Death before the fall

From: Ted Davis (tdavis@messiah.edu)
Date: Fri Feb 16 2001 - 16:16:29 EST

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    I won't repeat lengthy comments made some years back on this issue, but I
    will point to an important resource, an essay on geology and theology by a
    leading American geologist and theologian from the antebellum period, Edward
    Hitchcock, in which the issue of death before the fall features
    prominently:

    http://www.messiah.edu/HPAGES/FACSTAFF/TDAVIS/Hitchcock_selection.htm

    (This is one of several important and illuminating texts that I am making
    available online, which is of course an ongoing process.) Readers will note
    that most of what is said today on this subject had already occurred to
    Hitchcock.

    I will add a comment I've often made: this particular issue is IMO the
    central theological issue for YECs. Death of any kind prior to human sin
    (and only humans can sin) is such a black mark against the character of God,
    that it is simply unthinkable. Hitchcock shows however that we must think
    about it, and does so mainly on biblical grounds alone. Indeed anyone who
    (like Hitchcock) takes the earth's antiquity for a fact, must accept animal
    death before human sin.

    Ted Davis

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