Verified answer

The stories of Genesis were mainly like morality plays. They originally were part of the ORAL tradition of the early Hebrews. These were stories usually told around the nighttime tribal fires for both entertainment and to teach a lesson. Five different oral traditions were rather poorly combined in an attempt to form a continuous narrative. It is the overlap of the 5 different traditions where the so-called "errors" that atheists are fond of pointing out that the say "disprove" the Bible. They forget that the Bible isn't trying to "prove" anything. It is simply what it is... the story of one people's GROWTH in faith and understanding. NONE of the stories, especially in the first five books should be taken literally. The trivia of what happened was NOT important to the writers. What was important was the message. And they relate that message according to the understanding of God which they had at that time. This understanding grows over time and can be seen more clearly if you read the books in the order in which they were written rather than the order that they are included in the Bible.

Don't get focused on the trivia of what a "day" was.... that has nothing to do with the message.

It is Christ's teachings of love and the brotherhood of man which are the focus of the New Testament.... not if slavery existed then or women were considered second-class then. The more that people focus on trivia.... "Hell is Fire and Brimstone" "Hell is the grave" "Hell is separation from God".... the less His lesson of love is taught.

Most of Genesis is a historical narrative. Genesis 1 does not assert the world was created in six days, neither does it assert when the world was created. It only asserts the world was created (Genesis 1:1) that it became without form and void (Genesis 1:2) and that the already existing earth was restored as a life bearing planet in six days (Genesis 1:3 to the end of the chapter).

This understanding is validated by Genesis 2:4 which asserts the earth has had "generations" indicating multiple incarnations..

There is no basis in the text to assert it as being allegorical, neither is there any practical reason to assert it is allegorical unless one misreads Genesis 1:3 to the end of the chapter as the initial creation of the world which as demonstrated above is incorrect. Genesis 1:3 represents the current, latest generation of the earth, with there being many generations before (as demonstrated by the fossil record).

Neither, really. It's an adaptation of older Mesopotamian creation myths, probably already well known to its readers, to Hebrew monotheism. The only real point of it is to relate that there is only one God who created all things, and who rules all things; not a collection of gods in contention with one another. The explanation of the Sabbath is a nice touch -- in the original myth, the Sabbat was a full lunar cycle, not a week.

No Genesis is not a parable it is the simplest explanation on how G-d created the earth. As far as we know a day for G-d could be one rotation of our galaxy for all we know.

An all-knowing, all-loving God could not have written such appalling verses into the Bible. It should be obvious to you that primitive men wrote this book, not God.

Why don't you ask God to show you a sign by praying?