Ep 90: With Counter-Apologies

00:00Why do you hate the Bible, Dan?

00:03Well, it's because I hate God, can't you tell?

00:06It's all that Satan worship you've been doing.

00:09Hey, once you pop, you can't stop.

00:14Hey, everybody, I'm Dan McClellan.

00:19And I'm Dan Beacher.

00:20And you're listening to the Data Over Dogma podcast where we increase public access to

00:25the academic study of the Bible and religion, and we combat the spread of that ever present.

00:32I forget misinformation is the word you're looking for misinformation of the same.

00:39Well, it's amazing that you would forget that particular word because today is all about

00:43misinformation.

00:44It's a veritable schmorgus schmorgus, I don't know what the word is.

00:51It's a cornucopia of misinformation.

00:55All right, this is going to be a fun episode if Dan doesn't know how to word today.

00:59That'll be, this is going to be a tricky one.

01:02But yeah, we're doing a bit of a grab bag of apologetics.

01:07I'm going to, I'm going to call it, I don't know, something along the lines of my apologies.

01:11What do you think of that?

01:12Oh, yes.

01:13That works.

01:14My apologies.

01:15Yeah, because, because it is, we're, we're going to be talking about a lot.

01:20Look, there are plenty of fine apologetics out there.

01:23There are plenty of ways of looking at, you know, the stories of the Bible and, and, and

01:29harmonizing them with your worldview and whatever.

01:33There are also some really, really bad ways of trying to take what's in the Bible and

01:41mold it to what we actually know about the world around us.

01:46And it, it doesn't always work.

01:48Yeah.

01:49Yeah.

01:50It's highly problematic.

01:51And mostly because we, and a friend of mine on Facebook was a scholar friend of mine was

01:57talking about this yesterday.

01:59You've heard the term exegesis and then we also talk about isegesis.

02:04One is.

02:05Explain them both.

02:06Okay.

02:07So exegesis, the idea would be interpretation out of your reading from your, you're, you're

02:13basically trying to figure out what the text means.

02:15Exegesis would be reading into your putting stuff into the text and the concern that my

02:21scholar friend was expressing was the notion that these were a strict dichotomy because

02:27there's not, because there's no such thing as, as pure exegesis, because we're not just

02:33extracting meaning from a text.

02:36You are generating meaning with the text, something that I have harped on many times.

02:42And so all interpretation is isegesis to one degree or another.

02:47And, and so when all engagement with the text to one degree or another is remaking the text

02:55in our own image, the, the difference is what are our concerns and our goals and our methodologies.

03:02Are we trying to reconstruct a text in a way that we think is going to most closely approximate

03:07what the original authors and audiences would have understood, or are we trying to construct

03:13meaning in a way that serves our own interest today?

03:16And this is something that I point out in the introduction to my forthcoming book, the Bible

03:21says so.

03:22Gotcha.

03:23Good.

03:24Squeezing that in.

03:25That's awesome.

03:26Pre-orders available now.

03:29Yeah.

03:30What we get right and wrong about Scripture's most controversial issues coming out April

03:3529th, 2025. Link in the show notes, baby, everybody pre-order.

03:40We want this thing on the, on the New York Times bestseller list.

03:43We want to, we want to rocket this to start them.

03:46Yeah.

03:47This, we want it coming out number one.

03:51But one of the things I point out is that if you are not willing to let the Bible mean

03:58something that you disagree with, then, then you're not really concerned for the Bible.

04:05You're just concerned for the Bible as a proof text.

04:07You just want it to be the authorization for your own dogmas.

04:11And that's what bad apologetics, that's the foundation of bad apologetics.

04:16It's where really it's only, you're only attempting to perform a concern for context or history

04:24or textual things like that.

04:27It's a performance.

04:28You want to make it look like you are concerned for all those things.

04:31But in reality, the Bible is not allowed to contradict your dogmas.

04:37And we're going to see a bunch of ways that apologetics does that in today's show.

04:43Indeed, indeed.

04:45So let's pick, let's start at the very beginning.

04:49It's a very good place to start.

04:52In Genesis, one of the things that you proposed to me as we were looking through ideas that

05:00we could explore today.

05:02It was an indecent proposal, one might say, but indeed, is ways that certain Bible translations

05:13can fudge the translation to harmonize what they think the book is supposed to be saying

05:23rather than to present what the book actually says.

05:27Yes.

05:28Is that a fair description of what we're looking at here?

05:30Yeah, I think that's a fair description.

05:33We're talking about Genesis 2, right?

05:36Yeah.

05:37Yeah.

05:38Okay.

05:39So, and this is, and this kind of came up because of some videos that I made recently.

05:44One of them, I was talking about the difference between the creation account in Genesis 1 and

05:49then the creation account in Genesis 2 and 3.

05:53These are two entirely different creation accounts.

05:56And we've talked at length about this.

05:57In fact, I think our very first show talked about the differences between these two creation

06:04accounts, but inevitably there was pushback from folks who suggest that they are one in

06:11the same narrative and that they are entirely harmonious and that we just need to stop hating

06:20the Bible and just succumb to the dulcet tones of their harmony.

06:27Why do you hate the Bible, Dan?

06:30Well, it's because I hate God, can't you tell?

06:35It's all that Satan worship you've been doing.

06:38I'm, hey, once you pop, you can't stop.

06:42So, and this comes from the, the main verse I want to talk about is Genesis 2, 19, but

06:48also Genesis 2, 8 is a companion verse to this because there was a, a video that was made

06:55it.

06:56Actually, I don't think it was responding to me.

06:57I think it was responding to a comment from another comment on my video or something like

07:02that.

07:03But the person said that the notion that these two tech contradict is a product of a misunderstanding

07:08or a mistranslation or misinterpretation of Genesis 2, 19.

07:13And in the Hebrew, Genesis 2, 19 is just carrying on the narrative of God's creation of the

07:21earth.

07:22So, we have God taking the man and put him in the Garden of Eden to till it and keep it

07:27and the Lord God command in the man, you may, you know, all that stuff.

