What reality? Evolution—should the data become “overwhelmingly in favor.” So says Professor Bruce Waltke, professor of Old Testament and Hebrew at Reformed Theological Seminary, in a video from the BioLogos Foundation, posted by Chaplain Mike at the Internet Monk blog.
Given the resistance to the idea of evolution by many (not all) Reformed folk, this seems like a dicey proposition. But, in fact, there were early, cautious advocates of evolutionary theory in the Reformed camp—B.B. Warfield, known also for his high view of scriptural inerrancy, being one. (Evolutionary theory being something separate from Darwinism as an ideology, it should be added.)
So are we being asked to have Scripture’s account of the beginning of all things judged by worldly wisdom, and thereby opening a fissure in the rock of our assurance that God had spoken to us in his Word authoritatively and perfectly? Only if we insist that we know what the intention of the biblical authors was when enscripturating that Word in the first place.
In other words, what if we’ve been reading Genesis wrong—and what if it’s about something other than the beginning of the world? Then the squabble over creation in seven days vs. evolution over billions of years becomes irrelevant, no?
Check out Peter Enns’ contributions to the BioLogos website, namely, his “Adam is Israel” and “Paul’s Adam” articles. Quick abstract: If the Genesis text was written, as many scholars assume, sometime between 500 and 450 B.C., then what we may be looking at is not an attempt at a literal primeval “history” of universal origins, but rather one of Israelite origins. And the story of the Garden of Eden is but a recapitulation of Israel’s being cast out of their “Eden”—the promised land—during the Babylonian Captivity.
In other words, if we don’t read the Old Testament as first century Jews’ most certainly would have—as primarily about the history of Israel’s birth, death, and awaited resurrection—then we will always be approaching the biblical texts with denominationally colored glasses.
It should be noted that Enns is not offering a definitive exegesis of the opening chapters of Genesis. He is proposing yet one more way of looking at what many scholars already believe is a reinterpretation by the biblical author(s) of Near Eastern creation myths, which is intended to disclose what is unique about the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob and His promise to redeem his people and obliterate leviathan/chaos—that is, sin and death—once and for all.
What, exactly, is inerrant when we speak of the authority of Scripture? The words must mean something before we can speak of their being true. And the texts must relate one to the other in a certain way, with a certain through line of consistency and intention. They have their own history, intrinsically connected to a history of a people. What did the biblical authors intend when they set pen to paper (so to speak) informed by and rooted in that history? If you don’t have an answer to that question, then defenses of biblical inerrancy become directionless.
March 26th, 2010 | 10:39 am | #1
Anthony Sacramone: “What, exactly, is inerrant when we speak of the authority of Scripture? The words must mean something before we can speak of their being true. And the texts must relate one to the other in a certain way, with a certain through line of consistency and intention. They have their own history, intrinsically connected to a history of a people. What did the biblical authors intend when they set pen to paper (so to speak) informed by and rooted in that history? If you don’t have an answer to that question, then defenses of biblical inerrancy become directionless.”
(On one subpoint) To answer the boldfaced question, Moses intended for his audience to understand that the account of Adam and Eve is historical fact-narrative.
To deny that is to deny inerrancy. And I affirm what you say, if folks can’t even affirm a historical Adam or that Adam was real, then their defenses that they hold to biblical inerrancy and to the Authority of Scripture is directionless.
March 26th, 2010 | 12:02 pm | #2
A large danger in this topic is to unnecessarily divide it into just two alternatives that are far apart. Of course, there are bad sides that everyone should avoid, such as-
A) The Bible is nothing but metaphor, speculative writing by people that were completely unable to transcend their time and culture. This is because there is no “god” in the first place, let alone “truth”. In it’s worst expression, this extreme “affirms” that every “word” ultimately must have “parentheses.”
Or
B) Only the King James Bible as it was understood by a layman living in 1836 who was untouched by academics may be regarded as authoritative. (My room mate at the Sem. Had a friend of his family try to dissuade him from pursuing higher education telling him that if he really had faith, further book learning was unnecessary, nay, even harmful.)
None of use put forth either of these views, but I suspect in the back of our minds, we view them as the logical conclusion of our opponents’ thinking, if not by him, then by someone who follows his path.
That said, let me point out that for each of our considerations (good considerations, necessary considerations) there can be distinctions that are no less consequential for their subtlety. For instance-
While I agree with Truth Unites… and Divides’s statement,
“To answer the boldfaced question, Moses intended for his audience to understand that the account of Adam and Eve is historical fact-narrative.”
I would add that what Moses’ (and his first readers) understood as an historical fact-narrative may be different that how we think of it. I DO NOT mean that he was engaging in myth. But his understanding of enumeration of data, of time, and of relevance may have been different than ours.
Couple this with our (by ‘our’ I mean Orthodox Christians who affirm inerrancy) knowledge that the Bible was written by God and hence self-consciously to the immediate audience plus all subsequent generations. This includes the understanding that each generation gives to the Text and the response the God gives to their understanding. Most of the Bible is given as a back and forth conversation with the Church, God proclaiming, His people responding (for good or ill) and God again addressing them. This brings in the use of God’s Word by the Church and its understanding of it to our appreciation of any passages meaning. So, can anyone think of an example in the Bible where the Genesis account is seen as a description of the birth of Israel and not of the birth of humanity and of God’s relation to His creation?
I can’t. More over there are mythical accounts in the Bible of Israel’s creation, like Ezekiel 16. They are quiet different than Genesis 1 and 2.
March 26th, 2010 | 2:24 pm | #3
If we’ve been reading Genesis wrong since, say, it was written, we’re screwed. Jesus and Paul included.
March 26th, 2010 | 3:42 pm | #4
“If we’ve been reading Genesis wrong since, say, it was written, we’re screwed. Jesus and Paul included.”
Agreed. Because the hearers and readers of what Jesus and Paul said and wrote believed that both of them held to a historic Adam who was real.
