Threads from Henry's Web

Category: Intelligent Design

  • Is Theistic Evolution a Bad Term?

    I have a serious problem with the term “theistic evolution.” I’m a theist. I accept the theory of evolution as the best explanation for how life diversified on earth. I also accept the theory of gravity. I’m not a theistic gravitationist.

    Now I do understand the difference here. Evolution has become the center of a theological debate, and many people are accused of being atheists because they believe in evolution. The term “theistic evolutionist” makes it clear that someone believes in God and also accepts the theory of evolution. Then there is the additional confusion introduced by the term “desitic evolution” or “deistic evolutionist” which would technically refer to a person who is a deist and also accepts the theory of evolution. Since deism refers to a God who does not intervene in creation, there is the suggestion that deistic evolution differs from theistic evolution. Presumably deistic evolution would refer to unguided evolution, while theistic evolution would refer to some sort of guided evolution. Guided evolution could take on quite a number of forms, including potentially intelligent design (ID) theory. But that is not what is normally meant by theistic evolution.

    My mind was brought back to this subject by a discussion on Dispatches from the Culture War. Ed Brayton got into a discussion with one poster in particular on whether theistic evolution and ID are compatible (ID and Theistic Evolution). One poster has apparently “discovered” that they are, despite the fact that practically everyone who claims either title holds that the two views are not compatible. There really isn’t any kind of controlling body that can tell us who is a theistic evolutionist and who is not, thus the confusion grows.

    I would like the term “theistic evolutionist” to refer to someone who is a theist and accepts the theory of evolution. For example, I accept essentially the neo-darwinian synthesis (to the extent that this has meaning for someone who is not a scientist), and I’m a theist. I can be properly called a theist because I believe that God intervenes in the universe, though in a very limited sense. (For details, see The Hand of God, and its two succeeding essays.) I don’t believe God intervenes in the universe because it isn’t working properly. In other words, I hold that such miracles as occur are in the nature of communication, which can involve incidental physical effects, but that they are not a correction to the functioning of natural law.

    The evolution that I accept is no different than that which an atheistic evolutionist would accept. It is my theological position that theology does not provide the tools to study origins, nor does my own discipline of Biblical studies. These disciplines are simply not equipped to provide that information. I do not and cannot contribute to the development of the theory of evolution. I can work what other people discover into my own worldview to whatever extent that is necessary. So the “theist” and the “evolutionist” are substantially separate. I’m simply a theist who accepts a particular theory. The use of the combined term suggests that my theism is in some way an element of evolutionary theory, but at least for me it is not.

    Because of the problems I listed at the beginning of this post, I still use “theistic evolutionist.” It’s much more convenient than “theist who also happens to accept the theory of evolution.” But at the same time I find the need to make it clear that my theism is never an explanation for any natural process. Natural processes are to be studied naturally, and as of now, that’s via the scientific method.

    There are many variations between an old earth creationist position, and my own variety of theistic evolution. I see old earth creationism as starting with those who see the days of creation as long periods of time and thus phases of God’s creation. Such old earth creationists need to explain the boundaries past which they believe variation and natural selection cannot take changes (baraminology, in young earth parlance). Views then move through various types of progressive creationism to guided evolution. Those who believe that the correct answer to a science question is “God did it” do indeed hold a theory compatible with intelligent design. But that is not my position, nor is it the position of most theistic evolutionists I know or have read.

  • Creationist Boilerplate

    I was reading the entry The Ignorant Credulity of Creationists on Dispatches from the Culture Wars, where Ed Brayton quotes the following from a creationist response to Tiktaalic roseae, and then comments:

    . . . or those who are more of a six-day creationist stripe, the finding poses no threat either. Discovery Institute scientists have observed that Tiktaalik roseae is not an intermediate, but rather, “Is one of a set of lobe-finned fishes that include very curious mosaics–these fishes have advanced fully formed characteristics of several different groups. They are not intermediates in the sense that have half-fish/half-tetrapod characteristics. Rather, they have a combination of tetrapod-like features and fish-like features. Paleontologists refer to such organisms as mosaics rather than intermediates” It is simply not evident that this find is even an evolutionary link. I guess the “missing link” is still missing. (From The Latest Fossil Find: Fact or Fiction — HN)

    Here McDowell credulously repeats this idiotic argument from the ID without giving it a thought. Any thinking person would recognize that the DI’s statement above is simply gibberish. What on earth do they think an intermediate form would look like if you found one? It would have a combination of features from the ancestral group and a combination of features from the descendant group, and it would be found in rocks that date to the time such a transition was believed to have taken place. When those things are present, as they are here, the distinction between a “mosaic” and an “intermediate” is totally meaningless.

    Now while I might tend to use slightly gentler forms of expression, the point is pretty clear. In order to be viewed as an intermediate form, this creature must have some characters from the forms it is intermediate between, yet in this paragraph, Sean McDowell claims that this mix of characteristics doesn’t make it transitional. This is some pretty remarkable reasoning. When I read that comment, the terms and “logic” sounded so familiar that I just had to look up some material about Archaeopteryx. I immediately found the following quote from Answers in Genesis. Does any of the logic look familiar?

    In summary, it may be said that Archaeopteryx is truly unique, and appears to exhibit a mosaic of characters, sharing some in common with the class Aves and some with the class Reptilia. It seems to have been suited to a lifestyle of short flights and agile crawling in trees, and those features which make it unquestionably a bird for classification purposes are uniquely and completely present and perfect. The feathers are not halfway transition from scales to feathers, an assumed transformation of the most astounding complexity. If for no other reason, this would disqualify it as a transitional form. . . . (http://www.answersingenesis.org/creation/v1/i1/archaeopteryx.asp, note that the omitted portion discusses bats and the platypus as examples of a “mosaic of characters.”)

