gengwall

Two additional flaws in Matt Slick’s commentary on naming:

He goes through a great list of male namings and asserts that such namings were expressions of aurthority AND that they are a male act only. Of significance, he notes Seth’s naming of Enosh, yet he conveniently ignores the fact that it was Eve who named Seth (she also named Cain). If his premise about naming is correct, then Eve not only broke the “rule” that males are the only namers but she then took sole authority over Seth.

His rebuttal to the objection of Matthew 1:21 is also incorrect (as is the objection itself, which may have been misrepresented). In reality, the paralle with God and Adam is somewhat striking. Just as God instructed Adam to name the animals, the angel, as representative of God, instructed Mary to name Jesus. It was in fact MARY who named Jesus. Does God break his own rules? I hardly think so.

The second flaw is in the premise itself – that naming de facto grants authority. Adam (and Eve) did not achieve dominion over the animals by the act of naming them and would not have had less authority over the animals had God chosen to name them Himself. Nowhere in the bible, outside of cultural norms, is it stated that naming grants authority. The fact is that naming has no effect on authority. You either have dominon or you do not. Naming is a task which neither adds to or detracts from dominion. Mr. Slick should be careful what he presupposes. According to his logic in the many verses he quotes, no one, including God in His relationship with His named creation, had any authority until after they did the naming.