Examining the Assumptions of Mosaic Creationism vis-a-vis the Assumptions of Evolutionary Creationism

I think it’s implicit in Assumption #2. Nonetheless, I just added a sentence there for your sake.

As for most everything else you’ve said in this post, it appears the river is widening. (However, I wonder if it is actually widening or only appearing to widen.)

@Socratic.Fanatic

I was pondering that question as well. In the end, either the scribes had no interest in any kind of ultimate statement of fact (since, most everyone knew there were sometimes Earthquakes), it seems verifiable that the Yahwists believed that only Yahweh himself could move the Earth.

@Bill_II, I wanted to be sure you saw this post so I’m posting it a second time.

P.S. The formatting is off in this version so please revert back to the original if you choose to respond.

I think the Bible makes general mundane statements just as we do, not focusing on the exceptions but summarizing reality as it is usually observed. Thus, even the ERETZ (land,nation,region) did now and then experience an earthquake or even an occasional mudslide or sinkhole collapse, most of the time one could count on the land beneath one’s feet being reliably stable (i.e., unmoved.) We tend to speak and write in the very same terms. We say things like “The farmer plants seeds in the spring and harvest many more seeds in the fall.” even though farmers also plant winter wheat in the fall and harvest it then next summer. And sometimes a farmer plants a field and then drought, hard rains, insects, or disease result in no harvest at all. Yet, nobody would complain that the original statement about the general cycle of springtime and harvest was a false or misleading statement. Nevertheless, a lot of people—both Christians and anti-Bible people—try to read the Bible in hyper-literal ways which ignore what we consider common sense in our own language and culture.

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Needless to say, @Socratic.Fanatic, what’s good for the goose is good for the gander.

But in this “Mosaic” thread, I do not think we could get “fair & equal air time” for this general principle of verbal casualness. While @Mike_Gantt is perfectly comfortable offering apologia for texts that give him some trouble, when the table is pivoted, all of a sudden we are parsing sentences down to the conjugating bone!

It is the general truth of your statement that allows me to tolerate the oddities in Genesis.

So while you have the soul of a diplomat when it comes to offering placid acceptance of oddities here and there … it serves you poorly if you don’t have a plan B for when someone rejects the idea that Yahweh would let his scribes write in a casual way!

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Here you go @Mike_Gantt

Since pre-history is concerned with history before the invention of writing I am sure they are different. Wikipedia says a trope is a figure of speech.

To me unknown, but the collected writings were referred to as if written by Moses. This would have been acceptable to a person in the ANE. It is the difference between being written with the authority of Moses and written by Moses. To me they are the inspired Words of God so the author really doesn’t matter. You are aware that most of the books in our Bible don’t contain anything that identifies the author, most certainly including “The Books of Moses.” The source of the authority is actually God. But I hasten to add that this does not automatically make them “true” for us in the sense you employ.

You might be surprised by my answer but the author, whoever he was, used the words that the Holy Spirit wanted him to use. Trying to work out why God would do this is pointless as we will never know. In my view, the author had heard the creation story and probably accepted it as true so he was not deceiving himself.

I believe I know you well enough by now to anticipate the question that is even now forming on your lips, “If this was written under the authority of God how could it be a lie?”

A few examples.

If God had said “Write that the sun rises in the west and sets in the east.” That would be a lie.

If God had said “Write that the earth does not move.” That would be true to the author but with a future revelation provided by science we would know that it is not true literally.

For homework, provide my answer to a 6,000 year age of the earth.

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I’m drawing a line.

Mike, considering how many of my questions and posts you ignore, I don’t think you are in any position to chide me that I’m not working full-time here and being as detailed as you demand. (I’m fine with some good-natured snarkiness on your part—but it gets old after a while when you make demands of others as if they work for you.)

I’m happy to be as helpful as I can. But considering how you regularly dodge the issues I raise, cherry-pick without explaining why, and use what appear to be arbitrary double-standards, I just don’t feel like making the time investment anymore. (I don’t care whether you agree with my answers. But I do get frustrated when you simply ignore them or casually dismiss in the most unsubstantial ways what is explained to you by so many people in careful detail.)

