Just posted at BreakPoint: my review of God and Evolution, edited by Jay W. Richards. I begin with:
“Christians don’t think. They get all their beliefs handed to them, and they’ve been taught never to ask questions.”
Check it out!
_______________
Possibly related posts (automatically generated):
In your review you state this. “Clearly God and the Blind Watchmaker thesis are a complete mismatch.” Well on the face of it that would seem obvious. But is it?
Richard Dawkins says evolution explains the appearance of design in nature. He says the watchmaker is blind. The question is how certain can he and the Darwinian evolutionists be of the blindness of the watchmaker. Do they really know that God is not present. Can they prove it. No, they don’t know and can’t prove it. This is the basic issue that faith community has had with Darwinian evolution. Unfounded and unprovable claims as to what science has proved. They say there are places where evolution explains the process. They’re right. However, that doesn’t mean you can infer God’s absence.
Intelligent design theorists, I believe, have the same kind of problem. Within intelligent design is the idea that through science we can discover God’s workings. Intelligent design says we can examine the development of life and find the places that God is almost certainly present. It says if science can’t explain it then God certainly does. This is the basic issue that the scientific community has had with intelligent design. Unfounded and unprovable claims as to what science can prove. They say there may be places where evolution cannot explain the process. They’re right. However, that doesn’t mean you can infer God’s presence.
I agree with both critiques. Of course, the Darwinian evolutionists haven’t proven that God is not present in evolution and they can’t know if the watchmaker is really blind. Similarly, intelligent design advocates can’t show that the things evolution doesn’t explain prove God’s presence.
So, does that leave us a place for any understanding at all. I think so. First, the places where science works are the places where science works. If literally thousands of scientists use the theory of evolution to conduct scientific research that yield vast legitimate discoveries (all of which is true) then they are right about evolution as far as that goes. That, however, tells them nothing about whether God designed the evolution they use or supports it one way or another.
Does intelligent design tell us something. Well, probably that science will never have all the answers even within a single field of science like biology. And if science can’t do that it certainly has no business expounding on the existence of God.
Does all this tell us anything about God. To me the thing that is most often left out of discussions like these is this. God is a mystery. No, God is a profound mystery. Both sides of this discussion treat Him and that mystery much much too lightly. God is not explainable nor can he be explained way using science. It’s far too flimsy a tool. For those of us who believe in Him we know we will have an eternity to explore and know this quite infinite God and not a second of that will be without abject wonder. For those who don’t, they can’t even know this much.
“Intelligent design theorists, I believe, have the same kind of problem. Within intelligent design is the idea that through science we can discover God’s workings. Intelligent design says we can examine the development of life and find the places that God is almost certainly present. It says if science can’t explain it then God certainly does. This is the basic issue that the scientific community has had with intelligent design. Unfounded and unprovable claims as to what science can prove. They say there may be places where evolution cannot explain the process. They’re right. However, that doesn’t mean you can infer God’s presence.”
I think you are misconstruing Intelligent Design. ID isn’t the idea that we can ‘discover God’s workings’; ID is actually agnostic with respect to who or what the Intelligent Designer actually is. Rather, per ID.org, “The theory of intelligent design holds that certain features of the universe and of living things are best explained by an intelligent cause, not an undirected process such as natural selection.” Further, It isn’t some vague god of the gaps argument. We can infer design because ID is the only known cause of the vast amounts of specified complexity we find in the Universe’s fine tuning and life (DNA). This is Inference to the Best Explanation, a scientific method Darwin himself employed in his Origin of Species.
Also, I could probably cite a dozen articles where scientists articulate how utterly useless evolution theory is in the day-to-day activies of biologists.
As far as who or what the intelligent cause is, I find that a less than compelling as an argument. Either the intelligent cause is God or there isn’t an intelligent cause.
Also, ID certainly is not the “only known cause of the vast amounts of specified complexity we find in the Universe’s fine tuning and life (DNA).’ Theistic evolution is every bit as good an explanation and avoids the god in the gaps problems that are intrinsic to ID no matter how much they deny it.
As far as how “useless evolution theory is in the day-to-day activies of biologists.” You can run that by Francis Collins. He doesn’t agree with you.
“As far as who or what the intelligent cause is, I find that a less than compelling as an argument. Either the intelligent cause is God or there isn’t an intelligent cause.”
Well, there are other logically possible causes, such as some sort of alien life. We cannot rule that out dogmatically. But to be frank, I agree with you. However, the fact remains that ID is agnostic with respect to the Intelligent Designer.
“Also, ID certainly is not the “only known cause of the vast amounts of specified complexity we find in the Universe’s fine tuning and life (DNA).’ Theistic evolution is every bit as good an explanation and avoids the god in the gaps problems that are intrinsic to ID no matter how much they deny it.”
Well, ID is at least in principle compatible with theistic evolution as I understand it, since it seems to postulate at least some sort of teleology. So this does not harm the point. However, if you’re suggesting that non-intelligent causes have been empirically shown to be able to produce thousands of encyclopedias worth of useful information found within the cell, that is demonstrably false. And you still haven’t demonstrated how ID theorists make some sort of god of the gaps appeal.
“As far as how “useless evolution theory is in the day-to-day activies of biologists.” You can run that by Francis Collins. He doesn’t agree with you.”
Other scientists disagree with him.
http://www.trueorigin.org/biologymyth.asp
http://www.evolutionnews.org/2011/01/does_nothing_in_biology_make_s042281.html
Here is a statement of both my scientific/theological position and my thoughts about the so called inclusive accommodationism of Biologos. Briefly I find the position of Biologos, which accepts neo-Darwinian evolution without question, to be very narrow minded both scientifically and theologically.
Bryan,
We basically agree. I just find ID too narrow. It puts God in a bit too small of a box for me. Theistic evolution acknowledges the necessity for intelligent cause without getting into details that I find problematic both scientifically and theologically. I’ll look into your links on evolution. Thanks.
JAD,
I haven’t found the BioLogos position to be as narrow as you suggest. I found Collins’ “Language of God” to be a pretty reasonable take on the whole thing. I think they are pretty hands off about how God accomplishes what He does. It may seem like they accept the blind watchmaker but given their belief that God is part of the process in some way means their watchmaker isn’t really blind at all. It’s an unknown how God does what he does and will most likely remain so. And that’s how it should be given the God that we believe in.