07:31It is not good that man should be alone.

07:33I will make him a helper as his partner.

07:35And then Genesis 2, 19 says, so out of the ground, the Lord God formed every animal of

07:40the field and every bird of the air and brought them to the man to see what he would call

07:43them and whatever the man called every living creature.

07:46That was its name.

07:48And this is an attempt to find a suitable companion and as a connecto help meet for Adam

07:56and, and it fails, God is like, back to the drawing board.

08:00What if I just tore a piece of his flesh off?

08:03And that's where we get woman.

08:05But if you go look at the NIV and the ESV to translations with which we have quibbled

08:12on our show, the new international version and the English standard version, right.

08:19And funny enough, the English standard version exists because the people, the certain white

08:26men were like, hey, the NIV is too woke, although they used whatever they, they would have

08:34used for woke back in the 90s, right.

08:38But the new international version in verse 19 says, and, and here's the reason this is

08:42a bad thing because according to Genesis 2, God creates Adam, then creates all the animals,

08:49right.

08:50But in Genesis 1, the animals are created before humanity is created.

08:56So we've got a pretty clear contradiction.

08:58Genesis 2, 19 in the new international version says, now the Lord God had formed out of the

09:06ground, all the wild animals and all the birds in the sky.

09:09We're getting down to the minutiae again, we got, we're, we're hinging on a single word

09:14again.

09:15But yes, a helper verb had, which communicates in the English, what is known as the plu perfect

09:20tense, where instead of just talking about a simple past tense, we are talking about a,

09:26a past that is anterior to, to the past tense, called the plu perfect.

09:32The idea being this creation of the animals had already taken place before the story we're

09:38telling you right now.

09:40And so there's no contradiction.

09:44The problem is that is not a valid translation of the verb form at the beginning of this verse.

09:51It's what's called the white toll verb form, or some people call it the, the imperfect

09:57verb form.

09:58Some people call it the prefix verb form.

10:01It's a way to say it's in completed action, but with, because of its form, it's kind of

10:07thrown in the past tense.

10:09And this is, this is part of in Hebrew was called past time narrative sequence.

10:12When you're telling a story in Hebrew, it goes, this happened and then this happened and then

10:16this happened and then this happened and then this happened and thus and so, but if you want

10:22to interrupt it to provide some background information, like a plu perfect thing.

10:28Now he had done this.

10:30Then what you would do is you would interrupt that, that sequence of why you told verbs

10:34with what's called a cut all verb, which is the perfect, the completed action, the affix

10:38form, you know, whatever you want to call it.

10:43And we don't want to call it any of those things.

10:45That's fair.

10:46That's fair.

10:47Neither do any of the students I've ever taught Hebrew, but that is how you would indicate

10:53a plu perfect, but we don't have that here.

10:56Okay.

10:58And we do have it in Genesis two, eight oddly enough because Genesis two, eight says, and

11:06the Lord God out of Nylohim planted a garden in the east in Eden.

11:11And there he put the man he had formed.

11:16So the formation of ha-dahm, the human occurred before the planting of this garden.

11:23And if you look in the Hebrew, it's the why you told at the beginning of the verse, and

11:27then it's the cut all, that interruption of the pastime narrative sequence to indicate

11:34this has an anteriority to the current narrative.

11:38So this, so what that means is that that's putting the creation of Adam before planting

11:46the garden.

11:47Yes, which is another contradiction.

11:50Another contradiction, right.

11:51If you go look at the beginning of Genesis two, uh, well, Genesis two, four B is where

11:58this creation account begins in the day that Adonailohim made the earth in the heavens.

12:03Verse five, when no plant of the field was yet in the earth and no vegetation of the field

12:10had yet sprung up for Adonailohim had not caused it to rain upon the earth and there

12:15was no one to till the ground, but a stream would rise from the earth and water the whole

12:20face of the ground.

12:22And then God makes the human and then God plants a garden in Eden and there places the

12:27human that he had created.

12:31Right. And, and because of this issue, because Genesis one also says plants were on the earth

12:36before humanity as well, guess what the NIV does translates Genesis to eight as a blue

12:44perfect as well, but not the second verb.

12:47Well, it does translate the second verb as a blue perfect, but also the first.

12:50Okay.

12:51In the NIV, it says, now the Lord God had planted a garden in the east in Eden and there he

12:57put the man he had for.

13:01Both he had done all of this.

13:03He, he likes to front load the effort.

13:06Yeah.

13:07Yeah.

13:08And then just plonk it all in.

13:09There's a lot of of resumption, a lot of reflection, a lot of illusion backwards, two things that

13:16are nowhere described in the text, except we're in Genesis one.

13:21And so the NIV, even like you don't get a blue perfect from a y-eek toll verb, you get

13:28a blue perfect from interrupting a y-eek toll verb with a cut-all verb.

13:32And then in verse eight, they're just like, there is a y-eek toll verb that is interrupted

13:36by a cut-all verb.

13:37And they're like, nah, both of them are blue perfect.

13:41So it's like, well, there's no interruption with the y-eek toll.

13:44And then the interruption with the cut-all you're interpreting is carrying on the same

13:48sense as the y-eek toll.

13:51So it's doubly stupid.

13:54But the NIV's priority, as like it explicitly says, in the introduction, is the inspiration,

14:01the inerrancy, the univocality, the historicity of the text.

14:05That is their priority.

14:07Right.

14:08What the text says is secondary, which is the biggest problem with all this.

14:14It's like, you want the text, what the text says, solo scriptura, the text is all that

14:18matters, the text, the text, the text, but then you're telling the text what it, yeah.

14:23You're telling the text what it is and is not allowed to say.

14:26So in reality, it's your tradition.

14:30That is the authority and the text is just the proof text.

14:34And it's going to say what you tell it to say.

14:37Right.

14:38And in this case, you're telling it not to contradict Genesis 1 because it do contradict

14:44Genesis 1.

14:45Yeah, it just feels so, I mean, I understand the impulse.

14:51And when this book contradicts itself, that feels really scary if you've already decided

14:58that this book isn't allowed to contradict itself.