March 26th, 2010 | 4:02 pm | #5
David and TUAD,
It never ceases to amaze me that this is even a matter of debate. Genesis is about a clear as it comes, even to giving numbers of years which can be added up right to Abraham and beyond.
I’ll throw my lot in with Jesus and Paul. If they’re screwed, well I’d rather be there, with them, than in whatever other heaven there might be out there.
March 26th, 2010 | 4:20 pm | #6
I don’t think biblical hermeneutics should be driven by current scientific interpretations based on materialist, uniformitarian assumptions.
The text of Genesis presented no interpretive difficulty for the Jews or the Church until old-earth assumptions started to pop up in science a couple of hundred years ago. It is pretty clear what the text means.
If one wishes to disagree with what the text plainly states in favor of current suppositions of science, then I think it would be more transparent for them to simply say so and either give up or redefine the idea of what biblical inerrancy means means to them. I would not agree with them, but I would find it to be a more respectable position to take then to try to force old earth assumptions into a text that plainly reads otherwise.
March 26th, 2010 | 5:22 pm | #7
“To Deny That Reality Would Make Us a Cult”
To Deny Adam’s Historicity is to Deny Inerrancy.
March 26th, 2010 | 9:36 pm | #8
David, TUAD, etc.,
Before getting defensive, read the post and try to listen to what Enns and Waltke are actually saying before critiquing them. I think you might find that they are not being heretical or denying inerrancy (if understood in the same manner as the Reformers and Fathers, or say Old Princeton). Let’s not forget that this is the very same Waltke that Reformed friends were quoting verbatim just months ago against Enns’ interpretation of inerrancy. In other words, we’re not talking about some liberal here.
I’m a card-carrying ETS member who holds firmly to biblical inerrancy. I personally believe in an historical Adam and Eve, but think you both might be missing the point of this post, or whether or not denying an historical Adam/Eve denies inerrancy.
The most important question of all is what God has revealed in Genesis. Important factors are the context within Scripture, the authorial intention, the historical interpretation within Scripture itself and even the historical interpretation of the church. At this point, it has nothing to do with questions of origins or evolution.
What type of texts are Genesis 1 and then 2-4? Are there signs that the texts developed over time? Are there signs that they have always been interpreted in a literal or figurative manner within Scripture itself?
In regards to Genesis 1, conservative, evangelical scholars speak with one voice…this text is not meant to be read historically, scientifically, etc. but theologically. Sailhammer refers to the passage as a “hymn,” others such as Allen Ross, John Walton, Waltke, etc. see it as a poem or hymn about God coming to dwell in His temple. It’s full of temple imagery. A great starting point for thinking this way is Allen P. Ross’s fine work of biblical theology, “Recalling the Hope of Glory: Biblical Worship from Eden to the New Jerusalem.”
But now you start to see the problem…there was no temple in the time of Moses…there was a tabernacle, but the language seems more in line with the later language of God dwelling in the temple. Whenever you combine this with the other passages that are clearly non-Mosaic (such as his death, or city names that are clearly updated to fit their names from a much later period), you start to wonder how much the text has been edited at later times to remain relevant to the Israelites situation.
Thus, as it currently stands, you can search the Old Testament departments at Reformed, Westminster, Southern, Wheaton, TEDS, Regent or any other well known evangelical seminary and you will search in vain to find an Old Testament scholar who believe that the Pentateuch as we have it is word-for-word what was penned by Moses. Few would deny that it originated with Moses (some would), but most would also admit that it was edited and revised at later periods to keep current with Israels current situation and to rethink God’s previous revelation through what God was doing in their midst currently. It is their being honest with the text God has given us that requires these OT scholars to make such an admission.
So which text is Scripture, as in what is profitable for the church? Is it what Moses wrote originally or the text that was read in the synagogues in the time of Jesus? Wouldn’t we all agree that it is the latter which Paul tells Timothy is God-breathed?
As Christians, the Holy Spirit has revealed to us that this is God’s written revelation. Theologically speaking, we don’t believe the text because of its scientific or historical accuracy any more than we believe it due to its grammatical precision. No, we believe the text because God has given it to us. In light of this reality, we must read the Pentateuch through a variety of layers.
1. What does the tradition given to us by God through Moses mean?
2. What does the tradition given to us by God through Moses mean in light of the Israelite situation near Sinai?
3. What does the tradition given to us by God through Moses mean in light of later editing and later cultural situations?
4. How is God speaking through this text to us today?
So a text like Genesis 1 must be read as the original tradition, what it would have meant to God’s people without latter revelation at the time of Moses, what it meant to latter Jews who saw it as speaking about God coming to dwell in his temple and probably shaped the original tradition to align with God’s progressing revelation, what did Genesis 1 mean in light of Christ’s coming and what does it mean to the church today?
-to be continued-
March 26th, 2010 | 10:20 pm | #9
The last bit of the last comment may seem as though I am suggesting that truth changes. I most certainly am not. I’m merely suggesting that until Christ came, humanity did not have God’s full revelation. Thus, we should try to understand Scripture in its original context(s).
The story of Adam and Eve was surely known before Moses. Thus, it had a previous cultural context. We should try to understand it in this context.
According to an evangelical understanding, God then had Moses write it down, but God surely intended for it to speak not merely generically across the ages, but specifically to the people in the wilderness. We should try to understand it in this context.
If you believe the parallels with Israel’s history and exile, then you will add that later editors (through the Holy Spirit no less than Moses himself) shaped the story to tell of this latter situation as well as the previous ones. We should understand it in this context.
If you believe that Christ is the second member of the Trinity, come into the world to deliver humanity (which is the literal meaning of ‘dm or Adam in Hebrew) from their sin, then you need to understand the text in this context.
The truth never changes, but God progressively revealed Himself before Christ, and that situation changed drastically. Thus, the people of God in the 8th century could not have interpreted the text in its fullest Christological meaning.
And now we’re finally getting somewhere, haha.
You see, Christ came as the fullness of God’s revelation to man. As a human, he surely understood the text as any other 1st century Jew would have understood the text. He would have read about Adam and Eve and understood it in light of Second Temple Judaism and rabbinic interpretation at the time. Thus, he would have read it not merely in its original theological meaning, but in light of these latter meanings.
