Cheryl Schatz

Mark,
You said:

The parellel is the same with Adam and the woman. Just because God uses a human agent does not detract from God’s foreknowledge. The text simply saids that it was the man who ‘named’ the woman.

Where does the text say that this is God’s foreknowledge? Does it not say that God “built a woman”? (formed, fashioned). God’s building wasn’t foreknowledge at this point so what he built wasn’t either.

And the text doesn’t say that the man “named” the woman. Adam said that she shall be “proclaimed” or “called” woman. It is a statement of what she is as a recognition of what God had created her to be. Since God had already created her woman, her being proclaimed woman by Adam is very significant in that he recognized her nature. It is not significant in any way to show his authority over her since he had no authority assigned to him in such a way.

“Try as you might, you cannot take away the accuracy of God’s story just as He relayed it.”

Whats with this? First of all it was you who said God ‘named’ the woman. I have simply said that is not what the text saids.

The text does say that God created the woman. He created her as a woman. She didn’t become a woman when Adam saw and recognized her. She already was. The text certainly does say that God created something that He identified as a woman and the fact that God planned this creation as her coming forth from his body is the very meaning of woman. How much plainer can it get?

And now you say I am the one distorting the accuracy. Are you serious. Is this the way you approach all people who challenge your views, just say that they are tampering with the text.

Actually I didn’t say that you were “distorting the accuracy”. I said that you were taking away from the accurate account by making it a narrative that was not an exact rendition of what happened. When you say that God did not identify her as woman before He brought her to Eve, I am ready to challenge that. The fact is that the the text says that she was created by God as woman. She wasn’t just female, she was the one who came out of the man – a woman.

And here is the problem. You are approaching scripture the same way Muslims do, as if the historical setting is unimportant.

Mark, I don’t know if you intended to mock me, but to identify my reasoning from the Scriptures with Muslims is quite offensive. Perhaps you would also like to say that since I worked so hard to bring JW’s to Christ, that I also read the passage like a JW. This attempt at knocking my position by attaching it to a non-Christian religion is not appropriate for this blog. It comes across as a personal attack on me and I do not think that this is a wise thing to do, do you?

Now to answer your challenge. Genesis is a historical account. How the Jews thought about God’s creation is not a factor in what actually happened. Are you arguing that this is Jewish cultural myth as others have? I am arguing from the type of literature – that Genesis is historical literature and unless it is written in a specifically identifiable metaphor, we can take the Word of God just as it is written. God created something – a woman – and brought something – a woman to the man.

Which is interesting because when it comes to 1 Tim 2 you revert the other way and say it is all cultural.

Mark, I really like you best when you are trying hard to not misrepresent my arguments. I have never said that 1 Timothy 2 is “cultural”. I really don’t even know where you are getting that from. My argument is not Paul is talking about specific people and a specific situation. That is not “cultural”. That is “fact based” in the literature that is clearly a personal letter. But then this post is not about Timothy but about Adam naming Eve, right?

Whats this got to do with what I said. It was you who said something that is not in the text, and simply because it is your view that is contradicted.

It is plainly there that God built a woman. You can say that this isn’t in the text and that God didn’t identify/call her woman when her built her as woman from the body of the man, but the text says she was already known as woman before she was brought to the man. My friend, you will have to deal with that instead of say it isn’t in the text.

If you can try and dismiss the fact that it was Adam who named Eve then your view might stand, but the text is against you.

I didn’t dismiss the fact that Adam named “Eve”. I said that God identified/called her woman when he built her. Adam called Eve later after sin entered the world. Whether that is an example of his taking his authority over her is debatable. However there is nothing in the text about Adam affirming her identity as woman that would even have a hint that he took an authority over her that had not even been given him by God.

Again please engage with my comments not attack comp theology and say it denies the inspiration of scripture. Arguing these lines makes me feel like you are avoiding the real issue.

Mark, I really wish you would take the time to digest what I am saying instead of rewording it. I didn’t say that comp theology denies the inspiration of Scripture. I say that comp theology (and your theology) denies that the text states what exactly happened. I am not saying that they don’t believe it is inspired, but your comment that it is only narrative appears to deny that God really did create a “woman”. What did God create? Perhaps you can tell me. Did He create a female and she became a woman later? Or did God really and truly create a woman so that she was a woman because of God’s design? If that is so, which I believe the text shows, then Adam’s glorious acclamation was an affirmation of what she already was.

Not once have I questioned your belief in the inspiration of scripture, but you consistently say it about me under the label ‘comps’.

I will say it again. I didn’t question your belief in inspiration of scripture. I said that you were rather denying that she was created woman by God and identified as such. You said yourself that this was only God’s foreknowledge.

Where have I ever said that I am denying the account as it happened. I have no problem saying that God was in control of what Adam said and knew what he said.

Let’s go through this one again. Did God create a “woman”? Or did God create something that later became a woman when Adam identified her as such? Please tell me what the text says. Let’s discuss that.

If you really held to the account as it is written you would not have said God ‘called’ her woman before Adam, since that is not in the account.

Not true! God wrote this account and He wrote that He created the woman. Since her created her as woman, how do you deny that God called/identified her as woman?

And what did I say “This was God’s purpose and plan for it to happen this way.” How can you assume that I am saying God had nothing to do with what Eve’s identity when the words you quote me on say the opposite.

I am not talking about the name “Eve”. Please don’t switch to the naming of Eve by Adam later. I am talking about the identity “woman”. If God created her in her identity was woman and He did this before Adam identified her as woman, then God’s creative actions on a specific identity “woman” are where we get our identity from. The woman does not get her identity first from the man. She does get her identity second from the man as an agreement that this is what she is (what God made her to be – flesh of his flesh).