15:03The, it feels, it feels obvious to me though that the answer to that is to just like deal

15:11with your emotions about the contradictions rather than like fixing it, which would, which

15:17is not like, that's not what they think they're doing.

15:21Like they think they're honoring it in some way, but really all they're honoring is, uh,

15:26is there a sort of emotional discomfort?

15:28Yeah.

15:29And then, and then you've got a bunch of scholars who will then go out in search of arguments

15:36that the why you can communicate the blue perfect or the past perfect sense.

15:41Right.

15:42And so there are publications that are like, we're, we're certain that this can, this can

15:46communicate the, the blue perfect.

15:48And then there are other scholars who are just saying, no, it doesn't.

15:52No.

15:53And, um, and so, and all the, they, they bring up a handful of examples and all of them are,

15:58are contested by other scholars or other scholars are like, yeah, no, that doesn't have to be

16:02read as a blue perfect.

16:04None of that works.

16:05Um, but it, but it shows that, that apologetics is, is not about following the data where the

16:10data lead.

16:11Certainly not about giving priority to what the text says, apologetics is always about

16:16defending a predetermined conclusion, defending a dogma against the data.

16:22Right.

16:23Saying the data doesn't stop us from arriving at our predetermined conclusion.

16:28Um, you can't prove it's impossible.

16:31And there's that, that ginning up of the tiniest little sliver of not impossible where apologetics

16:36lives and breathes and has its being.

16:39Yeah.

16:40So that's, uh, that's a particularly, it's a particularly bad one.

16:45Um, but I feel, I feel like one of the, one of the interesting things about this particular

16:51thing, Genesis two and, and these, these blue perfect, uh, moments is that it makes it so

17:00clear how utterly unqualified all of us who aren't you and, you know, the people that

17:10we met that we talked to at SBL, like the rest of us are completely unqualified to make

17:18comment on this.

17:19Uh, it's like, I, we literally, so many people are like, I don't have to listen to the experts,

17:26so-called experts about things because I could do my own research.

17:30No, you can't unless you like learn as much ancient Hebrew as you know, Dan, like, and

17:39you know, I'm not willing to devote as much of my life to this study as you are.

17:44Like that's, it's just not a, you know, you are, you pursued multiple degrees in it and

17:51I'm not going to be doing that.

17:53So we all have to sort of, we all have to find what, uh, figure out which experts we

17:59believe.

18:00Yeah.

18:01Or, or, or, you know, what it makes out a very difficult pursuit.

18:04And the, the same is true of, of the experts, like none of us can, none of us are capable

18:12of gathering the experiences and the resources and the data and the training to be able to

18:18drill down to the bedrock of every single argument related to every single issue related

18:26to the Bible.

18:27At some point, even the people who are the most expert in certain fields are just relying

18:33on the judgment of other experts.

18:36And for folks who don't know these languages or the secondary literature or the archeological

18:41or the textual or the other data, um, very well at all, they're just unilaterally relying

18:46on the judgment of other experts.

18:48And so it always, it's always going to come down to who you're going to accept as, as

18:55an expert.

18:56And so yeah, that's, that's a reality for all of us.

18:59Uh, and, and so yeah, the folks out there on, on YouTube and, and, uh, in the TikTok comments

19:06sections and Instagram and blue sky and threads and what Mastodon is that still a thing?

19:12Um, what, and folks out there who are like, well, I just have to read the text.

19:17So like you can't read a single syllable of the text until one of those experts has translated

19:23it for you and you are relying entirely on their ability to accurately translate it.

19:28Right.

19:29So the arguments from the translation are, are just appeals to the authority of, of the

19:34translator and tell you can drill down to that bedrock, which, um, very few people have

19:40the, um, the Ghana's, uh, have the, uh, the desire, the, the resources, the time or the

19:47interest in, um, in acquiring.

19:50So, uh, yeah, we, we have a problem is what we have, those of us who do, um, want to, uh,

19:58to be able to drill down to the bedrock of all of this.

20:02So speaking of expertise, let's move on to another thing in which neither of us has any

20:10expertise, not, not you nor I, let's, let's go to NASA, uh, doesn't that, doesn't that

20:17mean to deceive and he, I'm pretty sure it does, or at the very least, I've definitely

20:23seen it claimed that the word NASA, I mean, do you want to just answer that?

20:28Really quickly.

20:29Since we're, oh, yeah.

20:30Um, so no, it doesn't mean to deceive.

20:33There is a verbal route that, um, a lot of people will look this up and like strongs concordance

20:38or something like that, which anybody who might, yeah, um, it's what I give out every year

20:45for Christmas to, uh, all my friends and family.

20:48Um, but, uh, people will look it up and they will look for words that mean deceive and they

20:54will see NASA and they will think, ah, ah, um, although what they will entirely ignore

21:01is the diacritics on these letters, including a little chevron above the S, a downward facing,

21:08um, kind of arrow, carrot, um, shape, yeah, that indicates that is not pronounced S, like

21:15it's pronounced SH. So Nasha is a verbal route that can mean deceive, but only when it occurs

21:25in a particular verbal stem.

21:29And in Hebrew, like, uh, in English, we have these helper verbs had did cause to like all

21:34these different ways to, to give nuance to our verbs.

21:38In Hebrew, you actually change the word itself.

21:41And so, uh, one of these stems, the causative stem turns a verb from, um, to do into cause

21:48to do.

21:49So like the verb to see if you put it in the causative, it would be cause to see and we

21:54would translate it as show or something like that.

21:57Sure.

21:58So Nasha only means to deceive in the causative stem, but in order to put it in the causative,

22:03you actually have to change the letters.

22:06You add, you add a hay to the beginning and with a verbal route that begins with a noon

22:12like Nasha, uh, that creates a consonant cluster with the first two consonants and the noon

22:17actually assimilates to the shah sound and becomes a second shah sound.

22:23Uh, and, and long story short, when this verb is used to mean deceive, it, one has never

22:32been Nasa, but it's not even Nasha, uh, it sounds completely different.

