Author: Richard R. Tryon, Sr.
THAT GOD'S OWN ACTIONS ON EARTH HAVE BEEN OBSERVED AND RECORDED by human witnesses over a period of some thousands of years will be corroborated and more clearly comprehended as, now beginning, we make a correlation of numerous portions of the Bible with the concepts which were independently derived from modern science in the preceding chapters of our study. As an initial step of such two-way verification, however, we shall need to make a preliminary evaluation of the credibility of the Scriptures, a task which calls for three approaches.
First: We must perceive that the Bible is not a complete and final compilation of theological and moral truth. Instead, it is a history of Mankind's gradual - but still incomplete - advancements in ancient times toward a goal of such completeness. Thus, its records of successive stages of progress not only tell of the acquiring of truths corrective of previous voids and errors but also reflect a condition of continuing incompleteness by the retention of certain other voids or human misapprehensions. In addition, it is especially obvious that the Scriptures are a record only of such progress as had been achieved until some 19 centuries ago, telling nothing of further advancements which have subsequently been attained.
Thus, in particular, the Christian religion must recognize that even Jesus did not seek to complete Mankind's possession of theological and moral truth. Instead, he left many critical facets of such knowledge to be discovered by human minds in later centuries - not only because to have revealed more truth than he did would have required explanations which could not have been understood by those who heard him but also because he knew that his Father's plan required humanity itself to make many discoveries of additional truth by a process combining its earthly experiences and its own cerebral efforts.
Moreover, it is an undeniable fact that Man has actually succeeded in discovering a great many new theological and moral truths in the centuries subsequent to Jesus' life on Earth. In turn, it is significant of the breadth of all humanity's related responsibilities that some of the most important of these post-Biblical discoveries were given to the Church and to the World by scientists, such as Darwin and Einstein, and by numerous secular philosophers, rather than only by members of the clergy.
Second: We must be equally prepared, on the other hand, to recognize that the Bible - despite its incompleteness and its inclusion of a great deal of ancient trivia - is nevertheless an accurate repository of a vast number of truths of transcendent importance.
Thus, particularly with regard to the wonders performed on Earth by God and His Son, as reported in the Old and New Testaments, we shall become able to recognize the accuracy of those reports - whether plain-spoken or cryptic - not only because such demonstrations were inevitable inclusions in God's plan for Mankind, as independently deduced in our previous three chapters, but also because of our new logic's explanations of them, to be provided among the chapters which follow. Moreover, it will be found of wholly convincing significance that, concerning such wonders, the Biblical writers provided details meaningful in the terms of modern science despite the fact that the contributors to the Scriptures were incapable of anticipating what the explanations in terms of modern science would actually be.
Third; With special regard for the New Testament, we can also see clearly that the Apostles - as the direct or indirect original sources of its content - were neither dishonest nor victims of gullibility.
Thus, it is inescapable that the conduct record of the Apostles is eloquent as well as irrefutable additional proof of their veracity. Of the original dozen of them, only one appears as a defector and even his "betrayal" of Jesus will be shown in our later logic to have been divinely intended. The other eleven, plus St. Paul, chose lives of hardship and some met death as martyrs rather than deny their testimony concerning Jesus. In contrast, if they had been guilty of deception, we can be sure that some of them would have chosen to recant, not only to escape the heavy price they paid for standing firm but also even to have received rewards from persons who would have been glad to purchase such apostasy.
Likewise, any accusations that Jesus performed trickery which deceived his followers will be refuted when our logic will later explain in terms of modern science how the wonders he performed - although possibly only with divine facilities and divine know-how - were in conformity to rather than violative of the physical laws of nature.
Let us perceive, therefore, that there will be reciprocal corroborations between the findings of our new logic and the key passages of what the Bible writers wrote. On one hand, it will be our explanations of how many events were actually accomplished which will verify that they conformed to the requirements of reality as well as to God's intentions. On the other hand, the details supplied by the Biblical writers, by fitting the knowledge of modern science, will simultaneously verify not only the accuracy of our explanations but also the fact that the related events did actually occur.