    What’s really remarkable here is the demand that a transitional form show specifically the halfway point between scales and feathers. It is not enough that there is a mix of characters in the creature, we want to catch one specific character in transition. Now I’m not saying that would be an impossibility, but it is definitely not a requirement in order for a form to be transitional.

    But let’s not stop there. ICR also has a comment on Archaeopteryx, and lo and behold, they don’t agree with Answers in Genesis.

    It has been asserted that Archaeopteryx shares 21 specialized characters with coelurosaurian dinosaurs.4 Research on various anatomical features of Archaeopteryx in the last ten years or so, however, has shown, in every case, that the characteristic in question is bird-like, not reptile-like. . . . (As a Transitional Form Archaeopteryx Won’t Fly (Impact #195))

    So what would it take to convince a creationist that a form is transitional? They really don’t say. If being found in rocks of the right age, based on a prediction that such a form should be found, and falling into a good sequence of transitional forms is not good enough, what is?

    The response to Tiktaalik has amply demonstrated the simple fact that creationists are not interested in doing science; they are simply spinning the work that others do in any way possible to make it appear not to damage their case.

    I’d be interested to hear two things from creationists. First, I’d like “scientific” creationism to specify just what it would be that they would accept as a transitional form, as a disproof of the special creation of each species. Second, just how many species were there simultaneously in the antediluvian world?

    I don’t think I’m going to get anything resembling answers to those questions, because I think that creationists know precisely what they will do; they will reproduce the spin that they have used with each new discovery. That is because they have a prior commitment to a particular interpretation of scripture. I suggest they just admit it and quit trying to claim they are doing science.

  • Appeal to Numbers and Supposed Authority

    When I was in the U. S. Air Force, I had to attend a human relations training program. The instructor was enlisted, but very proudly informed us of his two master’s level degrees. During the course of his presentation he brought up a particular bumper sticker, which happened to be one I had on my car. Of course my buddies made sure he knew I had one, and so he starts to make his point about how I should not have such a bumper sticker. When I disagreed, and pointed out that nobody was obliged to obey my bumper sticker, he became quite annoyed. During a break he came to me and said, “I have a master’s degree in management and one in human relations. Don’t you think I know what I’m talking about?” He had no way to know that I also had a graduate degree, though I possess only a meager one of the same, but he was very shocked when I said that I too had one of those pieces of paper and so was in a good position to know what it was worth.

    His was an argument from authority, and at least it came from an area in which he could claim some authority. He might even have had a point about my bumper sticker. 🙂 But today I’m interested in the argument from authority when one has no authority, and the argument from numbers when one is in the minority. Religious debates, and particularly creation-evolution debates, are often characterized by these types of claims.

    Recently in an online debate I observed someone arguing in favor of a young earth brought up a paper on ocean sediments and their evidence for the age of the earth. When another correspondent questioned the report, the first individual called him an undergraduate student critiquing a paper by a PhD in geology. We get various forms of the argument from authority and the argument from numbers in creation-evolution debates all the time and it’s really quite a humorous process. (You can find this discussion on The Religion Forum.

    Before I go into this just a little more, let me give you relevant links on this topic. The ocean sediment argument is one of those that is so simplistic and so bad that there really aren’t that many detailed refutations online, so let me give some links. First, the source article is ICR’s Impact #8, Evolution: The Oceans Say No!. Note that while the author’s credentials right now are listed as an MS degree, since this document was written, he has received a PhD. Now in case anyone is interested in the basic refutation to this, try the following article from the US Geological Survey: Developing the theory. It gives some of the basics and should lead you to some answers. In addition, Glenn R. Morton’s article Young Earth Arguments: A Second Look and the following article, The Age of the Earth from the Talk Origins Archive expands on material that may not be fully obvious from the more general article.

    Note that there are many people who are quite thoroughly qualified in the field who challenge the views of this “PhD in geology.” And this is the thing that got me thinking about this particular blog entry. Let me give another example. I was debating a Seventh-day Adventist about the proper interpretation of Daniel 8:13 & 14. (I’m ex-SDA, so I occasionally get into these debates.) This individual cites some SDA authorities on the subject, which happen to include my uncle Don F. Neufeld, editor of the SDA Bible Commentary. When I do not accept these individuals as authority (my late uncle would have been appalled at the notion that I would accept his position on authority, but that’s beside the point), he asked how I could hold my opinion against “all those experts.” He suggested I was alone in my opinion. Now I’m not particularly concerned about being alone on an issue, but I found that very interesting, because the interpretation I was proposing is, in fact, one that is either supported or offered as an option by practically every commentary on the book of Daniel. Those who hold the “investigative judgment” position that is held by many SDAs are in a distinct minority. And that is not relevant. I would never use the argument that the SDA position is a minority position as a refutation of that position. It’s perfectly possible that a minority position can be right.

    But it again is an example of someone in a position of weakness trying to use the appeal to numbers. The idea is to convince the person holding a minority view that their view is untenable because it is a minority view. But the argument from numbers when one is in a minority position already is a peculiar form of deception, or even of self-deception. I think the two arguments–from (false) authority, and from (false) numbers are closely related, and they are a favorite of creationists of all stripes, from young earth to intelligent design advocates. The number of fake degrees among young earth creationists is one good example (see Some Questionable Creationist Credentials). The fact that they spend a good deal of time talking about the number of people who support them is another.

    If you have the evidence, talk about the evidence. If you don’t you have to have something to talk about. But why talk about numbers and authority when those are precisely the things you don’t have? For every PhD that creationists can claim there are thousands in opposition. For examples of the argument from numbers see Project Steve, a satire of lists of people in support of some position or another, when that position is actually supported only by a tiny minority.

    Please understand that I am not in any way advocating that one simply accept the real majority position. Sometimes one has to accept authority simply because one is not well enough informed on a particular subject. But those competent in that subject should be able to propose new, minority positions and have them judged on the actual evidence.

