There are others too. A famous one is Romans 5:12: “Therefore, just as sin came into the world through one man, and death came through sin, and so death spread to all because all have sinned—”. Then, rather than complete the “just as” with a “so also,” Paul goes on in verse 13 to deal with some of the ways his comparison isn’t very exact after all. It isn’t until verse 18 that he takes another crack at making the comparison into a full sentence.
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Sometimes I wonder if Paul’s writings are a good example of early ADD.
Addendum–he was brilliant!–but had so much information flowing that the flow reminds me of that. Maybe I have it too, because I kind of like the pattern. Thanks.
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PRELUDE TO SUMMARY POST PART 1B:
ON THE ISSUE OF DEATH IN EVOLUTION
Hi again all, I hope you continue to enjoy this thread, it’s been a long one hasn’t it! I actually feel there is much more to come haha! So many interesting ideas continue to be generated/mentioned here, it has been really enriching and interesting for me. I’d love to think others are at least partially getting as much out of it.
This section here was going to be a summary of the key ideas responding to the second of my two original grievances (outlined below) … but then I found myself writing preliminary comments about it all. I now feel it best to make this a prelude to that summary part.
So, the issue at hand that will be discussed in summary form given so much up thread has touched on it is this:
that God would use evolution as his method of creating when there is so much death involved - and that this would seem to be inherently contrary to how God is described in the Bible, as being adverse to death and the bringer of life.
I’m aware this is a very deep topic, and not one that can be treated lightly, flippantly or with too much of a ‘pie in the sky’ tone. Death is a painful topic. We, will all die. Death brings grief, confusion, a desire for consolation. The fear of letting go. For those observing it in others, it brings the pain of loss - not wanting separation from those we love. Afterwards in can bring loneliness, sadness. Human emotion probably runs no higher or deeper than in the shadow of the face of death. From this fount of emotion - all kinds of things flow.
It would be true to say, from a historical anthropological view, that many many ideas about the afterlife no doubt originated from the flowing of this human fount of emotion. The Nordics have their view, as did the Egyptians, as did no doubt the many ancient islander cultures, ancient Aztecs, Myans, American Indians, Australian Aboriginals and so on. It would in fact be fascinating to study what these beliefs and rituals were - I know mostly only some of the Egyptian and tiny parts of only some of the others. I feel very ignorant as I consider this.
Anyway, all that is to hopefully bring some perspective to this issue. It goes without saying that the concept of Evolution would have been mind blowing and probably in most instances very confusing for all those ancient cultures to get their head around. How would they have understand Evolution in relation to the general concept of death and their afterlife beliefs? What would it have meant generally for their spiritual beliefs? This whole topic however is something generation after generation has never had to confront. It has been the unique challenge of only the last handful of generations whom have had to grapple with this. Looked at this way, as a phenomenon for the human species even, perhaps brings a certain somber humility to this whole issue, before we get into it.
Indeed, this phenomenon of the last handful of generations trying to synch the idea of evolution with various spiritual beliefs is definitely ‘a thing’, at least to my mind. From my understanding though … it has never really been called out specifically as ‘a thing’ which has been given a name and studied in detail by anthropologists and psychologists (having said that now, I’m totally expecting it probably has and I just haven’t heard about it).
Personally, I think it’s important and grounding to have this wider ‘all of humanity experience’ context in mind before we get into this discussion. It’s very easy for us in the Christian world to get one eyed, to get defensive, to get mean about our theological and related ideas. I’ve seen many times how people can switch into a kind of ‘battle mode’ about their theology … and sadly (and ironically given the whole ‘love thy neighbour’ golden rule) act like a total so and so, inadvertently and virtually subconsciously, in the process. I know especially in my younger days - I have definitely been guilty of this sin and I pretty deeply regret my harsh fool hardiness in some instances, no more so in fact (something I’ve actually just remembered) of when I made some stupid comments to a housemate and friend about how God plans and controls all things, without me properly realising how painful what I was saying was in the face of her mum being very unwell (and later dying). I just didn’t properly hold that in mind before I went into that mode (this is quite some time ago, but still - it destroyed the relationship, understandably, and apologies afterwards did not heal the wound). Its a powerful reminder to me: be very careful of words and mindful of people’s experiences and emotions.
I think there’s something in the ‘fight’ aspect of our human nature that causes us to literally forget this - like our brains switch into a different system that puts the blinders up to others emotions and/or feelings when we are ‘pushing forth’ our ideas.
I know I don’t really need to be saying all this here - the vast majority of people in BioLogos are decent, mature folk and the ones that ‘rush in’ or get all ‘fighty’ are probably not going to read this anyway.
As things precede, I know we’ll ‘play the ball not the man’ to use the old sporting phrase. I’m looking forward to some gung-ho engagement with the content - don’t hold back here - but with respect for the actual person delivering it.
The actual summary post will have lots and lots of quotes - maybe about a third to a half from articles this time.
The record goes to A.Suarez’s Treatment on a Pope’s Formulation for Original Sin’s Transmission! with 1058 posts and counting.
Just in case you want to be aspirational.
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Oh my goodness that post is huge! I just clicked on the link then and it started at like 960, I kept scrolling up and quickly realised it’d take too long to get to the top … so I clicked the up arrows on people’s posts … after doing that for a bit I only got into the 700s before I gave up. I’ll look it up later in the forum headings.
Anyway - ha - I cant see this post getting anywhere near that much and especially after seeing that one have no such aspirations lol.
I’m already picturing that once this post has wrapped up (there’s a thing that tells me “this post will close 7 days after the last post” - and all this is new to me so I’m taking it as it comes) it will act as a good go to for me, quite possibly years into the future. A time capsule of sorts. To that end (and cause I’m at least a little OCD re things having a good structure) I’m trying to be deliberate in organising the summaries etc … will be interesting how that all plays out. For me it feels a bit like a mining expedition of ideas - digging deeper and deeper to get to the gold
I wasn’t actually suggesting you read it, just that you view your own 166 post thread with appropriate humility. 