I have this nagging feeling that you are going to eventually tell people elsewhere that “I took my questions to the people on the Biologos forum and they just weren’t very helpful. I got very few answers and even the theologians and Bible translators there had little of substance to say. Not much came of my attempts to get answers.”

Sorry. Until it appears that you are seriously reflecting on what people are explaining to you here and starting to apply that information to thinking through your positions, I’ve lost interest. I admit it: I don’t always respond well to demands when I don’t get the impression that the other person is really trying to grasp the important points presented.

Perhaps others will have more patience than this crusty old man who is a little weary of an exchange that involves very interesting topics but which is not likely to be as fruitful as I had previously hoped.

Mike, I will be happy to reconsider if I see a change in your approach. (Seriously, I’ve tried the best that I can but I’m giving up. I don’t think you are truly listening. This just isn’t worth my effort.)

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Hi Mike,

When I speak of statements with scientific content, I mean statements that reveal an understanding of how the stuff around us is structured and how it operates in a proximate manner. For example, if I release a pencil from my hand, it falls to the ground due to gravity.

So when we read a Bible passage that says that God sends the rain, I would agree that it is devoid of scientific content. It manifests no “model” of how clouds and rain operate. Such a statement can peacefully coexist with a statement about the water cycle.

When a statement asserts that God stores up the waters above the raqi’a in great jars, however, that contains an understanding of structures and proximate causality in the physical universe. It is a statement with scientific content.

Do you believe that the ancient Hebrews had no conception of how the stuff around them was structured? Anthropologists have surveyed many hundreds of cultures, and every single one without exception has had an understanding of how the world works, how animals reproduce, where diseases come from, etc.

It would be a most astonishing thing for a sacred text with the size and scope of the Bible to manifest no understanding of how the world above and below operates. To suggest that I am importing a Western view into the Scriptures is basically an assertion that Israel, unlike any culture known in the history of the world, had no view of how the world around them worked.

Now if I were to condemn them on the basis of their imperfect knowledge of the world, you could well accuse me of cultural hegemony. But if I read God’s revelation to them with sensitivity to the fact that their culture is different than mine, how am I importing my worldview into their text?

I’m not saying that I can see with 100% clarity. However, claiming there is no cultural difference to focus on does not seem helpful. We need scholars of the ancient Near East to help us understand their culture, including their science, so we can understand what God spoke to them millenia ago.

Also, your phrasing of “Sola Scriptura” seems like it will lead nowhere in a discussion like this. If I am reading you correctly, once someone arrives at a conclusion, there is no deviation from it. So how would you apply assumption 2a to Marcion, Arius, Mary Baker Eddy, or Joseph Smith?

Grace and peace,
Chris Falter

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@Mike_Gantt -

You articulation of “Sola Scriptura” does not recognize that Augustine, Origen, and other theologians who disagree with MC did so (or, if still alive, do so) on the basis of the Scriptures.

Have you read Augustine’s Literal Interpretation of Genesis? He examines the Genesis text with extreme care, and he rejects MC specifically due to its lack of consistency with the first chapters.

You seem to be claiming that you are proceeding on the basis of Sola Scriptura, whereas Augustine and Origen are introducing non-Scriptural authorities–therefore you can ignore them. But I don’t want to leap to conclusions. So I ask:

Is that what you are claiming? If not, then how does your articulation of 2a help anyone decide between Mike’s Mosaic Creationism on the one hand and Augustine’s rejection of 6 24-hour days on the other?

Grace and peace,
Chris Falter

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HI Chris,

Another way to put what you are saying (I think) is that scientific hypotheses must be mechanistic.

That’s why the ID hypothesis (there was an intelligent designer) fails to be scientific in both the mechanistic way and in the testable way.

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Hi Ben,

I appreciate any and all attempts to clarify our ideas, so thanks for chipping in. I would prefer to say that the structures within the universe exist, and the interactions occur, according to an order that can be discerned through scientific investigation. And the order, once discerned, can be used to predict future observations.

“Mechanistic” seems a bit ambiguous to me; my concern is that some readers might think it implies adherence to metaphysical materialism, which is not where I stand. I do not think that you necessarily use the word that way, though.