    I am not certain just why the appeal to (supposed) numbers and the appeal to (alleged) authority are so popular. I can only think of two options. 1) Someone has such a narrow frame of reference that they simply do not comprehend the numbers. I think my SDA friend falls into this category. He was simply unaware of the numbers involved. 2) Someone knows that he has no solid support, but is using deception to convince people who don’t know any better that their position is better than it really is.

  • Evolution, Theology, and Respect

    In my book Not Ashamed of the Gospel, I comment that God respects us:

    • God Respects You
      Some of my more theologically inclined friends may be questioning this one, but God created humanity a little bit less than God (Psalm 8:4), and he allows human beings to make their own choices and plot their own course. He tries to communicate, but he doesn’t force communication.

    What I mean here by respect is that God allows us choices, but God also respects those choices. We often assume that God can do anything, and in His infinity, that is likely close to true. But when operating in finite space and time, God has to meet priorities. So the question is, what is God’s highest priority? Is it our safety and comfort? If it is, he should make the world “child-safe” so that we cannot injure ourselves or one another. On the other hand, suppose God valued our intelligence and independent decision making more than our comfort. In that case, he would have to allow our decisions to be independent, to leave us to live with the results of our decisions. Every act taken to make us safer involves a constraint on our decision making or on respecting the consequences of those decisions.

    It’s interesting that in responses to my book, two things have predominated. First, many have told me that they appreciate the book, but that they question (or are disturbed by) my support of evolution. Second, folks are interested in an expansion of my views on salvation and what it means, and this is a key element of that second point. The two points are related. In the process of salvation, God respects human choices, and in the process of biological evolution, God respects the freedom of his creation.

    This principle is expressed in Galatians 6:7, “. . . you reap whatever you sow” (NRSV). A great deal more theology is built on the earlier chapters of Galatians, but it is instructive to note that Paul ends his epistles generally by discussing the life of the Spirit–the change in life that is to take place in a follower of Jesus. When he does this, he makes it very clear that our choices and our actions are critical. I believe this principle of sowing and reaping applies on a much wider basis than we usually assume, and in fact applies even in issues of salvation.

    For those who track “Henry’s heresies” I go past Arminian in my view of salvation and am at least semi-pelagian, if not fully pelagian in my theology. Since that’s a certified heresy, so to speak, you now have a clear case over which to make such an accusation. 🙂 Specifically, I believe that salvation is dependent on a free choice to put one’s trust in God, and that the resulting salvation includes, as something that is essential and not optional, a change or spiritual restoration in the individual. Thus people can make good choices and bad choices and that God respects those choices by allowing the results of such choice.

    Would freedom truly be freedom if there were no consequences of actions, either positive or negative? I’m honestly not sure of the answer to that question. I am certain that freedom would be quite meaningless. Yet frequently the Christian theology of prayer seems to imply that God should alleviate or eliminate the results of our own choices. This can go even further when people pray that a hurricane be turned aside from them, or that it simply be completely dispersed. But such dangerous weather patterns are actually a positive part of the environment, though they are terribly inconvenient for us. (For more of my views on prayer see The Hand of God, The Hand of God: Miracles, and The Hand of God: Prayer.)

    So what does all of this have to do with evolution? It is very common for Christian advocates of evolution to indicate that evolutionary thinking does not make any difference to theology, that a Christian can accept evolutionary theory without it having any impact on faith. Depending on one’s starting point, that may or may not be true. Young earth creationists, for example, assume an early “good” state, that they believe is described in Genesis, in which there was no death and sin. They assume that all death entered the world with sin. In order to accept evolutionary theory, they would have to change that view. One might decide that spiritual death entered the world along with sin, but that physical death happened all along.

    This is one issue on which old earth creationists face the same problem as do theistic evolutionists, with one difference. Old earth creationists would have to explain why God would use a progressive form of special creation in which so much death was required, when death is not actually part of the creation process. What is the purpose of life, death, and major extinction events, if repeated interventions on God’s part are nonetheless required to produce new categories of creatures.

    But there are two issues that stand out. Inefficiency in creation via evolution and the extreme violence of the process, as animal eats animal. I’m obviously not the first to notice this.

    There, indeed, those who flatter themselves with the notion of reading the purposes of the Creator in his works ought in consistency to have seen grounds for inferences from which they have shrunk. If there are any marks at all of special design in creation, one of the things most evidently designed is that a large proportion of all animals should pass their existence in tormenting and devouring other animals. They have been lavishly fitted out with the instruments necessary for that purpose; their strongest instincts impel them to it and many of them seem to have been constructed incapable of supporting themselves by any other food. — John Stuart Mill, On Nature

    In addition, I have heard this particular objection in many private conversations. What does it say about God if he used such a violent method to produce diversity? Well, in my view, the evidence is in, and biological evolution, variation + natural selection, is the means by which he chose to diversify life. From the point of view of theology, the question is simply to ask what this reality means.

    Young earth creationists can defend against this charge of violence by saying that God created things good, but that they have been messed up by sin. Thus they hope to avoid the problem. God does things well, but they have been corrupted. I would like young earth creationists to construct a model of an “ecology” in which nothing dies and no creature eats another one. They could follow that up by constructing a world in which there actually was choice, but nobody every made a less than optimal one. (I think the latter is possible, but suspect the world would be pretty boring.)

    Even if we don’t find it troubling that animals devour one another, what about people? When human beings are involved we call it the “problem of evil.” The focus of this question is often the holocaust, though human history provides plenty of examples of human beings oppressing, torturing, and killing one another. I find it interesting that it is difficult for some people to stomach the notion of myriads of animals killing one another over millions of years, yet somehow manage to deal with the number of people who have killed one another in the world’s history. One explanation is that God is doing this for a demonstration to the universe (presumably people on other worlds) about the nastiness of sin, but one would have to wonder just how dense the “universe” is if it takes this long to figure out that there’s a problem. I think there actually is some light in the “demonstration to the universe” view, but I think we need to go a bit further.

