From: Michael Roberts (michael.andrea.r@ukonline.co.uk)
Date: Thu Oct 30 2003 - 14:01:03 EST
I agree that the problem of suffering is the key issue and that most YECs
will ultimately fall back on that to justify their position. My analysis is
very close to yours.
However the interesting thing is that it was not seen as a serious problem
for the vast majority of evangelicals until after the publication of the
Genesis Flood. As you say it was not a problem for Bryan Nelson or most
interwar Fundamentalists (correct term not derogatory as it is today), nor
for the contributors to the Fundaments , BBWarfields the Hodges and nearly
everyone else. They were as aware as anyone of dinosaurs chomping each other
up but that did not affect their adherence to substitutionary atonement. I
can only think of a handful of 19th century evangelicals who were worried
about it.
I know I was needling Ted, but with a very serious intent. A vast age (or
even 50,000years ) of the earth has a flip side that there was death before
Adam with all the implications for the wages of sin etc.
Finally I have looked briefly at what theologians said about suffering
before 1790 (ie when great age was accepted) and found there was no
unanimous voice that there could be no suffering before Adam. It is a vast
project and ought to be studied.
Michael
----- Original Message -----
From: "Ted Davis" <tdavis@messiah.edu>
To: <d.nield@auckland.ac.nz>; <ASA@calvin.edu>;
<michael.andrea.r@ukonline.co.uk>
Cc: <rjschn39@bellsouth.net>
Sent: Thursday, October 30, 2003 10:21 AM
Subject: Re: Sarfati's books (was Wells and Molecular Phylogenies)
> Michael wrote:
> Back to Paul Nelson. Is he any better than a biblical flat-earther who
> believes the earth is flat because of the only reasonable interpretation
of
> Gen 1 6-8, Ex20, 4 and Isaiah 40 22? I cant see how he can accept biblical
> arguments for a young earth unless he goes for a flat earth as well.
(Please
> no khug-khugging!)
>
> No, Michael, as you fully realize, Paul Nelson does not believe in a flat
> earth. Now let me deal with what I believe is the *real* question here:
how
> can he accept a young earth? The answer, for Paul, is *not*
scientific--he
> admits (unlike most YEC people) that the scientific evidence does not
favor
> a YEC position. The answer is *moral* and *theological*, driven partly of
> course by scriptural concerns but also by moral concerns. He cannot
> reconcile millions of years of suffering and death in the animal kingdom,
> with the love of God. I've often said, that this is the driving force
> behind YEC; Paul is a perfect example of why I have said this.
>
> As he made clear once again last evening, that concern outweighs for him
the
> scientific issues related to an old earth. He does not see how to put his
> moral and theological world together with an old earth. It isn't because
> he's stupid or ignorant--he's as bright as many other philosophers I know
> and he's far better informed about the details of evolutionary biology
than
> I am, and perhaps even than you are (the monograph he's completing, On
> Common Descent, is for a series of standard scientific studies on
evolution
> edited by a leading biologist at the Univ of Chicago). It's because he
> can't put his moral world together in any other way.
>
> This was precisely the same concern Bryan had 80 years ago. Bryan of
course
> accepted an old earth and death before the fall; but he could not put
> evolution by natural selection--the "law of hate" he called it, with good
> reason (this was based on what he saw in social darwinism,
> worldwide)--together with the "law of love," that is the gospel of Christ.
>
> I'm not interested in badgering Paul to accept the evidence for an ancient
> earth and universe. I am interested in understanding more fully why he,
and
> many other Christians, cannot accept that idea.
>
> ted
>
>
>
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