Bill T,
I think Biologos’ narrowness stems from an uncritical acceptance of neo-Darwinism. Scientific theories, especially historical theories like theories of evolution, are tentative in nature and should be examined skeptically and critically. They should not be taken by faith or as a basis of faith. An objective and critical examination of neo-Darwinian theory raises a number of questions not only about the theories accuracy but it’s utility.
For example recently geologist David Deming who identifies himself as a non-creationist and a non-ID’ist recently wrote, “there is plenty of skepticism in the scientific literature regarding the ability of natural selection alone to account for the changes we infer from the fossil record.”
For example, one problem that he writes about is that “The theory predicts uniform, gradual, and continual change. If Darwin’s theory were correct, every fossil would be a transitional form. But transitional fossils are rare.”
http://www.lewrockwell.com/orig9/deming5.1.1.html
It is a serious mistake to tie your theology tightly to a theory like that, but that is exactly what Biologos does.
Fair enough, Bill. But I’m not sure how ID puts God in a box. ID proponents fall into virtually every category on the theological/scientific/philosophical spectrum, from YEC (myself and others) to theistic evolutionism (Behe and others). ID is simply the idea that we can detect design empirically in nature, with the question of the identity of the designer being left to philosophers and theologians.
First of all, I enjoyed the review. That being said, I’ve honestly had trouble accepting that the truth of Christianity is contingent upon the age of the Earth or the means by which life appeared on it. I’m far less educated in these matters than you appear to be (I haven’t read God and Evolution, for instance), but as a Christian I see no reason not to take an agnostic position in the evolution/creation/I.D. debate.
I agree with you to a great extent, Brian, from the perspective of most of us who cannot go into the technical details of the study. God and Evolution is not so much about that, though, as it is about whether God was really running the show (or at least that’s the case for a large portion of the book). And that matters.
I find it interesting that prior to the Enlightenment/Darwinism, pretty much nobody took an agnostic position. Does that not suggest that the teachings of Scripture are rather clear and that we’ve allowed fallible, extrabiblical ideas and interpretations to affect how we understand
the Bible?
I anticipate objections like “well, ‘science’ says ‘clear, traditional biblical teaching x’ can’t possibly be true, so it must be interpreted another way”. This is scriptura sub scientia. fallible human science must submit to the infallible Bible, and not the other way around.
Sorry. I just couldn’t help myself.
And what would be so unusual about allowing extrabiblical ideas to affect how we understand the Bible? God never intended us to interpret Scripture only with Scripture! Have you never read a Bible passage life to which you did not take some extrabiblical perspective as you read?
I believe God did intend for us to interpret Scripture only with Scripture. At the very least, he did not intend for us to bring our fallible scientific ideas regarding the past which contradict the plain-sense meaning of His Word to the table.
It becomes a problem when you have to do violence to the text to get it to say what you want it to say. I find non-YEC ‘interpretations’ incredibly unconvincing.
I find it interesting that prior to the Enlightenment/Darwinism, pretty much nobody took an agnostic position. Does that not suggest that the teachings of Scripture are rather clear and that we’ve allowed fallible, extrabiblical ideas and interpretations to affect how we understand
the Bible?
One problem here is that just because belief X about Genesis was popular does not mean belief X was not itself extrabiblical and fallible. I think quite a lot of YEC thinking about Genesis comes across as extrabiblical – not necessarily wrong because of that, but certain reading beyond what the words themselves contain. Really, to some degree I find the very idea of a ‘non-extrabiblical’ reading of the bible to be impossible – utterly and completely stripping away all context just isn’t available. Getting the context right is key, and no reading is done in a vacuum.
Just my own two cents. I don’t decry YEC readings as stupid or what-have-you, but I also don’t see them as being the obvious correct way to take Genesis and so on.
“One problem here is that just because belief X about Genesis was popular does not mean belief X was not itself extrabiblical and fallible.”
It wasn’t just ‘popular’–it was pretty much the only way everyone understood Genesis up until several hundred years ago. Other Old Testament authors,Jesus, Paul and the New Testament writers, enemies of the Church and the Church fathers, Calvin, Luther–just about everybody read Genesis in this manner. This suggests that it was derived from careful exegesis of the text. The mere possibility that the plain sense meaning of the text was not the intended interpretation is not enough to overturn several thousand years of history. Or in the words of biologist David Abel, “Mere possibility is not an adequate basis for asserting scientific plausibility.”
This suggests that it was derived from careful exegesis of the text.
Or that they were just unaware of any other possibilities, period. Or the details in question (“How God did this”, etc) weren’t treated as even open to much investigation in principle, really. Certainly when Augustine thought there was another viable possibility, he entertained it. And really – Genesis itself is tremendously quiet on creation and ‘how’ it took place other than ‘God did it, here’s a tremendously brief summary of the order without any explanation of either the method or the reasoning.”
Sometimes ideas survive by inertia. And really, when I look at the text itself, I don’t find myself coming to the conclusion you are – in fact, I see it as open to interpretation on most points save for “God is the creator of all creation, bar none. His dominion is total.” (And I’ll also note that if we’re supposed to interpret scripture with scripture alone, calling on the church fathers for support and so on seems like an invalid move. That’s certainly extrabiblical. What about the Catholic practice of reading scripture through tradition, etc?)
I want to add, I also believe in an actual Adam and Eve, a real fall, original sin and so on. My ‘God is the creator of all, bar none’ was meant to apply specifically to the general question of creation.
I agree with Crude on that last comment in particular, but also in the general line he is taking.
God’s revelation comes to us through more than Scripture. That takes only a moment’s reflection to realize. Consider Genesis 1:1. What does “earth” mean there? Think of our planet in terms of its position in space, its size and shape, the proportion of solid and liquid mass to atmosphere, its rotation and tilt on axis, its magnetic poles—no, on second thought, don’t bother thinking, you don’t have to. You have it all immediately accessible in your knowledge bank, in a form very, very different from what it would have been a couple thousand years ago, or possibly even a couple hundred. How recently did we recognize that the word “planet,” which I slipped in a couple sentences above, accurately applies to Earth? We could never think of it as anything other than that now, could we? This conception of earth is something you carry into your reading of Genesis 1:1 from your knowledge of earth science, not from Scripture.