THE GENESIS ACCOUNT OF 'THE CREATION' is, of course, the logical starting point for a correlating of the key portions of the Bible with our science-amended version of Christian teachings. Accordingly, let us begin an untangling of the first Book of the Scriptures by perceiving that its writers created a confusing circumstance by mixing their account of the experiences of a very real Adam and Eve with an attempted explanation of how our Earth was formed and of how human life came into existence on it.
Thus, let us recall our earlier recognition that the substance of the Cosmos, including Heaven itself, came into existence in advance of the origin of God. Yet, if we acknowledge a possibility or a probability that Heaven was formed much sooner than Earth, we cannot exclude a related possibility that God may have used his know-how to trigger the physical forces of the Cosmos, thereby to cause the formation of Earth. Likewise, we cannot exclude a possibility that God may even have sent from Heaven the first one-cell organisms which appeared on Earth - to initiate the evolutionary process which finally led to ourselves. But whether God took such action or was simply a distant observer of the formation of Earth and of life upon it is not a vital matter to theology. In other words, it makes no difference whether life was independently created on Earth by a spontaneous electro-chemical process or whether life which had originated in Heaven by an analogous process was then transplanted to Earth. Likewise, it is unimportant the Genesis compilers wrote of Earth as having been formed in advance of the stars - simply conceiving of the stars as part of Earth's environment rather than depicting the relationship as the other way around.
What is of first significance in the Genesis record is, instead, that it tells of God taking a decisive step to involve himself in a special relationship with our species of life on Earth and of his conferment of immortality upon all souls of Mankind, as will be fully amplified at a later point in our study.
However, when Genesis speaks of Earth as a "void" until "light" (i.e., our Sun) came into existence, this is a view fully accepted by modern science also. Continuing, Genesis also has a startling correctness in telling of animal life in the waters of Earth preceding the appearance of life on land as well as in its listing of the sequence in which different forms of life appeared. Thus, after referring to the waters as having been the place for bringing forth "the moving creature that hath life," there is next a mention of "winged fowl." This omits an intermediate stage of amphibious creatures such as reptiles; yet there is such a close relationship between fowl and reptiles that they could be properly lumped together. Finally, Genesis mentions "cattle" (i.e., the lower orders of land mammals) just before it mentions the human species as the last of the series.
Let us perceive, therefore, that the ancient compilers of the Book of Genesis had a correct concept of the sequence of evolution which antedated the expanded evolutionary conclusions of Charles Darwin by at least several thousand years. Yet, Darwin's "Origin of Species," published less than two centuries ago, shocked the Christian World - chiefly because numerous theologians had misinterpreted other portions of the Genesis record.
But what about the Genesis account of God creating "Adam and Eve" to be Earth's first people? Doesn't our logic's acceptance of evolution imply a total error in this portion of the Bible's record?
To begin our response to those questions, let us consider some of the relevant facts of modern science. Thus, it has been computed that the first one-cell organisms on Earth came into existence as much as three billion years ago. The first mammalian-primates evolved about 25 million years ago. Our human species became a species about one million years ago. But although they had become separated from all others genetically, our species continued for almost a million years to be characterized by small-size brains, even though these were superior to the mental equipment of other creatures. Then, about 40,000 years ago, a momentous new mutation occurred among our ancestors, enlarging the size of their brains to the modern level and thereby causing a further increase in their mental capacities.
Yet, as our continuing logic will presently make clear, until about 6500 or 7000 years ago, our ancestors were different from modern Man in one supremely important detail: Like the common animals, they lacked the moral concepts of good and of evil. Thus, because those ancestors were different from us in this critical characteristic, we shall now begin to refer to them as Proto-men, to distinguish them from Real-men, even though in a genetic sense they and we are of the same species.
There is a great deal we know about the Proto-men. Thus, we know that long before their brains increased in modern size they had learned how to make and use stone tools and weapons. The acquirement of that skill, however, did not terminate Proto-man's lack of the moral concepts of good and evil. In this respect, still like the common animals, he was ever ready and willing to steal bodily or non-bodily property from others without any awareness that such acts were evil.
Of course, animalistic caution persuaded Proto-man not to attack others if it appeared that their defenses would be too costly to himself. Thus, whenever a balance of power existed between potential aggressors and defenders it was likely to produce a condition of simply vigilant truce. In such circumstances there would be bartering transactions in which two or more Proto-men would make mutual exchanges of property without acts of violence. Such a condition, even temporarily, was not maintained by any concept of good or evil, however, but only by each participant's consideration of what would be advantageous to himself.
