The fall and sin

Before he sinned? No - but the Bible indicates that Adam lived less than 1000 years when he died.

Genesis 5:5 And all the days that Adam lived were nine hundred and thirty years: and he died.​

HankD​

 

Scripture says Adam and Eve (man in God's own image) were created on the 6th day. If you believe in a literal 6 day creation, then that would have the creation of man, the garden, and the fall all occurring on the 6th day. Hard to image God resting on the 7th day if His creation had already fallen on the 6th.

Do you believe in a literal 6 day creation?

Chapter 3 also documents the fall.

Literally, it says Adam "knew" his wife, Eve, and she concieved. That is the same language as is used in 4:17 of Cain, that he "knew" his wife and she concieved.

I think your argument is weak on this issue. There is really no reason to believe Adam and Eve were not intimate until after the fall. Quite frankly, I'm still not sure why it would make any difference

peace to youraying:

 

Thank you for responding. I am not locked into a position on this. I am just exploring possibilities and you have been very helpful.

 

Brother, I appreciate your kind words. I am always open to being convinced that scripture teaches something other than what I believe. IOW's, I can be convinced if the argument has solid scriptural support.

Just a note for future reference. If you answer my points within my quote, it can appear that I am the one posting the words, even if you "bold" the words. Just to avoid confusion, it might be safer not to post that way.

peace to youraying:

 

Impeccable logic!!!

peace to youraying:

 

If all the premises are correct, then your logic is sound. However, there is no way to know if your premises are correct. Assuming they are begs the question.

The whole reasoning leaves out the possibility of unknown factors. For one, it assumes that conception is a purely natural function as opposed to something that God controls. There might have been reasons why God did not want them to conceive right away.

More significantly, it also assumes that perfect bodies function in the same way the corrupt bodies do. It could be that the reproductive function was slower, less likely to result in children than our corrupt biology would indicate. For instance, it assumes that women were on a monthly cycle before the fall. It might have been that perfect bodies had a cycle of a year, a decade, even a century or more (remember, people would have lived forever, so what is a millennium or so between kids when the represents an infinitesimally small portion of your life). In short, it assumes that we can predict how the human body functioned before the fall based on what is true after the fall. That is very much begging the question.

In fact, there are many good reasons to think that the reproductive cycle could have been quite different. For instance, if your assumptions are correct, then Eve and her subsequent daughters would have been in near constant state of pregnancy for all their lives - that is, for eternity. Plus the population would be astronomical in a very short order when birth rate is 1 per year per woman and there is no mortality.

In short, the answer is unknowable - even the best calculation involves assumptions that we have no way of knowing if they are accurate nor any good reason to believe they are accurate.

 

A very good post. You said it much better than I could have. We make many assumptions today based on what we know about today. I think it is unknowable whether Adam and Eve were in the garden a long time (thousands of years) or a short time (days). This is interesting, but not really that important.

 

This is actually a pretty solid argument against A and E living for centuries before the fall. Its not absolutely solid as it still assumes a few things that we can't really know one way or the other, but it definitely creates a solid default from which to reason.

However, it does still easily allow for up to 110 or so years living before the fall.

 

I know its not air tight. Depends on the basis of the kind of life "lived" means.

HankD