Apathetic Creationism

[Kenny]

Some open theists call themselves open creationists. So that label is potentially confusing.

[themuzicman]

Who here considers themselves Apathetic Creationists? In case you don't know what that means, I'll lay down a definition:

An Apathetic Creationist (AC) is one who believes that God is the Creator, but expresses apathy towards questions of how He created or how long it took.

This definition may require more in the future, but I think it will suffice for now as an adequate definition of the position. Anyone else adhere to this position?

That's me. I don't think the text requires that we think more than that God created, and it was good.

MIchael

[Kenny]

My profile lists me as TE, but only because that’s probably the imprecise two word summery of my view that is likely to give the most accurate impression. More precisely, I have no problem with the theory of biological evolution itself, I think the YEC position has an overwhelming amount evidence against it, I think that the thesis of common descent is probably true, and I think that the contemporary theories about cosmological evolution are true in their broad outlines (in those areas in which there is considerable consent in the scientific community). I don’t take any further definitive stands on the scientific issues surrounding origins than this (and even my stand on common descent is an extremely tentative one). E.g. I’m neither a supporter or detractor concerning the ID movement.

I think that Scripture actually leaves open a wide range of options for Christians in this area. And I think that Christians should be wary of jumping on this or that bandwagon and insisting on a particular position.

Theologically speaking, I do think that Christians need to be careful not to compromise important soteriological doctrines on account of their views of origins. I think it is important in this regard, for example, to insist on a strong connection between human sin and human physical death. And I see some TEs doing compromising in this area. (e.g. insisting that the “death” that enters the world through sin is only spiritual death). But there are ways to be TE and not do that. It’s also important that we not compromise an orthodox understanding of original sin. But there are a variety of orthodox understandings of the doctrine of original sin some which require the existence of a literal Adam, some which do not. There are also a lot of ways of developing TE, some which are compatible with the existence of a literal Adam, some which are not. And of course, for those of us who have a high view of the authority of Scripture, our stance on various exegetical questions may further constrain our options (but as I said, my own view is that Scripture leaves the options fairly wide open).

[Adrift]

I think I fit the definition... sorta... Well, I'm certainly not apathetic about the issue. I'm apathetic about things like politics, but I'm intensely curious about creation, I just find I don't fit easily into the corners available: YEC, TE.

Here's what I do and don't believe in:

I believe the earth is very probably older than 6,000 years.
I don't believe that evolution on a macro scale is likely.
I do believe that evolution on a micro scale is likely and observable.
I believe the flood happened.
I'm not certain, but I don't believe the flood was global.
I'm not certain, but I think the flood was regional.
I think God created or recreated the earth in the way its described in scripture in 7 literal days.
I think that a Gen 1:1-1:2 gap is plausible.
I don't think the Bible is a history book, but rather a book that seeks to unite us back to God through Christ.
I believe that the Bible is inerrant and literal where it's obviously meant to be literal.
I believe that the Bible often uses various forms of metaphor and figure of speech, but these are usually discernible in context. I don't believe the Creation events are (solely) metaphor.
I don't believe the 7 days of creation signify 7 ages. I believe the days are literal 24 hour periods.
I think the “ruin-reconstruction” concept of creationism has a lot going for it, and... a lot going against it, but at this very moment I lean closer to this concept than not.

Mostly, I just don't know, and I store it in the vault of my mind of other issues I don't quite understand but hope to some day.

[AngelDragon]

Makes sense to me.

[Silver Hand]

To quote former GOP presidential candidate (and my personal pick) Mike Huckabee:

"Let me be very clear: I believe there is a God. I believe there is a God who is active in the creation process. Now, how did He do it and when did He do it, and how long did He take? I don't honestly know...my point is, I don't know. I wasn't there. But whether I believe God did it in six days, or whether He did it in six days that represented periods of time, He did it! And that's what's important. Now, if anybody wants to believe that they're the descendants of a primate, they a certainly welcome to do it. I don't know how far they want to march that back, but I believe that all of us are the unique creations of a God who knows us and loves us, and who created us for His own purpose."

[shunyadragon]

Theologically speaking, I do think that Christians need to be careful not to compromise important soteriological doctrines on account of their views of origins. I think it is important in this regard, for example, to insist on a strong connection between human sin and human physical death. And I see some TEs doing compromising in this area. (e.g. insisting that the “death” that enters the world through sin is only spiritual death). But there are ways to be TE and not do that. It’s also important that we not compromise an orthodox understanding of original sin. But there are a variety of orthodox understandings of the doctrine of original sin some which require the existence of a literal Adam, some which do not. There are also a lot of ways of developing TE, some which are compatible with the existence of a literal Adam, some which are not. And of course, for those of us who have a high view of the authority of Scripture, our stance on various exegetical questions may further constrain our options (but as I said, my own view is that Scripture leaves the options fairly wide open).