After the enlargement of the brain, some Proto-men began to grow agricultural crops and to domesticate certain common animals. By about 10,000 years ago, some Proto-men had begun to construct and live in villages and small cities. Yet, even the building of such communities manifested merely a continued reliance on a condition of potential armed truce. Thus, on one hand, despite the walls for defense erected around such places, wandering bands of plunder-bent Proto-men were wont to attack and loot the inhabitants in the amoral concept that it was easier and more exciting to be stealers of wealth by conquest than to be producers of wealth by honest labor. On the other hand, the Proto-men inside the walls were quite as likely to commit similar aggressions against other villages or cities. Moreover, even inside such communities the Proto-men inhabitants had no concepts of morality - as distinguished from mere truce - to inhibit them from stealing bodily or non-bodily property among themselves.
Thus, it was not until some 6500 or 7000 years ago that "the knowledge of good and evil" was finally discovered - the first full dawning of the concept that Man should cease to be like the common animals in guiding conduct only by measuring the aggressive or defensive capacities of force and should begin to be guided instead by measuring conduct in terms of love. Let us perceive, therefore, that it was that momentous discovery which was the point of transformation whereby our species ceased to be Proto-men and became Real-men.
Now it is obviously true that not all Proto-men acquired the knowledge of good and evil simultaneously. Instead, there had to be one Proto-man who came upon it sooner than any of the others. Hence, because the first discoverer of that knowledge inevitably recognized its vast importance, it is not surprising that he and his descendants preserved a memorized record of the discovery and of the events most closely related to it whereby, converted into written form, the principal details ultimately became a major portion of a so-called Book of Genesis.
The Bible, telling of the discovery of the knowledge of good and of evil, says the discoverers were named Adam and Eve. It also says they lived in a Garden of Eden, thereby implying that the home-place of this famous couple was an area of lush vegetation and that it was somewhat secluded. In other words, it was a place where an outstanding Proto-man would have time to think profoundly about the conduct of the fellow-members of his species.
Genesis also makes it clear that there were numerous Proto-men contemporaries and predecessors of Adam and Eve. In particular, it makes it clear that Adam and Eve were not the progenitors of all subsequent humanity. For example, Genesis tells of Cain, one of the sons of Adam and Eve, finding a wife in a different geographical area, and tells of Cain's request to be "marked" so that he would not be slain when he went to live among his wife's people.
On the other hand, it also is wholly evident that, by their acquirement of the knowledge of good and of evil, Adam and Eve became the first of a new kind of people - the first of Real-men, as distinguished from their contemporary Proto-men and from all earlier antecedents of our species.
In turn, we can also perceive that the discovery of the knowledge of good and of evil meant to the God of the Cosmos that the time had arrived when evolution had made all human intellects adequate to begin the process by which their souls could become qualified for admission to Heaven. Thus, we can know that the knowledge discovery made by Adam and Eve became the occasion when God first supplied the Holy Spirit on Earth by which all human souls thereafter became immortal. Hence, from the words of Genesis as well as from the independent logic of the earlier chapters of our study, it is obvious that Adam and Eve acquired an additional firstness by becoming the earliest members of our species whose souls received the Holy Spirit to make them immortal. Indeed, Genesis gives a metaphorical but exceedingly clear picture of that first immortalizing process and we shall examine the recorded details as soon as our logic reaches the topic of "Original Sin."
We perceive, meantime, that the experiences of Adam and Eve were a double triumph on behalf of all of Mankind. But how can we know that a specific Adam and Eve were involved? Our answer begins with two elements. First, the fact that a heavily detailed record of the experiences of two persons who called themselves Adam and Eve were carefully preserved for thousands of years shows that what they experienced had to have been an utterly awesome occasion. Second, the fact that the recorded details of that experience fit the knowledge of modern science shows that they could not have been invented by ancients who had no knowledge of such science.
