Fun:Genesis as history
So many of our creationist friends tell us that we have to treat the Book of Genesis as an historical account... But the text doesn't read like history - more like aetiological mythology...
Fortunately for our friends, in early 2017 a manuscript clay-tablet turned up in a mound of collapsed residential real-estate in Mosul, and the Daesh government sold it for a nice round sum to a keen North American collector. Written in Babylonian Hebrew, and subsequently translated with the aid of some praeternatural high-tech, it provides an invaluable historical source document for a fragment of the Genesis account, as follows:
Day 5 - Now that We have matter sorted out and the basics of physics, I can record the day-to-day account of what happened. I call this a "diary", because of the day-to-day pattern. You can call it "history" if you like. So, looking backwards a bit:
Day 1 - The big problem - how many heavens to drape around this new Earth thing. I settled on seven - it seemed like a numinous number once We had sufficient things to count up to seven and had created math.
Once We had some light, I could see what a mess the void looked like. But One can have too much of a Good Thing, so I kept some darkness to hide the mess some of the time. (Not that I had invented time yet - that came later - on what I learned to call Day 4 - with seasons, days and years. They existed before (Day and Night, at least, from Day 1) but with fewer distinctions ... I think.)
Day 2 - Heaven was a big job - lots of water to pump around and separate out. Where did all that water come from? But I did it!
Day 3 - Another major task - dry land and something to cover it. Can't have bareness. I don't like bareness. - Mosses and lichens didn't do the trick, so I went for grass, with fruit trees for decoration. Quite like the idea of trees bearing fruit - might use that again at some stage. Ordinary primitive trees can wait.
Day 4 - Light Festival day. Re-inforcing the day-night division - felt it didn't get quite enough emphasis on Day 1. That big light looks so bright: toying with the idea of calling this day "Sunday".
Day 5 redux - Back to the waters. Seemed like a good place for the first "life" experiments. Also filled up the air - three-dimensional like the water - mainly with flying things called "bats". The first mammals! I felt so proud! Look no feathers!
Day 6 - The dry land looks much more two-dimensional, so populated it with a bit of variety in the way of animal life. Looking at all that creeping on the surface got Me thinking about burrowing beasts. So must look into insects some time.
All that former messed up stuff with making angels made Me hesitant about parking too much intelligence in an animal, but decided to see how things turn out with this "man"-clone. We can always start over if things don't turn out (again). Anyway, got the hierarchy thing right, I reckon. "Dominion over every living thing" - what could possibly go wrong ?
Day 7 - Exhausted. Resting. Have a good mind to commemorate My hard work in some way.
Did I mention that I invented language on Day Zero ? It seemed like a logical necessity in order to articulate the magic words "Let there be..." - I can't remember when I invented the logic of sequences (like "language precedes word-magick") - maybe it evolved on Day Minus 2. Or co-evolved with proto-language - I don't know.
I can't remember when I createdinvented memory either.
So there you have it, Dear Readers - the Diary (or History). Hope you find it useful in smiting unbelievers and infidels.