True moderator confessions, I have not done more than scroll-skim to the bottom in over a year (to occasionally get rid of the blue “72 unread posts” thing next to it). I got behind hundreds of posts ago, and there’s just no jumping back in. If there’s a bunch of rebellious ungraciousness going down there, I’m pretty sure it will remain unchecked indefinitely.
Pro tip: if you want to easily go to a certain post in a long thread you can change the post number at the end of the IP address and hit enter and it will jump to that spot. To go back to the OP you can click on the boldface title at the top of the thread. We don’t want anyone developing tendonitis in the scroll finger.
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Yes perhaps my comment about the thread being long came across in the wrong way - I’ve been going over all the posts and tracking it all closely and seeing it develop - so my comment about it being “long” was more a reflection of all of that, rather than some ‘wow, look at me’ moment ha. I guess we can all be prone to such frivolity that but try to keep trumpet blowing behaviour to a strong minimum lol.
Woah - didn’t realise you and all the other Moderators actually getting a notification every time someone makes a post. That must be nightmarish! (I can’t help but giggle “Oh no, not another 10 to read - it’s only been 20 minutes! Why, why did I agree to be moderator 
). I don’t think anyone would last for long with that kind of pressure! “Tonight I have the night off and I’ll be scrollin’ scrollin’ on BioLogos, what will you be doin?”
Can you guys - “The Moderators” [formidable, awish tone] divvy it up somehow?
I must say - I am totally impressed by whoever wrote the code to how this BioLogos chatroom works - it’s super functional with all the fancy bits and pieces you can do (quotes, block quotes, bold/italics, emojis etc). That person ought to be crowned with a wreath or something.
On that (the functionality of this platform) thanks for those tips - I’ll have to try them out sometime.
Well, I’m off into a long weekend now.
Happy notification checking! (sorry, couldn’t help it - obviously said in good nature)
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Thanks Christy for noticing.
I didn’t aim any record but it is a pleasure contributing to this high level BioLogos Forum.
And thanks to all the moderators!
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I don’t see that one as incomplete. But then, as I told my son last night when I was asking him about merisms, I was never good at English. I read that as
Therefore, just as sin came into the world through one man, and death came through sin, and THEREFORE death spread to all, because all have sinned. That sounds complete to me. Maybe it isn’t in Greek.
To my original question for literal interpreters – Did the tree of life die, or did it ascend into heaven like Christ? – I got the following answers:
The tree of life died. The source of immortality … died. But it reappears in the New Jerusalem.
I can understand the resurrected Christ in heaven, since the resurrection body is a “spiritual body,” whatever Paul meant by that. But a physical tree? Is it kept in soil and watered?
I can’t wrap my mind around either option. I feel like I should do a poll on this. Would it come out 50/50?
St. John wrote Revelation. Ask God how the tree is sustained. I wouldn’t have a clue.
SUMMARY POST 1B
Summarising answers under several key ideas to my original grievance, on the following issue:
That God would use evolution as his method of creating when there is so much death involved - and that this would seem to be inherently contrary to how God is described in the Bible, as being adverse to death and the bringer of life.
2a. Death is not inherently a bad thing and was necessarily built into creation. The death that came into the world through sin that the Bible speaks of is a spiritual death, which is different from physical death
There was a lot that came through along this line. It was probably one of the strongest key ideas in the thread. To capture all the quotes this time, I’ll experiment with using just block quotes rather than quoting the people - but I’ll add the post number so you can check it out if you’d like.
Blockquote
I think on some level we understand that mere “killing” of a living thing isn’t always wrong … death seems to be more a function of the material nature of the world rather than of evolution specifically
P2
Blockquote
Physical death is of no more significance than leaving the womb and being born. But the death which is the wages of our sins is quite a different thing altogether - that is the destruction of everything of value within us – our love, our integrity, and our relationship with God.
P15
Blockquote
Death itself will be done away but the death that is heavily talked about in Scripture is spiritual death which is far worse then physical death. As Jesus said, “Don’t fear man who can kill the body but not the soul, but fear God who can kill both body and soul.
P16
Blockquote
I would say he spiritually died. That death was not physical death. God said you will surely die on that day. Adam surely did. It was not physical.
P29
Blockquote
I think our scriptural [mis-]understanding of death has contributed to at least some of the cognitive dissonance that modern westerners agonize about. There is an impression that death is an enemy to be eradicated (to exist no more), whereas this is different than what Jesus and Paul both teach as death being subdued … denied its status of finality - its “sting” as Paul says. There are different ways an enemy can be “destroyed”. The simple way - as a child would think about that word - is that destruction would just make something cease to exist entirely. But an even higher, more satisfying form of destruction is to turn your enemy into your friend. By destroying the fear and hatred of separation, one has destroyed the enmity, and now has gained a friend. Without death we do not get resurrection.
P30
Blockquote
If living beings never died, where would the young go. Would there even be young? Surely there needs to be death for there to be new life.
P32
Blockquote
All that is to say, I’m far from convinced that Satan is the author of death, or even that physical death was a novelty introduced into the universe by our sin. While there are passages that do make such attributions (the text never lets us rest!), there are plenty more testimonies from both God’s word and works that persuade me that God’s creation isn’t so easily overpowered and remade by us, much less by our shortcomings. There is a stronger theme, I think, of all things being created good, and of evil being incapable of creating anything at all - but only perverting the pre-existing good. While I can’t say for sure what “good death” in an unfallen world would even look like, I’m nonetheless convinced physical death is part of the fabric of the good creation and it was then turned into an enemy with a sting by our sin.
P56
Blockquote
I don’t think the “death” the Bible attributes to human sin is all physical and animal death in the world. It’s human death, and often, spiritual death that is in view. There are passages in Job (38: 39-41) and Psalms (34:10), 104:21 where the Creator claims he provides for his apex predators, which implies they are doing exactly what they are created to do when they eat meat.