Why does Genesis say that God formed Man "of the dust of the ground" and removed a "rib" from Adam to be used in fabricating the body of Eve? Let us note again that although Genesis correctly attributes a firstness to Adam and Eve, it also makes clear that they were preceded in existence by other members of the human species. However, when Genesis was put into written form, an attempt was made to superimpose the account of the experience of Adam and Eve upon an earlier age of which neither they nor the compilers of the Book had any source-knowledge. Hence, the words of Genesis have allowed a misinterpretation to the effect that it was Adam who was created from dust, although the text actually asserts it was "Man", who was so formed, a distinction which further demonstrates that Genesis intended to let it be known there were Proto-men who preceded Adam.
Accordingly, the compilers of Genesis assumed that the Deity had shaped the body of the first predecessor Adam much as a sculptor might form a statue from clay. Yet, even by referring to "dust" rather than to "clay" the ancients chose a term which expresses metaphorically the truth that there is indeed a relationship between human substance and all other substance. As for the reference to God having taken a rib from the first male human, we can now recognize this was a cryptic metaphor which the writers of Genesis were impelled (or inspired) to write even though they probably had only a cloudy comprehension of its meaning. In the light of the new logic of our study's earlier chapters, however, we now can perceive that the mention of the rib was simply a cryptic allusion to the fact that neither the male nor the female of our species possesses the completeness of the culminative stage of cosmic evolution.
WHAT ABOUT THE SO-CALLED 'ORIGINAL SIN' attributed to Adam and Eve by traditional Christian theology? Were they guilty of disobedience to God in acquiring the knowledge of good and of evil, and is all Mankind today still subject to some curse in consequence of it?
According to Genesis, there was a "tree of knowledge of good and of evil" in the Garden of Eden, and God had forbidden Adam and Eve to eat of its fruit under penalty of death. However, a "serpent" (symbolizing humanity's thirst for knowledge) urged Eve to eat of the fruit, telling her that instead of such act causing her to die, "your eyes shall be opened, and ye shall be as gods, knowing good and evil." Thus, Eve did "eat" of the "forbidden" knowledge and Adam did likewise.
Let us perceive, therefore, that the acquirement of the knowledge of good and of evil did make Adam and Eve "as gods" (i.e., superior to Proto-men) even as the symbolic serpent had promised. Moreover, God himself is quoted as remarking that Adam (and Eve) had "become as one of us" (i.e., like the beings of Heaven in comprehending the meaning of good and of evil.) Also, that same phrase clearly identifies the acquirement of that distinctive knowledge as the mark of an advancement which demonstrated the mental capacity of the entire human species to begin the divine program which would win our souls admission to Heaven.
Likewise, it is significant that God did not impose the death penalty which he supposedly had threatened; indeed, we are about to perceive that such a penalty had not been threatened. Instead, Genesis says God caused Adam and Eve to be driven out of the Garden of Eden because there was also a "tree of life" in that place of which they might have "eaten" also, in which case they would have "lived forever" - (in an earthly immortality which would have been contrary to God's plans for Mankind.) Indeed, as our logic will presently show, there really was a "tree" (i.e., a substance) in the Garden which was capable of giving Adam and Eve a bodily immortality if they had been allowed to continue to live in that place.
In a distorted interpretation of the Genesis record, many theologians have contended that God intended Mankind to remain "innocent" (i.e., ignorant) of the concepts of good and of evil, and that our species would have possessed a divinely-conferred condition of perfection if Adam and Eve had not been "disobedient." Thus, the supposed disobedience of Adam and Eve in acquiring the knowledge of good and of evil has been construed by such theologians as having been an "Original Sin" for which all subsequent Mankind has supposedly inherited a share of the "guilt." In contrast, our logic will riddle that Doctrine of Original Sin.
The cause for the concept of Original Sin, we find, begins with the fact that Adam and Eve were truly expelled from the Garden of Eden - but without the real reason for their expulsion having been disclosed. Thus, it was natural for the ancient to equate "expulsion" with "punishment." In turn, because the acquirement of the knowledge of good and of evil was the central fact of the Eden drama, it was naturally assumed that this must have been the offense which led to the punishment. Accordingly, it was further assumed that the acquirement could not have been an offense unless it was something that God had forbidden.