The prophets, and especially Jesus himself, continually pointed toward observable truths in God’s creation to lead us to truths about God himself.
The above two paragraphs illustrate, in two ways among many, that God could never have intended us to interpret Scripture only with Scripture. The first has obvious connections to science, but the second is no less connected, for science is observation and experience writ large. That’s about all it is.
Well, that’s all it is except for the hugely important matter of interpretation. We have data in nature that require accurately fitting together with other knowledge and theory, and it’s certainly possible to get it wrong. We have data in Scripture that also require accurately fitting together with other knowledge and theory; and church history proves we can get that wrong, too. We can get it right, too, and on the vast majority of Christian doctrine I am solidly convinced that we have it accurately sorted out with all the relevant data. As I have already shown, the data are both Scriptural and extra-scriptural.
Am I saying that extra-Scriptural truth supercedes Scripture? By no means. I am saying that they go hand-in-hand. When the Bible says God has removed our sins as far from us as the east is from the west, I use my knowledge of geography to understand that. I do not conclude that the Bible is saying that east is infinitely distant from west, because my knowledge of geography tells me that’s incoherent. In that case my knowledge of geography overrules the first-blush, apparent meaning of a Scripture verse, but it certainly does not overrule the intended meaning, the actual truth of the verse, which is that he has removed my sins as far from me as it could possibly matter forever.
Genesis 1 and 2 tell an incomplete account of creation. It’s an outline, in just a couple pages, of an immense series of events. Science has added to our knowledge bank with information that is or might be relevant to that series of events. It has the potential to fill in many of the gaps. Why would we expect so much additional information not to affect our understanding, where there are so many gaps to be filled? I think it’s odd to suppose that it shouldn’t.
If this science and its interpretation were (as many have charged) just cooked up to evade the necessity of a Creator, that would be one thing. There is nowhere near enough evidence that this is the case, however; and I am in fact convinced of the opposite: the conclusion of an old earth is being read responsibly out of the observations, not into them. If that is so, then we have information that can legitimately inform our understanding of Scripture. It would be odd not to use it as such.
Having that, we must come back to the matter of interpretation. We have a data set consisting of Scripture and God’s creation. What does it all mean when you put it all together? I think we’re still working on that, and that’s okay, too.
Bryan, you wrote,
Could you support this with respect to other OT authors, Jesus, Paul and the NT writers, specifically with respect to the age of the earth, please? There is support outside Genesis for belief in Noah’s flood, but that’s only a part of the question, and not all of these persons spoke of it anyway.
The Bible may be infallible but that doesn’t make ones interpretation of the Bible infallible.
Bryan,
“ID is simply the idea that we can detect design empirically in nature, with the question of the identity of the designer being left to philosophers and theologians.”
Saying we can detect design is, to me, the same as saying we can detect the designer. It’s a distinction without a difference. By saying, “Look, there is eveidence of design.” you are really saying “Look, there is evidence of the designer”. As far as leaving the “question of the identity of the designer…to philosophers and theologians” I find that a bit of a fast shuffle. As I said before, either the intelligent cause is God or there isn’t an intelligent cause.
JAD,
Fair enough. I can see your point. I think though that given the scientific credentials of the BioLogos leadership, they would be willing to modify their scientific views based on solid scientific evidence. I’m sure they’re familiar with the critiques of neo-Darwinism. It’s possible they just don’t find them that compelling.
Tom,
Re: #18
Thanks. That is simply a great understanding of the subject.
I’m going to address several people in this post. However, I realize how futile this is since if you’re persuaded the scientific evidence points to an old Earth, nothing is going to convince you of my point of view. I recommend answersingenesis.org and trueorigin.org for in-depth rebuttals to old-Earth arguments.
Crude,
“Or that they were just unaware of any other possibilities, period. Or the details in question (“How God did this”, etc) weren’t treated as even open to much investigation in principle, really.”
That you must resort to this type of conjecture I think is indicative of the strength of my argument. I must reassert that wild speculation or the mere meager possibility that virtually every Scripture interpreter since it’s advent was wrong is not enough to assert plausibility or to overturn several thousand years of history. Those who wish to deny the traditional understanding of Scripture bear a heavy burden of proof.
“Certainly when Augustine thought there was another viable possibility, he entertained it.”
I am aware of Augustine, and I believe he affirmed an instantaneous, supernatural creation, so I fail to see how he would strengthen your argument. Nor would this one anomalous denial of a straightforward reading of Genesis be enough to counter the legion whom affirmed it.
“And really – Genesis itself is tremendously quiet on creation and ‘how’ it took place other than ‘God did it, here’s a tremendously brief summary of the order without any explanation of either the method or the reasoning.”
Have you even read Genesis 1? Moses really couldn’t have made it any clearer that creation took place over seven literal days. He numbers the days. He says there was a morning and an evening. He uses the Hebrew word Yom which always means a literal, 24 hour day. What do you need…for him to have left you a footnote “YES I MEAN A LITERAL DAY OKAY”? This is reaffirmed in Exodus 20:9-11. I find that there is no ambiguity whatsoever.
Tom,
When I say ‘extrabiblical ideas and intepretations’, I am not talking about common sense knowledge or knowledge accrued from operational science that does not harm the text when that knowledge is read into the text. Of course God would expect that of us. I am talking about ideas that are completely foreign to the text since apparently no one was able to exegete these ideas prior to the 1700′s and they do a great amount of violence to the Scriptures. The Big Bang contradicts Genesis in just about every possible way. So does evolution, and a denial of a worldwide Flood. Accordingly, analogies regarding extrabiblical knowledge pertaining to operational earth science and geography, which do not harm the text in any way, fail dramatically.
“Could you support this with respect to other OT authors, Jesus, Paul and the NT writers, specifically with respect to the age of the earth, please? There is support outside Genesis for belief in Noah’s flood, but that’s only a part of the question, and not all of these persons spoke of it anyway.”
Here you go, Tom. I don’t have time right now to write my own discourse.
http://creation.com/new-testament-creation
http://creation.com/genesis-new-testament
JAD,
“The Bible may be infallible but that doesn’t make ones interpretation of the Bible infallible.”