    As I suggested before, while we may call God “good,” we need to reexamine our understanding of God’s priorities. It seems pretty clear to me that God’s priority on the preservation of physical life is a bit lower than ours. If God chose to diversify life by having creatures compete for limited resources, then he made it necessary that the results of various actions of the creatures, and numerous random factors, be negative and even fatal. The freedom of creation is more important than its comfort. Now in this latter case “freedom” doesn’t mean the same thing as in conscious choices, but the same principle is involved. Action produces reaction. Choices, conscious or not, have consequences.

    Thus to me the fact that God chose natural selection as the guiding force in diversifying life suggests that God puts a high priority on freedom, and that he does not choose to alter reality for our comfort or to protect us from the results of our own choices, or from more or less random factors such as destructive weather or earthquakes.

    This adds a division to miracles, as I discuss in my Hand of God essays (see links above). God likes the natural laws by which he manages the universe. We should not expect miracles to alter that reality for our convenience, nor should we expect them to be necessary to alter the processes of nature or the production of life. The key miracle, apart from existence itself, is that God reaches out to communicate with us. I would also expect that such communication would not be forceful; that God would not intervene to directly alter our minds and understanding.

    Let me add a note here. In any basic course in the Philosophy of Religion, students are presented with the problem of evil. God is omnipotent, God is good, yet there is evil. If God is good, one would assume that he would want to eliminate evil. If he omnipotent, he should be able to eliminate it. So what’s the solution? The professor will tell you that there is no way to deal with the problem without dealing with at least one of the legs of the triad. You can say God is not omnipotent, and so is unable to eliminate evil. You can say “good” means something other than what we commonly mean by it. Finally, we could decide that evil is not really so bad after all. In a sense, I have done all three here. First, I’ve suggested that God must have an order of priorities when acting in a finite realm; that limits omnipotence. He can’t create a world in which the results of creatures’ decisions are respected, and yet also make certain that everyone is comfortable. Second, “God is good” does not necessarily mean that God wants every small animal, or even every person to live a comfortable life. Third, by looking at the positive effects of hurricanes (and I’ve experienced a number of these lately!) I’ve questioned whether evil is really evil.

    In this system the answer to the question of why the holocaust took place is that evil people made evil choices and took evil actions, and that apathetic people made ineffective choices and did not prevent those evil actions. There were either an insufficient number of good people, or they also made choices that did not effectively stop the evil actions. The solution, therefore, is for people to learn to make better choices. If God solves this problem, he will do so by communication, but the choices and the actions will remain with people. Taking the “reaping what you sow” principle seriously means that we can’t assume that God will come and solve our problems for us. God is expecting us to take responsible action ourselves.

    Thus evolution shows to us a God who allows freedom in his creation. It’s not a safe universe, but it is an interesting one.

  • Resistance to Evolutionary Theory

    Why is it that some people resist evolutionary theory so stubbornly? Many times I have used the argument that evolutionary theory is more complex than creationism, and that we are asking people to go against their intuition in favor of the evidence. But the more I think about it, the less I think that is true. I do think that most creationist thoroughly and systematically misunderstand the basics of evolutionary theory. But I’m going to suggest that the misunderstandings result from the need to reject it, and not the other way around. Most of these folks could understand, but at the most fundamental level they don’t want to.

    Many of you will find this article pretty redundant. The reason I took up the topic is because of the example, which is in my area of expertise, and thus it tickled me to use it as an example. In addition, it was when I did a paper on the comparison of the Septuagint and Masoretic text versions of the genealogies that I first began to question young earth creationism. I read my first creationist literature before I was ten, and was pretty much steeped in it by the time I was in college. Then I began to examine it critically.

    Let me illustrate from Kent Hovind’s Creation Science Evangelism, and their article titled Who Was Cainan? This is actually a rather simple question, and I’m only going to discuss it briefly as an illustration. Basically, if you take your choice of available modern Bible versions, and read the genealogy of Jesus provided by Luke, you can find the order of the post-flood patriarchs. (Luke reads these leading back to Adam, and I’m going to put them in chronological order here.) Luke has Shem, Arphaxad, Cainan, Shelah (also known as Sala) and so forth (verses 35-36). You can compare this to the genealogy of Genesis 11:10-13, and the order is Shem, Arpachshad, Shelah. Cainan is missing from the list.

    Now there is a simple explanation for this. This additional name occurs in the Septuagint (LXX), and this indicates that there is a textual variant in the text of Genesis, and the LXX, or another manuscript containing the same variant, was likely Luke’s source for this passage. Alternatively, the name could have been added by a copyist based on the same source, but the evidence for this is vanishingly light. If you consider the evolution of a text of this nature, you will start most likely with oral transmission for a period of time, followed by creation of written copies (there’s little agreement on the date of writing, though I suspect they may be quite early in the process of development of the Pentateuch, and form a framework for portions of it). These written copies are then included by redactors in broader documents, and then those documents are copied multiple times. Luke simply uses the documents available to him.

    Now old earth creationists use this very case to suggest that there may be gaps in the genealogies of Genesis, thus giving us Biblical room for a greater age for humanity on earth, and certainly a much earlier date for the flood. I would suggest in addition that the very formation of the lists into 10 names before and 10 names after suggests selected lists. So the old earth creationists find this name very convenient in support of their position.