22:38The, the vowels change as well.

22:40So in, uh, Genesis three where, uh, people will say, well, that's what, uh, Eve says

22:44in Genesis three, when the serpent, uh, deceived me, beguiled me, tricked me.

22:49That's NASA.

22:50No, the verb there is he, she, oni, he deceived me and that's so basically people who say

22:59Nasa means deceive, don't have the first clue what they're talking about.

23:03I feel like don't have the first clue.

23:05What we're talking about is, is going to be a theme, uh, it is going to be the through

23:10line.

23:11Yes.

23:12Of, uh, of so much of, uh, apologetics and particularly the bad apologetics.

23:17So, so the claim that we're, that we're looking at the specific Nasa claim isn't about Nasa

23:22deceiving, but is it really about believing Nasa?

23:26It is, uh, when, when the claims of Nasa support your dogmas, then they are the most authoritative

23:33of voice in the discussion.

23:36And, uh, and here it has to do with, uh, when Jesus was crucified, um, uh, because some

23:44people, uh, will go on to a website, uh, eclipse dot GSFS, excuse me, GSFC dot Nasa dot gov.

23:53And there's a page, uh, Nasa eclipse website and there's a page that has lunar eclipses

23:58of historical interest.

24:00And they'll, and they'll share the screenshot of this list of lunar eclipses of historical

24:05interest.

24:06And one of them is April 3rd, 33 CE.

24:09And in the description of the event on this page, there's a, it says crucifixion of Christ.

24:15A question mark.

24:17And so people are like, Nasa has confirmed Jesus's crucifixion.

24:23Right.

24:24And then they'll go to, um, the, uh, the accounts of the crucifixion where it says it got dark

24:30for three hours, right?

24:33And most of them it's noon to three p.m.

24:36Uh, the gospel of John actually places the crucifixion earlier than that.

24:40But we ignore that because, um, we're trying to nasha some, uh, the folks, uh, there.

24:46But, um, but anyway, they say, well, this, this eclipse probably is why it got dark for

24:52three hours.

24:53Now, what's the first thing that jumps out at you here?

24:57I feel like you used a word early in this moment in this description and adjective that

25:04might, uh, that might shed some, not light that might shed some darkness on this.

25:11Not enough to make the earth dark, but yes, no, you, you said it was lunar.

25:16It eclipses.

25:17Did you not?

25:18It's a lunar eclipse.

25:19Yes.

25:20Like, and every time they show the screenshot, it says in big bold letters on the very top

25:25of the screenshot, lunar eclipses.

25:28I mean, lunar eclipses are cool and all, but like, it's a, it's not going to make it dark

25:36in the middle of the day, because that's not how, uh, eclipses of the moon work.

25:42Right.

25:43Um, so that's not going to happen in the middle of the day.

25:46No.

25:47It just, and I'll, and also like, I, I do, you know, first of all, looking for a, uh,

25:56a scientific explanation for what is overtly meant to be miraculous, yes, seems backwards

26:04to me.

26:05Well, it seems like the exact opposite of what you want to be doing, but it's one, no

26:10scientific explanation.

26:12Right.

26:13But it's what we have been doing since the 19th century, because since, since the enlightenment,

26:19there's been, the scientific method is, has gained an awful lot of authority and has made

26:24an awful lot of advances and people live longer.

26:26And we have medicine and we put a man on Jan Moon, um, because of science.

26:33And, um, in the 19th century, when people started scratching their heads about the age

26:37of the earth and about evolution and things like that, it put the religious community

26:42on their heels because it was like, whoa, we got to respond to, uh, all of this science.

26:49And what they did was adopt the scientific method in response and say, well, wait, wait,

26:56wait, wait, wait, wait, we can use science to prove this.

26:59We, it's a, it's a way to try to beat them at their own game, uh, and, and not because

27:06they, they wanted to, but because they had to, they had no other choice.

27:10And so ever since the mid 19th century, it has been the, um, like the goal has been to

27:17show that these things are rational, that these things are scientifically supportable

27:22and all of this, because if you just punt and say it's a miracle, we're not supposed

27:28to be able to explain it, then the other side is going to declare victory and that is intolerable.

27:34So you have to be able to say, no, no, we can explain.

27:38There was a gust of wind and the very shallow part of the red sea, the water was pushed

27:43back.

27:44And that created the dry ground that allowed Moses to, to march across.

27:49You got to come up with naturalistic explanations to satisfy a naturalistic worldview.

27:54Um, but yeah, can I just say as someone who is, who has a naturalistic worldview, I don't,

28:01I think that's exactly the opposite of the, the position you should be coming from.

28:06Yeah, because it's so much less convey, well, in part because we know about lunar eclipses

28:11and what they can and can't do.

28:13Yeah.

28:14That's not a wiggle room.

28:15Even if it was a solar eclipse, it, I've seen a full totality of solar eclipse.

28:21It lasts minutes.

28:22Yeah.

28:23It doesn't max max seven minutes.

28:25It doesn't last three hours and not less than three.

28:28Nope.

28:29You're just, you're just like, you're not going to explain these things through natural means

28:34and you shouldn't, like the whole point is unnatural things happened here.

28:40Yeah.

28:41And that's, and, and therefore, uh, we can, we can attribute them to a super natural,

28:47uh, cause, it just seems so weird and backwards to me.

28:52It, I think it is, but a lot of apologetics is, well, one, the main goal of apologetics

28:57is not to convince skeptics, the main goal of apologetics is to make the people who already

29:03agree with you feel validated.

29:05Yes.

29:06Cause if they can think, cause they're on edge, they're like, mmm, I have this belief.

29:12I'm not sure the data support my belief and you've got to make a case.

29:16And as I've stated many times before, usually all it requires is ginning up the tiniest

29:21little sliver of not impossible because that gives them an opening that gives them that

29:27little tiny space where they can live, breathe and have their being of at least it's not

29:33impossible.

29:34And, and that's the main goal of apologetics.

29:37Now it has to perform validity within the broader, um, academic world, but it just has

29:44to perform it for its audience.