When Christ becomes the second Adam, he is not merely doing this to forgive people their sins, but to show that just as the Adam/Eve narrative has been interpreted and shaped to tell of Israel’s story. He will bring Israel back from exile! He will become their temple! The New Covenant (to which Adam/Israel has been disobedient) will now come through His blood! To read the Adam/Eve narrative as merely being about the ontological origin of sin actually diminishes the full story that is being said in light of Israel’s history.
And when you move to Paul’s understanding of Adam in Romans 5 (the real issue here…not Genesis) you start to see that he too may not be talking just about an historical Adam, but about Israel. All sorts of questions permeate Romans such as “Why does Israel continue to be unfaithful to the covenant whenever they know that faith brings righteousness?” As his focus just before chapter 4 starts to narrow in on Israel, you see that he is really concerned with the issues of justification in light of Israel’s continual rebellion against the covenant.
So could Paul be using Adam in light of the other meanings listed above? Could Paul be using Adam to answer the more pertinent question of why Israel is separated from God because of their unfaithfulness to covenant?
I believe so. One reason I think he is talking primarily about Israel (other than the context of Romans 5 in the book as a whole) has to do with his use of “all.” Paul is not a universalist, so who does he means whenever he says through Christ life comes to “all?” As a Reformed Christian, I would say that “all” means specifically all of his covenant people. Thus, who are the “all” to whom Adam’s rebellion brought death (or covenant separation)? Doesn’t it make more sense to say it was God’s covenant people, i.e. Israel?
Now, Paul clearly believes that all men have sinned and fallen short of God’s glory (3:23), not just God’s covenant people, but maybe here in chapter 5 the focus isn’t on everyone, but specifically on God’s people.
And now to inerrancy.
Since it can be argued that the historical Adam isn’t the context of Romans 5, and that it was possibly Adam as representative of Israel, how does this bear on inerrancy?
I don’t care about the syllogisms people use to argue for/against inerrancy. What I care about is Scripture, and Jesus says in Matthew 22 and Mark 12 that people are wrong (err) because they do not know the Scriptures. Obviously this implies that if you know the Scriptures you won’t err because the Scriptures don’t err. But they don’t err in what? In their wording? Was Jesus most concerned about the grammar of the Pharisees or about their theology? Isn’t the point of holding to biblical inerrancy to say that God has not erred in what He has revealed to us in Scripture? If this is the definition of biblical inerrancy (and it is according to the Fathers and Reformers), then how would such an interpretation of Genesis and Romans 5 deny inerrancy?
So to conclude these long, rambling comments, let me suggest to you as someone who holds to an historical Adam, as well as inerrancy, that I believe that Waltke (who also holds to an historical Adam as well as evolution) and Enns (who isn’t clear, but seemingly doesn’t hold to an historical Adam) could both still hold to biblical inerrancy with confidence in the God that they both passionately serve.
March 27th, 2010 | 1:35 am | #10
Dear Kyle,
Thanks for your comments. I need time to process and do a deep think about what you’re saying and arguing.
March 27th, 2010 | 2:37 am | #11
TUAD,
Let me share something that has recently been shaping my thinking in regards to second Adam theology in the OT and in Christ. It’s from Enns old school, WTS. They have recently uploaded a lot of classes to iTunes U, and one of them is a great lecture by Doug Green called “Israel’s Enemies Under David’s Foot: The OT and the Kingdom of God.”
In one of those Biologos lectures, Enns said that Adam was rare in the OT…that may be true on a basic level, but after listening to Green’s discussion of “second Adam” theology, I’m starting to think that Adamic imagery permeates both testaments.
March 27th, 2010 | 8:26 am | #12
Kyle of many words :) -
A few notes of my own.
My comment was in reaction to this part of the post:
And the story of the Garden of Eden is but a recapitulation of Israel’s being cast out of their “Eden”—the promised land—during the Babylonian Captivity (italics mine).
That says to me, “You think that Genesis is about the creation of the world, but it’s merely a story the Israelites post-dated to explain their origins.”
In a word, no.
Second, Jesus’ understanding of the scriptures was not that of a first-century Jew. If it were, why did He spend so much of His time correcting first-century Jews (from the age of 12)? For Jesus, as opposed to Enns, it was not book larnin’ and speculation. And Jesus didn’t use “quotey-fingers” when He talked about what “Moses” said, but “most scholars” can’t help but do so when speaking about the Torah. Have these scholars read what Jesus said about them?
Finally, I am not arguing for a wooden hyper-literalist interpretation of scripture, where nothing comments on anything else. With your “now we’re getting somewhere” paragraph, you’re certainly pointing to a fuller understanding of what scripture says about the nature of God’s covenant people. But such a reading is not helped by standing over the book of Genesis to say that it’s not about the creation of the world.
March 27th, 2010 | 10:23 am | #13
Kyle: “And when you move to Paul’s understanding of Adam in Romans 5 (the real issue here…not Genesis) you start to see that he too may not be talking just about an historical Adam, but about Israel.”
Three observations:
(1) The key wiggle word in the above sentence is “may.” This oftentimes leads to the opening of a door that leads to all sorts of creative speculation. Speculation that might lead to publishable papers, but not be edifying.
(2) Plausible authorial intent. Based upon author’s understanding of his audience’s plausible reader understanding…. of his written words. Would Paul’s audience, the readers and hearers of Paul’s letter, have likely believed that he was using Adam as a metaphor for Israel, or would they have likely believed that he was speaking of Adam as just Adam, the historical first human being in the Book of Genesis?
(3) Let’s look at another use of Adam by the Apostle Paul: “I do not permit a woman to teach or to have authority over a man; she must be silent. For Adam was formed first, then Eve.” (1 Timothy 2:12-13)
Would Paul’s readers and hearers think that Paul was referring to Adam as a metaphor for Israel, or to Adam as the historical first human being in the Book of Genesis?
