Science and the Bible

[theblueprint_Ni]

Hi BP, (hope that's not an insult, just easier to type)

I think you are making an significant error by conflating what is fact/fiction about the text with who happens to uncover it or act upon it, or how they act on it. The reality or truth associated with the information is independent of how it is used. The issue of the ANE cosmology being the 'backdrop' or 'language' in which Genesis is written must be assessed independent of whether you like the theological positions of those which tend to emphasize that data. From my perspective, the reality of the ANE cosmology being expressed as the author of Genesis describes God creative act simply can't be debated. What that means in terms of the authority of scripture certainly is up for debate, and I feel that is the primary problem. We that hold a high view of scripture and its authority have tended to cave to the philosophical proposition that IF the scripture describes creation in this fashion, it is diminished in authority or inspiration. This is what the Liberal scholar (and the 'new' atheists) take as a given - and we play to their position.

The truth is that Calvin already dealt with this issue: it is the issue of accommodation and phenomenal writing. God accommodates certain elements of the text to the writers position in order to communicate. And in other places God simply allows the writer to express His inspiration 'in their own words'. That is, The Bible is not the product of some kind of pagan auto-writing. God expresses Himself (perfectly) through the individual, not in spite of them. Unless a passage is specifically identified as being divine dictation (e.g. the ten commandments), I think we must not assume it is. The evidence is very, very strong (conclusive from my POV), that Genesis 1 is describing the flat or domed Earth, with a hard domed sky, above which are waters and beneath and around which are waters which is the ANE conception of the cosmos. I think it is very likely it's form is also adapted from the Egyptian creation epic. Our response to that as people that believe and trust that the scriptures are God's word should NOT be irrational denial of the facts, or to give up the faith. Our reaction should be: "Ah, I guess that is what God intended". And then we move on to understand what that means to us in terms of how we understand what the text is saying - as the inspired Word of God.



Well - see, that is just exactly what we cannot do. We do not cave to these kinds of conclusions. Our faith is first and foremost based on the Resurrection of Christ. It is That reality that defines the reality of our faith. To a large extent, HOW God chose to reveal through scripture is NOT of overriding importance - because the history which led to the Messiah, His coming, Life, Death, and Resurrection is all a reality. We do not stop believing in the Resurrection just because the creation story turns out to be something different than we imagined it to be - that doesn't affect the reality of the Resurrection. And if we have based our belief in the reality of the Resurrection on being able to prove Genesis 1 is a technical description of the cosmos and its physical history, then we've built our house on sand, not the Rock that is Christ.

But I realize its a bit more intertwined that this. But I would point out that when the disciples believed Christ rose from the dead, that believe was not based on anything concerning Genesis 1. It was based on the fact they saw Him raised from the dead. So the books that need to be literal history are the Gospels, not Genesis 1 or even Genesis 1-11. And they only need to be literal history in terms of providing a believable accounting of the Resurrection. But we have more than that. We have the prophecies of the OT which speak of Messiah that we can look to and see that Christ did indeed fulfill. Genesis 1-11 needs to be inspired and authoritative, but it does not need to be any specific literary genre for the Resurrection to be a real event.








Not a problem - so am I. If I say something you want to respond to and have the time to do so - I welcome the exchange. Otherwise we'll just interact indirectly as the topic hits on areas we want to discuss.


Jim

I'll address what I can. With regards to your perspective, well, that's all we really have isn't it? It's always a matter of perspective and interpretation. Neither you nor rogue will convince me of something different. I think part of being objective is realizing that you can't be objective. That's a cute way of saying that we can only do the best we can when we realize that our minds are littered with bias, innate disposition, cultural imprintation, limitations and trends of the age, and we can divest ourselves of none of them. We can only recognize that we have them and do our best to single them out and circumvent if necessary.

I suppose it would be intellectually dishonest of you to deny the ANE influences on Genesis. The problem is that its your opinion that it must be the case that ANE cosmology was developed quite independent of any actual connection to real truth about creation. You cannot accept the possibility that perhaps all ancient myth has its source from the Biblical narrative of creation passed down from Adam to Seth to Enoch to Noah, and henceforth culminating in Babel, from which no doubt every doctrine of the living God was perverted, who was then dispersed by the LORD throughout the earth, passing down from generation to generation residual bits of truth twisted and mixed in with demonic religion. All pagan religion worship demons. Moses restored by written record the original account of creation through inspiration of the Holy Spirit. Genesis is factual, ANE cosmology is a perversion of the original story. That's my view because it offers no compromise to Scripture and no reinterpreting of related doctrine.