P59
Blockquote
“Psalm 104 is definitely referring to the literal ‘lions’ and a good case that God provides meat. However, the nuance would be that this refers to God’s abundance in the creation of prey (I.e. all animals); I’m still wary of making the claim that God purposefully gives over prey to a predator. This is in line with the phrasing, they ‘seek their food (achelam) from God’ as in they are tirelessly creeping about until there is food appearing (a bit like how God provides the ram for Abraham as the sacrifice instead of Isaac)
P88
Blockquote
“I don’t see death, stripped of its sting, as posing a problem to God’s goodness. Why must every creature God makes be immortal? If it is somehow wrong for a young animal to outlive its mother, is it also wrong for the mother to live before her young exist?”
I don’t see death, stripped of its sting, as posing a problem to God’s goodness. Why must every creature God makes be immortal? If it is somehow wrong for a young animal to outlive its mother, is it also wrong for the mother to live before her young exist?
P102
The following quotes on this theme are from the article linked near the end of P11
Does the Bible teach death is the result of human sin?
I found this article very helpful.
Blockquote
“He [Jesus] doesn’t often address the origins of human death and suffering, but when he does, Jesus explicitly denies that disability, illness, natural disaster, and death are punishment for specific sins. Instead, he explains that God can work through such circumstances and also use them to call people to repentance”
Blockquote
“The sinless Jesus did not atone for sin by passing away in his sleep. Instead, taking our place required accepting the curse of being hung on a tree (Galatians 3). Christ, whom the New Testament repeatedly describes as the agent and organizing principle in the creation of the world, brings life through death. Revelation 13 depicts Jesus as the lamb slain from the foundation of the world. Christians should not be surprised to see this pattern of life emerging from death reflected in God’s good creation.”
Blockquote
“If mortality is part of the original, good creation, how could the Apostle Paul call death “the last enemy” in 1 Corinthians 15? First, death is not the only enemy that Paul says God will judge. In this same passage, he also names rulers and authorities, though these are part of God’s good creation (Colossians 1). Paul elsewhere names all humanity as enemies of God (Romans 5). Paul names death an enemy, but death remains part of God’s good creation.
Second, death is pictured as a friend in 1 Corinthians 15. Resurrection life comes through death—Christ’s and our own. Paul describes how Adam’s body was perishable precisely because it was made of the dust of the ground. The imperishable body of the world to come is not of the same kind as the “very good” body of Genesis 1-2.”
Blockquote
“Even more than spiritual death, the death that Israel experienced matches the consequences tied to work and family that Genesis 3 describes. With this in mind, it should come as no surprise that matching calls to obedience and life appear at the beginning and end of the Torah (Genesis and Deuteronomy). In both Israel and the original male and female pair (Adam and Eve), God creates a special people, offers a promising land to be subdued, provides a law, and encourages the people to choose life rather than death. In both cases, the people choose death. Curses and exile result.”
Blockquote
“Jesus speaks of “death” in the same way as Paul. He describes as “dead” the physically alive Pharisees, the prodigal son, and those who prioritize tradition, burying their dead, over following him.7 In the Gospel of John, Jesus often uses death to represent eternal death, as opposed to eternal life, and thus he can say that Christians have “passed from death to life” and “will never see death.”
From the article Is animal suffering part of God’s good creation? linked in P10 near the end
Blockquote
“Yes, there are difficult and painful aspects of how the natural world works—even what we would call evil. But the Cruciform view goes further, taking its cue from the greatest revelation of God’s nature to us—the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ. It is not just that these difficult and painful aspects are necessary or unavoidable evils. Rather, God has determined unambiguously to use suffering and death to bring about new life.
2b. Evolution simply is the most functional mechanism by which life is made
Blockquote
“Evolution is inseparably intrinsic to life and existence itself” P1
2c. The suffering built in to the functionality of the world (by evolution but also present in the YEC view) serves a deeper purpose
Blockquote
The loving part necessitates allowing evil and death to exist – if we were forced, that would negate love.
P26
Blockquote
there’s good reason to prefer a world where even people can suffer. Some element of pain and possible failure seems to lie beneath the potential for many of the greatest elements of our existence. Most athletics would merely be admiring other people’s genes if it wasn’t for how some of us can push through pain, conquer inertia, defy the cushy path and beat body and mind into a shape that can do astounding things. If everyone could do anything without risking discomfort or pushing against obstacles, every achievement would be tawdry. And the virtues we tend to admire most – bravery, compassion, self-sacrifice, devotion, love – all seem to find their truest expression when they come at a cost or at least the real potential of a high cost. A world where that cost never needed to be paid would be cheap and fruitless.
P78
2d. We ought not just to focus on the ‘dark side’ of what evolution brings - the death and suffering. That is part of the system, sure, but there is so much life to celebrate
Blockquote
We can morbidly focus on only the ‘red-in-tooth-and-claw’ side if we wish, choosing only to see the mangled raccoon on the highway, the squealing prey having life drained out of it by a merciless predator; but there is also much new life and beginnings that some of those same organisms may well have participated in too - and to make their final suffering moments the one and only defining characteristic of their existence is to miss a significant picture of life with all its God-praising existence. And I maintain that even those final moments that are so horrifying to us - that we do not wish on anything or anyone, that even those will in the end be seen by our transformed spiritual eyes as a necessary doorway toward yet more life and renewal - even transformed life, we hope.
P30
Blockquote
“As I was reading this thread, I was also wondering if it would be helpful for us to ask: Why do we as parents bring children into this world, even though we know that we cannot shield them from suffering and death? We still find immense joy in our lives with our friends and families in spite of the struggles we face. There is beauty in those relationships.”
P56
Blockquote
“Though death itself develops nothing new, without it there’d be little opportunity for new life and new gene combinations.
As human parents are at least willing to stand with their children to face the challenges, perhaps that is also what God offers? Everyone assumes God can do anything whatsoever but why would that be. Isn’t it more likely that we just are not privy to the considerations which shape His choices? Perhaps He can no more genie his tough choices away than we can.”
P57
Blockquote
Here’s something to think of as well.
We all agree that God cares for his creation. This is rhetorical by the way and not a serious question I have just feel like it helps focus a bit on the issue of god and his creation.
Who does God care for more?