29:46That does not know the broader academic world well enough to know if that is these arguments

29:51are valid.

29:52Um, and, and for those of you who don't know, uh, a lunar eclipse is where the sun is, uh,

29:57excuse me, the earth is in between the sun and the moon.

30:01And so the sun is shining on the earth and casting a shadow on the moon.

30:07And so what you're seeing is the moon with a shadow going across it, right with the earth's

30:12shadow, which happens to be much bigger, subsume it.

30:16Yes.

30:17And, um, and then the solar eclipse is where the moon is in between the earth and the sun.

30:23And then, um, you know, uh, the moon actually exactly matches the, uh, the size of the sun,

30:32uh, when it crosses in front of it for that's a, that's a fun little coenkid ink.

30:36I love that.

30:37Yeah.

30:38Um, and so the other thing that, uh, to know about it, this particular lunar eclipse is

30:43that in Jerusalem, it started around 6 20 p.m.

30:47Right.

30:49Because lunar eclipses usually happen in the evening.

30:51Well, they happen in the evening or the at nighttime, um, and, uh, or in the early morning.

30:57And so this was not at noon.

30:59This was not, uh, didn't last until 3 p.m.

31:02It was in the evening and there was like things were already getting dark.

31:08Um, so it, it, uh, it didn't cause any unusual darkness.

31:14That's a good, that, that's a good way to explain three hours of darkness is nighttime.

31:18Uh, if you want a naturalistic reason why it might be dark for three hours, uh, night

31:23fall.

31:24That's a good one.

31:25I, that just makes me think of the, uh, PJ masks, uh, opening sequence, but that's where

31:32that's for another time in place.

31:33Um, what were you about to say?

31:35I have no idea.

31:36Let's move on to our next thing.

31:37Well, I just want to point out one other thing though before we go.

31:41Some people are like, well, maybe there was a solar eclipse.

31:43Okay.

31:44Well then the gospels are all wrong.

31:46Yeah.

31:47Because the gospels say that Jesus was crucified on the Passover.

31:52And the Passover is the new moon and here's a little thing about the new moon.

31:58The new moon is when the moon is on the other side of the earth from the sun.

32:03It is literally and physically impossible to have a solar eclipse on the Passover.

32:11It's the exact opposite of the new moon.

32:15So yeah, if there was a solar eclipse that caused darkness for, uh, you know, 20 times

32:22the, the physically possible length of a solar eclipse, it didn't happen at the Passover.

32:27And so the gospels are all entirely wrong about when Jesus was crucified.

32:31So yeah.

32:32So there's, pick your thing.

32:33What do you think the, the gospels are wrong about?

32:37Go ahead and choose which one if it's, if it's, if you're trying to come up with a naturalistic

32:41explanation for this, um, all right.

32:45So I think, uh, that is a good, that's a good moment for us to move into another weird

32:54claim.

32:55There are more of them.

32:56Oh, look, we could just do a separate podcast entirely about a weird apologetic claims.

33:04And maybe we should have enough, but we're not doing that just yet.

33:08Okay.

33:09Right now we're just going to focus on a few other things.

33:11Okay.

33:12So to Isaiah, uh, the book of Isaiah chapter 40, here's the thing, uh, for, for a long

33:21time in the world, if it had, it's been a while since this was the case, but for a long

33:26time in the world, uh, the earth was assumed to be a, a plane, a flat plane.

33:33Yes.

33:34Uh, now the idea, at least that was the conventional wisdom.

33:38We have, we have evidence of awareness that things are, are, uh, of a spherical nature,

33:45going back to, uh, probably the middle of the first millennium BCE, but not widespread

33:52knowledge of this.

33:53Right.

33:54Yeah.

33:55And that was Greece.

33:56Uh, that's, that's its own right.

33:58We're talking.

33:59I mean, that was the first.

34:00Yeah.

34:01Yeah.

34:02There's the original, um, the OGs of the natural sciences who were, um, measuring things

34:08and being like, well, that's peculiar.

34:11Uh, and yeah, and coming up with, uh, around earth, but yeah, that's not widespread knowledge.

34:18Right.

34:19So, so, uh, I think we can assume, uh, safely, though it's not a hundred percent clear that

34:26the authors of the Bible, particularly the Hebrew Bible, uh, we're assuming a, a flat

34:35earth.

34:36Uh, and you know, if you look at the Genesis description of the earth, you look at a flat.

34:42Uh, it's basically because they've got that, that darn dome.

34:46The sky is a dome.

34:48Yeah.

34:49So, so talk a little bit about that.

34:51Uh, the, the earth is, uh, it, it's got land and water.

34:56And a dome over it.

34:58And then more water on the other side of the dome.

35:00Am I right about that?

35:01Yeah.

35:02And in most of the, the creation accounts from ancient West Asia, uh, creation is, is basically

35:09a process of separation between, uh, amidst chaotic waters, uh, the, the primordial chaotic

35:19soup.

35:20Uh, there's a separation.

35:22And one thing that needs to happen is dry land needs to appear.

35:25And that either happens from the receding of the waters or it happens through the rising

35:32of the dry land.

35:34But one thing that you need for either of those things happen is for space to be between

35:39the waters.

35:40And so in the Hebrew Bible, this happens, uh, the, the waters of, of creation are already

35:46there.

35:47And God creates a rachia, which, uh, comes from a verb that means to hammer or flatten

35:55out.

35:56And the idea is, uh, think of, uh, hammering out like a metal bowl or something like that.

36:02And this rachia, uh, appears there and, and God actually creates it.

36:07God says let there be.

36:08And then instead of just saying, and there was a rachia, God makes the rachia, um, and

36:14this suspends the waters above.

36:19So from the waters below, and this creates the space.

36:22And then later on, you have the separation of the waters, you have the appearance of

36:25the dry land, but that rachia is basically a large crystalline dome.

36:31This is why it's blue and shiny and sparkly and the waters above are suspended above.

36:38And then you have, uh, the waters beneath, uh, recede and you have the dry land.