Calvin didn't know about evolution. What you have in mind and what Calvin had in mind are entirely different.

The natural sciences cannot accept the miraculous. Period. There must be natural explanations for everything. All the natural sciences were developed with this assumption in mind. Human beings are capable of awesome things when they believe something must be true. Every discipline in the natural sciences are built around the assumption that evolution is a fact and that all things have their origin in the natural. 150 years of developments can build some magnificent, self-sustaining theories, even if they aren't true. The natural sciences are supposed to be scientific(observable, verifiable, testable), yet evolution, whose premises are themselves unscientific (that is, abiogenesis, mutation and NS as the mechanism to produce whole organs, are unobservable, unverifiable, untestable).

My faith in the resurrection of Christ is made possible by the testimony of the word of God. The Bible is the vehicle of the gospel. Without the Bible, the gospel would have vanished long ago. Therefore, the Bible is the ultimate authority. In the same way some folks overestimate the varying interpretations of Scripture so we should therefore trust the sciences on certain matters, my view is that the sciences are subjected to a plethora of interpretations so we should therefore trust the Bible.

I'd say that Genesis, as well as every other book of the Bible, was critically important to the disciples. Everything ties in to the legitimacy of Jesus as the prophesied Christ. Adam, for instance, is part of the lineage of Christ. Genesis has great bearing on the identity of Jesus. They no doubt thought back to everything they heard from the beginning and made the connection to Christ.

[oxmixmudd]

I'll address what I can. With regards to your perspective, well, that's all we really have isn't it? It's always a matter of perspective and interpretation. Neither you nor rogue will convince me of something different. I think part of being objective is realizing that you can't be objective. That's a cute way of saying that we can only do the best we can when we realize that our minds are littered with bias, innate disposition, cultural imprintation, limitations and trends of the age, and we can divest ourselves of none of them. We can only recognize that we have them and do our best to single them out and circumvent if necessary.

We have no disagreement in principle here.

I suppose it would be intellectually dishonest of you to deny the ANE influences on Genesis. The problem is that its your opinion that it must be the case that ANE cosmology was developed quite independent of any actual connection to real truth about creation. You cannot accept the possibility that perhaps all ancient myth has its source from the Biblical narrative of creation passed down from Adam to Seth to Enoch to Noah, and henceforth culminating in Babel, from which no doubt every doctrine of the living God was perverted, who was then dispersed by the LORD throughout the earth, passing down from generation to generation residual bits of truth twisted and mixed in with demonic religion. All pagan religion worship demons. Moses restored by written record the original account of creation through inspiration of the Holy Spirit. Genesis is factual, ANE cosmology is a perversion of the original story. That's my view because it offers no compromise to Scripture and no reinterpreting of related doctrine.

Well, in point of fact, that is one of the first possibilities I pursued. But the reality is, the world is not land surounded by the sea over which is a dome impregnated with the star an in which move the sun and moon and above which is a great mass of water. This is what Genesis 1 describes. There is nothing I can do that changes that. And as best I can tell, there is no viable reading of that text that does not stumble over the simple non-reality one of those elements. There must be a move to non-literality of that text to get any kind of mapping to the real structure of the universe. And the only way one can be motivated to pursue such a mapping is to understand first what the actual, factual structure of the Universe is - as is evidenced in part of in the whole by every interpretation of those verses that existed prior to Galileo's discoveries.

Calvin didn't know about evolution. What you have in mind and what Calvin had in mind are entirely different.

I disagree in principle, but I understand that Calvin did not have sufficient information in his time so as to understand or respond to the information we have today. He would have (and did not have) even the slightest idea that one had to move to phenomenal reading as regards the fixity of the Earth, and he did in fact reject the implication the Earth orbits the Sun - even though he formulated and understood in principle the concept of divine accommodation.

The natural sciences cannot accept the miraculous. Period.

This statement is simply ignorant. There are two elements here. Yes, Natural Science cannot invoke the miraculous as part of its process, or as part of its conclusion. But that is because Natural science is concerned with understanding the Nature of the creation God has made, its inherent properties and 'powers'. Not because Natural Science is itself anti God or the super natural. The second is that Natural science doesn't concern itself with the miraculous. It has nothing to say about it, except to confirm or deny that potential for a natural explanation for a given event.

There must be natural explanations for everything. All the natural sciences were developed with this assumption in mind.