The answer’s obvious.
So when Paul made references to Adam, did he think that his readers and hearers were sophisticated enough and nuanced enough in their understanding that he believed they would understand that in one situation when he referenced Adam, they would easily know that he was metaphorically referring to Israel, and in another case, they would know that he was referring to the historicity of a literal Adam?
I don’t think that’s plausible. I find it highly doubtful.
“So to conclude these long, rambling comments, let me suggest to you as someone who holds to an historical Adam, as well as inerrancy, that I believe that Waltke (who also holds to an historical Adam as well as evolution) and Enns (who isn’t clear, but seemingly doesn’t hold to an historical Adam) could both still hold to biblical inerrancy with confidence in the God that they both passionately serve.”
Kyle, I appreciate the suggestion, but I’m not quite buying it yet.
With all due respect, Waltke and Enns’s confidence in the God that they both passionately serve is not the issue. It muddies the waters when discussing inerrancy. It’s like granting someone carte blanche just because they are sincere in whatever they believe. They could be sincerely wrong. And being sincerely wrong just means that you’re wrong and sincere about it. And sincerity doesn’t change the fact that you’re wrong about it.
That’s the same thing as you saying that Waltke and Enns “could both still hold to biblical inerrancy with confidence in the God that they both passionately serve.” Just because they have confidence in the God they both passionately serve doesn’t justify that they legitimately hold to biblical inerrancy.
At the risk of being obstinate, I’ll still maintain my statement in comment #6:
To Deny Adam’s Historicity is to Deny Inerrancy.
March 27th, 2010 | 10:24 am | #14
Kyle: “And when you move to Paul’s understanding of Adam in Romans 5 (the real issue here…not Genesis) you start to see that he too may not be talking just about an historical Adam, but about Israel.”
Three observations:
(1) The key wiggle word in the above sentence is “may.” This oftentimes leads to the opening of a door that leads to all sorts of creative speculation. Speculation that might lead to publishable papers, but not be edifying.
(2) Plausible authorial intent. Based upon author’s understanding of his audience’s plausible reader understanding…. of his written words. Would Paul’s audience, the readers and hearers of Paul’s letter, have likely believed that he was using Adam as a metaphor for Israel, or would they have likely believed that he was speaking of Adam as just Adam, the historical first human being in the Book of Genesis?
(3) Let’s look at another use of Adam by the Apostle Paul: “I do not permit a woman to teach or to have authority over a man; she must be silent. For Adam was formed first, then Eve.” (1 Timothy 2:12-13)
Would Paul’s readers and hearers think that Paul was referring to Adam as a metaphor for Israel, or to Adam as the historical first human being in the Book of Genesis?
The answer’s obvious.
So when Paul made references to Adam, did he think that his readers and hearers were sophisticated enough and nuanced enough in their understanding that he believed they would understand that in one situation when he referenced Adam, they would easily know that he was metaphorically referring to Israel, and in another case, they would know that he was referring to the historicity of a literal Adam?
I don’t think that’s plausible. I find it highly doubtful.
“So to conclude these long, rambling comments, let me suggest to you as someone who holds to an historical Adam, as well as inerrancy, that I believe that Waltke (who also holds to an historical Adam as well as evolution) and Enns (who isn’t clear, but seemingly doesn’t hold to an historical Adam) could both still hold to biblical inerrancy with confidence in the God that they both passionately serve.”
Kyle, I appreciate the suggestion, but I’m not quite buying it yet.
With all due respect, Waltke and Enns’s confidence in the God that they both passionately serve is not the issue. It muddies the waters when discussing inerrancy. It’s like granting someone carte blanche just because they are sincere in whatever they believe. They could be sincerely wrong. And being sincerely wrong just means that you’re wrong and sincere about it. And sincerity doesn’t change the fact that you’re wrong about it.
That’s the same thing as you saying that Waltke and Enns “could both still hold to biblical inerrancy with confidence in the God that they both passionately serve.” Just because they have confidence in the God they both passionately serve doesn’t justify that they legitimately hold to biblical inerrancy.
At the risk of being obstinate, I’ll still maintain my statement in comment #6:
To Deny Adam’s Historicity is to Deny Inerrancy.
March 28th, 2010 | 1:59 pm | #15
What a surprise is to discover that how the Church understood Genesis 1 for the first 1800 years or so is now to be treated as cultic.
March 28th, 2010 | 5:15 pm | #16
Before Genesis 1 was the introduction to the Bible, it was the introduction to the Torah, written with a message for the generation of Israelites entering the Promised Land (I won’t discuss the post-exilic shaping of the book at this point).
Before we read it in the light of later Scriptures we should ask what it would have meant to that first audience. I think that is all Enns is saying.
If you compare Genesis 1-3 with Moses’ sermon in Deut 29-30, which summarizes the message of the entire Torah, the one he wants that generation to hear, you will see the same words, the same themes, the same message in both passages. The verbal and thematic correspondences are abundant and undeniable.
In the creation stories and in his final message, Moses is teaching that:
1. The good land is the gift of the true and living God to his people.
2. If his people trust and obey him, they will enjoy life in the good land.
3. If they fail to trust and obey him, they will be exiled from the good land.
4. Yet God will remain faithful to them even in failure, and will make a new covenant with them.
This is simply a close and defensible reading of the text.
March 28th, 2010 | 5:18 pm | #17
Jeff, #14. FYI, the church has read Genesis 1 in many, many different ways over history. Augustine himself wrote five books with different perspectives on the text.
March 28th, 2010 | 7:19 pm | #18
Until about 1800, I do not think that, for the most part, the Church interpreted Genesis 1 as teaching an ancient earth on the order of millions of years instead of on the order of thousands of years. By and large, Genesis 1 understood in terms of a young earth and the days were taken as literal. No “day-age,” no “gap,” no “framework.” Those are all recent innovations.
March 29th, 2010 | 10:55 pm | #19
Even if I concede your point, which I don’t, your point really doesn’t prove anything.
