I realize you probably didn't mean any harm, but this sort of generic religious tangent is not on-topic here. Also it tends to lead to religious flamewars, which are bannable offenses.

We detached this subthread from https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13879554 and marked it off-topic.

Not allowing discussion of something (including, if not especially, religion) should be the "bannable offense" by any intellectually-honest institution, especially given the significant impact that unsubstantiated religious belief has on the world.

The key to avoid flamewars (this from someone who has moderated many many discussions including those of a controversial nature) is to stick as close to facts and secular ethical reasoning as possible. Where there are no facts nor secular ethical reasoning to be found, one cannot impose one's view on others, and one cannot successfully argue any case, simple as that.

1) more complicated discussion that what can be done here

Not necessarily - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jewish_principles_of_faith

2) do some believe that? sure.

I tend to argue that while we say one can't define god, one of the attributes attributed to god is "truth" (last word of Exodus 34:6). Many have a hard time associating God who is defined by as truth with a god who is like Loki who is just here to trick us by putting our senses against us (i.e. what we can observe).

Further, Maimonides, who enumerated the principles of faith accepted by Orthodox Jews, also held that Genesis could/should be interpreted allegorically[1].

> Some medieval philosophical rationalists, such as Maimonides (Mosheh ben Maimon, the "Rambam") held that it was not required to read Genesis literally. In this view, one was obligated to understand Torah in a way that was compatible with the findings of science. Indeed, Maimonides, one of the great rabbis of the Middle Ages, wrote that if science and Torah were misaligned, it was either because science was not understood or the Torah was misinterpreted. Maimonides argued that if science proved a point, then the finding should be accepted and scripture should be interpreted accordingly.

[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Allegorical_interpretations_of...

Maimonides always amazes me. What an incredible position to advocate for in the middle ages.

Interesting.

Calling God "truth" sounds nice, but at least in science, what is considered "true" is constantly debated and is not a static, immutable thing. That said, if a consensus of learned people decide a new thing is true, religions should accept it IMHO

and the argument would be that our understanding of God increase as we understand creation even more.

on the flip side, if one's faith is based more in the god of the gaps, i.e. the "magical" aspects of creation, of course one's faith will be tested or discarded as science's knowledge increases as the gaps shrink and shrink (and fits with clark's "Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.")

The modern creationist view on fossils is that they were laid down during Noah's flood. I grew up in a creationist home, and never heard anyone seriously claim dinosaur bones are a trick. As far as I can tell that's just a straw man.

So the position is that the Flood killed off the dinosaurs?

No, there's supposed to have been dinosaurs on the Ark, too, but the climate was sufficiently messed up right after the flood that they died out. I wish I knew where to find a good summary.

While Orthodox Judaism (and be careful, there are distinct flavours of what 'Orthodox' means and multiple authorities) holds the Torah to be the revealed truth of God, the concept of an "obvious, literal interpretation" of anything is anathema to Judaism. You're supposed to struggle with the texts, peeling back layers of meaning, context and application, finding patterns, etc. The truth doesn't come from reading a verse, but through a lifetime of focussed study. It is also part of the tradition that the revealed truth is understood in the context of the world as it is experienced---G-d doesn't lie. If your observations contradict your understanding of the Torah, your understanding is flawed.

Someone could write something very opaque and a bit random and if it were told to me that it was a holy text, it might inspire an equivalent amount of lifelong struggle

I have no idea why G-d put dinosaur bones on Earth. It has no effect on my belief that G-d created the world, and on how old it is.

If you feel very strongly about it, then when you create a world, make it's physical age and time age match :-p

> were... implanted by God to waylay followers without enough faith and basically confuse us?

To give you free will. The free will to believe in God or not believe is the most fundamental free will there is.

If there is incontrovertible proof of God then there is no free will.

Judaism does NOT believe there is proof the earth is only 6000 years old (i.e. young earth creationism has never been part of Judaism).

The Earth is both 6000 years old and billions of years old. (And I mean real years, no semantic games on the meaning of "year".)

Most Jews and Christians don't ascribe to the 6000 year old earth view. That's a relatively modern 20th-century interpretation and mostly driven by Christian fundamentalism in the USA.

It's true that a lot of theology that we might think is "ancient" or "traditional" isn't really. However, the Jewish year (currently 5777) is widely at least referred to across Jewish denominations.

This reckoning is called לבריאת העולם‎ or Anno Mundi in European cultures and does officially refer to the creation (בריאת). Wikipedia says that the current consensus about this timescale was fixed by Maimonides in 1178 CE.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anno_Mundi

I should add that writing dates in the Jewish calendar doesn't necessarily imply that one using the calendar personally believes that it literally refers to the age of the world, but most users would probably agree that "Jewish tradition" in some sense has regarded it that way.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dating_creation#Early_Jewish_e...

According to wikipedia the Christian calculation traditions started with the earliest Christians and continued through medieval European times https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Young_Earth_creationism#Biblic...

All orthodox Jews ascribe to this.

I'm not sure how you can claim this is a 20th-century interpretation as I'm currently looking at writings from ~2000 years ago (the Mishnah and Talmud) that discuss it.

I don't agree that all orthodox jews subscribe to it, although I do agree that it's a commonly held belief.

The universal values held by Orthodox Jews are the articles of faith of Maimonides ("Rambam")[1], which are included in regular prayers. Maimonides is, as a result, extremely well regarded among Orthodox Jews as a source of values.

Maimonides took the position that Genesis (Bereishis) was to be considered allegorical when its plain reading conflicted with science[2]. This was a source of debate among his contemporaries, and it's uncontroversially the case that he strongly believed this.

As a former Orthodox Jew, I don't think that Orthodox Jews are doing themselves any favors by teaching their children that if they believe that the Torah is not in conflict with science, they are violating basic, universal Orthodox values when Maimonides disagrees with that point of view.

[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maimonides#The_13_principles_o...

[2]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Allegorical_interpretations_of...

Yeah, but orthodox Jews are like 10% of Jews.

As a conservative Jew, I think this view is a minority position amongst all the liberal movements.

True.

I was mostly stating that in regards to the viewpoint of orthodox Jews as espoused in the GP.

My main point was that it is not an idea that came about in the 20th century.