36:43And this is where the idea of Leviathan, uh, or Rayhab, uh, or the sea, the, the dragon.

36:50Uh, the archaic battle between God and the, the sea monster are kind of a, a metaphorical

36:58representation of, of God's, uh, restraining of the waters of creation, which allow the

37:05dry land to appear.

37:07But what you have here in the ancient West Asian conceptualization of the earth is this

37:11notion that there's more or less flat dry land.

37:16There are mountains on it, but more or less it's flat and it's more or less circular in

37:22shape.

37:23And then beyond the dry land are seas, which also are more or less circular in shape.

37:30And at the edge of the seas, you have the edge of the dome.

37:35So think of Truman show, if you take a boat out there far enough, you're going to clunk

37:39into the side.

37:40Yeah.

37:41Yeah. And that's going to be, uh, that's going to be where the dome meets the seas.

37:47And then it's going to go straight up and, and you got this guy's above.

37:50Um, and so the, this earth, the land was thought to be flat and here in, not, not that it ever

37:59says the word flat in reference to the earth.

38:04No, no.

38:05We, um, I think this is a situation where to talk about a flat earth, you got to have

38:09a concept of a round earth, right?

38:12Cause otherwise, you know, you're, it's just the earth, you don't have to qualify it unless

38:19there's an alternative.

38:20Yeah.

38:21It's so funny to me.

38:27As you say, like it's been millennia that we've, that humans, some humans have known that

38:33the earth was a sphere.

38:35It's been hundreds of years since everybody agreed that the earth was a sphere and, and

38:42yet it does seem like there's a, I mean, there, there definitely is a group of people

38:49who have sprung up who don't like that idea.

38:53Yeah.

38:54And, and want to, and, and it feels like a lot of them when I've drilled down on the

39:00very flat earth, uh, people, very many of them are again, trying to justify what they

39:08read into their, their Bible reading.

39:12Yeah.

39:13Or, or it's a part of some conspiracy theory where the government is hiding everything

39:18from them.

39:19And because I think they fantasize about this being the Truman show and, um, and they enjoy

39:26being part of a community that, um, kind of enjoys the effervescence of this asinine conspiracy

39:37theory.

39:38Um, but yeah, there is a counter to that theory, uh, theoretically a counter to it from the

39:49Bible itself.

39:50Uh, there are people who say, nah, the Bible also disputes the flat earth.

39:57Right.

39:58And that's where we get to Isaiah 40.

39:59Yes.

40:00And, and this is part of the apologetic that the Bible is, is inerrant.

40:04And so even on, even in matters scientific, it's going to be accurate.

40:09Therefore the Bible promotes a, uh, globular, globular, a spherical, um, notion of the earth.

40:17And, and thus we turn, uh, in the words to Isaiah chapter 40 verse 22, and this is part

40:24of, uh, Deutero, Isaiah, which we have talked about recently, second Isaiah, probably written,

40:29uh, in the late sixth or fifth century BCE.

40:34And we have Isaiah referring to the circle of the earth.

40:40It is he who sits above the circle of the earth and its inhabitants are like grasshoppers,

40:45who stretches out the heavens like a curtain and spreads them like a tents to live in.

40:50So, um, this is talking about God, obviously, um, and we have some people who say this word

40:56circle, who in, in Hebrew, uh, means glow or sphere.

41:03Yeah.

41:04A, no, it doesn't, uh, just not for nothing, but like the word circle is we have two words

41:13for a reason, um, I suppose a translator could just use a word that means sphere and just

41:20say circle, but that seems weird.

41:23Um, but yeah, so go on with what you're saying.

41:27Yeah.

41:28And so the, um, so this word occurs, I think three total times in the Hebrew Bible, Isaiah

41:3440 verse 22, Job 22 verse 14 in Proverbs eight, 27. And if you look at this up in a lexicon,

41:43it's going to probably talk about, uh, a circle that would be, um, drawn with a compass because

41:52um, you, you get it, uh, the, the noun occurs anyway, three times you have a verb, uh, that

41:58means to describe a circle. And, uh, in which one is it, I think, um, yes, uh, Proverbs

42:08eight, 27, it, uh, it uses, uh, the verbal root hug, hook, excuse me, hook and hug, two

42:17different words, okay, means to inscribe or decree. And, um, in, in this, uh, at the end

42:25of Proverbs eight, 27 says in his inscribing of a hube upon the face of the deep. And the

42:35idea is the inscription of a circle like you might use a compass to create. In other words,

42:42it's a flat circle. Right. And it is being, um, it is being inscribed upon the deep basically

42:49to delineate that, um, the, the waters where the, uh, where the dome is going to encapsulate

42:58them. Sure. Um, in this circular, uh, shape. And so you, you, you don't draw a globe on

43:06the waters on the top of the waters, the face of the waters, you draw a flat circle. Uh,

43:13and so who, um, if you look it up in, uh, in, for instance, the Hebrew and Aramaic lexicon

43:18of the Old Testament, probably the most commonly used, uh, lexicon for the Hebrew Bible, uh,

43:23it refers to the circle of the earth. And it says the earth conceived as a disc. So, uh,

43:32very clearly this is in agreement with the broader notion that the earth represents

43:37a flat circular shaped, uh, plane, uh, on which we have dried down in water. It's the

43:44disc dome theory, uh, of earth shaping. Yep. I, yeah. So there you go. You got to imagine

43:52a, uh, a snow globe. Uh huh. And in, you've got a little circle of, of land and some little

44:00mountains poking up in that little circle of land and then around it is the waters and

44:05then over it, you've got this glass dome. And then you just go and shake it. Um, when,

44:12when the people start looking at naughty magazines and things like that, because, uh, because

44:16there's nothing worse than that, or every now and then you got to just open up the water,

44:23the, the, the dome and let the waters come in and just drown everybody and then, and

44:27then suck it back out. And yeah, yeah. And we were starting all over. We're starting

44:31from scratch. Well, and finally, I want to, I want to bring us back to Genesis. All the

44:36answers are in Genesis. All roads lead back to Genesis ultimately. Yes. Uh, we're in,