Until Copernicus and Galileo, the church generally interpreted the earth as flat and the center of the universe. Believers have regularly adjusted their understanding of the Bible throughout history.
Furthermore, you fail to ask what the ancient Hebrews would have thought when hearing Genesis 1. Today, we like to think we come to Scripture with a blank slate, but the reality is that our minds are filled with all kinds of preconceptions based on the knowledge we have from other disciplines.
As a simple example, Gen. 1:1 should probably be translated something like, “In the beginning, God created the skies and the land.” The author is looking out, as it were, over a landscape, and describing creation from a nonscientific, earthly observer’s standpoint.
When we read “heavens and earth,” our minds picture the cosmos, the universe, the galaxies, and a globe that is planet earth. Why? Not because we learned it from the Bible, but because our knowledge of the universe has expanded to include these things. We have telescopes. We’ve been to the moon. We’ve looked through the Hubbell telescope. We’ve visited the planetarium.
A person living in the ancient near east would have never had such conceptions. What he knew was what he saw with his eyes from the ground in the context of near eastern cosmological thought.
And he wouldn’t have been concerned at all about certain distinctions we make between “story” and “history,” between “myth” and “truth”. Whether or not you accept modern versions of something like the “framework theory” or not, it is clear that the account of Genesis 1 is clearly of a different genre than journalistic reporting or scientific description. It is more like poetry, or even liturgy; a literary formulation designed to highlight the who and why of creation, not the scientific how.
March 29th, 2010 | 11:41 pm | #20
Chaplain Mike: “Until Copernicus and Galileo, the church generally interpreted the earth as flat”
What makes you think that?
March 30th, 2010 | 7:49 am | #21
Chaplain Mike,
You seem to have forgotten that a)Ancient people weren’t dolts and b) God wrote the Bible, and He’s no dolt either.
Funny what we’ll do to “biblicize” a theory or set of theories, that began as an open attempt to explain how the world came to be, without the need for God.
Even that stuff aside, does it make sense to anyone, really, that when God says “In six days God created the heavens and the earth (or the skies and the land, if you prefer), the sea and all that is in them, and rested on the seventh day.” what he REALLY meant was “Over a indeterminate period of time, various life forms were created and changed and died, until the world as we know it eventually became recognizable to us, but most importantly, 2000 years after this indeterminate span of eons (measurable to the very year, by the way) some guy named Abram came along and Israel began.”
Do you really think that God couldn’t've explained the origin of all things differently if He hadn’t, O I don’t know, created everything from nothing in, say, six actual days?
Hey, I know, the people in Israel, 2000 years ago didn’t understand medical science like we do either. And does it really make sense that the would understand that a resurrection isn’t medically possible? Of course not. So why on earth do we imagine the Jesus actually rose from the dead.
I’m guessing it’s poetry or song or something. To describe the how and why of the beginning of the church, not the scientific facts…
March 30th, 2010 | 8:22 am | #22
The world has know for at least centuries before Christ that the earth is round. The idea that the ancients thought it was flat is a myth. The Church NEVER taught that it was flat.
In the middle ages, the Church did hold, against Galileo, that the earth was orbited by the sun, not vice versa. However, this was not the early teaching of the Church. It was a later accommodation to the science of the times. Trying to reconcile the Scriptures with science, theologians tried to find a stationary earth in the Bible. Such attempts did not represent a plain reading of the Scriptures, nor did they represent the consistent reading of the Church from the beginning.
The Galileo episode should be a warning to the Church to not let science drive the interpretation of Scripture. Because science has often changed its viewpoint about the way things work (ask Isaac Newton, Albert Einstein and Max Planck). As someone has said, he who marries the spirit of this age will be a widower in the next.
But the Church has consistently held, from the beginning, the plain sense and natural reading of Genesis 1 — six 24-hour days of creation — up until about the 1800s when theologians began to let science drive their biblical hermeneutics.
So it is quite ironic that some suggest it is cultish to hold to the long-held reading of Genesis 1 instead of adopting more complicated readings in accommodation of recent conclusions of science that are based on materialistic assumptions.
Biblical hermeneutics should not be driven by the current state of secular science, as the Galileo incident demonstrates.
March 30th, 2010 | 4:48 pm | #23
Chaplain Mike: “Until Copernicus and Galileo, the church generally interpreted the earth as flat”
Jeff Doles: “The world has know for at least centuries before Christ that the earth is round. The idea that the ancients thought it was flat is a myth. The Church NEVER taught that it was flat.”
——–
Jeff Doles: “The Galileo episode should be a warning to the Church to not let science drive the interpretation of Scripture.”
Biblical hermeneutics should not be driven by the current state of secular science, as the Galileo incident demonstrates.”
Professor Bruce Waltke: “To Deny That Reality Would Make Us a Cult”
What reality? Evolution—should the data become “overwhelmingly in favor.” So says Professor Bruce Waltke, professor of Old Testament and Hebrew at Reformed Theological Seminary
——-
I agree with Jeff Dole on both counts.
March 30th, 2010 | 7:37 pm | #24
No one said, “Ancient people were dolts.” I just think you’re missing the entire point of the Biblical story. You think it’s about cosmology. I think it’s about the Promised Land.
Genesis 1:1 is all anyone needs to hold to the first article of the Creed and stand against a naturalistic view of the universe. The rest of Gen. 1 is about God’s provision of a good land for his people, and their responsibility to fill the earth with his glory from there.
And your view of the history of interpretation of Genesis is far too reductionistic. For example, Clement of Alexandria: “That, then, we may be taught that the world was originated, and not suppose that God made it in time, prophecy adds: “This is the book of the generation: also of the things in them, when they were created in the day that God made heaven and earth.” For the expression “when they were created” intimates an indefinite and dateless production.
March 30th, 2010 | 8:09 pm | #25
Well Mike, I think it’s much clearer than that. I think it pretty plain the all of Genesis reads like history, right down to the “Adam lived such and so many years and then he died etc…”
I think it’s history, you think that modern science is to be trusted, so Genesis 1-4 as history is out.