So responsible hermeneutical methods play absolutely no role whatsoever, and every man’s interpretation is equally valid? This is postmodernist nonsense.
BillT,
“Saying we can detect design is, to me, the same as saying we can detect the designer. It’s a distinction without a difference. By saying, “Look, there is eveidence of design.” you are really saying “Look, there is evidence of the designer”. As far as leaving the “question of the identity of the designer…to philosophers and theologians” I find that a bit of a fast shuffle. As I said before, either the intelligent cause is God or there isn’t an intelligent cause.”
Of course design implies a designer, however, the inference to design and the identity of the designer are two separate issues, with the former being the only one amicable to science, since we can observe objects in nature but we cannot observe the designer. Accordingly, ID does not address the identity of the designer because it cannot. It is beyond the bounds of natural science.
Bryan,
That you must resort to this type of conjecture I think is indicative of the strength of my argument. I must reassert that wild speculation or the mere meager possibility that virtually every Scripture interpreter since it’s advent was wrong is not enough to assert plausibility or to overturn several thousand years of history.
Wild speculation? Show me the alternative accounts of creation that were considered and discarded by the people in question. Heck, show me developed accounts of creation while you’re at it, beyond simply affirming God creates and sustains all. I don’t think the possibilities I’m highlighting here are meager at all. Again, I point to Augustine as an example of what happened when someone thought they had a reasonable alternate possibility for how creation took place.
My speculation is very well grounded here.
I am aware of Augustine, and I believe he affirmed an instantaneous, supernatural creation, so I fail to see how he would strengthen your argument. Nor would this one anomalous denial of a straightforward reading of Genesis be enough to counter the legion whom affirmed it.
It strengthens my argument because it shows exactly what I suspect: That those considering Genesis and creation were working with very little knowledge of How God could accomplish creation, period – and the one time an alternative was thought up (Augustine) it was considered openly. Really, in his case, preferred to the ‘literal, straightforward’ reading. I can only wonder how many people followed Augustine on that.
You keep casting your reading of Genesis as ‘straightforward’. I’m saying, it’s not straightforward at all. And it doesn’t become straightforward simply because one particular reading was popular for a long period of time, in the absence of additional pertinent insight or knowledge.
Have you even read Genesis 1? Moses really couldn’t have made it any clearer that creation took place over seven literal days. He numbers the days.
Sure he could have made it clearer (Well, God could have told him how to make it clearer if he wanted.) He could have explained the methods He used to create. He could have explained how ‘morning’ and ‘evening’ were being used sans stars (or are these ‘days, to God’?). He could have given vastly more specifics.
Instead, what we get is a summary of creation that does little more than explain that A) God created all, B) He intentionally created these and those specific things, and not others (no talk of God creating horse carts or houses or such), and C) in a tremendously brief fashion, that is ridiculously easy to take as illustrative. (And from what I read, no, yom does not always mean a literal 24 hour day anyway.)
Sorry, but while I can see how someone can read Genesis as speaking of seven literal days, I can also very easily see someone taking the creation story as both literal (God created intentionally) and illustrative (‘we are leaving a lot of details out, because various specifics are not important here.’) People ran with an assumption that was reasonable in extra-biblical context. Some extra-biblical developments have taken place since then.
I didn’t say that every “man’s interpretation was equally valid.” I was saying that no one can claim that their interpretation of the Bible is infallible. That’s literally what I said.
Are you claiming that your interpretation of Genesis 1 is infallible?
In his book, The Literal Meaning of Genesis, St. Augustine writes:
The clear literal interpretation for Christians during St. Augustine’s time was that the sky was a solid dome studded with stars that, literally not figuratively, separated the upper waters from the lower waters. Why was this interpretation abandoned? It’s the most literal.
Here is how the New American Bible translates Genesis 1:6-8
If literalness is what guides your exegesis that is the way you should interpret these verses. Shouldn’t it be?
“Wild speculation? Show me the alternative accounts of creation that were considered and discarded by the people in question. Heck, show me developed accounts of creation while you’re at it, beyond simply affirming God creates and sustains all.”
I find it more plausible that, given the straightforwardness of the text, all other interpretations would have been considered untenable. Just because alternative interpretations are theoretically possible does not make them plausible or exegetically supportable. Further, if the event occurred in a day, with an evening and a morning, then it was a supernatural, rather than some sort of gradual and natural, event. Your conjecture is unpersuasive.
“I don’t think the possibilities I’m highlighting here are meager at all. Again, I point to Augustine as an example of what happened when someone thought they had a reasonable alternate possibility for how creation took place.”
Well, I don’t have a detailed account of Augustine’s opinion in front of me or an account of how me came to it, but I suspect his departure from orthodoxy was not based on a careful exegesis of the text, but rather his own personal philosophical speculations apart from the Bible. So I must contest the notion that he postulated some sort of ‘reasonable, alternative account’ which finds exegetical support in the Bible. You are welcome to try to demonstrate to us how a responsible hermeneutic will yield Augustine’s interpretation. Again I stress that Augustine is the very rare exception to the rule and he is not enough to counter the legion who affirmed the YEC position.
“It strengthens my argument because it shows exactly what I suspect: That those considering Genesis and creation were working with very little knowledge of How God could accomplish creation, period – and the one time an alternative was thought up (Augustine) it was considered openly.”
It is highly disputable, however, whether Augustine’s account finds any exegetical support in Genesis. Again, you are more than welcome to try to mine his position out of the Pentateuch.
Of note is that any of us can come up with any creation account we want. What is important is what the Bible actually says.
“You keep casting your reading of Genesis as ‘straightforward’. I’m saying, it’s not straightforward at all.”
So if it weren’t for “science”, and say, you lived in the middle ages, you’d deny that the Bible plainly teaches a literal creation week? You would dissent from the interpretive conclusions of your peers? I find that unlikely.
It is ‘straightforward’ because it seems like that is what Moses was intending to convey. Genesis 12-50 are clearly narrative history, and Gen 1-11 uses the same type of narrative, historical language found in later chapters.