I see a distinct problem with the highlighted portions of this response. The geological and paleontological evidence is overwhelming that the natural physical cycle of birth, life and death has always been with us. How can you justify the evidence any other way than a spiritual death which most TEs would endorse?

[Kenny]

I see a distinct problem with the highlighted portions of this response. The geological and paleontological evidence is overwhelming that the natural physical cycle of birth, life and death has always been with us. How can you justify the evidence any other way than a spiritual death which most TEs would endorse?

A theistic evolutionist who thinks it is important to believe in a literal Adam and Eve and/or a literal Fall could think, for example, that God chose a particular pair of hominids, raised them up to moral and spiritual awareness and granted them a provisional immortality, which they subsequently lost. Alternatively, such a theistic evolutionist can think that God promised that he would grant that pair immortality on certain conditions, but that in disobeying God, they failed to meet those conditions.

A theistic evolutionist who doesn’t think it’s important to have a literal Fall or a literal Adam and Eve can still think that there is connection between sin and death insofar as there is a counterfactual dependence relationship between the two. I.E. she can think that were it not the case that human beings were disposed toward and guilty of sin, they would be granted immortality.

[shunyadragon]

A theistic evolutionist who thinks it is important to believe in a literal Adam and Eve and/or a literal Fall could think, for example, that God chose a particular pair of hominids, raised them up to moral and spiritual awareness and granted them a provisional immortality, which they subsequently lost. Alternatively, such a theistic evolutionist can think that God promised that he would grant that pair immortality on certain conditions, but that in disobeying God, they failed to meet those conditions.

A theistic evolutionist who doesn’t think it’s important to have a literal Fall or a literal Adam and Eve can still think that there is connection between sin and death insofar as there is a counterfactual dependence relationship between the two. I.E. she can think that were it not the case that human beings were disposed toward and guilty of sin, they would be granted immortality.

There is a problem with using 'special case' as you are doing, because Theistic Evolutionist view usually does not plead special case, but accepts the evidence and places the Bible in a more spiritual perspective. You can plead 'special case' for for YEC and OEC to justify anything despite the evidence.

Your view would be closer to OEC Creationism where certain things are justified as 'special case' to fit scripture, but the evidence is accepted for an ancient earth.

[Kenny]

I’m not sure what you mean by ‘special case.’

Do I “spiritualize” everything in Scripture? Certainly not. Do I read every narrative in Scripture as if it is a modern historical narrative? Also no. Both of those ways of reading Scripture strike me as extremes that often miss the point of the text itself.

Do I personally think that God did something special at the origins of humanity and that there was a historical fall of humanity into sin? Yes. And I don’t see any inconsistency between that view of contemporary evolutionary theory (unless “contemporary evolutionary theory” is just stipulated to be such that it precludes any special divine activity at any point). Although, I’ll point out that the second TE view that I described in my last post (the one according to which the connection between sin and death is one of counterfactual dependence) doesn’t require the above view.

As far as what label I should give myself – in a way, I don’t really care. I care about positions more than labels. But I also don’t want to mislead people about what I believe by mislabeling myself. That being said, though – am I closer to OEC than TE? Not really. I (at least tentatively) believe in common descent and that takes me outside the OEC position. I’m also not a member of the “intelligent design” movement because I don’t know how to assess the biological merits of their claims (I freely admit that I’m just a layperson in the area of biology). Do I think that some of their claims are plausible? Yes. So I’m not opposed to their movement either. I’ll let the biologists fight among themselves over that. Do I think that God had his hands on the evolutionary process, that he often actively moved things along in directions he wanted them to go? Absolutely.

So I don’t know where all of the above puts me, but it does seem to me, as I said, that ‘theistic evolutionist’ is probably the least misleading two-word summary of my position.

[shunyadragon]

I’m not sure what you mean by ‘special case.’

It is not hard to understand the nature of 'special case' in this situation. The 'special case' is justifying your belief by making it fit the physical evidence of evolution. There is not any evidence that there was anything other than the natural cycle of birth, life and death, and no evidence than humans could live as long as the Bible records people living.

Do I “spiritualize” everything in Scripture? Certainly not. Do I read every narrative in Scripture as if it is a modern historical narrative? Also no. Both of those ways of reading Scripture strike me as extremes that often miss the point of the text itself.

I did not say you spiritualize everything, that is what TE believers tend to do. I said you selectively justify individual beliefs as literal and physical.

Do I personally think that God did something special at the origins of humanity and that there was a historical fall of humanity into sin? Yes. And I don’t see any inconsistency between that view of contemporary evolutionary theory (unless “contemporary evolutionary theory” is just stipulated to be such that it precludes any special divine activity at any point). Although, I’ll point out that the second TE view that I described in my last post (the one according to which the connection between sin and death is one of counterfactual dependence) doesn’t require the above view.

You will have to explain ?counterfactual? a to how it is used here.

[

[Kenny]

It is not hard to understand the nature of 'special case' in this situation. The 'special case' is justifying your belief by making it fit the physical evidence of evolution.