Grace and peace,
Chris Falter

The worldview of biblical writers was that creation exists in essentially two dimensions: visible (physical) and invisible (spiritual). The scientific view is that there are multiple physical dimensions. For example, I am seated at my desk. Science tells me I am moving through space at a high rate of speed, but that is not something my five senses are telling me. Science also tells me that that my desk is made up of atoms and that there is more empty space in this “hard” surface than actual matter, but I know my hand will still smart if I slap it on the table. Science has therefore brought me awareness of two additional physical dimensions - but that awareness does not change the primary physical dimension that I still operate within and that the ancients operated within as well. Nor does science change, or render unimportant, the spiritual dimension which lies behind the physical dimension(s).

Modern thinkers impose their worldview on ancient thinkers when they assume that the ancients thought of activities in the spiritual realm the same way we think of activities in the “behind the scenes” physical dimension(s).

Similarly, consider that science gives us germ theory such that we know unseen physical germs lie behind diseases. The ancients thought that God or evil spirits lie behind diseases. Cultural insensitivity is at work if moderns assume that ancients erroneously thought of evil spirits as causes when, had they known better, they would have thought of germs as causes. It would be more “culturally sensitive” to recognize that the awareness of germs is awareness of an additional physical dimension - not of a replacement for the spiritual dimension.

The culturally insensitive modern imposes his worldview on the ancients when he assumes that an ancient thought of the behind-the-scenes production of rain in the mechanical way that we do. A proper way to compare our view with theirs is that we have more awareness of what is going on physically than they did, but this has nothing to say about what was going on behind-the-scenes spiritually. Viewing things in this proper way helps us to see that it’s not that the ancients were wrong about science, it’s that they weren’t thinking about things in scientific terms. That is, they weren’t thinking about the physical dimension existing in multiple forms. To say it another way, they were thinking about things in terms of a single physical dimension and a spiritual dimension whereas we think about things in multiple physical dimensions - and, to our detriment, often forget about the spiritual dimension.

To come full circle, I am sitting at my desk and I want to be aware of the spiritual dimension all around me. Most of all, I want to be aware of the Lord - much as Brother Lawrence described in The Practice of the Presence of God. The speed of the earth’s movements, or the action of the desk’s atoms in motion has its purposes, but the prophets and apostles had it right that ignoring the spiritual dimension is never a good idea. We should walk by faith, not by sight. That we today can see multiple physical dimensions is helpful in many ways, but it can be a distraction from the ever-important spiritual realm - and all the more so if we assume that the ancients thought ignorantly about “how the stuff around us is structured and how it operates.”

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You would apply it to them the same way you would apply it to John Hus, Martin Luther, John Calvin. You make your choice about who is being more faithful to the Scripture and who is not. One man’s heretic is another man’s hero.

Not at all. Of course, they take their position based on Scripture; so do I. That’s the not the difference between us. The difference is in what we see the Scripture saying.

No, I’m saying I can’t accept their interpretation of the Scriptures if I believe in good conscience that it conflicts with Moses’ view.

Sola Scriptura says that a person has to decide which interpretation is more faithful to Scripture regardless of the position or reputation of the person promoting the position.

What does this actually mean? Modern thinkers who are thinking correctly, do not think that the ancients think the way we do.

This does not make sense theologically or biologically. We know for a fact that many of the ancients (though not Israel), believed that evil spirits caused disease. We know that if they had known of germ theory, they would have understood that disease actually are caused by germs. We know that diseases are not caused by evil spirits; not as a proximate cause, or an ultimate cause. Where is the actual evidence for “cultural insensitivity” here?

We don’t impose our worldview when we read what they say about how they thought rain was produced, and understand this is what they actually believed. If you want to claim that they wrote X but actually believed something different, you need to demonstrate that this is actually true. Where is the evidence for example that they wrote that the firmament was solid, but actually believed it was not solid?

How is it to our detriment if we believe that rain is the product of the evaporation/condensation/precipitation cycle? What is the “spiritual dimension” which we’re missing, which prevents us from understanding properly how rain is formed?