“And it doesn’t become straightforward simply because one particular reading was popular for a long period of time, in the absence of additional pertinent insight or knowledge.”
I think you are subconsciously trying to downplay the issue here. It wasn’t just ‘one popular, particular reading’, rather, it was the only exegetically tenable position for the better part of three thousand years, and I believe it remains so.
“Sure he could have made it clearer (Well, God could have told him how to make it clearer if he wanted.) He could have explained the methods He used to create.”
Since the events occurred in a week, we can infer that it was supernatural. It clearly says God spoke these things into existence. “Let there be x, …and it was so. and it was evening, and it was morning…the nth day.”
“He could have explained how ‘morning’ and ‘evening’ were being used sans stars (or are these ‘days, to God’?). He could have given vastly more specifics.”
The evening/morning objection has been answered in depth:
http://creation.com/how-could-the-days-of-genesis-1-be-literal-if-the-sun-wasnt-created-until-the-fourth-day
These interpretations are interbiblically supported do no violence to the text, unlike when one is trying to cram billions of years into a week.
“Instead, what we get is a summary of creation that does little more than explain that A) God created all, B) He intentionally created these and those specific things, and not others (no talk of God creating horse carts or houses or such), and C) in a tremendously brief fashion, that is ridiculously easy to take as
illustrative.”
You omit the part where God says that this occurred in seven days, per Exodus 20:9-11.
“(And from what I read, no, yom does not always mean a literal 24 hour day anyway.)”
What I mean to say was whenever Yom is modified by a cardinal number (one, two, etc) or ordinal number (first, second…) it always means a 24-day or part thereof. 359 times Yom + number is used in the OT outside of Genesis and in every instance it means an ordinary day. And Genesis 1 may be the clearest example of all since it modifies this with an ‘evening and morning.’ You and other old Earth compromisers bear a tremendous burden of proof if you want to argue against that.
“People ran with an assumption that was reasonable in extra-biblical context. Some extra-biblical developments have taken place since then.”
I want to point out here that nothing in ordinary, operational science is a threat to a traditional understanding of Genesis. Rather, it is certain *interpretations* given to things in the realm of the historical science which are the threat. They’re just interpretations, and nothing more. Please review the literature found at answersingenesis.org and maybe you’ll come too see that the scientific case isn’t as open and shut as you’ve been told.
JAD,
“I didn’t say that every “man’s interpretation was equally valid.” I was saying that no one can claim that their interpretation of the Bible is infallible. That’s literally what I said.
Are you claiming that your interpretation of Genesis 1 is infallible?”
No, but given the interpretive history of Genesis, the genre of Genesis, textual criticism and hermeneutics and the weakness of alternative interpretations, the probability of YEC interpretation being the correct one is astronomically high.
“If literalness is what guides your exegesis that is the way you should interpret these verses. Shouldn’t it be?”
This is a straw-man. I never said the YEC modus operandi was to interpret everything literally. In Psalm 91:4, it says that God will “cover you with his feathers, and under his wings you will find refuge; his faithfulness will be your shield and rampart.” Are we to believe that God has feathers and wings? No. Rather, YEC’s take into consideration genre, context and the author’s intention. We take history as history, poetry as poetry, and so on.
I’m detecting a trend with you guys in your appealing to fringe groups and rare anomalies in an attempt to build your case. It looks like the NAB is the only such translation which uses the word dome. Further, it appears that Augustine has erred again (he’s 0 for 2 so far.) The Bible uses phenomenological language, just like we do today by saying the ‘sun rises’ even though we know better. So in a phenomenological sense, the sky *is* a dome. We find that this interpretation does no harm to the Bible as a Big Bang or evolution would. For more information, please see:
http://creation.com/is-the-raqiya-firmament-a-solid-dome
“I find it more plausible that, given the straightforwardness of the text, all other interpretations would have been considered untenable.”
What other interpretations? That’s what I’m asking for – where’s the evidence that any were even thought of and rejected? Augustine considers an alternate reading, and ends up endorsing it. It seems to me this wasn’t even given much thought in the past – maybe because it wasn’t considered as important, or as knowable, as it’s made out to be nowadays – at least, on the details in question. *That* does seem plausible.
“Further, if the event occurred in a day, with an evening and a morning, then it was a supernatural, rather than some sort of gradual and natural, event. Your conjecture is unpersuasive.”
Calling it “supernatural” doesn’t help much here. In fact it only seems to make your case shakier – I know what a natural, earth ‘day’ is. A supernatural day? What the heck is that? What could it be? And again, we’re going beyond the text by making that move.
“So I must contest the notion that he postulated some sort of ‘reasonable, alternative account’ which finds exegetical support in the Bible.”
I think you and I may simply end up disagreeing on this, because I reject the idea that scripture is supposed to be read in a vacuum, so to speak. I’m Catholic – I accept things you’d find unacceptable, and I’ll spare us both arguing over that for now. But in this particular case, I don’t think it’s proper to frame the question as one of requiring much more ‘support from Genesis’ than what I pointed out. Really, my line of argument here is that the events in Genesis – specifically the ones in question – do not seem to me to be intended as strictly literal. “Well, they were real days, but they were supernatural days” helps illustrate that.
Really, I’m not saying a YEC view is untenable. Just that it’s not the only option demanded by the text, or the most clearly reasonable one by leaps and bounds. The passages in question are thin, thin stuff to weigh much on in the sense of actual creation methods.
“So if it weren’t for “science”, and say, you lived in the middle ages, you’d deny that the Bible plainly teaches a literal creation week? You would dissent from the interpretive conclusions of your peers? I find that unlikely.”
Man, ‘what if’ scenarios like that are touchy. Would you be Catholic if you lived in the Middle Ages? I mean, doesn’t that strike you as an unfair question?
But let me try to run with it. I think if I were in the middle ages I’d regard creation as a mystery. Meaning, how God created anything, or just what methods he used. But more than that, I’d consider specifics like that unimportant, and I’d consider the ’6000 years old’ concept a reasonable idea based on extrabiblical considerations, and biblical speculation. I’d certainly not think something like.. “God was logically compelled to create as He did” or “This text must absolutely be literal in this strict sense”. But I’m trying to imagine myself in a really foreign situation about an intellectual subject, it’s tricky.
