In a message dated February 28, 1998, RghtWnger writes:

I couldn't agree more! Kick the bastard out!

Thank you, Rghtwnger, for pointing out this verse. This verse occurs in Exodus as part of the Mosaic Law. Not only are there verses in the New Testament that state that the Law came to an end with the death of Christ (see John 1:17), but Paul indeed confirms this in Romans 10:4: "For Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to everyone that believeth."

If we examine the passage that Rghtwnger offered in his message, we find that he did not include Exodus 21:24: "Eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot." If you look to Matthew 5:38-39, in the famous 'Sermon on the Mount', you will see what Jesus himself had to say about this particular tenet of the Mosaic Law: "Ye have heard it been said, 'Eye for an eye, and tooth for a tooth': But I say unto you, That ye resist not evil: but whosoever shall smite thee on thy right cheek, turn to him the other also."

Clearly Jesus had no intention of the Law that Moses laid down to continue.

But even if Jesus did want for the Law to continue (which some will of course argue, as I have heard it before), RghtWnger's application of Exodus 21:22-23 does not apply to a woman who decides to terminate her own pregnancy. Obviously it is one thing when someone strikes a pregnant woman, and that violence results in the death of the unborn child; this was not by choice of the mother, but a breach of the mother's right to nurture her unborn child as she chooses. There is no verse in the Bible that I have ever read that prohibits a woman from terminating her own pregnancy. The closes we've seen are the Mosaic Laws essentially prohibiting someone else from making that decision for the would-be mother herself. Clearly elective abortion was not an issue in the times of Moses or Jesus; the advent of elective abortion is a rather recent medical option.

But aside from what the Bible may say or may not say about elective abortions, our Constitution is not based on the Bible (thank God!!), and certainly modern man has hopefully risen from the primitive past of supernatural worship and the morality of self-sacrifice. Again, I say hopefully, for that is my personal hope. Unfortunately, there are many who still cling to primitive philosophy, and who will stop at nothing to justify the enforcement of their will on the lives of others.

I have read the verse where God commands Noah to take along food for himself and his family, and presumably the 'beasts' that he has gathered for the journey during the Flood (Gen. 6:21). But I failed to read any verse that commanded Noah to take along the seed of every plant, tree and weed along. Certainly any seeds that were eaten by the 'guests' aboard Noah's Ark might eat vegetarian foods containing seeds, and it is possible that some of these seeds might be deposited with fecal droppings once the 'beasts' were loosed from the Ark, but this is such a stretch that I can only laugh.

So, I've assembled a few questions that anyone who stands behind the biblical Flood tale can tackle if they choose:

1. How many species of vegetation are there around the earth?

(Remember that Genesis 6:17 mentions that "everything which is on the land will die," which means that no vegetation will survive the Flood unless Noah and his mates gather seeds and bulbs and pine cones, etc., for the purpose of their survival, as opposed to nutritional purposes.)

2. How many of those species of vegetation which exist around the earth are edible?
3. How many of those species of vegetation which exist around the earth are poisonous?
4. How many of these species which exist, both edible and non-edible, did Noah collect seeds for?
5. Where does it say that in the Bible?
6. What did all the herbivorous 'beasts' eat when they first got off the Ark if there were no plants around?

(Remember Gen. 6:17": "Everything which is on the land will die.") There were no shrubs or grasses on the land when Noah and his sailing mates finally disembarked. What was everyone going to eat while they waited for alfalfa and fruit trees to sprout from RghtWnger's scattered dung heaps? Any answers to this?

Now, I would also like to point out a glaring contradiction here that the apologist must deal with (yes, by means of rationalization, of course…).

Remember Gen. 6:17: " Everything which is on the land will die." Now we go over to Genesis chapter 8 and join Noah and his crew in the Ark on the flood waters which have allegedly covered all the earth and killed all life which remained on the land. While they had been out "at flood" (I can't really say "at sea"), Noah had sent out a raven (Gen. 8:7) with the hope that it would return with some sign of dry land. Noah also sent out a dove (Gen. 8:8) "to see if the waters were abated from off the face of the ground." In Gen. 8:9, the dove returned empty-beaked. No mention of the raven at this point; the raven is basically forgotten by the author.

Now Gen. 8:10-11 state: "And [Noah] stayed yet another seven days; and again he sent forth the dove out of the Ark; and the dove came back to him in the evening; and, lo, in her mouth was an olive leaf plucked off: so Noah knew that the waters were abated from off the earth."

Now here's the problem. Genesis 6:17 stated explicitly that "everything which is on the land will die." But here, in Genesis 8:11, we have a dove returning with a fresh olive leaf - from a living plant, that can be from nowhere but an olive tree surviving the flood waters somewhere on the earth. Now, this is a blatant contradiction, there is no way around it. Either "everything which is on the land will die" as Genesis 6:17 states, or not. If Genesis 6:17 is true, then there could be no surviving olive tree from which the dove that Noah sent out from the ark could bring back in Genesis 8:11. However, if Genesis 8:11 is true, and the dove did bring back an olive leaf presumably "plucked off" a living tree someplace (it would have to be a living tree for it to have been plucked off; the earth has been covered by a flood for over half a year by this time), then Genesis 6:17 could not be true, for here we have a case of at least one living thing surviving the flood. Quite simply, both verses Genesis 6:17 and Genesis 8:11 cannot both be true because of this contradiction.

Perhaps my question was not clearly understood. My question is basically this: The continents of the earth are separated by huge expanses of ocean. On each continent there are found unique species of both animals and plantlife that are not found on other continents. There are species that are found in South America, North America, Australia and even Antarctica that are not found in the region of the world where Noah's ark allegedly came to rest (Mt. Ararat, eastern Turkey). How did the species that are unique to the remote parts of the earth traverse from Ararat to those distant places, AND how did those species also not populate themselves in the meantime in the vicinity of the Middle East? This seems like an obvious question to me, if anyone wants to take the tale of Noah's ark seriously, but I have never heard any serious address to these issues.

By 'adaptation', what does RghtWnger mean? That these species somehow wound up on other parts of the world without leaving any kind of trail, and suddenly just planted themselves 10,000 miles away, just like that? Isn't evolution a process of adaptation? When environments change, it seems species - both plants and animals - have only one choice: adapt (evolve), or die.

Again, as I pointed out in an earlier mailer, the assertion of the supernatural never explains anything. The assertion of the supernatural only makes one look foolish, and brings upon himself more and more questions - and scrutiny - than his imagination can bear. "Oh what a tangled web we weave, when it is we attempt to deceive" (Shakespeare paraphrased).

I kindly await your reply.

Tindrbox

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