March 30th, 2010 | 8:28 pm | #26
Who said anything about science? How does science have anything to do with my interpretation of Genesis? I have made no reference to science, in fact, my point has been that our modern scientific presuppositions are the very thing that cause us to read the text incorrectly!
March 30th, 2010 | 9:00 pm | #27
Reductionist is when you take Genesis 1, which presents itself in the language of cosmology — the creation of the heavens and the earth — and reduce it to the Promised Land. Moses might well have had the Promised Land in mind, but I don’t think that was all he had in mind. His language was much broader than that.
March 30th, 2010 | 9:45 pm | #28
You may disagree. But this position comes from a close reading of the text. Grammatically, a new subject begins in 1:2, “Now the land…” I think my reading is defensible and makes good sense of the passage in the context of the Torah’s message to its original readers. Whatever interpretation one takes, my point is that it should fit with the message of the Torah to those who first received it. The scientific questions we raise today were not on their radar.
March 31st, 2010 | 6:56 am | #29
It is a novel reading. How did the Church miss it for most of its existence and get it so wrong? If this is inherent in the text, where are the interpreters throughout the centuries who recognized it in the text? By and large, the Church has understood the text in a very way, as being cosmological, about the heavens and earth, not restricted to the Promised Land.
Believe it if you wish. My point in this thread is that the way the Church has traditionally read Genesis 1 for century upon century should not now be relegated to cult status because it conflicts with the way scientists have interpreted some data through a materialistic lens.
March 31st, 2010 | 12:20 pm | #30
Jeff, all I can say is, please do some more study and I’m convinced you’ll find that “what the church has always believed about Genesis 1″ is not what you think it is.
I’ve enjoyed chatting with you all.
Peace. Out.
March 31st, 2010 | 12:26 pm | #31
The scientific questions we raise today were not on their radar.”
I would think that they are exactly the same questions.
Questions like, How old is this earth? How did it get here? Wasn’t this all just here forever?
Those are essentially the scientific questions we raise, we just try to word them in scientific language to make them sound more sophisticated.
The scientific lens we read Genesis through is the evolutionary time scale. The millions of years from era to era.
Nothing that school teaches us to be modern science leads us to a 7 day, God did it 6000 years ago kind of conclusion.
And so we read it as poetry or the beginning of the promised land or what have you, simply because we’re convinced by “science” that a real week-long creation of everything isn’t plausible.
March 31st, 2010 | 12:45 pm | #32
St. Augustine essentially said that once we agree that the cosmos had a beginning, we’re just quibbling about dates.
March 31st, 2010 | 2:25 pm | #33
Thanks for the advice chaplain mike. I have studied it quite a bit and have yet to find where the Apostolic Fathers or the Ante/Post Nicene Father, or the medieval or later Church limited Genesis 1 to the Promised Land, or even read it primarily as being about the Promised Land. Perhaps you could point out a few of them for me.
I maintain that for the first 1800 years or so, the Church pretty consistently understood Genesis 1 as being cosmological in scope and took the plain reading of it in regard to time, believing creation to be on the order of thousands of years old, not millions of years.
Much more recently, there have been new interpretations that have come along to allow vast amounts of time into the Genesis account. I think these are hermeneutically driven by the current old earth presuppositions of science. And the question I still get stopped by is, if these novel interpretations are inherent in Genesis 1, requiring only a “close reading” of the text, then how is it that the Church failed to see them until fairly recently. That the Church has not seen them before now leads me to believe that there is nothing in the text that requires such a reading and that the text, plainly read, yields a different understanding.
There is, of course, a contradiction between the plain reading of Genesis 1 and the current assumptions and conclusions of science; that is why there have been so many attempts in recent years to avoid the plain reading, in an effort to reconcile Genesis 1 and the current state of science.
March 31st, 2010 | 4:32 pm | #34
I really can’t afford to spend any more time commenting here, but thanks to everyone for a stimulating conversation.
Jeff, all I can tell you is that the path you describe is not the path by which I came to my current conclusions. The science aspect was never really a factor for me. The only reason I ever discuss it is because I think Christians have made certain matters unnecessary battle grounds upon which to take unflinching stands.
My conclusions come from studying the text and trying to listen to good teachers, both traditional and contemporary.
For example, the modified framework interpretation I hold has its precedents at least as far back as Augustine, who repeatedly stresses in his book, On the Literal Meaning of Genesis, that the six-day structure of the text is a logical structure and has nothing to do with the passing of time.
I am thankful for this discussion and hope that it will lead us all into a deeper study of God’s Word so that we will know him and his ways better.
Peace.
March 31st, 2010 | 6:25 pm | #35
“To Deny That Reality Would Make Us a Cult”
Well, I have read both theistic evolutionists and atheistic evolutionists that evolution is a FACT.
Reality is based on facts. Objective facts.
I (and many other folks, usually Christians) deny evolution. Does that make us a member of a cult? A Christian cult?
I would guess that there are some secular liberals (and possibly even some liberal Protestants) who think that Christians denying evolution are showing mental symptoms of belonging to a de facto cult.
March 31st, 2010 | 8:46 pm | #36
“I (and many other folks, usually Christians) deny evolution. Does that make us a member of a cult? A Christian cult?”
To those who respect Natural Revelation as equal partner to Divine Revelation, rejection of any established scientific discovery makes you a well intentioned but self-deceived Christian, for you choose to see receive only half of God’s word.
Address to the Pontifical Academy of Sciences
Pope John Paul II, November 10, 1979
“[Galileo] declared explicitly that the two truths, of faith and of science, can never contradict each other, ‘Sacred Scripture and the natural world proceeding equally from the divine Word, the first as dictated by the Holy Spirit, the second as a very faithful executor of the commands of God’, as he wrote in his letter to Father Benedetto Castelli on 21 December 1613. The Second Vatican Council says the same thing, even adopting similar language in its teaching: ‘Methodical research, in all realms of knowledge, if it respects… moral norms, will never be genuinely opposed to faith: the reality of the world and of faith have their origin in the same God’ (Gaudium et Spes, 36)…
The Ecclesiastical magisterium admits the plurality of the rules for the interpretation of Holy Scripture. It teaches expressly in fact, with Pius XII’s encyclical Divino afflante Spiritu, the presence of different literary styles in the sacred books and therefore the necessity of interpretations in conformity with the character of each of them
Gaudium et Spes,
Pope Paul VI, December 7, 1965
Now many of our contemporaries seem to fear that a closer bond between human activity and religion will work against the independence of men, of societies, or of the sciences.
