Genesis Anonymous?

Question

Who actually wrote the book of Genesis? I mean, writing didnt exist in the time of the Garden of Eden, and if the story was passed down thru generations, it probably got mixed up. And God's not just going to share his story with us mortals, is he?

Answer 1

Of course, Genesis was written (made up) by men. In biblical times, people thought that the earth and heaven were all that there was... and that the earth was essentially a 'terrarium' (you might want to look that up). They thought that the sky was a solid object, called the 'firmament', and that the sun, moon, and stars were affixed to it. So, essentially, heaven is 'on the other side of the sky'.

The story of Genesis is comprised of the myths, superstitions, fairy tales and fantastical delusions of an ignorant bunch of Bronze Age fishermen and wandering goat herders, lifted from the oral traditions of other cultures, and crafted into a tale that incorporated some of their own folk tales and pseudo-history. This collection of ignorance provides the basis for the Abrahamic death cults of desert monotheism... Judaism, Christianity and Islam.

The cosmological aspects of Genesis are perfectly understandable, if you contemplate it in the proper context. At the time the bible stories were concocted, the perception was that the earth was the object and the center of creation. Why? Because they had no reason to think otherwise. Today, as we advance science, we stand upon the shoulders of all the scientists that came before. Back then there were no shoulders to stand upon... so they did the best they could with what they had... their senses and their imaginations.

* They had no concept of 'outer space', and so they conceived that in the beginning all that existed were dark waters.

* They had no concept of 'nothingness'. Remember, the concept of 'zero' wasn't invented (discovered?) until thousands of years later. With that in mind, the term 'void', as it is employed in Genesis, can not refer to 'nothingness'... it can only be applied in its alternative definition, which is 'empty'. So, the waters were dark, formless and empty (devoid of content).

* They thought that all of creation consisted of the earth and an unseen 'heaven', and they thought that the sky was a 'thing'... a substantive 'firmament' (the sky) that was created by god to separate the waters and differentiate earth from heaven, when both were created.

# They had no idea that Earth was a planet, orbiting the sun.

# They had no idea that there is no firmament... that the sky is not a 'thing'.

(If you don't believe that they thought the sky was an object... a solid barrier... consider the Tower of Babel, that they were building to reach heaven. Apparently, God ALSO thought that the sky was an object, since it concerned him so much that he confounded their speech, so as to disrupt their project and keep them from reaching his domain. God must be pretty much of a dumbass, if he doesn't even know the actual configuration of the universe that he created. So much for the 'inerrant' bible.)

* They thought that the sun was a light that god had placed upon the 'firmament' to differentiate night from day.

# They had no idea that the sun is a star... the center of our solar system.

# They had no concept of 'stars' in the same sense that we understand them today.

* They had no idea that night and day were a consequence of the earth's rotation.

* They thought that the moon was a 'lesser' light that god had caused to travel across the firmament to enable man to differentiate the seasons, and provide illumination at night.

# They had no concept of the moon as a satellite.

* They thought that the stars were tiny lights that god had placed upon the firmament to provide for omens. (Some thought that the stars were 'holes' in the firmament that allowed the 'light of heaven' to shine through.)

# They had no idea that the stars were suns, just like our own sun.

# They thought the eyeball-visible planets (Mercury, Mars, Venus, Jupiter, Saturn) were 'wandering stars'.

# They had no idea that the planets were actually sun-orbiting bodies, just like earth.

* They had no idea that the earth, itself, is a planet.

# They had no clue as to the actual nature of the earth, our solar system, the place of our solar system in the galaxy... or even of the existence of our galaxy. (Up until very recently, we didn't even know that there were other galaxies. Our galaxy, when it was first known that there actually WAS a galaxy, was thought to be the whole universe.) From their perspective, the 'earth' and 'heaven' (i.e., whatever existed on the other side of the sky) represented all that there was. A terrarium.

I do not say this things to disparage what they thought back then. They were trying to do what science is trying to do today... trying to understand reality. Today, we have technology and disciplined meta-procedures (scientific method) to help us extract answers from nature.

Back then, they did not.