    CSE cites Jonathan Sarfati of Answers in Genesis, who indicates that he believes this is one of the few copyists errors in our largely excellent manuscripts. For him, it is the autographs that are inerrant, and not any copy or translation. Thus, we solve the problem more or less by assuming a copyist’s error, and also assuming that the form of the text we have is correct. There is considerable variation in the genealogies in the LXX of Genesis 5 & 11, but this is beyond the scope of this entry. Also, I’m not trying to criticize Sarfati, and am not basing this on his work. (You can see his discussion at Cainan on the Answers in Genesis site.) So one set of young earth creationists would solve the problem with the assumption it was an error.

    But CSE does not approve of this answer. They want a result that allows them to claim that the Bible as they have it is inerrant, and not some autographs they can’t get a look at anyhow. So they must somehow preserve both the chronology of Genesis 11, and the presence of the name in Luke 3:36. Thus they explain how even if there was an intervening generation, the chronology would be unchanged. I’ll leave you to read the creative explanation directly from their site if you care to. In producing this ad hoc explanation, they use another interesting tactic, citing another group with very low credibility, Gail Riplinger’s AV Publications. Gail Riplinger is the author of one of the worst pieces of trash I have ever encountered in print, titled New Age Bible Versions.

    (At one point I started to critique that book, but after just a few pages I found there was insufficient space in the margins to keep track of even the major falsehoods, much less the more minor, but significant errors. (James White, who is much more conservative than I, nonetheless took the time to go through the book in detail. He has a lengthy response to New Age Bible Versions on his site, New Age Bible Versions Refuted. Riplinger in turn calls White’s material “libellous” and “actionable,” though I can’t see where she has tried to sue. For anyone who thinks Riplinger’s material has any value, look at her answer to the supposed question, “What is the most subtle change that new versions are making?”. In this she argues that changing the capitalization of pronouns that refer to God is changing the orthography of God’s word. I kid you not.)

    Now why do I go to this example? To illustrate a method. Neither CSE nor AiG can simply follow the evidence where it leads. The old earth creationists get into this situation in some cases, though in this case they have an explanation that accords with the evidence, though not, in my opinion, all of it. CSE has a previous theological position that the KJV as they have it must be inerrant, and thus there must be an explanation for that set of English words. AiG has a position that the autographs must be inerrant, and thus they must assume that the autograph did not contain the fateful added name. Old earth creationists accept the name because it is actually helpful to their claim that there are gaps in the genealogies of Genesis 5 & 11.

    You might say that I reject all these explanations simply because I want the passage to be inaccurate. But that is simply not the case. I would be fine with whatever variant was correct in the book of Luke, but the evidence points to the presence of Cainan in that text. It is possible, of course, that I’m wrong on this. Sarfati’s point about documents of the LXX might have some validity, though I think it’s weak. But you see, it would be no problem for me if he turned out to be right, and Cainan was not in the sacred, though unattainable, autograph.

    But the key here is that in the cases I cited we have something that must be true, so an ad hoc explanation for how it is true. With any ancient near eastern document, literary, or historical, the approach of historians is to examine critically its claims, and to determine its credibility based on that kind of historical study. Nobody thinks that the Sumerian antediluvian king lists are historical documents. Why? Because they give preposterous lengths for the reigns of the kings. But in the case of the Bible we are told to ignore all evidence in any direction except to confirm some interpretation. We should let the Bible speak for itself, and if we did we would realize that these lists belong to a different category of literature than “historical records” and could then treat them as such.

    So is it that evolution is counterintuitive? It seems rather intuitive to me, especially common descent. There is simply so much about the animal world that suggests a genetic relationship. I think it is not common sense, or our intuition that is the problem, but rather a prior commitment to treat a certain document as historical no matter what the evidence suggests. This results in a backwards methodology. A source is accurate not because one has checked it and found it so to the best of one’s abilities, but rather because it supports the position that already must be true.

    So one stray patriarch tells the story.

  • Witness without being a Pest

    Over on Philosoraptor, Carol Roper has an open letter to theists entitled Sick and Tired of God Talk. Carol talks about how tired she is of various standard questions from theists, general theists who want to convert her, and in this country one would assume mostly Christian theists. Carol is an adamant atheist, and she finds these people and their words and behavior annoying.

    I’ve been planning to write a response to this essay for more than a year, if I remember correctly, but I haven’t gotten around to it. My response is not directed at Carol. After all, she knows what annoys her and what doesn’t, and I’m not about to try to tell her what’s what. But reading her article suggested some things that Christians do that I think are quite annoying and also counterproductive.

    There seems to be a divide between some Christians who want to push themselves on everyone in a frantic race to convert and bring into church membership as many people as possible. “Jesus is coming back,” they think, “and he’s going to accidentally fry a bunch of people if I don’t get busy.” The answer, they seem to think, is to work on the statistics as fast as possible. Going door to door or randomly down the street and confronting people with what they think is the gospel is the only way they can see to really get into action and catch all those people before they go to hell. Their level of panic is matched on the other side by people who are quite apathetic. To hear them, Christianity is a dirty secret that one ought to keep as quiet as possible. Jesus may be returning, but he’ll have to deal personally with the people, because these folks aren’t going to do anything.

    The first group supports their behavior by claiming that the gospel does offend people, and if they share the Good News with someone and they become offended, it’s not their problem. They gave the warning! But the question is, is it the gospel message that’s offending people, or is it you and your behavior? Studies have shown that people who are persuaded to accept Jesus as their savior by means of manipulative monologue generally do not stay in the church, while those who enter the church through a relationship with an individual Christian normally do stay. (My copy is loaned out right now, but you can find extensive discussion of this issue in Faith-Sharing, by Fox & Morris.)

    I mention this because I think it shows that the frantic, manipulative method of witnessing is ineffective, even when measured by numbers. I don’t think measuring by numbers is the appropriate way for a Christian to measure witnessing. A witness is about being obedient to God. The fruit of that may show in your challenge to others to behave better, to help others more, or to think more seriously about spiritual issues. You may never see any fruit that you can hang on your church wall, so to speak. Fruit is God’s measuring stick, not yours. If we remembered this as Christians, we would cause far fewer problems.