The plant or the mouse that eat it’s?
The mouse or the snake that eats it?
The snake or the hawk that eats it?
Once you decide which one God likes the most does he still not say we as humans are worth many birds in the eyes of God?
P63
2e. The suffering that is part of the system of evolution is mere child’s play compared to the suffering that occurs within a system of a God that flooded the world and sends people to eternal torment
Blockquote
the fact that there is a lot of yucky stuff in the world to come to terms with is not an exclusively EC problem. In the YEC model, the God of the Universe uncreated his creation by flooding the whole earth, violently killing EVERYTHING except a few lucky boat riders. Don’t even get me started on eternal conscious torment for the billions of people who die never hearing of Christ, just because a couple ate some forbidden fruit and broke the world, also willed by the God of the Universe. There is a reason “the problem of evil” is considered a problem when it comes to God-belief.
P40
2f. God guided evolution
From the article linked in P67
Blockquote
Some may take issue with the general notion of God guiding evolution. For a Christian, however, the idea is no more controversial than saying that God guides us in our everyday lives.
Blockquote
I believe God guided evolution at every step of the process. The Lord is intricately and intimately involved in his creation, not locked on the outside looking in. In theology, this is the doctrine of God’s immanence, or presence. Of course, since God is spirit, I’m not talking about his physical presence.
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SUMMARY - PART 2A
Dynamics of Biblical inspiration and their implications
Hi all,
I won’t guild the Lilly too much on this one. This post will be me critically analysing the key ideas that have been put out in this thread in response to one of my two original grievance issues I brought up:
that God as creator obviously knew how the world was made and despite having the ability to communicate this, even to an ancient world, choose not to. He instead used stories that we understand were not factually true so that they could sound similar to other stories around in the part of the world the Bible originated from at the time, enabling easier reception to the original audience. I took issue with this as odd, very unsettling and casting all kinds of doubts on all kinds of things. Connected to this are the topics of the nature of inspiration, how we understand Genesis, the historicity of Scripture and purpose of Scripture and related topics.
This post is extremely personal for me. My faith, to be frank, is truly hanging on a few threads at the moment as I’ve been wrestling with all this. Yesterday I received in the mail the fascinating book “The believing primate” which is an Oxford published book where biologists, psychologists, theologians and a few others examine the whole concept of religion, in the light of evolution. It’s a book I ‘need to read’ with where I’m at right now … but I kinda know where it’s going to lead me. Sigh.
I’ve decided to more or less not hold back in what I say below. I mean no offence to anyone if it all comes across a bit raw.
Analysing:
1a. God spoke in the Bible in such a way that would make sense to the ancient people who were the audience. God therefore was not focussed on communicating in a way that would relate to us in the 21st century with our codes of thinking, knowing that we would later develop further as a human race to better understand why he spoke like he did at the time
Obviously this is a big key idea to respond to. People had some good comments about this that I’ve really considered. I guess for me what gets to the heart of it, is whether God wanted to convey actual factual truth about the physical world or not, and it would seem he didn’t in the Genesis account. Obviously there is more to it than that but that is part of it.
I know when considering this topic for me, having an analogy to bounce off is going to help. It’s certainly hard to come up with something of a modern day analogy to something like this … so an imaginary scenario was the closest thing I could do. Bear with me here as it is a little different … but I’m hoping as it sinks in … this short story allegory might be helpful:
** Allegory - the Proto Humans on Eiona **
It’s the year 2954. Since about the 2600s, humans have in earnest been spreading out across the galaxy. Governmental restraint on certain operations of the rich has become virtually impossible at anything more than a localised level, meaning what happens in the outer reaches is near impossible to police.
One company valued at multi quadrillions (1000 trillions) has had a secret operation running for a few generations now. They have set up a large colony on a distant moon. Using undisclosed methods that manipulate the speed of cells’ mitochondria processing, they have managed to vastly speed up the evolutionary processes. By this method, and with much human selection along the way, they have managed to evolve a relatively primitive human like species at incredible speed.
These ‘proto humans’ have no idea who created them. Their understanding of time is vastly different to ours; one of them can be born and live a full life in only 18 months, yet how they process and think is essentially the same as us - only faster. Over time, the proto humans have expanded and split off into multiple groups.
The company who set up the operation watch and see how their creation make sense of their world and their origin. Different origin stories start to arise, much based around an unseen power that drives and grows. The proto humans seem to have an innate sense of this and it is fascinating how they spiritualise it. Notably, very few animals have been created alongside these proto humans but the ones that have been made, are heavily referenced in the origin stories.
This whole area is incredibly fascinating for the company to observe. In the end, these ‘creators’ decide to carefully craft a story, not dissimilar to those that different groupings of the proto humans had come up with themselves, about origins.
Fascinatingly, a real human is able to ‘appear’ to these proto humans and the reactions they receive are amazing. These ‘appearances’ have been strictly limited and in delivering the origin story, the company was careful to strike the right balance between outright appearing (or theopany to the minds of the protos) and allowing the protos to think they had come up with the ideas supplied.
This story provided by the company hints at their being an “exalted group” of creators who made the proto-humans. Most of the rest of the crafted story fits in with the culture of these partially advanced proto humans.
The actual facts - the humans race travelling to the Kenarix region of the Milky Way in the year 2523, there being a megalomaniac ex leader of the prime colony, Mastaris Drune who went totally rogue, there being a small civil war on planet Marsharna that ended with Drune taking a third of the colonists on the planet into exile are totally unknown. Likewise that Drune had discovered new technologies and then with his scientists began the process of super evolving the protos on the secret moon called Eiona - these proto humans know absolutely nothing about.
*The Mastarisians (who live on a different part of Eiona) have a whole comedy program about it - it’s pretty hilarious actually. *
The Mastars have been working on this secret project for nearly 250 years. Of course, they know that, overtime, their creation will start to get more advanced and actually begin to realise more of how they came about. In line with this, the company know there are certain elements in the proto humans that can be reverse engineered that will point to this.
