On Sun, 10 May 1998 21:23:41 -0500, Glenn R. Morton wrote:
>SJ>You don't just "disagree with what they" (ie. "Christian apologists") say,
>>you "attack" them *destructively*. I don't think I have ever heard you say
>>anything positive about any "Christian apologists.
GM>This is an interesting criticism. Yesterday I added the list of my
>publications to my web page. Go see if I didn't treat myself in the same
>fashion.
>
>http://www.isource.net/~grmorton/publi.htm
I looked this up and I cannot see how it answers my claim that "I have ever
heard you say anything positive about any `Christian apologists.'"
GM>When we are wrong, factually wrong, we have no inherent right to have
>people agree with us. And people have a duty to try to correct us. I
>personally am grateful to the many people who confronted me when I was a
>young-earth creationist. They didn't tell me my views were correct. They
>pointed out over and over and over again that what I was saying was
>contradicted by observational evidence. They didn't tell me that my views
>were as good as theirs, because my views weren't anywhere near as good as
>theirs. My views at that time were terribly misguided and someone (actually
>many) was needed to tell me clearly that I WAS WRONG!!!! Far from doing bad
>for me, they actually made me better.
It is a moot point whether you jumping from YEC to TE/DE is "better". Then
you may have at least been sympathetic with some Christian apologists. Now
you seem hostile to *all* of them.
But my argument is not that these Christian apologists should not be corrected if
they are wrong, but you never say anything *positive* about them. You attack your
fellow Christians with a hostility that is relentless. I cannot square this with the
New Testament understanding of how Christians are to think and act.
GM>We don't do anyone a favor when they say something false and we act as if
>they are correct. When Don Boys, in a book introduced by Duane Gish, writes
>of Baalbek,
[...]
This is just a red herring. There is no doubt that YECs say wrong things. But
my point is that you never have anything *positive* about them, or even
OECs . Whether you realise it or not, evolution has become your shibboleth.
>SJ>I have asked you for you to state your what your Christian bona fides are, in
>>order to assess your Christian credibility in attacking leading "Christian
>>apologists" like Hugh Ross and Phil Johnson. But you have ignored same. In case
>>this was an oversight, I will again give you an opportunity to state what your
>>Christian bona fides are:
GM>Doubting my Christianity huh? I believe that Jesus Christ was the son of
>God, the maker of Heaven and Earth. He died on the cross, rose the third
>day and today sits at the right hand of God the Father. It was his
>sacrifice and his sacrifice alone that pays the penalty for my sins. My
>works don't mean a thing. Through Him, and Him alone, is one able to find
>eternal life and forgiveness of sin. Jesus is also to be the Lord of our
>lives, meaning that we are to do what we believe He has led us to do. For
>me, this means a struggle in the area of Christian apologetics, a struggle
>I might add that has little to show for it.
>
>I hope this satisfies you that I am a believer, but if it doesn't that is
>your problem.
I said nothing about you not being "a believer". It is possible to be "a
believer" and yet be "worldly" (1Cor 3:3); or a spiritual "infant" (Heb
5:12-13). What I wanted was evidence of your Christian *spiritual maturity*
to assess where you are coming from in your relentless, bitter attacks on
godly Christian leaders like Ross and Johnson:
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From: "Stephen Jones" <sejones@ibm.net>
To: "Evolution Reflector" <evolution@calvin.edu>,
"Glenn Morton" <grmorton@waymark.net>
Date: Mon, 27 Apr 98 07:28:12 +0800
Subject: Re: Yet more denigrating of Apologists (was Why?)
What *are* your Christian bona fides Glenn? I have been in almost
constant communication with you for the last 2-3 years and while I
have heard plenty of criticism from you of Christian apologists, I
have never heard much about your own Christian situation. What is
it? You claim to be a Christian, but I have seen little evidence of
the fruit of the Spirit in your posts. Do you go regularly to
church? Do you read the Bible and pray regularly? Do you pray for
your `enemies' like Morris, Gish, Ross and Johnson? You don't have
to answer this but I will draw my own conclusions if you don't.
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Well how about it Glenn? "Do you go regularly to church? Do you read the
Bible and pray regularly? Do you pray for your `enemies' like Morris, Gish,
Ross and Johnson?"
If you keep evading this then I will conclude that while you may be a "believer",
you are not one who is living what mainstream evangelical Christianity would
regard as a normal Christian life. I will then have no alternative but to regard
your attacks on godly Christian leaders like Phil Johnson and Hugh Ross as
manifestations of this lack, and I will discount them accordingly.
GM>I also believe that above all, Christians, who are under the Lordship of
>Christ, should NOT engage in sloppy scholarship, sloppy research, sloppy
>logic and they should not be unwilling to correct what they say when they
>are shown to be wrong.