    The usual excuse is simply that we are commanded to be witnesses and to make disciples, so how can we stop? I am absolutely not telling anyone to stop witnessing. In fact, I don’t think you can stop. If you are a Christian, you are a witness. The question is what kind of witness you are going to be.

    I’m also not saying that everyone on the street or knocking on a door is a pest. There are many legitimate reasons to do this sort of thing. If you are truly there to help, that’s one thing. If you are there to teach them your theology, that’s another.

    A person who is so apathetic that most people don’t know of they are a Christian at all sends the message that Christianity is a sort of sideline that has a very low priority in their life. Christians are, to borrow the words of Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, “mostly harmless,” but they also aren’t much good for antything.

    A person who is frantic, and portrays panic, while bumbiling ineffectually from person to person sends the message that Christianity is a group of people in a panic, afraid that the world will end. Not only that, they have a God who is not really prepared for the end. These Christians portray their faith as something that is actually dangerous to the world, as they live their lives contrary to the command of Jesus, as though the world would end at any moment. Ecology? Who cares? Jesus is coming. Social Security headed for bankruptcy? Don’t worry! Jesus will come before I need it!

    So how does one manage to witness without being a pest?

    Start by living your faith. Christianity worships God as creator and upholder of all that is (Hebrews 1:1-3), and also as a God who offers unearned favor to humanity, so much so as to cross the gap between infinity and the finite in Jesus Christ, who showed to us what God was like. We needn’t be in a panic.

    Love your neighbor. This does not mean to sneak your way into your neighbor’s heart so you can convert him. It means that you build relationships because you love and value people. People will know if you are insincere. If you live up to your Christian principles and don’t make your Christianity either a secret or a wall between you and your friend, you are being a witness.

    Learn to speak other spiritual languages. By this I mean to learn to talk about topics of interest in terms that the other person understands. Even as a Christian I am offended when a politician uses his or her faith as lever to get my support. I don’t know the sincerity of those faith claims. But if a candidate, of any faith or none at all, has lived according to certain principles, that is something I can understand and test. In communicating with a non-Christian, for example, WWJD (What Would Jesus Do?) is probably not the best question to ask. But if you think that your Christian principles are also good principles, perhaps you can find a way to express those good ideas other than by claiming they are divine commands. You are not denying Jesus just because you argue for his moral principles based on something other than the fact that he gave them as commands.

    Learn the basis for your faith. This may not be the same as the basis for my faith. What brought you to your position of faith? Are you confident of that? Your personal testimony is more important than any amount of logical argument. If you are not an apologist by nature or training, you don’t have to behave like one. (An apologist is one who answers questions about the Christian faith professionally.) When people ask, answer for yourself. That’s not waffling. That’s just talking about what you know.

    Wait for questions. If you live a life that is a good witness, inevitably people will ask something about your beliefs. That is your opportunity to answer. But remember it is not your opportunity to manipulate them. You believe that your Christian experience is a good thing, and it’s natural for you to want to share. When someone asks that means they want you to share. Then is when it’s fine.

    Don’t resort to force. Many Christians today are trying to get the government to do their job for them. By this I mean by advocating state-sponsored, teacher led prayer in public schools, public displays of religious documents such as the Ten Commandments, introduction of intelligent design into the schools, and radical action against abortion and abortion clinics. I think all of those things demonstrate that we don’t really believe in the power of the gospel shared with the power of the Holy Spirit to change lives. We think we need to use force in society just as we sometimes use manipulative language and behavior in our personal witness. Be a witness. Then let God do his part.

    Think about it this way. You might be a pest, rather than a witness if:

    • You knock on doors belonging to people you don’t know, but can’t name your own next door neighbors
    • You know all the details of soteriology*, but don’t know where to get help for a homeless person
    • You think salvation is equivalent to joining your church congregation
    • You talk to people you despise so you can “save” them, and yet continue to despise them
    • You’re sure your relationship with Jesus makes you more special than everybody else
    • The only language you know how to speak is “church-ese”
    • You set a mental timer counting down until you will break off a friendship if the stubborn jerk doesn’t accept Jesus
    • You can’t carry on any conversation that isn’t about your religion
    • You try to befriend someone only because you think you can get him to attend church

    *If you have to ask what that is, you’re probably a pretty reasonable person to talk to!

  • Home and Church Education

    As intelligent design (ID) propnents complain about censorship and freedom of speech, one thing is being ignored: They are getting their message out to the public, and any scientist who wishes to examine their data, should they care to provide some, can acquire the material should they desire to do so. In addition, high school students do not get all of their information in the classroom, nor should they. There are many other opportunities for us, as parents, to educate our children in things that are not part of the high school curriculum.

    I think that claims that ID materials are being censored are particularly empty. In this time in which internet publication is incredibly easy, it is practically impossible to keep an idea quiet. Acceptance is another matter. What the ID proponents crave is the opportunity to say, “See, we’ve been published in a peer reviewed journal.” It is unlikely that if the reviewers for a particular journal determine that an article is not sound enough to be published, the readers of that journal are going to be interested in it. After all, the journal has its customers as well, and if they are not presented with material that interests them, they will read something else. Thus creationists of various stripes create their own “peer reviewed” journals, that are read by those who are interested in such things. But the information is available to any scientist who finds it interesting.

    So it’s not that there is no way to make the information public that is the problem. The issue is really simply whether the high school students of the nation should be made a captive audience for ID. ID proponents are going to say, at this point, that right now these same students are a captive audience for Darwinism, but that is not accurate. They are a captive audience for science, whatever is the current consensus body of knowledge that represents. What every other new idea has had to do in order to get into the textbooks is to demonstrate through the scientific process that it is truly science, and to become the consensus view, it has to convince the key thinkers in the appropriate field that it (a proposed theory) represents the best explanation. ID propoents want to dodge this part of the process.