I don’t see how pointing out that a belief in a historical fall and in a strong connection between human sin and human death is consistent with the evidence for evolution amounts to “justifying” my belief in those things. I am pointing out that the evidence for evolution does not, by itself, provide me with a defeater for those beliefs.

There is not any evidence that there was anything other than the natural cycle of birth, life and death

I don’t think that there is any strong empirical evidence against the theistic evolution view that I have proposed either. And I think that there are theological grounds for affirming that there was a historical Fall.

and no evidence than humans could live as long as the Bible records people living

I have doubts about the historicity of those portions of Genesis. I don’t take the earliest chapters of Genesis as a straightforward historical narrative. (On the other hand, I don’t think it’s all a historical either. I think it is likely a mixture of history and myth and/or the recounting of genuine historical events in mythical terms). That being said, I also don’t think there is any strong evidence against the view that some people lived that long either. If it happened, it would have been something miraculous. But it certainly is something that God could have brought about had he chosen to do so. And had it happened within a small population of people, it would have been, I would think, largely invisible with respect to the empirical evidence that we have now (given that the evidence we have concerning the specifics of human origins is sketchy in any case).

I did not say you spiritualize everything, that is what TE believers tend to do. I said you selectively justify individual beliefs as literal and physical.

I think that there are good theological grounds for believing in a historical Fall. And I think the evidence is consistent with there being one. So I affirm that there was one. I don’t see how that amounts to “selectively justifying” anything – unless believing things that are probable with respect to one’s other beliefs and consistent with the known evidence amounts “selectively justifying” things.

You will have to explain ?counterfactual? a to how it is used here.

I think that a theistic evolutionist could consistently hold that the following counterfactual conditional is true: If it were not the case that human beings are disposed toward and guilty of sin, God would grant them immortality (NB: A “counterfactual conditional” is a conditional that specifies what would happen if certain states of affairs were to obtain). IOW, a theistic evolutionist could consistently maintain that it is human sin that keeps human beings from being reconciled to God and thereby keeps them from being set free from the inevitability of death. A theistic evolutionist could maintain this furthermore, even if she doesn’t believe that there was any historical Fall of humanity or special divine activity surrounding human origins.

[Buboni Cleg]

Who here considers themselves Apathetic Creationists? In case you don't know what that means, I'll lay down a definition:

An Apathetic Creationist (AC) is one who believes that God is the Creator, but expresses apathy towards questions of how He created or how long it took.

This definition may require more in the future, but I think it will suffice for now as an adequate definition of the position. Anyone else adhere to this position?

I don't like it. The concept of Open or Apathetic Creationism bespeaks an underlying distrust of hard-nosed data. You can go about saying Genesis might be literal or even quasi-literal, but that strongly implies things like human-caused death and a global flood have equally sufficient amounts of evidence compared to modern geology and biology. They actually don't even come close. It's a lazy straddling of the fence. Changing "apathetic" to "open" doesn't really make the position epistemically sound.

We must work hard to accommodate the general revelation rather than lean on unfounded semi-skepticism of it.

[Adrift]

I don't like it. The concept of Open or Apathetic Creationism bespeaks an underlying distrust of hard-nosed data. You can go about saying Genesis might be literal or even quasi-literal, but that strongly implies things like human-caused death and a global flood have equally sufficient amounts of evidence compared to modern geology and biology. They actually don't even come close. It's a lazy straddling of the fence. Changing "apathetic" to "open" doesn't really make the position epistemically sound.

I'm not sure I'm completely understanding your meaning here, but it seems to me you may be equating literalism with YEC. I can think of a variety of ways one can be a literalist and not be constrained to YECism. Two theories I find interesting on the subject include the Gap theory of creationism and John Sailhamer's Historical Creationism theory.

We must work hard to accommodate the general revelation rather than lean on unfounded semi-skepticism of it.

I'm not sure anyone is saying they're skeptical or even semi-skeptical here. I think many of us are just saying "I don't know".

[justsumguy]

Who here considers themselves Apathetic Creationists? In case you don't know what that means, I'll lay down a definition:

An Apathetic Creationist (AC) is one who believes that God is the Creator, but expresses apathy towards questions of how He created or how long it took.

This definition may require more in the future, but I think it will suffice for now as an adequate definition of the position. Anyone else adhere to this position?

Lack of emotion and/or interest regarding how God created and how long it took?
I think the "how" God created the universe is a goofy concept when applied to the physics of the matter (that was a good one - physics of the matter). If one is thinking in terms of what was the recipe and how did God combine the ingredients along with the settings on the oven for optimum baking of the cake...sounds goofy to me.
Now if we're talking about how the heck God created something other than everything that is and already was...now we're talking.

We can explore and study the workings of the physical universe. It can be quite emotional and interesting but it really has little to do with creation.

I think what we are really talking about here is the apathy towards some of the views of how it went down and the insistence by those who hold to those views that they are paramount to being on the right side of the creator. In that case...I couldn't be more apathetic.