Today, we have 'theories' to provide consistent explanations for what we are able to observe in nature, supplemented and validated by the additional information that we are able to extract from nature by means of our technology, our disciplined methods and our intellectual tools (mathematics, logic). Most of our theories are incomplete, so we continue to work on them... because we know that they are incomplete.

Back then, they did not have disciplined methods, and they did not have the technology to extract answers from nature. The only information they had access to was what they could see with their own eyeballs. There was no technological knowledge base or scientific context in which to interpret their observations, so they had to appeal to their imaginations... and the 'supernatural'... in order to make sense out of what they saw. Actually, what they really achieved was deluding themselves into thinking that they knew the truth. Amazingly, over time, this delusion has become codified, institutionalized, and incorporated... complete with franchises.

Basically, Genesis can be thought of as a 'theory', concocted by people who were constrained by lack of technology, methodology and intellectual tools... but they sure weren't constrained by lack of imagination.

Today, we try to interpret Genesis in the context of what we know to be true of the universe... galaxies, stars, planets, moons, gravity, orbits, inclination of the earth's axis, planetary rotation, etc. They problem is that Genesis can't be interpreted in terms of those things, because Genesis was written by men, based on oral traditions, and those men did not know about those things. They could only write about what they could see and what they could guess about the reasons that lay behind what they saw. In any event, it provided them with a mechanism to quell the innate anxiety that comes with fretting about how and why they came to be here.

They guessed wrong.

So... I think that the cosmological aspects of Genesis require a literal interpretation... no metaphors... no allegory... no hidden meaning. The key, though, is in understanding that the literal interpretation does not lead to a description of the way things ARE... it leads to a description of the way they THOUGHT things are. It leads to a naive description of reality, concocted by people who were doing the best they could with what they had.

It is absolutely appalling, though, to realize that hundreds of millions of people, TODAY, including participants in this forum, BELIEVE that this ignorant bovine excrement is actually TRUE.

Answer 2

For maeves_child:
He is not trying to hurt any ones feelings with this question.
It is an honest question. Who did write it?
The answer is: Even though you won't like it maeves_child, the book of Genesis (and the 4 books after it) was a story that was passed down for 1500 years before the Bible was ever put together. I never really happened, it is a story, if you don't believe me then just do the research. And try to read material written by NON Christians instead of Christians.
If Christians believe in God, The Bible and Jesus and put God on a Human level then don't you think He would have a sense of humor? A garden where everyone, and I mean everyone lives forever, never gets sick, always gets along, never has to work, and never dies????? Really, hey I've got a bridge I'd like to sell you, interested?
Research it for pity's sake instead of taking someone else's word for it.

Brother Michael,
You need to really do more research, the kind not written soley by Christians. It did get mixed up, it's a story!!

Answer 3

The account of Genesis was originally an oral tradition, and was then, along with the following four books of the Bible, written down, or caused to be written down by Moses, under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit.

For complete details, go here:

http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/11646c.htm

Answer 4

Why do you think that people before Moses could not write? When first created Adam was able to name all the animals. They made cloths, cities, towers, an ark. People find very detailed things in coal mines all the time made from gold and silver (things made before the flood).

Answer 5

The book of Genesis was not composed by a single author and was written by groups comprised of the Yahwist source, giving sacred history, God's design through His intervention in the affairs of men, and then a second group of the Elohists and the Priestly sources, which reflect older oral traditions.

Answer 6

I like DuckPhup's answer (except for the bovine part) Maybe God reveals to us only what our limited minds can comprehend. What do you think would happen if extra-terresterial life were confirmed to exist? It would throw Christianity for a loop. It would make our government and our life on Earth seem less significant. Until we can deal with notions like this on a rational basis, the supreme benevolent force will not allow them to be revaeled, for our own good.

Answer 7

The bible has over 40 authors. The genesis was written in about 1400 BC. I don't think we're sure of who exactly wrote it.

Answer 8

Swedenborg said that Moses did not write the first 11 chapters of Genesis. It was existing scripture. The literal people in the Bible starts with Abraham.

Answer 9

If God gave up his son, Jesus to us mortals what is not stopping him from giving us anything we desire from him? God wrote Genesis...if he can write on the tablets and give it to Moses, why can't he do the same?

Answer 10

Who says writing didn't exist 5000 years ago, when Adam was still alive? And why couldn't G-d tell us?