They have sent various ‘prophets’ in here and there, for different reasons, some experimental, but none have substantially updated the origin story (that said, a small group who called themselves the Lucifolds did try and get all righteous and let them know what was going on … but they were quickly subdued before too much damage was done. Fascinatingly, echoes of this attempt have merged with the protos origin story which made the whole thing more interesting.
** End **
Okay, so there you go. A sci-fi based allegory. Obviously there are many divergent points where the allergory wouldn’t hold up against traditional perspectives but I write it as a way to “reverse analyse” our situation (and yeah I got a bit carried away ha).
I think it is indeed fair to say that the proto humans in this imaginary scenario are gonna feel some pretty big and weird emotions once they realise how they actually came to be. The progenitors (ie the company, the creators) definitely could have told them how they came to be. They could have sent someone down with a clearer explanation. But they didn’t and so all manner of confusion - and wars etc break out over the proto humans development between their growing nations. The protos would be bitter and angry at the company - quite possibly wanting to find them and hold them accountable by some means - “look at all the suffering you caused, and why?”.
I think the argument that the progenitors “were only focussed on speaking to the early generations in a way they would understand“ when they gave the origin story … is not going to cut it for the more developed generations of proto humans years later. Especially considering the actual origin story was only given to a tiny group of them, the Ionzites.
(Side point: For anyone who has seen the movie Prometheus, there’s some interesting cross over in parts here - when the humans go out to find the ‘Engineers’ (who evidently made another much more nasty very non human species as well as them).
Indeed there are so many questions and issues that flow from this scenario. I genuinely think it is a helpful one to keep in mind when considering this key idea.
My conclusion then, at present - is that this argument in 1a. doesn’t hold water on so many levels. If God is indeed committed to revealing himself and truth to mankind, why not do so more progressively in a way that matched our ongoing development … like a parent would? I suppose some will answer “He did and the end point was Jesus” … but I personally don’t think that argument holds out when scrutinised. For example - why has clear revelation essentially stopped after Jesus? “cause he’s the prime and only real main revelation we need” I hear someone say, to which I answer “well, the fact revelation stopped, kinda abruptly, around 1900 years ago is totally not helpful … we really could have God’s guidance and revelation on a bucket load more issues … one of which being how we truly came about, ie the fact we evolved, it was pretty nasty just to ‘stumble’ on that knowledge”.
Indeed the “only revealed in a way they could understand at the time” argument has strong parental overtones - such that the other side of the coin of this argument is “well, why did God only show us something us human toddlers (and then only to a tiny group of Hebrews, ‘special’ toddlers if you will) and then when we got to about the collective human development age of about 11-12 years old, just leave us to figure out the rest? I emphasise again, in the process of ‘figuring out the rest’, God has allowed us to ‘stumble upon’ the actual truth of evolution- ie a very different story to what we had believed. God didn’t give us any prior warning. How this does not feel like getting a stone instead of bread, you can tell me cause I can’t see. Biting into evolution, it ain’t soft and delicious like bread - it’s a stone. A cold, lifeless, non digestible (and spiritually very innutritious) stone.
If anyone has seen the Netflix Movie ‘I am mother’ - there are some overtones here too with all this … when the main character finds that jawbone in the kilm. To reference another movie - when people on the movie ‘The Island’ realise there’s a whole other world out there, or when Neo discovers the Matrix. All of these are horrible, massively confronting revelations for the characters in those movies and I feel realising we evolved rather than were created in the way that was believed for 1000s of years is like that. Like I said in my original post, I feel this experience is probably like thinking your origins were via one family to then find out you’re adopted.
To the logic of the argument “God revealed to them only what they could understand” cannot we also say “well, if God was like that to them - why did he leave us to just ‘stumble’ on evolution without telling us?”. You’d think a loving parental figure by virtue of speaking to the early Hebrew folk how did, would also be of such a character to tell us - to tell someone, anyone - how we actually came to be.
So, at this present moment (it could change, sigh), I reject this argument, wholesale. It doesn’t hold up … and I challenge anyone to counter these points above. I ideally hope not to hear ‘more of the same‘ (the reason I went to the effort of doing the summary was to point out everything that has been said already so I’d appreciate the same things not being said again haha). If anyone feels they need to phrase things differently to capture a different angle than has been depicted already, please go for it. I just ask, humbly and with a weird kind of desperation almost (this is my faith hanging on here) please engage with the specifics of my arguments.
Analysing:
1b. The story of Adam & Eve (and by extension much of the Bible) uses metaphorical language to explain deep truths and is not meant to be understood as fact like we understand fact
This key idea I relate to and resonate more deeply with than 1a and in this, there is a lot of overlap with key idea 1c. It’s the finger prints, it’s the voice, it’s the person of God I want though - not just humans reflecting and responding in a “spiritual” way.
What I mean by saying this is - if scripture is full of metaphorical language that explains deep truths about the human condition - it creeps into the territory of the Iliad and of other people’s ancient stories rather than actual, factual hard truth. And by doing so - how can we make a real distinction (except for personal subjectivity) about how to discover the real truth?? Ultimately we humans just end up facing ourselves in the mirror when we think about “God” here. I don’t want that and I don’t believe that - I believe there is something, someone higher … although I wrote that line about a week ago and even since then, my belief in this has diminished now … but it is still there. I just think traditional concepts of it are, basically, not correct. I’m still a Christian with the imprint of the cross on my heart but on this Pilgrims progress of mine … I’ve now wandered into a pretty dark land … not unlike the elephant grave yard in the Lion King and I can certainly hear the jackals calling. Is God still my shepherd here? Or is the thought of having a shepherd just a sense of safety that even enabled a confidence to come and explore this land? This land I might now get stuck in? Certainly I can’t see how I’ll make it back to the prime right now. The sun is down and I don’t see it rising that’s for sure … I feel like the rest of my life will be spent in a shadowy kind of darkness after thinking through all these things. A never ending night. The daylight of my innocent beliefs is gone. But who knows - the sun may well rise again and it will be particularly special if it does
(I’m going on a bit I suppose but the nature of such emotions isn’t always near. In my ‘lamenting’ - I’m comforted by the memory that many in the Bible - King David being a prime example but certainly others, Obadiah being another, did have large sections of complaint, of sadness, of expressing how they truly felt … so God, I’m expressing how I truly feel here …).