In contrast, although Adam and Eve did acquire the knowledge of good and of evil, and although they were expelled, the actual connection between those incidents was something which the ancients did not know and could not have understood even if the true explanation had been offered to them. That explanation, however, can easily be comprehended today as our new logic sets it forth. It begins with the fact that the Proto-man ancestors and contemporaries of Adam and Eve had lacked the basic concept of morality because evolution had not advanced them sufficiently to make them capable either of discovering or comprehending that wisdom. In contrast, God had been waiting for the day when some members of Mankind would give evidence that our species had progressed to a higher level of mental ability at which his process to enable our souls to become qualified for Heaven could begin. Hence, because our reincarnations in Heaven will need to know the desirability of good and the undesirability of evil, it is evident that Man on Earth had need to acquire a knowledge of that distinction.
We perceive, therefore, that God did not forbid Adam and Eve to acquire the knowledge of good and of evil which they needed to be in accord with his plan; hence, neither were they disobedient to him. Instead, God was full of joy at their accomplishment because it signified that not just them but all of humanity had reached the mental level at which his program for our souls could begin. Thus, the exile from the Garden was not a punishment but had a different purpose which our logic will presently explore.
More immediately, however, let us perceive that instead of punishing Adam and Eve, God rewarded them with one of the components of the greatest of gifts. In specific terms, he rewarded them by conferring the Holy Spirit upon their souls to make them immortal as the first step of qualifying them for admission to Heaven. Moreover, in so doing God simultaneously supplied the whole World with a sufficiency of the Holy Spirit to make all other earthly souls likewise immortal, and not just for those in existence at the time of Adam and Eve but also for all of the others that would be still to come in the future.
How can we know that God made such a response to the acquirement by Adam and Eve of the knowledge of good and of evil?
One process of logic that leads to that conclusion has already been provided in our study. This deduced God's possession of an inevitable desire for human souls to become qualified for admission to Heaven. Further, it explained why each soul must receive a minimal quantity of the Holy Spirit to provide it with immortality for the beginning of the qualifying process. Thus, it was made evident that God - to fulfill his own desire - would inevitably supply the necessary quantity of the Holy Spirit as soon as our species attained a knowledge of good and evil as the initial evidence of a mental capacity sufficient for the additional steps of the process. Moreover, we would know of such a supplying even if we had no record of when or to whom it first occurred.
A parallel step of arriving at the same conclusion begins by analyzing certain details of the Adam and Eve experience as meticulously told by the Bible itself. Accordingly, we proceed along this course by next recalling that it would be possible for our own bodies to live almost forever if they could be supplied with a sufficiently improved form of cellular nutrition. On the other hand, we have also deduced there is some deficiency in Earth's nutritional materials which is, apart from any other factors, the chief cause in limiting the bodily life of a human on our planet to an optimum of about 70 years. Hence, it is a matter of outstanding theological (and scientific) significance that the Bible not only credits Adam with living to the phenomenal age of 930 years but also relates that his direct descendants for many generations continued likewise to experience longevity of phenomenal proportions. In other words, it is an inescapable deduction that Adam and certain of his descendants received so great a quantity of the Holy Spirit - the same nutritional radiance which accounts for immortality in Heaven - that it not only provided immortality for their souls but also caused the extreme longevity of their bodies.
Moreover, in dramatic corroboration or our related conclusions, - significantly including even our earlier finding that, ever since the time of Adam, all human infants have received an immortalizing infusion of the Holy Spirit for their souls by way of their lungs - we are told in the words of Genesis itself that (now meaning Adam) God "breathed into his nostrils the breath of life and Man became a living soul." Thus, because the human species, including Adam, was already in possession of bodily life, and because even the soul-cell of Adam was also already in possession of earthly-limited life, we must understand that the "breath of life" as mentioned by Genesis did not refer to bodily life; thus, that what Adam received "into his nostrils" was the Holy Spirit to give immortality of life to Adam's soul.
As for the assertion that God "breathed" out whatever it was that was in-taken by Adam, we now can perceive that this was purely a metaphorical allusion. What it means is simply that God supplied the Holy Spirit which was in-taken through Adam's nostrils. Its metaphorical implication, however, is significantly in accord with our earlier conclusion that God was personally present for this occasion.