If you don't go to church, read your Bible and pray, then you are "wrong"
in a far more important sense than these "Christians" you attack are.
GM>To do less than this is to engage in all of the above. That is why
>Longisquama bothers me (it has been around for years and years yet never
>discussed in Creationist literature).
It actually *is* "discussed in Creationist literature" (albeit indirectly).
See my quote of Gish citing Maderson's article that you cited re Longisquama.
But that is not what *really* "bothers" you. Jim Bell once said you were
fighting an "inner war with the ICR", and I agree, except I would make it
wider than that. Your "inner war" seems to be with *all* "Christian apologists"!
GM>That is why Philip Johnson saying that rodents gave rise to whales bothers
>me (Phillip E. Johnson, "A Reply to My Critics: The Evolution Debate Continued,"
>First Things, November, 1990, p. 52). That is why it bothers me when Johnson says
>that rodents gave rise to bats
>
>("A Darwinist can imagine that a mutant rodent might appear with a
>web between its toes, and thereby gain some advantage in the
>struggle for survival, with the result that the new
>characteristic could spread through the population to await the
>arrival of further mutations leading eventually to winged
>flight."~Phillip E. Johnson, Darwin on Trial, 2nd ed. (Downer's
>Grove: Intervarsity Press, 1993), p. 104)
Why should this "bother" you? In the context, Johnson had already
quoted Steven Stanley using the word "rodent" in respect of bat's
common ancestor:
"Stanley uses the example of the bat and the whale, which are
supposed to have evolved from a common mammalian ancestor in
little more than ten million years, to illustrate the insuperable problem
that fossil stasis poses for Darwinian gradualism: `Let us suppose that
we wish, hypothetically, to form a bat or a whale...[by a] process of
gradual transformation of established species. If an average
chronospecies lasts nearly a million years, or even longer, and we
have at our disposal only ten million years, then we have only ten or
fifteen chronospecies1 to align, end-to-end, to form a continuous
lineage connecting our primitive little mammal with a bat or a whale.
This is clearly preposterous. Chronospecies, by definition, grade into
each other, and each one encompasses very little change. A chain of
ten or fifteen of these might move us from one small RODENT like
form to a slightly different one, perhaps representing a new genus,
but not to a bat or a whale!' (Stanley S.M, "The New Evolutionary
Timetable". 1981, Basic Books, NY, p. 71) (Johnson P.E., "Darwin
on Trial," 1993, p51. My emphasis)
Elswehere Johnson uses the more precise term "rodent-like":
"...if Darwinism is true then the bat, monkey, pig, seal, and whale
all evolved in gradual adaptive stages from a primitive rodent-like
predecessor." (Johnson P.E. "Evolution as Dogma," 1990, p35)
I fail to see why this should "bother" you (apart from your need
to scrape the bottom of the barrel to find something to attack
Christian apologists). Clearly Darwinists must believe that bats
arose from some small primitive mammalian animal, which presumably
resembled a rodent, if it was not exactly one.
It reminds me of the claim by evolutionists that creationists were
misrepresenting evolution by claimg that man evolved from an "ape".
Their quibble was that it was an "ape-like" common ancestor. But
as Simpson pointed out, such an "ape-like" common ancestor would
be called an ape:
"George Gaylord Simpson is one of the most outstanding
evolutionists in our country today. Concerning this matter he says,
`On this subject, by the way, there has been too much pussyfooting.
Apologists emphasize that man cannot be a descendant of any living
ape-a statement that is obvious to the verge of imbicility-and go on to
state or imply that man is not really descended from an ape or
monkey at all, but from an earlier common ancestor. In fact, that
earlier ancestor would certainly be called an ape or monkey in
popular speech by anyone who saw it. Since the terms ape and
monkey are defined by popular usage, man's ancestors were apes or
monkeys (or successively both). It is pusillanimous if not dishonest
for an informed investigator to say otherwise.'" (Simpson G.G., in
Davidheiser B., "Evolution and the Christian Faith," 1969, p27)
So what exactly is your point Glenn (apart from trying to denigrate
Christian apologists like Johnson at every opportunity)?
GM>Pseudogenes were around for over 10 years but were not
>discussed in antievolutionary literature until the past couple of years.
So what? All discilines are affected by what Denton (Kuhn?) called
"the priority of the paradigm". Christian apologists are slowly coming
to grips with scientific issues. Part of the reason is that it is
often hard to work out what exactly *is* the current scientific view
of anything, so rapidly do scientific theories change.
