestingly enough there is an enzyme (telomerase) that will lengthen the telomeres at the end of DNA replication, but the enzyme is closely linked to cancer as a big enabler for cancer growths. So I don't see the system itself as designed (or once designed) as a death free one; our bodies and genomes are simply not made to allow immortality.

Thanks for the explanation.

I understand that some research has been done linking malfunctioning apoptosis to various diseases including cancer.

Either way, do you think it's possible atleast that a mechanism could have existed pre-fall to replenish the telomeres that are lost during mitosis? Especially considering that all the other genetic mechanisms would not be corrupted through mutation, which means while telomerase enables cancer now, it may not have done so with the uncorrupted genomes of Adam and Eve.

And on apoptosis, every baby does this while in the womb. The only example I can think of off the top of my head is the space in-between your fingers, while in the womb they were full of healthy cells but they went under cell death to create your fingers. And I just find it ironic that we undergo cell death to come into a world that supposedly is designed to have no death.

I understand that apoptosis plays a vital role in various processes. The thing to keep in mind, as I pointed out to Don Fanucci as well, is that "cell death" is merely an anthropomorphic term. It may as well be called "cell self-deletion" or something like that. It's like the "blue screen of death" that windows shows when it crashes. It has nothing to do with death really.

I've heard that before (also that only things that have "blood" are alive), but I'm not sure how sound it is in this application. For example, earlier in this thread it was talked about how one of the main problems with evolution is that it prescribes death. But if you look at it from this nephesh perspective this isn't a problem for micro-organisms, fungi, plants, insects, basically most of life on Earth including most animals. I have yet to see this sentiment expressed or acknowledged, and usually how creationists treat things like a single celled organism gives the impression that the exact opposite is true.

In addition I think that it is an odd interpretation in that logically there would be no death for "sentient beings" but for everything else there was death. To me it sounds like a hybrid of the idea that the death in the Garden was spiritual death only for humans and the death was (also) physical applying to all that lives. Again, I don't see creationists (or any Christian) holding these interpretations or acknowledging that it could be correct. So I don't see it as a compelling counter-point to the fact that we need those bacteria and those bacteria live, reproduce, and die inside us.

I find in everyday life we do make such distinctions. I don't feel bad about pulling a carrot out of the ground, but I feel bad killing rats and mice that I find in my yard. We splatter bees on our windshield driving through the countryside, but imagine the horror splattering cats, dogs, budgies and pandas on your windshield.

The bible distinguishes between levels of life, our modern scientific idea of life (which is generally limited to measurable quantities) is different from the Biblical point of view and I think it's important to keep the biblical point of view in mind when dealing with scripture. There are many things that we call 'alive' that, from a biblical standpoint are mere biological machines.