In addition, the Bible shows a direct connection between the exile from the Garden of Eden and the bodily longevity experienced by Adam and some twenty generations of his direct descendants. Thus, for amplified analysis in the next section of our present chapter, we note that Genesis says in its metaphorical terms that in addition to the "tree of knowledge" there was a "tree of life" in the Garden. Continuing, it quotes God as saying that if Adam and Eve were allowed to remain in the Garden, to "eat" of the tree of life, they would live forever. We perceive, therefore, that - although the writers of Genesis merely understood that there was something in the Garden which would have caused bodily immortality for anyone permitted to stay there - their metaphorical allusion to a tree of life shows us today that such immortality would have been caused by the presence of the same nutritional ingredient which normally accounts for immortality only in Heaven.
It is evident, accordingly, that our logic is presently deep in the midst of showing not only that God personally supplied a quantity of the Holy Spirit to make the souls of Adam and Eve immortal, and not only that he provided an amount at that time that would be great enough for all other human souls then or later to be existing, but also that to prevent the bodies of Adam and Eve from attaining an unintended immortality he had to expel them from the Garden simply to cut them off from a vast residual supply of the immortality ingredient which had become highly concentrated even in that area's soil and waters.
THE PHENOMENAL LENGTH OF EARTHLY LIFE attributed to Adam and to a succession of his descendants has been one of the most frequently challenged - and ridiculed - of the Bible's passages. In the light of modern science, however, we now can know that the Scriptural reports of humans living to ages of several hundreds of years are not exaggerations but are literally true. Moreover, the scientific explanation of such longevity and of the steps by which God caused it to be reduced will provide some of the most significant corroborations of the entirety of our up-dated theological findings.
We proceed, therefore, by deducing that when God supplied a quantity of the Holy Spirit in the garden of Eden the amount was extremely large because the purpose was to confer immortality not only on the souls of Adam and Eve but also - by a gradual dispersal of this immortality ingredient - on all other souls of our species wherever in the world they then or later might happen to be. Thus, because those particles were originally concentrated in the limited area of the Garden, we conclude that some of them were absorbed not only into the soul-cells of Adam and Eve but also into all of the other cells of their bodies. Moreover, we perceive that an enormous residue must have entered even into the land and waters of the Garden area.
Accordingly, we conclude it was that residue which constituted the "tree of life" to which Genesis metaphorically referred. In other words, as long as they might have been permitted to remain in the Garden of Eden, their continuing intake of the Holy Spirit - through food and water and even as radiance entering them through the soles of their feet - would have prolonged the life of their bodies. Hence, God's practical reason for their expulsion is obvious: In a different locality they would retain immortality of their souls but they would no longer have a continuing intake of the Holy Spirit in such large quantities as to make their bodies immortal also.
Yet, despite expulsion from the Garden, Adam is credited in the Bible with having lived to the amazing age of 930 years. Moreover, the Scriptures list phenomenal ages for 20 successive generations of the direct lineage extending from Adam to Abraham. From Adam to Noah, the ages given are: 930, 912, 905, 910, 895, 962, 365, 969, 777, and 950. From Shem to Abraham, the ages given are: 600, 438, 433, 464, 239, 239, 230, l48, 205, and l75. Thus, our logic will need to deal later with the reasons that the expulsion did not cause at once an ending of the phenomenal longevity of this lineage.
Presently, however, let us note there is nothing surprising that those generations passed along a record of their names and ages. Thus, Adam knew he had experienced a wondrous contact with God and that the record of it would be of enormous significance for all time to come. Certainly also, he was curious concerning how long he would live; thus, it was a simple matter for him to make a pile of stones, one for each year, or to cut an annual mark on a slab of stone, so that when he died the total could be counted. In turn, each successive generation of this lineage knew that its record would be important also and took similar steps to ensure that it would be preserved.
We find, therefore, that the record of those ages is important to us for two chief reasons. First, the total from Adam to Abraham, as combined with reliable computations of when the latter lived, show us that Adam's experience with God must have been about 6500 years ago. This has a special corroboratory significance in our logic because, as anthropologists can point out, a date of roughly 4500 BC is a good approximation of the time when the concept of good and evil is known to have first begun to challenge Proto-man's previous efforts to achieve happiness and peace by a total reliance on the unreliability of mere "armed truce." Second, the bodily ages given for the lineage will provide us, through further analysis, a great additional corroboration of the true nature and function of the Holy Spirit in its relationship to human bodies and souls.