    But then there are those who, for religious reasons, believe that evolutionary theory is wrong, and they want it replaced with something. For the moment they are kind of united on the plan of getting their collective foot in the door, but be assured that once that is accomplished, there will be plenty of differences of opinion over just what variety of creationism should be taught. But I believe that these parents have a right, to a certain extent, to raise their children as they see fit. The limits of that right, in my view, involve avoiding abuse, and failing to prepare their children to live in the real world. I’d even go very far in allowing parents to determine to educate their children in ways I might find very counterproductive, though I do see a state interest in setting some standard of education. Within those limits, however, parents have many options, including home schooling, private schools, and supplementary materials provided at home or at church.

    The fact is that these ideas are not suppressed at all. They simply fall outside of certain boundaries for discussion at certain places and times. We don’t expect the psychology teacher to discuss horticulture in class (except, of course, as therapy!), and we don’t expect the science teacher to discuss religion. This is very similar to the frequent arguments about prayer in school. I hear parents complain regularly that their children can’t pray in school. But that’s not really the problem. The problem is that their children are not directed in prayer by teachers or staff, or that prayer is not officially mandated or provided for. The children can, and do pray. What the parents need to do is teach their own children how to pray, and how to lead prayers, and the young folks can meet as much as they want. I think that’s a much better idea than asking the school to teach children.

    The same thing applies to things that are not taught in science class, but we think our children ought to hear. I have some suggestions:

    1. Turn the TV off one night and spend some time talking to your children about your faith and how it relates to science. If you think the earth was created in one literal week, tell them. Explain your reasons. If you don’t know much about the subject, get one of the many books on your particular view of creation and learn.
    2. Provide your child with books that support your viewpoint. (I recommend having someone read materials on all sides, and then critically examine them. That will probably require you to get involved again.)
    3. Ask your church education department, to offer a seminar, Sunday School series, Wednesday night program, or series of sermons on origins. It’s your church, and you and your fellow believers will get to decide what the content should be. As you might have guessed, I think such teaching should talk about all views that Christians hold on origins, but that’s just my view. (I offer just such a seminar for churches.) Now we’re talking about your church.
    4. Regularly communicate with your children about your faith and theirs, and let them express themselves on what they have heard at school and elsewhere. Get involved with their education, whether they are in public, private, or home school.
    5. Encourage your church to have a substantive Sunday School program for various ages, so that children can learn about their faith and how it relates to the world. There’s no reason for young people to be shocked when they get to college because they find out the world is so different from what they are used to at church. I have frequently encountered young adults who feel that their pastors and Sunday School teachers lied to them. (It is more likely that those individuals simply didn’t know, although I have heard pastors justify withholding facts from their congregation.)
    6. Make your home a place where learning is an expected part of life. Books, computers, and opportunities to learn about the physical world should be plentiful. Let them know that questions are good.

    You will do much more to build your children’s faith by these means than by any amount of political activity to include religious materials in public school.

  • Christians and Defamation

    One who covers up hatred by lying,
    And one who spreads defamation is stupid.     — Proverbs 10:18
    (my translation, but try any version you like)

    I’m often interested in the portions of the Bible that some Christians think they must follow, and what portions many Christians think they can avoid. For example, right now many conservative Christians seem to think they are more bound by Leviticus 18:22 (you shall not lie with a male as with a woman: it is an abomination) than they are by Leviticus 19:34 (The alien who resides with you shall be to you as the citizen among you).

    But when it gets down to lying, slander, and defamation of character, it seems that the Biblical mandate is pretty clear. Christians definitely should not be engaged in slander or defamation. But how far can one go in “misunderstanding,” shall we say, and still fall within the bounds of Christian behavior?

    There is just such a defamation going on right now, defamation of the character of Dr. Erik Pianka. I’m not breaking this news. I’m going to provide you with some blog entries so you can research it for yourself. These blog entries contain both opinion on the topic, but also links to other sources of information so you can research this for yourself. I would simply note that the accusations made against Dr. Pianka are of such a nature that any reasonable person should question them, and should research very carefully before making such accusations or repeating them. This is a very clear case from the Christian biblical point of view of slander.

    Let me just list some sources:

  • Zimmer: The Sixty-Million-Year Virus

    I only do this every few weeks, but I wanted to make sure that “Threads” readers noticed this wonderful article on The Loom. (Hat tip to Dispatches from the Culture Wars, where I saw it first.)

    I really don’t have anything to add on this one, but I do challenge young earth/old earth creationists to produce a credible scientific explanation for this data under their models.

  • God is Creator of Everything

    In a previous post in my series on Christian view on origins, Biblical Doctrine of Creation, I listed six elements of a Biblical doctrine of creation. I need to specify this more precisely as a Biblical doctrine of creation based on the Christian Bible and on one or another Christian approach to Biblical interpretation.

    Excursus – What is Biblical?

    Very often debates on whether any particular doctrine is Biblical founder on the fact that people are using different approaches to interpretation, and thus a text that applies in one way in one person’s argument means something completely different to the other, simply because of a different approach to interpretation. Since this is so important as I start discussing a Biblical doctrine of creation, let me give a simple example.

    In Matthew 5:17 Jesus says, “Don’t think that I have come to destroy the law and the prophets. I have not come to destroy, but to fulfill.” Now I interpret this text to mean that Jesus came to bring the law to fruition, that is to give it its deeper meaning, something defined by the texts that follow indicating a new way to look at various laws. Murderous anger is now like murder, lust like adultery, and so forth. In each case Jesus discusses the motive. I see these as examples of how Jesus invites his followers to look at the law.