Apologetics is a vast discipline with a need to be proficient in
Hebrew, Greek, Latin, and German. Few theologians have the time or the
training to study scientific issues in any depth. In one sense it is
not a major issue for them (YECs excepted). If God created Adam partly
through natural and historical processes (complete with "pseudogenes"),
that could easily be incorporated into a broad Christian worldview,
and it is already well under way. For example, the conservative
evangelical Tyndale commentary of Genesis says:
"If, as the text of Genesis would by no means disallow, 2 God
initially shaped man by a process of evolution it would follow that
a considerable stock of near-humans preceded the first true man,
and it would be arbitrary to picture these as mindless brutes.
Nothing requires that the creature into which God breathed
human life should not have been of a species prepared in every way
for humanity, with already a long history of practical intelligence,
artistic sensibility and the capacity for awe and reflection."
(Kidner D., "Genesis: An Introduction and Commentary,"
Tyndale Press: London, 1967, pp28-29).
Even the arch-conservative evangelical Christian apologist Carl
Henry does not rule out man being made by God from animals:
"Perhaps we are not to rule out dogmatically the possibility that the
dust of man's origin may have been animated, since the animals
before man appear to have been fashioned from the earth (Gen. 1:24).
The Bible does not explicate man's physical origin in detail. The fact
that, after Genesis 1:1 the narrator deals with a mediate creation,
which involves the actualizing of potentialities latent in the original
creation, should caution us against the one-sided invocation of divine
transcendence. The new levels of being arise with quite obvious
dependence on the lower in the creation account." (Henry C.F.H.,
"Science and Religion", in Henry C.F.H., ed., "Contemporary Evangelical
Thought: A Survey", Baker: Grand Rapids MI, [1957], 1968 reprint, p282)
In any event, the same problem affects non-Christian evolutionists
even more. They routinely fail to understand Christianity and
creationism.
GM>When an apologist says something factually wrong, is he bringing glory or
>dishonour on the Lord? Which is it Stephen? Are we allowed to state all
>manner of falsehoods in the name of Christ?
I said before, that the *real* problem is your lack of *love*
for "apologists":
-------------------------------------------------------------
From: "Stephen Jones" <sejones@ibm.net>
To: "Evolution Reflector" <evolution@calvin.edu>,
"Glenn Morton" <grmorton@waymark.net>
Date: Mon, 27 Apr 98 07:28:12 +0800
Subject: Re: Yet more denigrating of Apologists (was Why?)
[...]
"...the real "ultimate goal for a Christian" is *love* (Jn 13:34;
Mt 22:39; 1Cor 13). At the very least it is *both* truth and love
(Eph 4:15). But you show by your constant destructive criticism of
leading Christian apologists that you have anything but love for
them.
-------------------------------------------------------------
GM>Why should I not protest that truth is not being served by his
>terrible scholarship? Consider this simple but clear example:
[...]
Red herring deleted. I am not defending YECs I have never even
heard of. I am defending godly Christian apologists like Hugh Ross
and Phil Johnson. Your hostility to them is sub-Christian.
GM>Stephen, it is no crime to ask Christians to get their facts correct. To
>make the kinds of mistakes that we do makes our Lord, our religion and us,
>look foolish.
This your usual line by which you justify your vendetta against all
Christian apologists. But I believe it is only a pretext. Otherwise
you would also say *positive* things about them too.
GM>I would suggest that you read Ed Babinski's _Leaving the Fold_, where he
>documents several people who became atheist because Christian apologists
>were not able to answer their factual questions. And if you don't care that
>people are becoming atheists because we christians avoid correction and say
>silly things as if they were factual, then I feel sorry for you.
the main one.
I don't believe that people become atheists just "because Christian apologists
were not able to answer their factual questions". I think they become atheists
because they really *want* to become atheists, and after they event they blame
it on "Christian apologists". No doubt some "Christian apologists" give them
an excuse, but it won't wash because there are plenty of "Christian apologists"
who *could* answer their questions.
If they are intelligent people they could work it out for themselves by reading
the Bible and pray to God for guidance. Plenty of ordinary people do that. One
does not have to be a rocket scientist to realise that one can still be a
Christian and not believe in 6-day literal creation or a global Flood.
In any event, your constant denigration of those Christian apologists like
Johnson and Ross who could help them (as they have helped thousands) makes
the situation worse, not better. None of the atheists on this Reflector
over the last 2-3 have been impressed in the slightest by *your* half-
baked solutions, like your 5.5 mya Adam/Noah theory, which does not even
agree with science, let alone Christianity.
Steve
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Stephen E (Steve) Jones ,--_|\ sejones@ibm.net
3 Hawker Avenue / Oz \ Steve.Jones@health.wa.gov.au
Warwick 6024 ->*_,--\_/ Phone +61 8 9448 7439
Perth, West Australia v "Test everything." (1Thess 5:21)
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