No, they were developed to understand the natural world. It is a particular philosophy that concludes the natural world is all there is to understand. But that is ancillary to Science.

Human beings are capable of awesome things when they believe something must be true. Every discipline in the natural sciences are built around the assumption that evolution is a fact and that all things have their origin in the natural. 150 years of developments can build some magnificent, self-sustaining theories, even if they aren't true. The natural sciences are supposed to be scientific(observable, verifiable, testable), yet evolution, whose premises are themselves unscientific (that is, abiogenesis, mutation and NS as the mechanism to produce whole organs, are unobservable, unverifiable, untestable).

Your application here is simple ignorance. I know that some observers of this thread will accuse me of derailing it if I expound on WHY this is simple ignorance, so I will not pursue fleshing out that observation unless you request it. But when a Christian characterizes the current state of science in this way, the expose not a flawed system, but their own massive ignorance. And they perpetuate the secular myth that Christian faith is necessarily anti-science, anti knowledge, anti truth. IF you are going to try to characterize what is going on spiritually, culturally, scientifically, you MUST take the time to understand what you criticize.

My faith in the resurrection of Christ is made possible by the testimony of the word of God. The Bible is the vehicle of the gospel. Without the Bible, the gospel would have vanished long ago. Therefore, the Bible is the ultimate authority. In the same way some folks overestimate the varying interpretations of Scripture so we should therefore trust the sciences on certain matters, my view is that the sciences are subjected to a plethora of interpretations so we should therefore trust the Bible.

You are wrong here in several ways. First of all, the Christian church flourished for 350 years before the Bible was ever formally canonized. What is required for the Church to flourish is the Holy Spirit of God active in the hearts and lives of men. The Bible IS God's inspired word, let me make clear this proclamation. And it exists to stabilize and direct us in our faith. But it is not what we worship, nor is it the reason we worship. Christ is the object of our worship, and His Death, Resurrection and Ascension is why we worship. The Bible is NOT the 'ultimate' authority in matters of science. It can't be. That is not its purpose. Much of it is phenomenal writing, observations that simply can't be understood in a scientific way unless first we understand the true nature of what it describes. We don't learn to make computers and how to explore the moon and stars - or even what they in fact are - from the Bible, and we can't subject what we learn about them to the AIG statement of faith.

The Bible as God's word, when properly understood, should be consistent with what we know from science. But that is about as far as one can go. The Bible IS the ultimate authority on what it teaches about. Which is the nature of God, the nature of man, and those aspects of God we need to know to be set free from our sinful state and restored to right relationship with Him. In so much as it teaches that God created the universe, it is the ultimate authority. But as to the mechanics of how the process unfolded, that depends on whether God intends to teach that in scripture. All the evidence is that is NOT what God was doing as He inspired that text.

I'd say that Genesis, as well as every other book of the Bible, was critically important to the disciples. Everything ties in to the legitimacy of Jesus as the prophesied Christ. Adam, for instance, is part of the lineage of Christ. Genesis has great bearing on the identity of Jesus. They no doubt thought back to everything they heard from the beginning and made the connection to Christ.

Yes, critically important. But not necessarily correctly understood in all aspects of the text. As for Spiritual truth, the had Christ right there - we must yield to what they heard from Him. But as to the physical structure of the universe. Look, at best Paul and Luke being educated men may have understood the Earth was a sphere. But there was nothing known at that time that challenged certain traditional views of those texts. And none of Christs statement directly challenged those views either. Primarily because the spiritual truths and physical implications of those truths remain effectively unchanged in light of what we know. But you don't see that - which is part of the problem. But what compounds that problem is you will not listen to the explanations as to why what we know now does not affect the truth of what the Bible teaches, at least why it does not have to and should not.

Jim

[Jedidiah]

God-exclusion methodology science uses.

What do you mean by the "God-exclusion methodology science uses?" There is no way science could include God want to or not.

[37818]

Given that the Holy Scripture was and is God's word as it was originally authored, and what is regraded as natural law is God's word, both the correct understanding of holy scripture and truth which is really discovered through science will always agree where needed. The only problem will be human understanding where there is what appears to be disagreement.

[seanD]

What do you mean by the "God-exclusion methodology science uses?" There is no way science could include God want to or not.

A) the fact that God is totally ruled out of the process of assessing and evaluating the natural world -- his creation (albeit I do acknowledge the fact that this is not befitting to the scientific process... and all that)
B) the secular establishment's hostility and even attacks towards groups that do acknowledge God, at least as far as the cause behind the natural processes
C) the fact that this establishment is secular and predominantly non-theist (probably 100% non-Christian), which is the driving force behind (A).