    Now some people will say that Matthew 5:17 means that Jesus came to put an end to the law by keeping all of it, and would not see the following instructions as examples of that, but as a separate topic. When Jesus died, according to these folks, taking the penalty of the law, he removed the law and now we live by the Spirit. Others hold that since all of the preaching of Jesus was given to the Jews, the moral instructions of this chapter only apply to Jews. Christians belong to the church age, and are under grace. Somewhere in there most Christians will have found an approach to interpreting Matthew 5:17 that resonated with them, and may feel that the alternatives are quite weird. (I might not have included your view, and I certainly oversimplified them all.)

    Those differences in interpretation illustrate what I mean when I say that everyone approaches Bible study within some kind of interpretational matrix, and that if yours matrix is different from mine, we can debate about the matrix (or paradigm), but likely we’ll just degenerate into yelling if we try to argue what is “Biblical” and what is not based on completely different interpretational matrices. In the first three chapters of his book Faith, Form, and Time, Kurt Wise builds a case for a literal reading of the Bible in general and the early chapters of Genesis in particular. Thus he believes in a literal creation week of 24 hour days, patriarchs who literally lived hundreds of years, and a worldwide flood with all creatures preserved on the ark. For him this is Biblical, and any view holding that these materials are not narrative history, but rather are of other literary genres and thus should be understood very differently, would be unbiblical. For me, on the other hand, Wise’s view is not Biblical, because he is reading genres such as liturgy, myth, and legend as narrative history, and thus makes them mean things that are inappropriate to those genres.

    Note that the doctrine of inerrancy is not at issue here. While I do not accept the doctrine of inerrancy, there are theistic evolutionists who do. The issue is intent. An inerrantist can read the book of Jonah and determine that it is not historical. How is this possible? Because if he determines that the genre is “edifying story” it is not an error that the book is not historical. One doesn’t test a work of fiction based on whether the characters in it actually existed and did the things described. (For a connection of this same concept to the book of Daniel, see Dating the Book of Daniel.)

    So keep in mind as I discuss these various views that when I discuss how each view handles the Biblical materials relating to a particular doctrine, I’m considering their approach to interpretation. I’m not trying to say that all views are Biblical; I’m simply pointing out how each group relates its view to the Biblical material.

    Creator of Everything

    Major passages: Genesis 1:1-2:4a, Psalm 104:24, Hebrews 1:2, Romans 11:33-36, Isaiah 45:7.

    Most of these passages are quite self-explanatory in connection with this topic, though they are subject to different interpretations in terms of how and when God created. The key common element is that nothing is attributed in Christianity (or Judaism as I understand it) to any entity other than God. There are some points in Christian theology in which negative results have occurred in creation based on the activities of hostile entities. It is common, for example, for Christians to credit Satan with the “creation” of evil.

    The problem here is the understanding of God’s responsibility for the actions of creatures with free will. Many Christians remove God from responsibility for evil simply by attributing it to Satan. But Satan himself is a created being, again according to the Bible. (Note here that this statement is a bit loose, as the doctrine of Satan is not clearly fixed, especially in Hebrew scriptures.) In general, however, if someone makes something that causes damage, one is regarded as responsible for that damage. If I light a fire in my back yard, and then don’t control it, and it burns out of control and damages my neighbor’s yard, I cannot claim that the fire is responsible but I am not.

    That is not quite analogous to our case, however, because God is creating a creature that can choose what behavior it will engage in. Nonetheless, God created a creature who was capable of becoming evil, and thus set in motion the process of evil coming into existence. While most of the texts I listed simply speak of God creating everything, one text is more specific.

    7Forming the light,
    Creating the darkness,
    Making well-being,
    Creating disaster,
    I YHWH do {or make} all these things.

    There is some debate about the word I have translated “disaster” and the KJV translates “evil.” Some people think this alternate translation solves the problems. But this passage is actually using two words indicating the extremes in order to include everything between. No matter how light it is or how dark it is, God is the one who made it. No matter how good things get or how bad they get, God is the one who made it. God is absolutely the creator of everything. We may look for excuses (Satan did all the bad stuff), but God is not looking for such excuses. According to the Bible, he readily claims responsibility for the creation of everything.

    This doesn’t mean that I’m unaware of texts speaking of the devil. It does mean that I see the Bible as ultimately attributing all creative activity to God. For some reasons (best know to God, presumably), God created entities that were capable of evil, and gave them the freedom to exercise that option.

    In my view all of the Christian views of origins potentially fulfill this first requirement. Some Christians use the concept of the devil to avoid divine responsibility, but one can’t even make a generalization there, as many do not.

    Nonetheless, thestic evolutionists are frequently accused of not seeing God as the creator of everything, but rather of maintaining that all living things are produced by evolution, and thus not created by God. This accusation is itself unbiblical.

    It’s clear (I think) to both creationists of all varieties as well as to evolutionists that there are things in the world that come into existence on a regular basis. (I’m leaving stellar evolution for a later article discussing whether God is still creating.) For example, a new island might be formed by a volcanic eruption. I recall a visit to Crater Lake in Oregon, which was formed in only moments ago geologically speaking. Would any Christian claim that the lake and islands are not created by God?

    But the text of Isaiah gets very specific on this by calling God the creator of Israel (Isaiah 43:15). Now God clearly did not create Israel out of nothing. Rather, their ancestors were called, went through the normal processes of population growth, migration, and conquest, and eventually became the people to whom the message of 2nd Isaiah was proclaimed. Thus God is still the creator even of things that are produced through natural processes. Finally, let me mention every human baby, and in fact every form of new life, all of which is a creation of God, even though it is the result of natural processes.

    That is the first element of a Biblical doctrine of creation, and I believe that all of the views of creation we have discussed so far are consistent with it.

    For other entries in this series see Post Series.