It is ‘straightforward’ because it seems like that is what Moses was intending to convey. Genesis 12-50 are clearly narrative history, and Gen 1-11 uses the same type of narrative, historical language found in later chapters.
I’m not even concerned about the rest of Genesis right now. And I certainly think Genesis is historical in a number of senses, including the creation sense. I just don’t think it’s spelling out a 6000 year old earth and a 7 day creation week. (Really, even you seem to not think it’s a straightforward 7 days. It’s 7 supernatural days.) Again, I don’t think Adam and Either are utter figments of myth. No, there was a fall, there was an act of introducing original sin.
“I think you are subconsciously trying to downplay the issue here. It wasn’t just ‘one popular, particular reading’, rather, it was the only exegetically tenable position for the better part of three thousand years, and I believe it remains so.”
And I think you’re trying to morph ‘only one view was really explored’ into ‘that was the absolutely, positively best reading ever’. Really, my impression from reading about history on this matter is that the timeframe wasn’t considered very important, and was regarded as beyond much investigation anyway.
“These interpretations are interbiblically supported do no violence to the text, unlike when one is trying to cram billions of years into a week.”
Your source is ‘deducing’ things about the earth’s rotation, etc, from Genesis. If that’s interbiblical support, then I’ll call everything I’m saying here ‘interbiblical support’. I can point at figurative language elsewhere in the bible and use that as ‘interbiblical support’ for my position – it’s a pretty loose consideration of those words.
What I mean to say was whenever Yom is modified by a cardinal number (one, two, etc) or ordinal number (first, second…) it always means a 24-day or part thereof. 359 times Yom + number is used in the OT outside of Genesis and in every instance it means an ordinary day.
Except the creation of the heavens and the earth doesn’t take place 359 times in the bible. I think it’s fair to call the context being used in Genesis 1 pretty darn singular, and given the litany of other problems and questions, interpreting ‘yom’ there so strictly is a weak case to argue. Doubly more difficult considering the morning/evening considerations, the brevity, the style of what’s being communicated, etc.
I want to point out here that nothing in ordinary, operational science is a threat to a traditional understanding of Genesis. Rather, it is certain *interpretations* given to things in the realm of the historical science which are the threat. They’re just interpretations, and nothing more. Please review the literature found at answersingenesis.org and maybe you’ll come too see that the scientific case isn’t as open and shut as you’ve been told.
I can understand why you’re coming at me with this, but let me respond: I really am not coming at this with an ‘open and shut case’ approach. I’ve told you more than once that I think the YEC interpretation is viable. I’ll further say that if you want to go on and add, ‘And I trust the bible more than science on this – historical science is not science, but extrapolation, and I reject that extrapolation’ I’m actually not going to argue with you. I won’t even mock you. There are materialists running around insisting mankind isn’t conscious and subjective experience doesn’t exist – these guys are respected. Frankly, if that’s treated as reasonable, omphalism is reasonable. And really, even though I accept an old earth and evolution, my understanding of it puts me at odds with most evolutionists and a number of TEs besides.
My attitude is simply that Genesis 1 is given to broader interpretations than you’re saying here, and doesn’t plainly state what you take it to. It’s not that I feel compelled by science – at most, I’m compelled by certain ideas, ways to look at Genesis, the text itself in what I really think is proper context. I don’t think it says what you take it to say when it comes to creation – though I certainly agree that all was created by God, that whatever processes do exist take place under God’s auspices and direction, etc.
“What other interpretations? That’s what I’m asking for – where’s the evidence that any were even thought of and rejected? Augustine considers an alternate reading, and ends up endorsing it. It seems to me this wasn’t even given much thought in the past – maybe because it wasn’t considered as important, or as knowable, as it’s made out to be nowadays – at least, on the details in question. *That* does seem plausible.”
How does one man endorsing his own creation account interpretation indicate that millions of prior exegetes never gave Genesis much thought? I think that is a bit of a stretch.
I am personally unaware of any evidence that other alternative interpretations were given serious consideration (I’m not saying there isn’t any). So based on my personal knowledge, your suggestion is possible. However, what is also possible is that we are brains in vats on the planet Neptune. But that is improbable.
What sounds more probable to you–that millions (if not billions) of prior exegetes, which included such great minds as Isaac Newton, Blaise Pascal, Thomas Aquinas, Luther and Calvin, and so on–were so mentally dull, uncreative and exegetically untalented as to not have been able to come up with a feasible alternate interpretation of Genesis, or that the text actually means what everyone said that it meant?
The strong words of C.S. Lewis come to mind about modernists writing thousands of years later and far removed from the cultural context, yet claiming to understand the text better that those living much closer to the time and culture of the writings.
“Calling it “supernatural” doesn’t help much here. In fact it only seems to make your case shakier – I know what a natural, earth ‘day’ is. A supernatural day? What the heck is that? What could it be? And again, we’re going beyond the text by making that move.”
Read again what I said:’Further, if the event occurred in a day, with an evening and a morning, then it was a supernatural, rather than some sort of gradual and natural, event. Your conjecture is unpersuasive.’ I did not say the day was supernatural, rather, that the *event* was. That is, if an event such as the creation by God of every known plant and animal kind on earth occurred within the span several says, we can safely conclude that the event was not gradual and natural. There is no mystery there.
“I think you and I may simply end up disagreeing on this, because I reject the idea that scripture is supposed to be read in a vacuum, so to speak.”
As do I.
“I don’t think it’s proper to frame the question as one of requiring much more ‘support from Genesis’ than what I pointed out. Really, my line of argument here is that the events in Genesis – specifically the ones in question – do not seem to me to be intended as strictly literal.”
Please see the additional reasons here for taking Genesis as a plain-sense historical narrative:
http://creation.com/should-genesis-be-taken-literally
“Man, ‘what if’ scenarios like that are touchy. Would you be Catholic if you lived in the Middle Ages? I mean, doesn’t that strike you as an unfair question?”
I tried to place you in that time period because I wanted to see how you’d approach Scripture as someone who hasn’t been influenced by “the scientific findings.” Genesis must be considered in it’s cultural context, as it’s original readers would have understood it, just like the Epistles.
“I’m not even concerned about the rest of Genesis right now.”