Sigh. Cutting in to an earlier bit of this write up here, I’m seriously having to ask questions like “what is truth? What actually is the Bible? And how is it truly and genuinely different from other people’s ancient scriptural texts? Like really - how? Because it is ‘inspired by God - the one and only true God?’ - this God who decided not to make any super clear distinguishing features to his ‘actual’ revelation (aka the Bible)? It is a pathetically weak argument to say “my version of the truth is true … um, because my version, um, says it is true! Yes, that’s right”.
Sounds like a primary school argument between 7 years olds, 6 years olds even. But that is kind of what we’re left with … if we except the idea that Bible is metaphorical and primarily not literal but is despite this, still true over and against other ancient religious scriptures. More holes than Swiss cheese.
I’d certainly posture that the Bible is deeper and maybe in the sense of it being ‘deeper’ therefore ‘truer’ than other texts (I’ve read part of the Koran and, with respect for another religion here - it came across to me as a lot of kinda random like sayings one after the other … without a narrative coherence to it but that’s just me. Certainly, it wasn’t a story. I’ve read small parts of other ancient scripture (can’t find it now but I think it was some ancient Hindu scripture or something - anyway, it was actually quite beautiful and I distinctly remember it talking about “the one true God” and how virtuous he is and how is sustainer and things like that. I remember thinking “this sounds like parts of the Bible!”.
So I certainly don’t reject this key idea - I embrace it, as I can see some very deep truths in the Bible communicated by it - deeper even than if I try and see the early part of Genesis as historical.
But then - how do I explain the actual historical inaccuracies (or what are generally postulated fo be inaccuracies) written down in our Bible. For example, ones to make Abraham look amazing fighting off that huge Babylonian army in Genesis 14 … I mean, hmm. There’s that and there’s - basically everything outlined in the last 10 minutes of episode 100 of the ‘Bible for Normal people‘ podcast.
Here a “totally pure and heavenly” sense of all the deep truths the Bible begins, in my mind, to break down. In the growing debris, a picture forms of how there is a clear agenda in parts of the Okd Testament, saying how special and awesome the people of Israel were and using essentially untrue stories to back this up. I mean look at all the awesome stuff Abraham and then Moses did.
This apparent bias in the Bible skews and pollutes a kind of “pure revelation to all of man kind” perspective this key idea is in many ways based on.
There’s this and then there’s the related argument “well, maybe ‘deep truths’ are also found - perhaps even better and lore clearly articulated without the bias of political agendas in other ancient holy writings. Did God ‘inspire’ those too? Or do we draw the boundaries of heavenly inspiration around our own scriptures (harking back to the 6 year olds in the school yard)? If we don’t … where and how do we draw the boundaries??
On this I wrote back in Post 13
Another interesting quote in this direction was
P15
1c. The Bible is man’s (humanely fallible) way at trying to communicate eternal truths and [sub idea to this point] is done in the context of God being accessible and awareness of his existence being felt in a deep way by all. This said, awareness of God can only be communicated via human means and is therefore bound by the restrictions of communication in time and place
Well, basically everything I said in 1b is covered here. I’m leaning very much to 1c. being what I’ll be running with for now …
1d. God actually has put clues about creation having occurred by evolution- obviously these could only be vague clues as they could not have been understood by the original audiences but they are still there and it is also our duty, joy and privilege to find out the truth rather than just have it told to us
I’ve addressed some of this above in my relatively brief discussions with @gbob and @Jay313. The logic of this key idea also connects with the above ones, perhaps especially with some of the things in 1a.
Certainly one of BioLogos’ entire main key ideas is that, just as scripture says “he knits us together in our mother’s womb” isn’t actually some hands knitting us together per se but natural biological processes, so the story of God creating us humans in general and Adam & Eve specially, could be a general picture of God creating humans and that this can be - that it is in BioLogos’ view - God working to knit humanity together by the natural means of evolution. Simples (I.e. no stress).
This whole argument then at this point takes an off ramp to the issues all raised in the key ideas of point number 2, so refer to that those points (in the next forthcoming summary instalment) for more on this
1e. Explaining how all things were created was not a priority for God
I think the original reference to this was the fact that God spoke at more length in scripture about rules about grains and goats than he did about actually how he made the world.
I generally agree however would point out that there certainly are multiple references to God creating the world, with some further slightly specific details dotted through scripture besides in Genesis - e.g. in the Psalms, in the earlier part of Proverbs quite a bit, and here and there in the major prophets with occasional phrases like “he lays out the heavens like a sheet” etc. Still, the total sum of all these references might add up to maybe 4-5 bible chapters, not much compared to other topics up for discussion in scripture. While I’m here, I note that it would be an interesting exercise to correlate and compare the various references through the whole Bible about creation and deduct a picture. I’m sure someone could link an article in on that.
Certainly though, there is never a clear reference - anywhere - to evolution, nor to there being billions and billions of years of time in the universe from starting point to now. Nor are there any special clues about such things as multiple galaxies, gravity, supernova, black holes, bacteria or DNA. God knows about all these super cool things and will spend bulk chapters on prophecies about ancient nations not around anymore but who discussion about has been immortalised forever (and which includes some comments and prophecies - I wince to say - that I understand never even came about (the Gog and Magog stuff) … yet does not reveal actual interesting and later verifiable facts about his creation. Great, thanks. Doesn’t that seem really odd? Isn’t that like … sad? We have to really start to lower our expectations of ‘God’ when we start to realise such things, well, that’s how I’m feeling anyway. It’s like a kid who thinks their Dad can do anything when their going to later realise, ah, maybe not. At least it feels a bit like that.
I’m sounding super facetious here but I mean it. Us humans we have to start realising such things and asking ”God, what the?” If he is God - he can take it! Take it like a man, take it like a God. That is, unless God is Man and Man doesn’t want to take it. I hate the thought but it’s properly surfacing right now. I’ll probably end up taking that “thought captive” to quote Paul but it’s a wily one.
