There is a common tendency for some Christians (and others) to imagine that their generation is somehow more indisputably wicked than the one before, as if the moral status of civilizations (in Biblical terms) does not shift back and forth. While Matthew 24 does predict that certain conditions will worsen before the return of Christ, this does not mean that each generation becomes successively more bent towards evil, nor does it mean that there is no fluctuation before Christ's return.
The generic, imprecise belief that whatever generation one is living in is by default worse than the previous one is, of course, often embraced by the conservative evangelicals fixated on eschatology. They scarcely ever acknowledge the nuance that defines societal shifts. They might selectively point to certain trends as alleged evidence that the "days of Noah" as referenced in Matthew 24 are returning, yet anyone who does this usually displays enormous ignorance about how Genesis 6 describes the days of Noah.
Genesis 6 clearly says that the world of Noah's day was filled with such extreme and frequent violence (6:11) that God regretted having created humankind in the first place (6:6). Indeed, it states that every person's thoughts (with the exception of at least Noah) were aimed at some sinful purpose (6:5). These verses, despite not elaborating very extensively on the exact types of violence and sinful desires that were most common at the time, plainly detail a level of evil that far surpasses that of today. After all, God never punishes the world with anything near the magnitude of the flood between Genesis 6 and the book of Revelation.
Whatever the reason, many Christians forget that many abominable recent events are nothing compared to the events alluded to in Genesis 6. Even the atrocities of the Nazis often pale in comparison to those of Rome and other tyrannical regimes of distant eras that came after the flood, but more recent acts are nonetheless usually considered worse simply because they are closer to the present day on a timeline. It follows that the days of Noah as described in Genesis 6 were marked by a degree of violence (it must be remembered that mere murder is only one of the least vicious forms of violence) that many people in the modern world could scarcely stomach.
World conditions are generally far better than they were elsewhere in recorded history: women and men (just far more slowly for men) are being freed from oppressive stereotypes and the use of unbiblical torture as legal punishment has declined, to list two examples. There are indeed moral problems that are somewhat unique to the modern world, such as the unprecedented push for blind tolerance, but it is obvious that the days of Noah eclipsed the depravity of current times.
Genesis 6:9 describes Noah as "righteous, blameless among the people of his time". Obviously this was way before Mosaic Law, but my question is how would've Noah known what was righteous and that the world was morally depraved without having God's law at the time?
ReplyDeleteAlso as I love me some evidence, what is good historical evidence we have to know that the flood event happened? If we can only go off with what Scripture describes, is that ok since the Bible is pretty well preserved and agrees with other historical aspects?
It is important to clarify that even before Mosaic Law, people would still be accountable for moral mistakes, as they only lacked the ability to epistemologically defend moral concepts, whether they are Biblical or unbiblical. They would also still be capable of being righteous, even if only by happenstance. Since God audibly speaks with key people in the Old Testament, it is also possible that God provided Noah (and other specific individuals living before Mosaic Law) with special moral information before that same information was revealed to Moses and the Israelites later on. Either way, conscience would still have no demonstrable or inherent connection with moral truths, and the rest of the Bible affirms this logical fact.
DeleteTwo things that some have cited as evidences for a global flood are the discovery of fish fossils around the tops of mountains and stories about a major flood that appear in different cultures. Even if scientific laws have remained uniform across time and the flood of Genesis 6 is treated as an extreme example of an otherwise scientifically normal flood, though, a global flood is just one possible scientific explanation for why the fossils of aquatic creatures might be found in such high areas. It is also possible that plates shifted over time so that regions once located underwater were eventually raised far above their former positions.
Since more important parts of the Bible do have direct historical support, the ambiguity of the evidence for a flood on the strictly scientific and historical side of things is not detrimental to the evidence for Christianity. There is no extra-Biblical evidence I am aware of for the historical existence of Leah or Cain, two people from the same book of the Bible as the flood, and yet the fact that other key historical components of the Bible can be evidentially supported strengthens the probabilistic evidence for the historicity of Leah, Cain, and the flood, just in a more indirect way.
Ah, ok! I'm thankful for that. It puts me at ease to know how the probabilistic evidence for Christianity can still tip the scales in favor of confirmation, even if we can't prove with certainty every single minute detail.
DeleteI'm glad at the very least that the most important, relevant parts of Christianity aren't left ambiguous or kinda unclear like the Leah or Cain thing. Not to mention that the logic and external evidence doesn't contradict them! I've been trying my damnedest to try and derive mental comfort from remembering these facts!
The same would also be true of many other documents: not every detail can necessarily be historically supported by something outside of the text, and yet the document itself can legitimately be defended if there is evidence that its major components are valid (as long as one doesn't confuse historical evidence for logical proof and leap from probabilistic commitment to belief in what is ultimately unverifiable, of course!). Also, it does need to be pointed out that there is nothing about any Biblical event or doctrine that contradicts the laws of logic, like you said, as that alone would falsify the event/doctrine in question!
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