Thus, concerning the first ten generations of this lineage, it is an obvious deduction that they continued to abide only a relatively short distance from the place from which they had been exiled. Hence, it was inevitable that considerable quantities of the immortality ingredient were carried by wind and water from the Garden of Eden to those nearby places before being further diffused throughout the World. Accordingly, we deduce that by inhalation, radiation, and ingestion of water and food, these generations continued to receive enough of the Holy Spirit to keep their body cells from death for a much longer time than is possible for ourselves.
In approaching a consideration of the longevity of the second group of ten generations, however, we shall do well to make a preliminary inquiry as to whether the concentration of the Holy Spirit near the abandoned Garden had any effect on numerous "cousins" of Adam's lineage who presumably lived at slightly greater distances. Thus, we can deduce that some of these relatives also experienced lives longer than is normal today, yet not great enough for mention in a handed-down record. Yet, more significant is the Biblical evidence that the same kind of particles which caused longevity were also capable of causing genetic mutations. Hence, taking into consideration that the ancients had no knowledge of any mutational process, it is significant that Genesis also mentions that "there were giants in the Earth in those days."
The same significance continues in the context about the giants wherein Genesis mentions a decision by God to put an end to the phenomenal longevity of Adam's descendants, to reduce their maximum age to 120 years. Moving them away from the Garden had succeeded only in reducing the potential of bodily immortality to the level of extreme longevity for the first ten generations of this lineage. Thus, it is especially noteworthy that Genesis directly links together: (1) God's decision, when Noah had already lived 600 years, to cause a great reduction in such longevity among Adam's subsequent descendants, (2) an implied undesirability of a potential genetic influence of the giants upon the future nation of the Hebrews, and (3) God's decision to cause a Great Flood in the vicinity of the Garden of Eden. This linkage is highly significant because, by analysis in the terms of modern science, it for the first time shows the real reasons for which God caused the Flood to occur. Thus, as we are about to perceive, the Flood was simply God's means of simultaneously exterminating the giants or other genetic undesirables of the nearby area and of shortening the life-span of Adam's descendants.
In the first place, the Flood caused the drowning of all who lived near the abandoned Garden of Eden (obviously including, in particular, the giants) with the exception of Noah and Noah's family. Thus, as we shall increasingly perceive in later chapters of our study, one aspect of the Flood was simply one of a great many genetic interventions by God over a period of many centuries in shaping a special lineage descending from Adam for a special purpose that was not immediately revealed.
In the second place, the Flood applied to a large area what was essentially the same "wash-away" technique that is used on a lesser scale today to decontaminate places that have become dangerously radioactive. Thus, God knew - although the Genesis writers didn't - that the electronic particles of the Holy Spirit which were capable of producing not only bodily immortality in Heaven and bodily longevity on Earth but also premature genetic mutations or other bodily alterations on Earth would be leached from the soil of the Garden area by the waters of the Flood. Thus removed, those particles would be carried into the oceans whence they would rise into the atmosphere for all parts of the World; hence, by such diffusion they would no longer exert a mutative or a longevity effect on earthly bodies. Only the soul-cells of Mankind would find the World-wide quantities sufficient to serve God's plan for their admission to Heaven.
Before we corroborate the anti-longevity element of the Flood's purposes, however, let us examine God's non-metaphysical means for the causing of that vast inundation. Thus, we perceive that the divine preparations for the flood began when Noah was directed to build an Ark to keep the current generation of Adam's direct descendants from becoming victims of the waters. Likewise, we comprehend it was merely a practical matter that Noah was reminded to take on board the several kinds of domesticated animals that would be needed by his family when the flood subsided.
But are we to understand that God appeared in person to give those instructions? Our logic responds with an affirmative, why not? It was not a difficult matter for God to visit Earth, using a means of transportation as deduced earlier in our study. Moreover, about a thousand years had passed since the Deity's personal contact with Adam and Eve, and close to another thousand years would elapse before God would have a conversation on Earth with Abraham. Also, having determined on a Flood to serve the purposes which our logic has deduced, it is plain that God would not have waited for a sufficient inundation to be dependent on the vagaries of nature. Moreover, to ensure that Noah would construct the Ark in haste, probably in the face of ridicule from unwarned fellow-men, there was need for him to be given the kind of certainty that could be provided only by a face-to-face meeting with God.