If by the autonomy of earthly affairs we mean that created things and societies themselves enjoy their own laws and values which must be gradually deciphered, put to use, and regulated by men, then it is entirely right to demand that autonomy. Such is not merely required by modern man, but harmonizes also with the will of the Creator. For by the very circumstance of their having been created, all things are endowed with their own stability, truth, goodness, proper laws and order. Man must respect these as he isolates them by the appropriate methods of the individual sciences or arts. Therefore if methodical investigation within every branch of learning is carried out in a genuinely scientific manner and in accord with moral norms, it never truly conflicts with faith, for earthly matters and the concerns of faith derive from the same God. (6) Indeed whoever labors to penetrate the secrets of reality with a humble and steady mind, even though he is unaware of the fact, is nevertheless being led by the hand of God, who holds all things in existence, and gives them their identity. Consequently, we cannot but deplore certain habits of mind, which are sometimes found too among Christians, which do not sufficiently attend to the rightful independence of science and which, from the arguments and controversies they spark, lead many minds to conclude that faith and science are mutually oppose.
April 1st, 2010 | 7:50 am | #37
If you can handle something in greater than 5min chunks, I suggest you may be interested in going to the website of Blackhawk church and viewing a series by John Walton (OT teacher at Wheaton) on Genesis. I would give a more direct link, but the way they have video links set up is not conducive to such
http://www.blackhawkchurch.org
April 1st, 2010 | 10:50 am | #38
I agree with the cult reference, if it’s understood thus- If, in our defense of the Faith, we present the Word as being cut off from the empirical world then we do reduce it to a cult, in that a cult is a belief which is cut off from reality, a myth in the basic sense of the word.
As Christians we affirm that God really exists, and exist in the world which He created. “The Word became flesh…” Consequently, we take up the burden of coming to terms with the measurable reality around us. There is a short step from, “The world only appears old.” To “Jesus only appeared to be resurrected.”
If we tolerated some of the reasoning techniques of young earth creationism, in our theology, we would be guilty of gross sophistry. Always, take heart the Truth is always and ultimately on God’s side, so we need not fear to let the chips (and the evidence) fall where it may.
April 1st, 2010 | 12:15 pm | #39
Thanks, Pastor Spomer. I do not think the suggestion has been put forth here that the Word is somehow cut off from the empirical world (that would seem to me to be a form of gnosticism). But what has been presented as a “reality” in the topic title of this thread is not actually a reality but an interpretation.
Neither the theory of evolution nor a millions of years old earth are facts — they are interpretations of data through the lens of certain presuppositions. Neither those interpretations nor the assumptions upon which they are based are infallible or unassailable (to hold them as such, well, that would be cultic). They cannot be equated with reality, not even with empirical reality, merely a particular view of empirical reality.
So to hold an interpretation of the Genesis creation account that differs from the current scientific consensus is not at all the same as divorcing the Word from the empirical world.
The “appearance” of age is only a problem if one has made certain unwarranted assumptions about the way a thing must have originated and the date of that origination. For example, if God made man fully formed and mature in one day then the age of that man on that day would be one day. Normally, the process requires 9-month gestation and a certain number of years for a man to reach maturity. And if we could somehow go back and see Adam on the day of his creation, we might assume that he was a certain number of years old, if we made assumptions about how he was created. But we would be wrong, and our error would not be in his appearance but in our perceptions based on our assumptions. But if we let go of our assumption that everything has ever and always happened at the same rate, then we will not be fooled by our perception about appearance. So, the world appears old only to those who have made certain assumptions.
BTW, I don’t know of any YECs (Young Earth Creationists) who have denied the actually bodily resurrection of Jesus from the dead. All the ones I have seen defend it quite vigorously. OTOH, I have seen some OECs who denied it.
April 1st, 2010 | 2:59 pm | #40
So to hold an interpretation of the Genesis creation account that differs from the current scientific consensus is not at all the same as divorcing the Word from the empirical world.
When you deny the Truths that science discovers, you reject half of God’s revelation (Natural Revelation). So yes, it is the same as divorcing the Word from the empirical world. Please understand that is how the Catholic and Orthodox Christian churches perceive your well-intentioned by misdirected understanding of Scripture.
April 1st, 2010 | 3:39 pm | #41
You cannot equate scientific opinion with natural revelation, or with Truth on a par with the Word of God. THAT is a cultic mindset because it makes a religious claim for science that science does not even make for itself. Science, as a methodology, can never make any claim to absolute knowledge for itself, although scientISM often tries to.
April 1st, 2010 | 4:30 pm | #42
“When you deny the Truths that science discovers, you reject half of God’s revelation (Natural Revelation). So yes, it is the same as divorcing the Word from the empirical world.”
R Hampton,
That’s pretty puzzling.
When we seek truth by looking at both natural revelation and special revelation, we can’t avoid interpretation, right? And our interpretation is fallible. We can be wrong in our interpretation of Scripture, and we can be wrong in our interpretation of physical data.
It’s obviously not true that “If you disagree with the current majority scientific consensus, you are rejecting the Truth of Natural Revelation,” because the scientific community does get things wrong. It’s also not true that “If you disagree with the common interpretation of the Bible, then you are rejecting the Truth of Special Revelation”, because people misunderstand Scripture.
We have to say a lot more than that, to figure out what to do with apparent conflicts. But can you agree with that much?
If so, do you see how that should stop you from saying “yes, it is the same as divorcing the Word from the empirical world”?