44:44in the fourth chapter thereof, there's a moment where anyone who's like reading for the first

44:51time and kind of paying attention, everyone just goes, hang on. What? What? And that is

45:01baking powder. Excuse me. We, we've got Adam. We've got Eve. They have a few kids and then

45:08two children. Yes. Exactly. Yeah. They have the cane enable couple, couple guys. And,

45:15and then suddenly, um, wives show up, uh, talk a bit about that. Let's, let's just dive

45:24into that. So, uh, chapter four, verse one begins, uh, the man knew his wife, Eve. And

45:31she conceived in Borkane saying, and this is the NRSVUE. I have produced a man with

45:37the help of the Lord. And you, you mentioned that the NIV, uh, that you ran across something

45:42where the NIV had, uh, had a different rendering. What is the, yeah, yeah, the NIV on that,

45:48uh, let me, let me find it. Hang on. Uh, I think NIV says with the help, uh, with the

45:55help of the Lord, I have brought forth a man. Yeah. Um, but I don't think that the word help

46:01is in there. Is it? No, no, the word help is not in there. In fact, it's, it's pretty

46:06short in Hebrew, uh, Vatomar. And she said, canity ish Edadunai, which, um, canity, uh,

46:15is the, uh, first common singular, uh, Qatar, there's that word again, uh, form of the verbal

46:21root kana, which is generally associated with acquisition. You buy, you purchase, you receive,

46:27you get something, uh, but there are scholars out there. I have argued this. I have a friend

46:33who has argued in print directly against this and directly against me, um, that it, that

46:39it never has a pro creative nuance. Um, or at least that does, it doesn't mean to create,

46:46uh, whether or not it has a pro creative nuance, but this verb occurs in, in euguritic as well.

46:51And there are certain times when it seems to mean pro create. Um, and so she probably

46:57is saying I have pro created a man and then it at Adonai and at here is a, um, a preposition

47:06that means with. So she says I have pro created a man with Adonai. And so that could be sketchy.

47:15Yeah. Yeah. Adam's like, now hold on a minute. Um, although, uh, it does have to be a call

47:20being a part of this later in the book, we do, there is a moment where a woman, uh, uh,

47:26has a child theoretically without her husband's help. Uh, we do know that Jesus, yes, uh,

47:35the Holy spirit, yes, was, uh, the Holy dove was moving too. Yeah. Um, and, uh, uh, so,

47:42so it's not unprecedented. It's the idea of, of a woman conceiving with God rather than

47:50with her husband, but, but there are scholars out there who suggest that this perhaps betrays

47:56the preservation of some kind of archaic myth where the first woman was impregnated by God

48:02through sexual intercourse. Um, I don't think that's the consensus view. The consensus view

48:08is that the idea here is that, uh, as with most, uh, childbirth and child rearing in the

48:15ancient world, it was so fraught with risk that any successful conception, gestation,

48:24delivery, uh, was attributed to the blessing of a deity. Sure. So the idea is probably with

48:32Adonai's support and help. Right. Um, I have been able to, uh, get a man or procreate a,

48:40a man or something like that. So even if the word for help is not in the original Hebrew,

48:45uh, it, it might be elucidating the actual meaning of, yeah, yeah, because it's a choice.

48:52Yeah. Yeah. That's definitely a choice. And, and that is the translator saying this is

48:56the direction we're going here. Um, I mean, I just noticed that NRSVUE also uses the word

49:02help in there. Yep. It does. Um, and so literally you would say whatever she has done, she has

49:08done with Adonai. Um, so with Adonai have brought forth a man or something like that.

49:14But, you know, um, that lends itself to, uh, some other interpretations. Sure. But while

49:21I was a, uh, uh, scripture translation supervisor for the LDS church, our, our mantra was maintain

49:28the ambiguity. The idea being it is better to, um, default to an ambiguous, uh, reading

49:40rather than make a choice and one restricts the options that the reader has. Right. But

49:47two, perhaps, uh, make the wrong choice. So, but, but anyway, we have Cain, then we have

49:54Abel. Now, uh, it mentions the conception of Cain never says she then conceived Abel.

50:02It says, it says later she gave birth to or next she bore his brother Abel and, um, and

50:10Yalad, uh, to bear is actually the process of delivering the child. Oh, okay. So there,

50:16there is, uh, a reading out there that she, um, conceived twins and then first gave birth

50:24to Cain and then later gave birth to Abel, um, but they grow up and, um, and as brothers

50:31do, they fought, um, and in short, Cain, uh, murdered Abel. Yeah. And then, um, God is,

50:40what the hell did you do that? I only have two of you. What are you doing? Um, and God

50:47in verse 11, now you are cursed from the ground, which has opened its mouth to receive your

50:51brother's blood from your hand. Um, blah, blah, blah, blah. And then Cain says, my

50:57punishment is greater than I can bear today. You have driven me away from the soil. I

51:01shall be hidden from your face. And I shall be a fugitive and a wanderer on the earth and

51:06anyone who meets me may kill me. And here's where a thoughtful reader is going. Anyone.

51:14There's the three of you. Yeah. You killed the fourth guy. You reduced the world's population

51:22by 25%. Yeah. Yeah. So you know everybody on the planet. Um, but we don't know how to

51:31kill you and we don't know how Eve feels about this, but maybe that's what he meant. Mom's

51:35going to kill me. Um, and then God says, uh, no, no, no, no, no, no, whoever kills Cain

51:42will suffer a seven fold vengeance. And Adam and I put a mark on Cain so that no one who

51:48came upon him would kill him. Um, woo. And the, the, um, yeah, this has nothing to do

51:55with the mark of Cain. There's a whole, we're not going to, yeah, we got to do the curse

52:01of ham mark of Cain stuff at some time. Yeah. Take a note. Yeah. I'm writing it down right

52:06now. Anyway. And, uh, and then in verse, uh, so verse 16 says Cain went away from the presence

52:13of the Lord and settled in the land of nod east of Eden. So there's, there's a land that's

52:17named nod evidently. And then the very next verse says Cain knew his wife and she conceived

52:22and bore Enoch and he built a city and named it Enoch after his son Enoch. So, so Cain

52:32was evidently married. Yeah. And then his son built, he builds his son a city. And so again,

52:41a thoughtful reader is going, they seem to be presupposing an already inhabited world.