You should be, because if the latter 38 chapters of Genesis (and note that the ‘chapters’ were a later redaction–the original was one long narrative) plainly indicate historical narrative, then you must provide some strong reasons for rejecting the former 12 as such.
“I just don’t think it’s spelling out a 6000 year old earth and a 7 day creation week.”
How would you interpret the ‘days’ in Genesis 1 and the genealogies of Genesis 5-11, then?
“Your source is ‘deducing’ things about the earth’s rotation, etc, from Genesis. If that’s interbiblical support, then I’ll call everything I’m saying here ‘interbiblical support’.”
The inference to the rotation of the Earth is a logical deduction based on operational science, not an explicit interbiblical assertion. What is interbiblical support, however, is that God is light (1 John). As Calvin wrote: ‘‘Therefore the Lord, by the very order of the creation, bears witness that he holds in his hand the light, which he is able to impart to us without the sun and the moon. Further, it is certain, from the context, that the light was so created as to be interchanged with the darkness … there is, however, no doubt that the order of their succession was alternate…’ and ‘God had before created the light, but he now institutes a new order in nature, that the sun should be the dispenser of diurnal light, and the moon and the stars should shine by night. And he assigns them to this office, to teach us that all creatures are subject to his will, and execute what he enjoins upon them. For Moses relates nothing else than that God ordained certain instruments to diffuse through the earth, by reciprocal changes, that light which had been previously created. The only difference is this, that the light was before dispersed, but now proceeds from lucid bodies; which, in serving this purpose, obey the commands of God.’ Do you see an violence being done to the Bible? I don’t.
“Except the creation of the heavens and the earth doesn’t take place 359 times in the bible. I think it’s fair to call the context being used in Genesis 1 pretty darn singular, and given the litany of other problems and questions, interpreting ‘yom’ there so strictly is a weak case to argue. Doubly more difficult considering the morning/evening considerations, the brevity, the style of what’s being communicated, etc.”
Do you think creation being a unique event allows you escape from the profound implications of 359 Yom/number references all meaning a literal, 24-hour day? Why, because you say so? That isn’t responsible hermeneutics and it is poor scholarship. And here’s the kicker: the other Yom/number historical narrativereferences were unique, historical events, too.
Bryan,
How does one man endorsing his own creation account interpretation indicate that millions of prior exegetes never gave Genesis much thought? I think that is a bit of a stretch.
Well, that’s why I’m asking you if they gave it much thought. I’m saying it seems to me that previously, none of them really thought about alternatives – even Augustine’s account is concerned more with time frame than creation method. And that’s partially because no alternatives or creation methods were known (even Genesis doesn’t express this), and how to find out about stretches of time in that historical sense wasn’t realized either. Indeed, it may have been regarded as fairly uninteresting for precisely those reasons.
I’m just putting them in context.
What sounds more probable to you–that millions (if not billions) of prior exegetes, which included such great minds as Isaac Newton, Blaise Pascal, Thomas Aquinas, Luther and Calvin, and so on–were so mentally dull, uncreative and exegetically untalented as to not have been able to come up with a feasible alternate interpretation of Genesis, or that the text actually means what everyone said that it meant?
Millions? Billions? C’mon, that’s really pushing it. How many of these guys were focusing on Genesis much at all? A billion Christians doesn’t give you a billion people committed to seriously investigating this question, especially when alternative possibilities were considered beyond comprehension, imagination or discovery. Not to mention YEC is not a dogma of the Catholic church – I suppose I could turn around and say, ‘The Church saw fit to make ex nihilo creation dogma, along with monogenesis – but not the age of the universe. Doesn’t that speak against Catholic certainty on this matter?’ Did I just gain billions of people on my side of the argument?
Nor is it a matter of being ‘mentally dull’ to lack understanding on this. We all stand on the backs of giants and so on – if not being able to easily see an alternate way of how God could have done this or that is the mark of mental dullness, we’re all dull.
The strong words of C.S. Lewis come to mind say about modernists writing thousands of years later and far removed from the cultural context, yet claiming to understand the text better that those living much closer to the time and culture of the writings.
I’m not saying I understand the text better than those people. I don’t think the author intended to communicate what you’re taking him to be. I don’t think the people who were considering Genesis were arriving at the conclusion you think they were because ‘the text demands it’. I think they were reading into the text something that at the time seemed plausible due to extrabiblical factors, and then proceeded not to give it all that much thought.
Not to mention, if I recall right, Lewis was a TE of sorts himself.
I did not say the day was supernatural, rather, that the *event* was.
You went on to give a reference that the ‘day’ took place with a rotating earth and a sourceless light. That is a supernatural day, and requires some very interesting reading of Genesis to arrive at as a conclusion. To say nothing of one that I doubt was very popular throughout history.
I tried to place you in that time period because I wanted to see how you’d approach Scripture as someone who hasn’t been influenced by “the scientific findings.” Genesis must be considered in it’s cultural context, as it’s original readers would have understood it.
That can’t be right. The context of Genesis is not ‘the middle ages’, and they certainly weren’t the ‘original readers’.
And I said, this actually doesn’t have much to do with scientific findings. Remove the science and simply leave me with the possibilities, and it’s still going to exert influence. Just as it did with Augustine and others.
You should be, because if the latter 48 chapters of Genesis (and note that the ‘chapters’ were a later redaction–the original was one long narrative) plainly indicate historical narrative, then you must provide some strong reasons for rejecting it as such.
But I just said that I’m not rejecting Genesis as being historical. In fact I’ve flatly rejected treating it as “myth”. Calling it “historical” doesn’t get one to where you’re trying to take it – events can be really described, even if not related in some utter 100% documentary sense.
I think I am providing strong reasons to read Genesis 1 the way I’m indicating. You disagree – I understand that, but that’s not going to make me think my reasoning isn’t strong. I’m not persuaded by your arguments.
How would you interpret Genesis 5-11, then?
I’d prefer staying on Genesis 1 as much as I can. I will say that yes, I do think there was a Noah, a flood event, etc, etc. It’s history, but quite a lot of the history is left out – because the rapt history wasn’t even largely the point.
Do you see an violence being done to the Bible? I don’t.
