> "Additionally, the Bible has two creation stories, with different orderings. Genesis 2 has man created before animals."

This is an incredibly important detail that a lot of people ignore. Genesis 2 is a fairly old and classic creation story, whereas Genesis 1 is probably the most recent addition to Genesis, probably written during the Babylonian Exile. It's a poem, structured by the days of the week, that tells that God didn't only create animals and humans, like Genesis 2 tells, but also the very fabric of the universe, light, darkness, the sun and stars, etc. It expands the scope of Creation compared to the more human-level view of Genesis 2. Genesis 2 is the human story of creation, Genesis 1 is the scientist's story of creation (at the time; Babylonians were the scientists of their age and studied the stars).

Thanks for your strong points. I guess I would say that it's still interesting to me how close it is to current details of evolution theory. According to my other reasons for believing in God and the value of the Bible, it seems wiser to assume that the scientific community has yet to observe enough. But, I understand how someone would prefer the current consensus of the senses.

I guess I just don't see how it's all that close.

How are there grasses and herbs and trees (Genesis 1:12) before there's day and night or seasons (Genesis 1:14)? Evolutionary theory says that life was created after the crust cooled down - which means there was already day and night. And seasons too, since that depends on the inclination of the Earth.

Genesis 1:16 says the Moon was created after fruit trees. The earliest seeded trees are from the late Devonian, so no more than about 400 million years ago - well after the Moon started to orbit the Earth.

There are many other creation myths. How do you evaluate them for accuracy if you don't use "the current consensus of the senses"? Perhaps Mbombo really did vomit us up - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mbombo , and we just haven't found the evidence?

> I guess I just don't see how it's all that close.

To me, it is interesting that the rough outline is similar. Yes, I agree that some specifics are not in the same order. Also, simply the fact that Genesis 1 describes a process at all, seems like a prescient paradigm. And, that there was actually a Beginning, rather than just everything always existing.

> Mbombo

My best guess is that the creation story was passed down orally for a long time, thus there are variations in different cultures. So why would I accept the Genesis account as more accurate than the account given by the Kuba people? That's predicated on my faith in the Judeo-Christian God. Why do I have faith in Him? Because I was born into a Christian household, and learned about the teachings of the Bible, then opened my mind to seek the truth with relentless intellectual honesty (or at least tried to), and God worked in my life (just a case study here), and I couldn't harden my heart to how meaningful He is. So, I was no longer debating with facts, but with a Person. In addition, every intellectual debate always left room to maintain faith or abandon faith. I haven't found an argument that forces me to disbelieve (nor do I have one that forces someone to believe). It's clear from Scriptures that God allows us the choice; that he doesn't make himself undeniably plain.

The Biblical creation story seems strongly influenced by the older Babylonian creation story, for which we have written records. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/En%C3%BBma_Eli%C5%A1#Influence... points out:

> The Enuma Elis contains numerous parallels with the Old Testament, and has led to a general conclusion amongst some researchers that the paralleled Old Testament stories were based on the Mesopotamian work. Overarching similarities include: reference to a watery chaos before creation; a separation of the chaos into heaven and earth; different types of waters and their separation during the creation process; as well as the indirect textual similarity between the number of tablets and the number of days of creation: seven.

I therefore think it's difficult to say that Genesis 1 "seems like a prescient paradigm" when the roughly similar outline existed before Genesis was written. At the very least, the Enuma Elis should also be considered an equally prescient paradigm, yes?

My current stance on that is that the account in Genesis is older than the Babylonian version, despite not having yet discovered any written record of the former older than the latter. And again, that the Genesis story was passed orally for some time, and many cultures appropriated and molded it to reinforce the divine power of their government. As discussed in the previous post, I'm biased because of personal experience. Though for precedence, consider how the 1947 discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls brought a written record that was a millennium older than any other known at the time (I don't know much about archaeology, but I think that's accurate).

And another example of archaeological discovery affirming Biblical accounts after a period of doubt (from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hittites#Biblical_background):

> Before the archeological discoveries that revealed the Hittite civilization, the only source of information about the Hittites had been the Old Testament. Francis William Newman expressed the critical view, common in the early 19th century, that, "no Hittite king could have compared in power to the King of Judah...".[10]

From the link you shared, this theory would be interesting to explore:

> Based on an analysis of proper names in the texts A.T. Clay proposed that the Enuma Elish was a combination of a Semitic myth from Amurru and a Sumerian myth from Eridu—this theory is thought to lack solidity, and specifically any historical or archaeological evidence.

It feels like you've shifted the topic.

Earlier you wrote "simply the fact that Genesis 1 describes a process at all, seems like a prescient paradigm."

I commented that it cannot be seen as a prescient paradigm because earlier texts describe a similar paradigm.

You correctly point out that the Genesis story can be older than Genesis 1.

Which I agree with, since I think the Enuma Elish is the same Genesis story. Or rather, the Genesis account "[borrowed] themes from Mesopotamian mythology, but adapt[ed] them to the Israelite people's belief in one God" ( Quoting https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Genesis_creation_narrative ).

I also agree with the concept since the Biblical flood narrative is believed to have been written nearly 1,000 years after older written Mesopotamian flood myths - see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flood_myth#Mythologies .

Any argument for older precedence must also consider that Mesopotamian mythology is also almost certainly far older.

However, you still can't argue that the Genesis 1 description seems a prescient paradigm. At best you can say is that you believe there are centuries older accounts which match the Genesis 1 description and which, if found, would be a prescient paradigm.

But the complexity of that statement doesn't fit your "simply the fact" comment.

> And another example of archaeological discovery affirming Biblical accounts after a period of doubt (from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hittites#Biblical_background):

Was all of The Illiad correct because Troy was found?

Note also that https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biblical_Hittites comments about ongoing "debates about possible identities between the Anatolian Hittite Empire and the biblical Hittites".