52:47Yeah. Very much. And like there's a land of, uh, people, of seemingly people. Yeah. And

52:55then we have, we have, uh, all these people being born and, uh, ada bore job all. He was

53:02the ancestor of those who live in tents and have livestock. His brother's name was Jubal.

53:07He was the ancestor of all those who play the liar and pipe. So we've got, uh, we've got

53:12a bunch of different people who seem to be ideological ancestors of these different,

53:19um, uh, disciplines and industries and things like that. But, but yeah, it, uh, it seems

53:25very clear. And then, and then Lamek said to his wives, Ada and Zilla, here are my voice,

53:30you wives of Lamek, listen to what I say, I have killed a man for wounding me, a young

53:35man for striking me, uh, like they're, they're people around. So I made a video a bit ago

53:40where I said, Hey, why does the author of Genesis two, four, excuse me, Genesis four

53:46seem to presuppose an inhabited world. Whereas Genesis two and three seem to describe Adam

53:51and Eve as the only humans on the entire planet. They are first humans to exist. And that's

53:57it. And, and my, uh, and the answer is that these are two separate traditions. One, they

54:05Adam and Eve tradition, uh, in the Garden of Eden, that's just the creation of humanity.

54:10Genesis four, this is a separate tradition, whether it's earlier or later, I, I don't

54:14know, uh, but these, these are people who live in an inhabited world. And so Cain is worried

54:20because there are other people out there and, and, uh, words spreads fast, uh, in small

54:26towns. And so, um, he's worried about other people killed and he's got a wife because,

54:31you know, um, he's got a wife. Yeah. You, you took a wife when you became an adult in

54:36that time and place. And so they, they contradict each other in that regard and an awful lot

54:43of people just can't accept that. And so I had a bunch of comments that said, Dan, you

54:50ignorant slut. Adam and Eve had a bunch of other kids. It says it in the text, incest

55:01wasn't a problem. And, uh, and this, this always gets into these problematic notions

55:08of pure bloodlines and stuff like that. It's so funny to like the idea that like, oh, I'm

55:14very uncomfortable with two different stories being merged together in a way that doesn't

55:21quite make sense, but I'm much more comfortable with like a whole lot of incest until we're

55:28all until the place is like densely populated. Like that's more comfortable to you. Yeah.

55:34Yeah. And, and the, the argument is that the, the bloodlines were pure or they had not

55:38but yet been corrupted by something or sometimes it's the flood after the flood, the, the atmosphere

55:49was dirtier or something. I don't know. Some, some people think that the, uh, the, uh, the

55:56Benelohim, the Children of God and Genesis six, these, uh, people corrupted the bloodlines.

56:02They introduced impure blood. And so again, wildly problematic arguments, uh, but not

56:10supported by any data and, um, and Genesis four actually directly refutes that argument

56:17because here's what happens in verse 25. So we had, um, uh, Haddam, the human knew his

56:24wife, uh, they did the horizontal mumbo and then we had Cain enable. Right. Verse 25 says,

56:32Adam knew his wife again. So when Hebrew, that's owed, it happened again. And she bore a son

56:39and named him Seth. And this means appointed for, she said God has appointed for me, another

56:47child instead of able, because Cain killed him. In other words, God has replaced the child

56:55that I lost because they're like pairs of jeans. When you lose one, you just get another.

57:02But the text is pretty clearly indicating that the birth of Seth represents the third

57:08child total in total that Adam and Eve have had. Right. And Seth is the replacement of,

57:17of Abel. And that, that, that scripture comes after Cain has gotten, uh, has met all of

57:25these other people and blah, blah, blah. And, and Cain has already had, uh, a bunch of

57:29kids and his kids have had kids and all that in the narrative. And after, and immediately

57:33after that, Seth has a son. Yeah. You know, so, and unless that son was born to his mama,

57:43uh, that means I think we're meant to assume that Seth also gets a wife. Yeah. And, and

57:49if we, if we go on to Genesis five and Genesis five is again, probably from another source.

57:55But if you want to read this all, if you're arguing, this is all univocal, this is all

57:59one continuous narrative. Uh, Genesis five, verse three, when Adam had lived 130 years,

58:04he became the father of a son in his likeness, according to his image and named him Seth.

58:09So basically Adam was a 130 years old when his third child was born. Seth. Right. The

58:16days of Adam after he became the father of Seth were 800 years and he had other sons

58:20and daughters. So this is that explicit mention that Adam had other sons and daughters. And

58:26it is after the birth of Seth, the birth of Seth occurred after the death of Abel. So

58:35according to the narrative, these things all happen sequentially consecutively. And in between

58:43child number two and child number three, Cain has a wife. Yeah. And Cain goes off to the

58:49land of Nod. Kate Nod. Cain is afraid of strangers. Cain builds a city. Like all the

58:56stuff goes on when there should be a grand total of three people on the planet. So the

59:01text does not leave room for Adam and Eve to just be, um, you know, doing it like they

59:08do on the discovery channel. Right. And just generating all these other people for, um,

59:16his children to, uh, to marry and raise children with. So it's, it's another situation where

59:21the text is not the authority. The text is not the most important thing here. The most

59:27important thing is the dogma. The text is secondary. We will tell the text what it is

59:32and is not allowed to say because the text is just there to facilitate our dogmas. And

59:39that's what apologetics is doing with Genesis four. All right. Well, uh, I, you know, I'm

59:46sure we're going to get some, some emails, some lovely, lovely messages. Some, some comments

59:51in the, uh, in the comments section over on YouTube, et cetera. But, uh, thank you, Dan.

59:56The apologists are, uh, are mad and, uh, and the apologists are always mad. That's kind

60:02of their, that's kind of their thing. Uh, but yes. Uh, if you friends appreciated these

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