April 1st, 2010 | 4:35 pm | #43
Fides et Ration
Pope John Paul II, September 14, 1998
34. This truth, which God reveals to us in Jesus Christ, is not opposed to the truths which philosophy perceives. On the contrary, the two modes of knowledge lead to truth in all its fullness. The unity of truth is a fundamental premise of human reasoning, as the principle of non-contradiction makes clear. Revelation renders this unity certain, showing that the God of creation is also the God of salvation history. It is the one and the same God who establishes and guarantees the intelligibility and reasonableness of the natural order of things upon which scientists confidently depend, and who reveals himself as the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. This unity of truth, natural and revealed, is embodied in a living and personal way in Christ, as the Apostle reminds us: “Truth is in Jesus” (cf. Eph 4:21; Col 1:15-20). He is the eternal Word in whom all things were created, and he is the incarnate Word who in his entire person (30) reveals the Father (cf. Jn 1:14, 18). What human reason seeks “without knowing it” (cf. Acts 17:23) can be found only through Christ: what is revealed in him is “the full truth” (cf. Jn 1:14-16) of everything which was created in him and through him and which therefore in him finds its fulfilment (cf. Col 1:17).
79. Developing further what the Magisterium before me has taught, I intend in this final section to point out certain requirements which theology—and more fundamentally still, the word of God itself—makes today of philosophical thinking and contemporary philosophies. As I have already noted, philosophy must obey its own rules and be based upon its own principles; truth, however, can only be one. The content of Revelation can never debase the discoveries and legitimate autonomy of reason. Yet, conscious that it cannot set itself up as an absolute and exclusive value, reason on its part must never lose its capacity to question and to be questioned. By virtue of the splendour emanating from subsistent Being itself, revealed truth offers the fullness of light and will therefore illumine the path of philosophical enquiry. In short, Christian Revelation becomes the true point of encounter and engagement between philosophical and theological thinking in their reciprocal relationship.
April 1st, 2010 | 4:38 pm | #44
R Hampton,
I don’t think the issue is that we’re misunderstanding how the Roman and EO churches see our understanding of Scripture.
And what difference should it make to see how that group sees the Protestant view of Scripture?
Also, most of what is taught today as evolutionary science would be almost nonsensical or at least unrecognizable to Darwin and his contemporaries. What makes you think that what will be taught in 100 years (or less) won’t be equally puzzling to today’s “scientists”.
Because science is essentially observation, as our mindset changes, or our tools change, so changes the observation, and so changes science.
April 1st, 2010 | 4:41 pm | #45
R Hampton,
Please…what difference does Pope John Paul II’s view of science make?
Even if someone ignores legitimate science or logic, if it is because that science or logic contradicts Scripture, what of it?
April 1st, 2010 | 5:42 pm | #46
R Hampton,
The mistake you are making is in equating the changing conclusions of science with the Truth of nature and treating as on a par with divine revelation. Science does not even claim that for itself. And I do not believe the Pope of the Roman Catholic Church treat scientific consensus on that level. Science is not some sort of infallible magisterium on nature, and its conclusions, by the limited nature and scope of its methodology, do not constitute some sort of ex cathedra pronouncements. It can never guarantee us Truth.
April 1st, 2010 | 7:42 pm | #47
Jeff Doles,
Nothing can guarantee us Truth, not even Scripture. Humans use Science and Theology – both essentially pieces of the single, unified truth – to understand God as best we can. In this respect, the use of Science to know Creation is no different then the use of Theology to Scripture. For example, several decades ago the Southern Baptist Convention understood the Bible to support segregation, but takes the opposite stance today. Of course the Bible had not changed in all those years, just our understanding of it.
“This truth, which God reveals to us in Jesus Christ, is not opposed to the truths which philosophy perceives. On the contrary, the two modes of knowledge lead to truth in all its fullness.”
April 1st, 2010 | 9:50 pm | #48
So, seeing that science is not infallible, then to disagree with particular conclusions that are based on particular assumptions is not at all the same thing as rejecting half of God’s revelation. It is merely rejecting particular fallible interpretations of data.
April 2nd, 2010 | 12:22 am | #49
R. Hampton: “Nothing can guarantee us Truth, not even Scripture.
Was this a typo? Did you mean to write this instead:
“Nothing can guarantee us Truth, not even the Magisterium.
April 2nd, 2010 | 3:33 pm | #50
Jeff Doles,
Science is not infallible, but neither is it so untrustworthy as to posit a 6,000 year old earth. So when YECs, for example, disregard or twist the the findings of Science (our knowledge of Creation gained through Reason), they inadvertently reject half of Revelation.
TUAD,
Be it the Magisterium, Scripture, or the Periodic Table, nothing can guarantee us Truth — such is faith. But by using Science and Theology as our means to understand Creation and Scripture, we are led to the unity of Truth as it is fully embodied in Christ.
April 2nd, 2010 | 4:34 pm | #51
So…
You not saying that disagreeing with current scientific consensus is necessarily “divorcing the Word from the empirical world”, then? Not in general?
You’re saying specifically, “The empirical evidence against a young earth is so strong that believing in a young earth divorces the Word from the empirical world”?
April 2nd, 2010 | 7:14 pm | #52
Yes, but that is just one example of how Christians reject Natural Revelation. When speaking of Dinosaurs and their apparent age, Ken Ham of Answers in Genesis argues;
“If you remove the evolutionary framework, get rid of the millions of years, and then take the Bible seriously, you will find an explanation that fits the facts and makes perfect sense.”
Many Christians make similar errors when trying to understand how Science and Theology are complimentary aspects of Truth, and thus “divorce the Word from the empirical world”.
And you can’t use the fallibility of Science to justify a belief in Creationism, any more than you can you use the fallibility of Theology to justify a belief in Segregation. It’s not a loophole that Christians may use to be suspicious of Science.
April 2nd, 2010 | 7:51 pm | #53
In previous ages people believed the earth to be the center of the universe.
In the scientific age, people believe themselves to be the center of the universe.
Hm.
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