YEC's Roots in 7th Day Adventism

[TedDavis (Dr. Ted Davis)]

@gbrooks9

Ted, let me pull out the nitty gritty items that make the arc of the man’s life (courtesy of Wikipedia, link at bottom

Thank you for putting this all down so clearly and succinctly, George. Wiki is a better source that it used to be, even for culturally controversial topics like this (though I’m not persuaded yet that their editors are as even-handed as they might be on some origins-related topics).

The last point in the article (which you mention), namely Price’s view of Rimmer and the gap theory, is not something that I would accept without looking further into it. Certainly he had a low view of the gap theory or any other view different from his own, but I don’t recall him saying anything specific about Rimmer. The article accurately quotes Rimmer’s appreciation for Price’s book, The New Geology, but the citation it gives for Price’s view of Rimmer can’t be right: the book cited there was published in 1902, when Rimmer was 12 years old.

At some point in the 1940s (I think that’s the right period), Price loosened up on his view of the “recent” creation of the universe, though he continued to insist on a recent biosphere. That caused the waters to part within Adventist circles and he lost some friends over it. That view–an older (maybe ca. 100K years) universe with a recent creation of all life–circulates today in parts of South America, but isn’t often found anywhere else to my knowledge.

[TedDavis (Dr. Ted Davis)]

@Mervin_Bitikofer

Would it be accurate or fair to say that White, or Price himself was influenced by these earlier Scriptural geologists? --and that in this indirect way they are progenitors for modern YEC?

Yes, at least to some extent. I’m not fully confident of the general impression I have formed from reading some of Price’s many works, but as far as I can tell this is how it went: early on he wasn’t widely read in non-Adventist literature, so his core YEC views came from the Adventist tradition, especially White. Price did specifically mention his debt to White. Later on, as he read more widely and became more widely read by others, especially people outside Adventism, he did cite one or two Scriptural geologists from time to time. But, a lot of his ideas came from his own fertile brain, thinking about geological features in North America that the Scriptural geologists had never seen.