Violence? No. Going beyond the text? Explaining something in a very circuitous way that is otherwise hard to swallow unless one is really striving to stay with that reading? I’d say so.
I have an alternate idea: Trying to speculate about sunless light and rotating earth so as to fabricate days and time-periods indicates that, perhaps, the reading of Genesis 1 that leads to such speculation is flawed. Maybe someone is trying to pull more out of it than was intended.
Do you think creation being a unique event allows you escape from the profound implications of 359 Yom/number references all meaning a literal, 24-hour day? Why, because you say so? That isn’t responsible hermeneutics and it is poor scholarship.
Because when we’re talking about the very origin of ‘days’, the origin of those things that ‘days’ depend on, the origin of time and existence itself, yeah – the context dictates that a reasonable exception can be made, or even must be made. I think it’s far more responsible to realize that it’s extremely justified to read the text as openly as I am in this case, considering the context. Those other yoms are about as “profound” an implication as noting that there was a ‘yesterday’ before each and every day otherwise mentioned in the bible, therefore there was a yesterday before the first day mentioned. I mean, what you’re telling me here is “But if what you’re saying is true, then Genesis 1 is a special case that stands apart from other talk of days!” To which I reply… well, yeah.
“Well, that’s why I’m asking you if they gave it much thought. I’m saying it seems to me that previously, none of them really thought about alternatives – even Augustine’s account is concerned more with time frame than creation method. And that’s partially because no alternatives or creation methods were known (even Genesis doesn’t express this), and how to find out about stretches of time in that historical sense wasn’t realized either. Indeed, it may have been regarded as fairly uninteresting for precisely those reasons.
I’m just putting them in context.”
I just find it very unlikely that no one gave much thought to the interpretation of Genesis for thousands of years. Christians and Jews were very concerned with the interpretation of their documents–see the Jewish Midrashic literature, The Talmud, Jewish and Christian Psuedo-literature, etc. The idea that so many many great minds were oblivious to other rational interpretations of Genesis just pushes my credulity past it’s breaking point.
Further, the creation method is implicit from the context: God commanded it to be, and it was. Since this occurred in a day, we can infer that it was supernatural. Context (cultural and literary) is of utmost importance.
“Millions? Billions? C’mon, that’s really pushing it. How many of these guys were focusing on Genesis much at all?”
Nevertheless, thousands of years worth of Christians and Jews is still a great deal of exegetes you are suggesting were exegetically oblivious to any other possible interpretations, and this surely would have included many great minds devoted to the Scriptures. I find this implausible.
“Not to mention YEC is not a dogma of the Catholic church.”
While not being a present day dogma, I’m pretty sure the pre-Enlightenment Catholic church interpreted Genesis in a YEC manner.
“You went on to give a reference that the ‘day’ took place with a rotating earth and a sourceless light. That is a supernatural day, and requires some very interesting reading of Genesis to arrive at as a conclusion. To say nothing of one that I doubt was very popular throughout history.”
I think you clearly misread what I said. Read it again carefully. I make no mention of any concept of a ‘supernatural day.’ The issue pertaining to the light source during the first three days is something that I addressed several paragraphs later that it seems you’ve mishmashed into a paragraph unrelated to that. Going back to the original posting of the paragraph pertaining to supernatural events, from the context we can see I am addressing your claim of God’s method of creation. I asserted that if an event happened in day, such as the creation of all the animals, it must have been a supernatural event. And even if the first three days of creation week were ‘supernatural’ in the sense that they occurred without the sun as a light source–so what? Creation week was pretty dang supernatural.
“That can’t be right. The context of Genesis is not ‘the middle ages’, and they certainly weren’t the ‘original readers’.”
I didn’t mean that. The cultural context was pre-exilic Israel and the original readers were pre-exilic Jews, obviously. I said middle ages because that age was far enough back for one to have been uninfluenced by modern “science.” I should have just placed you in pre-exilic Israel for clarity.
“Calling it “historical” doesn’t get one to where you’re trying to take it – events can be really described, even if not related in some utter 100% documentary sense.”
This is true, and why we must take context and authorial intention into consideration.
“I’d prefer staying on Genesis 1 as much as I can.”
Well, you made mention of the age of the Universe/Earth and Genesis 5-11 plainly indicate that only a couple thousand years had passed since the creation of Adam on the first day to the days of Abram. You can’t just avoid the issue. What, then, is your interpretation?
“Violence? No. Going beyond the text? Explaining something in a very circuitous way that is otherwise hard to swallow unless one is really striving to stay with that reading? I’d say so.”
How so?
“I have an alternate idea: Trying to speculate about sunless light and rotating earth so as to fabricate days and time-periods indicates that, perhaps, the reading of Genesis 1 that leads to such speculation is flawed. Maybe someone is trying to pull more out of it than was intended.”
That God is light and can produce light without a material source is well supported biblically. The rotation of the Earth is a sound logical inference that doesn’t do violence to the biblical text.
“Because when we’re talking about the very origin of ‘days’, the origin of those things that ‘days’ depend on, the origin of time and existence itself, yeah – the context dictates that a reasonable exception can be made, or even must be made. I think it’s far more responsible to realize that it’s extremely justified to read the text as openly as I am in this case, considering the context. Those other yoms are about as “profound” an implication as noting that there was a ‘yesterday’ before each and every day otherwise mentioned in the bible, therefore there was a yesterday before the first day mentioned. I mean, what you’re telling me here is “But if what you’re saying is true, then Genesis 1 is a special case that stands apart from other talk of days!” To which I reply… well, yeah.”
First, you claim that, since we are talking about the origin of days/time here, we are exempt from forcing a literal understanding of days onto the text strikes me as a bit of a non-sequiter. We are talking about the origin of days here but–so what? As stated, in the other 359 instances in the Old Testement where cardinal/ordinal numbers are used with Yom, it always means an ordinary day. This point is not so easily cast aside. On top of that, an evening and morning are indicated. The literal reading is also innerbiblically supported in Exodus 20:9-11 and Exodus 31:17. Accordingly, your argument seems like a case of special pleading.
Second, you argument pertaining to ‘yesterdays’ would only be analogous if you were trying to argue that a particular ‘yesterday’ in Scripture didn’t really mean what every other ‘yesterday’ meant.