By what process was God able to cause rain to pour down upon the region of the Garden of Eden for 40 successive days and nights? Let us not be misled by tradition concepts that perhaps he merely snapped his fingers and uttered some magical incantation. Let us perceive, instead, that even as modern Man has "seeded" clouds to induce precipitation, God also used non-metaphysical methods - because "metaphysical methods" simply do not exist. On the other hand, God had so many different physical methods available to cause the deluge that it is impossible to deduce which one or several of them that he actually used. The examples will suffice. As one alternative, he could have blanketed the Mediterranean Sea with cosmic radiation, inducing accelerated evaporation to form rain clouds which then moved eastward to the area of the Garden of Eden. As another means, he could have summoned radiant energy to push other rain clouds even from the most distant parts of the Earth. In turn, there were a dozen ways in which he could have chilled the clouds when they reached the destination he had chosen so that their moisture condensed into rain.
That there was a Great Flood that covered a very large area is, of course, testified by the Bible's record. In turn, the fact of such a flood has been deduced by logic showing why, quite within the reach of God's power, it was needed to serve his purposes. Also significant, however, is the testimony of modern research excavations near the ancient city of Ur. These not only show the deposits left from an extremely great flood in ancient times but also locate it in the stated homeland of Abraham, the 10th descendant of Noah and the 20th descendant of Adam. They further show that such an inundation must have covered so large an area that, to Noah, its limits were far beyond the limits of his vision. Thus, to him it appeared the Flood had covered all of the Earth.
Now let us examine the corroborative significance of the actual decreases of longevity among Noah's descendants following the Flood. Accordingly, we note that although Noah was already 600 years old when the deluge began, he continued to live for 350 years thereafter. However, it is notable that his son Shem lived to be only 600. In turn, Noah's grandson lived to be only 438. Then, with minor irregularities, the decreases continued, dropping to l75 by the time of Abraham, whose exodus from Ur - ten generations subsequent to Noah - is further evidence that all of the lineage from Adam to Abraham had lived in the vicinity of the pre-Flood and post-Flood Garden of Eden.
Yet, because it was God's announced intention that the age-span of Noah's descendants should be reduced to 120 years, how do we account for the fact that even by the time of Abraham that result had still not been fully obtained? Obviously, the answer is that the process of leaching the longevity-immortality ingredient from the flooded area could not be completed by a single treatment. In other words, there remained a considerable residue of that ingredient after the waters subsided, an amount which thereafter continued to decrease by natural and less dramatic processes at about the same speed to also mark the decreasing longevity of Noah's descendants. Indeed, even a temporary reversal of the longevity decreasing as in the case of the two generations preceding Abraham was a normal variation easily explained by perceiving that when the waters of the flood receded they left behind some temporary pools where the particles of Heaven's type of nutrition remained in a higher than average concentration. Hence, those of Noah's descendants who happened to have an intake from such natural reservoirs were caused to have a longer life than other descendants who happened to lack a similar intake.
Also significant, for three reasons, is the fact that although God intended to reduce the longevity of Noah's descendants to a maximum of 120 years this goal was not fully obtained even within 10 successive generations. First, the gradualness of the actual result shows that the powers of God have been incorrectly attributed by many theologians to his supposed use of "metaphysical" processes, whereas the truth is that God's wonders were and are achieved not by violating the laws of the Cosmos but rather by applications of his omniscient know-how in conformity to them. Second, by showing the physical nature of the processes used by God, as in the case of the Flood, our logic demonstrates that he functions as a person and thereby provides added corroboration of our basic conclusion that he is a person. Third, our analysis corroborates the veracity of the writers of Genesis concerning the Flood and the ages of Adam's descendants because if those authors had been seeking to fabricate an illusion of God's power they would have shown falsely an immediate reduction of ages to 120 years (subsequent to Shem) instead of showing that even the Deity did not get a "metaphysical" fulfillment of his intentions.
In addition, of course, our explanation of the purpose of the Flood provides added corroboration not only of the fact and the means by which Adam and Eve became the first of Mankind to receive immortality of their souls but also of the true reasons for their abandonment of the Garden of Eden and for our conclusion of the falsity of the concept of an "Original Sin."
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