In all this (ranting here? Yes, sorry) I feel we should feel comfortable to ask the “Why God”
questions. “Why God did you tell us about ancient this and not that?” I think is fair. If God is Abba - Dad, well a child who feels comfortable enough to call their father ‘Dad’ is comfortable enough to ask such questions.
Before I finish on all this prior to getting into the next key idea, I want to mention something else. In my job, I do a lot of reading over other people’s work and make corrections about spelling (ha, I know mine through this thread hasn’t always been best 
), about phrasing and generally about how to correctly convey a strong, clear message to the reader. In all this, I often have it in mind how something will be read and understood by future workers who didn’t know necessarily about the specific context of the here and now. Our department has in fact been pushing for sometime now about the importance of clearly recording decisions and rationales in our system at a point in time, so it can be understood later. Before I sign anything - I need to feel comfortable with it. I won’t just sign anything - if I do, it’s basically me saying “this meets my standard and I’m okay with it”.
I suppose one way to look at the concept of the inspiration of scripture is that humans, with the Holy Spirit inside/around them guiding, wrote the words but by virtue of inclusion in the canon, God has ‘signed off’ on it. I know the picture is not that clear cut but there has to come a point where we get real and say “okay, if we believe this is ‘God’s word’, well then obviously as a minimum God has seen it, read it, is more or less happy with the phrasing, happy with the generally understood take away meanings including how it could be understood in the future by people who didn’t know the context at the time, etc. There are so many implications of this it would almost need another thread to explore them all - but my main point in pretty much everything I’ve written here is that scripture leaves me with a profound awkwardness and sense of almost embarrassment. It does not leave me with a sense of jaw open awe, which the scripture itself says is what God is jealous for and often aims for in his dealings.
1g. At the end of the day, trying to understand the tensions and apparent contradictions of how science and scripture interact is not something we will eventually ‘figure out’, at some point we just need to accept that and move on while still holding on to faith
So here we are, at this fun point. You know what this key point feels like, it feels like ‘barleys’ in the old game of chasey. In primary school (and maybe a bit in high school) I and many others used to love playing chasey. Running away from the person who was “it” in a big group was so much fun. Then there was reverse chasey (or whatever it was called, I forget), where each time a person was touched by the person who was “it”, they too became “it” and chased down all those who were not “it”’until one person was left. Those trying to avoid the growing number of people who were “it“ would have certain safe zones to run where they could call out “Barleys!” and be safe from being tagged. This argument feels very much like this “Barleys” or “Time out”.
My thoughts in response are
“Sure. Stay there, it’s good not to by blown around by all kinds of ideas …but also, c’mon now”.
Sometimes we do need to run away from some big and scary idea running after us. Sometimes we enter a “barleys room”, so to speak, from one door and instead of going back out that door to face that scary idea again, we go out another door. Avoidance, dressed up in smart clothes. Dressed up in religious clothes, scented with myrrh if you don’t mind.
Sometimes avoidance is okay. But for me, those big scary ideas will just come round a different way and find you again. Are we just going to keep running from them? I guess in many ways, many of us can live our whole lives this way. Running into Barleys rooms away from things we don’t want to confront or don’t want to be tagged by. It gets hard though … it is convenient in many ways, but also is a weird way to love and a tad soul destroying. I’m very much talking to myself here, but I think also to a general ‘human experience’ I imagine many can relate to.
For me right now, the scary thing pursuing me is called Occam’s Razor of logic. It has in fact totally caught up with me and I’m in its grip. It’s confronting, but it’s good. I want the truth - I want THE TRUTH. I don’t want make believe - stories, excuses, confusion. I want real.
I’m embracing Occam’s Razor these days … and thus I’ve been shaving off a whole of stupid theories and sub theories because of it. I’m not going to hide in the Barleys Zone anymore - Occam Razor come get me and make me a better and more sensible, grounded person. I see much much less of God and much much more humanity as it cuts away at me.
Can I ask that you please watch this short video (it’s pretty funny I think)? Please especially consider the part about how people had to try and come up with all manner of crazy theories to try and make a geocentric model of the solar system work.
So much of the essence of trying to reconcile evolution with all its implications to scripture has, for me, felt so much like this …
Occam’s Razor
The way you describe this seems like a false dichotomy to me, especially with a phrase like “how we actually came to be.” God did reveal how we came to be – he told the Hebrews things that are far more important than a change in allele frequency over time. Continuing with the parental figure idea, if my parents told me that “sometimes when a mom and dad love each other, God gives them a baby,” but then I later find out at school that it’s actually just two gametes coming together to produce a zygote, does that mean they lied to me? Should I be mad at them for not telling me “how I actually came to be”? I just don’t see that God owes us any scientific information. It’s only part of the equation, and it’s a part we can figure out on our own. He gave us the part we couldn’t figure out on our own, and I simply trust that he is able to assess that better than I am.
It sounds like you’re still struggling with this idea of evolution as a cold, mean, horrible process, and so I won’t rehash the arguments people have already made about that. I would completely agree with you if evolution was all there was. If humanity were just an evolved accident with no real purpose or future, I’d feel let down too. Even now the problem of evil can be hard to reconcile with God (or at least with our idea of him), and with the fact that God has and continues to let terrible things happen on Earth. But I simply don’t see evolution as taking away anything about God – not his creative power, or his love, or the redemption he’s put in motion.
I’m sorry deconstruction/reconstruction/shifts in expectations can be so overwhelming and soul-crushing. You’re not alone. I keep thinking of Proverbs 25:2:
It is the glory of God to conceal a matter and the glory of kings to search it out.
It doesn’t always feel glorious. I think sometimes this process is more childlike than I’d like to think, that the real question hiding behind the “facts of life” or crazy new information a child must eventually learn, is something more like “Do you love me? Am I important to you?” Science can’t answer those questions. I continue to believe that God absolutely does love us and we can see this in science if we don’t try and separate it too much from those deeper truths.