A contrast to (C): Galileo was Christian -- thus God was most likely the driving force behind his scientific discoveries (hence does not fall under the criteria of Romans 1:21) -- whereas today's modern scientific community that endorses ToE is not Christian (hence, it would be difficult to conclude that God is the driving force behind their theories).

A-C doesn't fit the criteria of Romans 1:19-21? If not, then what does?

[seanD]

Jedidiah, I may be jumping the gun and forcing the issue of ToE on you when that wasn't your intent from post #18. It's just that when people appeal to Romans 1 to confirm the truth of science in discussion about science, I always think that they're associating that with the secular scientific method, when nothing could be further from the truth.

[Jedidiah]

Jedidiah, I may be jumping the gun and forcing the issue of ToE on you when that wasn't your intent from post #18. It's just that when people appeal to Romans 1 to confirm the truth of science in discussion about science, I always think that they're associating that with the secular scientific method, when nothing could be further from the truth.

Indeed, I am not an evolutionist of any stripe.

[seanD]

Indeed, I am not an evolutionist of any stripe.

Okay, then take out my reference to ToE and apply everything else to that question at the bottom of my post #35.

Galileo, who was Christian = the father of science. Modern science, which is predominantly secular = theories like ToE and anthropogenic global warming.

[RBerman]

Rberman,

I have come to expect better than this from you. This is neither a fair, nor accurate response to my post. Would you try to feign indignation at what I posted - then at least point out what is actually false about it, if anything.

I'm sorry, Jim. I like you, but I don't have time to engage you on this.

[rogue06]

I imagine that you believe the Bible teaches a flat earth and a solid heaven because you're inclined toward liberal scholarship which already supposes that ignoramuses wrote the Bible

Don't know that the view the earth is flat was ever widely accepted based upon reading the Bible but they certainly thought the firmament was a solid structure. In fact I have yet to find a Church Father or theologian who mentions the nature of the firmament who didn't describe it as being a solid structure (quotes available upon request) until scientific evidence demonstrated that this wasn't the case.

And that has nothing to do with "liberal scholarship" or any other red herring you care to toss out there. Nor does it imply "that ignoramuses wrote the Bible" -- especially when you realize that the intent of Scripture isn't to provide us with a scientific textbook.

As John H. Walton put it in the opening of his lost "Lost World of Genesis One"

"If cosmic geology is culturally descriptive rather than revealed truth, it takes its place among many other biblical examples of culturally relative notions. For example, in the ancient world people believed the seat of intelligence, emotion and personhood was in the internal organs, particullarly the heart, but also the liver, kidneys and intestines. Many Bible translations use the English word "mind" when the Hebrew text refers to the entrails, showing the ways in which language and culture interrelated. In modern language we still refer to the heart metaporically as the seat of emotion. In the ancient world this was not metaphor, but physiology. Yet we must notice that when God wanted to talk to the Israelites about their intellect, emotions and will, he did not revise their ideas of physiology and feel compelled to reveal the function of the brain. Instead, he adopted the language of the culture to communicate in terms they understood. The idea that people think with their hearts describes physiology in ancient terms for the communication of other matters; it is not relevation concerning physiology... Throughout the entire Bible, there is not a single instance in which God revealed to Israel a science beyond their own culture.”

So it wouldn't be a case of ignoramuses writing the Bible but rather the utilization of popular cultural beliefs to convey a message.

[rogue06]

Certainly both exegesis and scientific interpretation of the world are imperfect works of man. However, God promises that his Holy Spirit will make Scripture perspicuous through the eyes of faith. We have no such guarantee about scientific examinations of the natural world.

Except for the fact that the Bible tells us repeatedly that we can gain some insight about God by studying His creation (the natural world). Look at for instance how Adam Clarke described Psalm 148:3:

"The meaning of this address and all others to inanimate nature is this: Every work of God's hand partakes so much of his perfections, that it requires only to be studied and known, in order to show forth the manifold wisdom, power and goodness of the Creator."

Likewise, Calvin emphasized that God reveals Himself in His creation and that we know the invisible God through His works. He tells us that God, desiring to invite us to the knowledge of Himself, placing heaven and earth before our eyes "rendering Himself, in a certain manner, manifest in them." To Calvin the heavens are potent messengers of God's glory, the beautiful order of nature proclaiming His wisdom.

