This is a fallacy for a simple reason: it ignores the fact that the scriptures are ancient literature by requiring them to speak in terms of modern science.
In this they are confused because science is nothing more nor less than studying what God has done.
You keep using that claim but you also keep ignoring the fact that the scriptures are ancient literature! In both of the literary types of the first Genesis Creation story the days are literary days, not literal days.
That’s idolatry – we don’t worship days.
Well, Ham is an uneducated self-appointed ‘teacher’ who comes close to being a false prophet; he understands neither the scriptures nor science and thus misleads many. He is also legitimately called a fool because he condemns people who have studied the scriptures more deeply than he is even capable of for having a better understanding than he does.
This statement shows the same sort of ignorance that Ham displays: the number of scientists who “search only for scientific evidence that is contrary to Genesis 1” can probably be listed on a single page formatted like an old-school telephone book. The fact is that most scientists aren’t interested in Genesis 1 because it has nothing to tell science and science isn’t capable of commenting on it.
This, to the contrary, is clear and accurate:
But people who prefer to be told what to believe will never get that.
Imagine my agony when I hike one of the side canyons with a bunch of Christians who turned out to be primarily YECists. I had never before encountered such rabid blindness or refusal to actually consider the implications of the Creation accounts having been written as ancient literature that was never intended to be read as though it was actually written in English like someone’s great-grandfather’s diary of events he witnessed.
I hadn’t encountered that oath to be dishonest when I was on that hike, which was a good thing as I was reeling enough by the deliberate blindness the YECists were demonstrating.
Well said! That puts it more clearly than I’ve ever managed to do.
They can’t answer it – to even think about it would violate their oath to be dishonest.
And right there is the biggest reason that YECism should be denounced from every pulpit in the world: it requires people to be dishonest! It has no respect for the scriptures, only for its idol of demanding that God in ages past must conform to their views now. As this puts it:
I decided to weigh in on the geology issue after all . . . .
I’ll be blunt: either the geological record that shows the ages of the youngest mountain ranges being at the very least many hundreds of thousands and probably millions of years old actually tells us that the earth is at least that old (since it can’t be younger than any of its parts), or God is a liar.
YECism denies the plain evidence about those mountain ranges. They are thus teaching the second option.
The only explanation for the fact that the youngest mountain ranges are many hundreds of thousands of years old that includes a young earth is that God is deliberately deceitful.
And while I’m at it…
We seem to have arrived on the scene at a very special time in cosmic history: late enough to be able to observe the cosmos and gain understanding, early enough that we can still see back to the beginning. Neil DeGrasse Tyson once noted this, but he failed to reach what to me is an obvious point: is this just coincidence?
This would be an abuse of the pupit. It is not our job t dictate or to insist on a point of view. The job of the preacher is to lay out the evidence, the possible viewpoints, and let the listener make an informed choice. If you try and destroy a YEC viewpoint you will more than likely destroy the faith that it underpins.
There is nothing wrong with YEC as long as it is self-contained. The problem comes when it confronts or is confronted by science. The age of the cosmos has no bearing on sin and salvation or practical Christianity. But, if you make it important, say as a litmus to the accuracy of the Bible, it becomes critical.
The problem is not with the specific view but how it impinges on everything else. And, if you are going to attack that view you have to be able to replace the parts it underpins or the whole faith collapses like a deck of cards. IOW the reason so many young YECs lose faith is because they lose faith in the Bible. They have been shown that it does not say what they thought in terms of creation so they no longer believe any of it. All or nothing!
Before you can teach against YEC you must first establish that the Bible is not an authority on science. And that is easier said than done.
As a preacher I must allow for people to still believe in both a seven-day creation and an historic Garden of Eden with all the apparent incongruities with science or reality still intact.
Otherwise I am destroying not building faith. I can offer the alternative viewpoint, but must emphasise that it is not essential for faith in God or salvation.
No – you have to move faith away from the book and to the Incarnate Eternal Word, His death and His Resurrection.
With university students introducing them to the critical apparatus in my Novum Testamentum Graece was a good first step because why would God allow all those variant readings unless it was to tell us to not trust a book but a Person?
You can’t have one without the other. All knowledge about Christ comes from the Bible.
The main criticism of those who dispute Genesis is that they are trying to edit or pick and choose which parts of scripture to believe. The Bible is, and must be, central to Christian faith.
This is not a simple argument nor is there a trite answer to it. Biblical criticism can take a lifetime to understand. To some, the whole notion of criticising or questioning scripture is abhorrent and wrong. Suffice it to say criticise does not always mean deny or reject.
Not true. If it were, I wouldn’t be a Christian. Generation after generation scholars have set out to prove that Jesus wasn’t real and couldn’t have risen from the dead, but repeatedly they discovered that under their legal systems there was enough evidence to “convict” Him of returning from the grave.
The Incarnation, the Cross and Resurrection, are central; the scriptures are testimonies to these – and the scriptures do not need to be perfect to provide that testimony. Even YEC Christians know this because they understand that the Gospels have disagreements, and those come from the writers having their own perspectives – and if the Gospel writers wrote from their own perspectives, then naturally so did all the other writers.
The written word is always secondary – the Living Word is the center. YEC kids who abandon the church in college do so because they weren’t taught where the real center is.
That is not the orthodox view. Regardless of whether there is human input or bias, Scripture is paramount. External evidence can corroborate certain facts concerning the existence, death, and controversy of Christ but the theology comes solely from scripture.
Given the very broad range of different versions of theology there is something else being added to scripture. Before scripture an assumption must be made as to how you get meaning from scripture. Also, my personal theory is theology comes from a person’s judgement as to what is going to be the correct outcome in advance. Then scripture is used to support that outcome.
That is a very dangerous use of scripture. You can prove almost anything by quoting/misquoting scripture. Theology should come from understanding scripture, not by imposing a view onto scripture.
Richard
Sorta like saying … there is nothing wrong with falsehoods as long as you don’t speak them or believe them. Or nothing wrong with carcinogens in your food, so long as you don’t eat it.
If I am not mistaken, that is exactly Bill’s point. Many tend to have a pet theory and then look for support in scripture. A similar thing happens in science as well. We all need humility and a willingness to let the scripture (data) guide our theology (conclusions.)
No, it is a case of how it affects the person’s faith, and how it impinges on the Christian Doctrine. Creation is not central to Christianity, in fact it can survive without any thoughts on the subject.
Truth is not so black and white or precise as most would have it. I look at it more like a pie. We each have slices but not necessarily the complete view. Are you going to condemn for incompleteness? We all fail that one.
Homo Naledi’s going to give a lot of folks a “run for their theology.” [And I say that as a Christian “Shroudie” and believer in the benefit of exorcism, the Trinity, and the Doctrine of Original Sin.]
Hmmmm…why not trust both? that is, book and Person. After all, the Book told people (in the long ago past) to expect the Person…and they were eager and waiting in the first centuries BCE/CE…
you got a range of responses here. I think the answer to the first question is “only for those who are trying to decide.” Once people have decided, debating is probably less and less useful. Thanks for the question though!!
That has been the orthodox view since the first century!
We do not trust in a book, we trust in a Person. Teaching people that our faith rests on a book ends up producing people like Bart Ehrman who did exactly what such people taught – finding the least ‘error’ caused him to abandon Christianity completely.
That was one fun part of learning Greek totally apart from the New Testament: it was much easier to not smuggle in the familiar translations instead of actually translating, and thus to reduce expectation of what the text was “supposed to” say.