Anyway, I don’t know if my own disconnected thoughts will help much, but on the chance that they will, hang in there.
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The hardest part in all of this is that no one can do your wrestling for you, you have to do it yourself. And I don’t think what you really want is better, more definitive or satisfying answers to your questions, what you want is assurance of God’s love and faith in his promises. But no one here can give that to you. Prayers for you as you sort out your stuff. It gets better.
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Like my attorney is gonna fall for that one.
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Why are you so sure it has? In fact, if you are right that it has, then Christ would have been wrong, then, to teach us that the Spirit will be coming and continuing to teach (John 14:26).
Which of these is generally admired as the best teacher? The one who jumps in and feeds the pupils all the correct answers? Or the one who gives them ample chance to think about and wrestle toward those answers for themselves? God did give us brains to use, right? It seems probable to me that God delights in seeing those created minds well-used.
Especially if the particular god they are hoping to believe in isn’t the real God. I’m pretty sure I’ve got notions about God that need tweaking, correcting, or some of which may be just entirely wrong. Some people think the only valid notion of God (courtesy of their fixation on a couple isolated scriptures) is that God should be a giant vending machine. Insert proper prayer and faith here, and expect the prayed-for treat in the receptacle. Is it such a bad thing that they come to discover there is no such vending machine god? If that is the highest aspiration for a god their minds can reach, then I’ll suggest they may be better off to be atheists. It might prove to be much the same for other versions of god we have floating around in our brains … perhaps the geeky equivalent of the vending machine god would be the information-dispensory god: one who should function as an accurate encyclopedia for us who also attends to our needed proofs and intellectual assents as a needed preliminary basis before anything else. We are often upset when we discover that no god seems to want to march under the authority of our scientific demands any more than our vending machine demands. That God should not submit to our terms on whatever operational fronts we demand is a hard pill for us to swallow. And indeed, I think God does (in his own terms and timing) come into our fronts where we are in order to reach out to us. But when we then want to pin him down inside those particular fronts - imagining that God then is all about meeting our demands, then I think we are challenged then to grow beyond that towards more of a relationship. Sort of like a kid realizing that mom or dad are more than just “the person that always gives me what I want.” Mom and dad indeed do that on occasion, but it isn’t their final identity (the child’s need-supplier) that they would hope to cultivate with a maturing child. That analogy does break down in one sense in that we never grow independent of our heavenly Parent and should always look to God as our need-supplier, but that remains a very “us-centered” view of God that cannot contain nearly all of who God is. “It’s not all about me/us” is a very hard pill for any of us to swallow, and yet we are obliged toward taking the ever-repeated, daily dose of that very medicine. I may be about due for my own daily dose.
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But not the most important one. The most important objection is that science and cosmology was not the purpose of the text. It is frankly like complaining that the Bible doesn’t explain the rules of chess, how to run a democratic government, or how to fix a computer.
Nor is there a clear reference to the shape of the Earth, just those describing it like a table with 4 corners. And some people think there are vague references to evolution. Certainly there are references to a great deal more people on the Earth than Adam and Eve.
That is too bad since as a physicist, I think Occam’s Razor is mostly baloney. The problem is this…
- Two explanations are almost never completely equal, and fact is that scientists go with the explanation which is accurate (matching the measurable data) no matter how complicated it is. Describing quantum field theory as simple is downright laughable.
- When two explanations ARE equal then it generally recognized that we require the freedom and flexibility to look at things in either way – and the different ways or frames of reference are useful for different calculations.
So which is it in the case of the Ptolemaic (geocentric) versus Copernican (heliocentric) view of the universe? Both. The biggest problem with the geocentric view is that is will never be as accurate. That is why you keep having to add corrections (epicycles). Assuming you do make all the corrections to the geocentric view required for accuracy to the required precision, then the geocentric view is just the one that directly describes the motion of the planets in the sky. And there is nothing innately more accurate about the heliocentric view when you consider the velocity of the sun around the galaxy and the velocity of the galaxy itself in the local cluster.
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Hi Laura,
Thanks for your comments. It probably is another ‘key idea’ in the thread that I didn’t point out that, in the same way a parent mightn’t explain all the details of a matter to a child but the key point - so God did in Genesis (although thinking about it, I suppose that is the actual point of 1a.).
Personally, I would still respectfully disagree with
I don’t think he did. At all, anywhere in the entire catalogue of scripture. And what was told to us is so different to what is actually the case it is unsettling. I suppose many feel differently, but that is how I feel.
Of course, he owes us nothing. But perhaps the word “scientific” is something of an oversimplification or a distraction in this instance. I think the fact the whole earth evolved as did humans and how we actually came to be rather than essentially creation ex nihilo would be worth an explanation… be worth some information. Sure, you don’t need to break it down to all the chemical reaction details … but just give us something. With respect, I think there is something of a false dichotomy in what you seem to be implying - that for God to give us a greater explanation than what we have now, it needs to go into all the scientific detail. It doesn’t - rather, it didn’t (the horse has indeed bolted) - just something of a general outline would’ve done perfectly fine. But we didn’t get that. Indeed, God is actually the only one that could have given us an idea … an inside scoop, a clue - something - that would’ve made us go “ahhh, I see now, okay” regarding evolution. The closest thing to that is how Genesis 1 says “let the earth and let the sea ‘bring forth’”. I suppose there might be some other little clues but nothing we can really strongly hold onto, depending how you look at it. Related to this I refer to an earlier point from Post 24
To connect with the comments about this being child like, in part I agree. But I’d reframe the key issue - for me it’s not so much “God do you love me?” but me having to wrestle with the thought “God, if you’re like this - can I actually trust you?”. My spirit says “Yes I can” but the logic of things, well …
Anyway, thanks for your comments and support regardless of all the ins and outs, appreciate it
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I should also add… that even in the case of the heliocentric view we still have to keep adding corrections even if it is for a considerably higher degree of precision. This is because of the innate instability of gravitational kinematics for more than two bodies. Even the three-body problem is a non-linear system with no general closed form solution – and thus… chaos rules!