IOW, God "clothes himself with the image of the world in order to present himself to our contemporaries." He is in essence "magnificently arrayed in the incomparable vesture of the heavens and the earth." For Calvin there is a symmetry in God's works to which nothing can be added. He arranged creation in such a wonderful order "that nothing more beautiful in appearance can be imagined." In the 1541 Catechism of the Church of Geneva he states that the world is a kind of mirror in which we may observe God.

[RBerman]

Except for the fact that the Bible tells us repeatedly that we can gain some insight about God by studying His creation (the natural world). Look at for instance how Adam Clarke described Psalm 148:3:

"The meaning of this address and all others to inanimate nature is this: Every work of God's hand partakes so much of his perfections, that it requires only to be studied and known, in order to show forth the manifold wisdom, power and goodness of the Creator."

Likewise, Calvin emphasized that God reveals Himself in His creation and that we know the invisible God through His works. He tells us that God, desiring to invite us to the knowledge of Himself, placing heaven and earth before our eyes "rendering Himself, in a certain manner, manifest in them." To Calvin the heavens are potent messengers of God's glory, the beautiful order of nature proclaiming His wisdom.

IOW, God "clothes himself with the image of the world in order to present himself to our contemporaries." He is in essence "magnificently arrayed in the incomparable vesture of the heavens and the earth." For Calvin there is a symmetry in God's works to which nothing can be added. He arranged creation in such a wonderful order "that nothing more beautiful in appearance can be imagined." In the 1541 Catechism of the Church of Geneva he states that the world is a kind of mirror in which we may observe God.

None of that addresses what I said about the special role of the Holy Spirit in helping Christians in the theological task of understanding Scripture.

[RBerman]

Don't know that the view the earth is flat was ever widely accepted based upon reading the Bible but they certainly thought the firmament was a solid structure. In fact I have yet to find a Church Father or theologian who mentions the nature of the firmament who didn't describe it as being a solid structure (quotes available upon request) until scientific evidence demonstrated that this wasn't the case.

Was such belief found in nonChristians of their day as well?

[Adrift]

Don't know that the view the earth is flat was ever widely accepted based upon reading the Bible but they certainly thought the firmament was a solid structure. In fact I have yet to find a Church Father or theologian who mentions the nature of the firmament who didn't describe it as being a solid structure (quotes available upon request) until scientific evidence demonstrated that this wasn't the case.

I see the "Church Father's thought the firmament was solid" argument brought up in this discussion all of the time, but no one's been able to explain to my satisfaction why its important what the early to medieval Christian, largely Gentile church community assumed about Hebrew cosmology. Its just as likely (if not more so, as OT scholar John Sailhamer argues) that the Church Fathers were relying on current Greek cosmology to support or enhance their view of ancient Hebrew cosmology. Every time someone throws out the argument "the Church Fathers believed"... It makes me think that the person who says this assumes that all ancient, pre-modern science peoples held essentially the same universal cosmological views. And that seems like quite the exaggeration. Historians have shown that people understand their surroundings quite differently depending on place and time.

Now, one might counter "well a plain reading of the text enforces the view that the early Church Fathers believed in a solid firmament". But if someone replies "well when I read it, it doesn't read that way to me!". This is usually countered with "Well that's because you're reading in light of a modern perspective on cosmology, of course you don't read it with the same understanding of an early Church Father!" (man I could carry a whole debate by myself ) The irony, of course, is that this is the exact reason we shouldn't be reading the Church Fathers to come to conclusions about what people thousands of years before them thought of cosmology.

If you want to make a similar argument that seems to me to make better sense, then I think you'll have to say something like "In fact I have yet to find an ancient Hebrew who mentions the nature of the firmament who didn't describe it as being a solid structure". At least then you'll be comparing like for like, rather than comparing the thoughts of foreign peoples 2000 years later (or 4000 years later).

This really cuts to the heart of the question, and removes a lot of fluff that's not worth debating. Then we can move into things like, "How about the translators of the Septuagint? Did they hold to the beliefs of their ancient forebears, or were they too influenced, as some scholars argue, by Hellenistic cosmology during translation?" Or you can discuss the beliefs of surrounding ancient cultures, and I think that's all fair to debate as well. But bringing up the Church Fathers has never made sense to me in these sorts of discussions.

[oxmixmudd]

I'm sorry, Jim. I like you, but I don't have time to engage you on this.

That's fine - but could you the next time this comes up and you want to disengage over time, could you just say so rather than post something that is somewhat snarky/derogatory?

Thanks,


Jim