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We know that the Lord lets go of some things - and wants us to let go of them - when they become obsolete, when they are replaced by something greater.

For example, when the temple was built, the tabernacle was no longer important. And when Messiah came, the temple was no longer important - nor were its furnishings, nor was animal sacrifice, nor was the Levitical or Aaronic priesthoods, nor were dietary restrictions, nor was Jewish bloodline, and so on.

We also have this Scripture:

1 Cor 13:10 but when the perfect comes, the partial will be done away.

Thus we have the clear principle from Scripture that while some things stand forever, others rightly pass away.

Therefore, it seems reasonable to ask: With the coming of Messiah (and His glorious resurrection from the dead) and particularly with the advent of modern science, is Old Testament history thereby rendered obsolete? That is, should we regard it as no longer important to uphold or defend?

We can ask and answer this question about OT history at several levels:

  • The entirety of OT history
  • The history recorded in the Torah
  • The history recorded in Genesis
  • The history recorded in Genesis 1-11

In other words, the answer to the question might differ based on which portion of OT history we are considering.

Although I have not previously asked the question, at least not in this formal way, it seems clear to me that many of you would answer “yes” to the question, at least in one of these forms - most saying that the history recorded in Gen 1-11 may be discarded in favor of SGH with no loss to our faith.

I give you the opportunity now to answer this question explicitly at whatever level you wish. (I am adding to the OP by making this issue a fifth “Stipulation” by which MC would fail.) If any of you do answer, please describe at what level you are answering it and what guided you as to where to draw the line. That is, if you think it’s only history in the Torah that’s obsolete, how did you decide that as opposed to all the history in the OT on the one hand and only the history in Genesis or in Genesis 1-11 on the other?

P.S. The relevant fundamental difference between MC history (see “Defining Mosaic Creation” in the OP) and SGH is that the former dates the universe in thousands of years and the latter dates it in the billions. Other important differences include:

  • The extent of Noah’s Flood
  • The historicity of Adam as progenitor of the human race
  • The historicity of Eve as an individual formed by God through Adam
  • The historicity of the Fall as the actions of these two individuals
  • The historicity of the Tower of Babel including the multiplication of languages

[quote=“Mike_Gantt, post:161, topic:36410”]
Therefore, it seems reasonable to ask: With the coming of Messiah (and His glorious resurrection from the dead) and particularly with the advent of modern science, is Old Testament history thereby rendered obsolete?[/quote]

No.

No.

I am one of a number of people here who would not say this. I do not believe the history recorded in Genesis 1-11 needs to be discarded at all. Additionally, I believe that talking about discarding the history of Genesis 1-11 “in favor of SGH” is a false dichotomy.

I don’t believe the history in the Torah is obsolete.

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It is to our detriment if we forget that all things come from God. It is to our detriment if we credit El Nino for bringing the snow to California and ending the drought, and we forget to thank the Lord for his mercy. It is always to our detriment if we forget the spiritual dimension …

OK that doesn’t answer my questions. Look carefully.

“How is it to our detriment if we believe that rain is the product of the evaporation/condensation/precipitation cycle? What is the “spiritual dimension” which we’re missing, which prevents us from understanding properly how rain is formed?”

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Yes, but we must be careful not to make sola Scriptura into something that it is not. The Reformers insisted on this principle in their debate with Rome over the source of authority in matters of faith and practice. It was a debate between Scripture as sole authority over the church, versus Scripture, tradition, and church leadership as three pillars of authority. Sola Scriptura has to do with questions of theology, faith, and practice. It was not meant to be used as a tool for judging what is “true” or “not true” about the natural world.

If you try to extend sola Scriptura into all areas of life, you run into serious problems. Scripture interprets Scripture is a principle for deciding which interpretation is more faithful to the overall teaching of the Bible. As far as the natural world goes, misapplying sola Scriptura to that realm creates a closed system.

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No, I understood your point, but I don’t think you understood Mike’s. I think the point he was making was more along the lines of what I said about forgetting the spiritual dimension. Perhaps I was wrong, but Mike can clear it up for us.

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