RE: NA Evangelicals shift away from TE between 1880 - 1920 (was [asa] Park Street church)

Michael Roberts said:
"My take is that even today, it is very unlikely for any
dispensationalist to hold a TE position. (Anyone know an exception to
this?) "

Interesting observation. It is funny how seemingly different topics are
tied together (anti-evolution and dispensationalism). It is like a lot
of theological issues... there is a web of other issues interconnecting
many of them... It is a good heads-up when meeting people. "Oh, you are
a dispensationalist?" ... then also thinking "you must also be against
evolution..."

Yes, I would be surprised to see a dispensational evolutionist. Does
that mean if a dispensationalist becomes a TE, they will drop
dispensationalism? Seems that way... darn that Darwinist "universal
acid" that eats-up everything in its path...

________________________________

From: asa-owner@lists.calvin.edu [mailto:asa-owner@lists.calvin.edu] On
Behalf Of Steve Martin
Sent: Monday, December 17, 2007 12:57 PM
To: Michael Roberts
Cc: Ted Davis; asa@calvin.edu; gordon brown
Subject: Re: NA Evangelicals shift away from TE between 1880 - 1920 (was
[asa] Park Street church)

Hi Michael,

re: your 7 suggestions why North America Evangelicals shifted away from
TE between 1880 and 1920. (Actually, it's probably more accurate to say
that the Evangelical consensus shifted away from TE being a valid
Evangelical option - I'm not sure it was ever even close a majority
position).
 

* the rise of Dispensationalism encouraging biblical literalism,

This is a good point that is not often highlighted. I think this is one
Sandeen's points in "The Roots of Fundamentalism". My take is that even
today, it is very unlikely for any dispensationalist to hold a TE
position. (Anyone know an exception to this?)

* reaction to Modernism and Biblical Criticism,

Yes definitely.

* The conflict thesis of science and religion being regarded as
"actuality" by both sides

Again agreed.

* influence of McCready Price on flood geology creating doubt but not
rejection,

Not sure about this one. My take is that flood geology was pretty much
a minority / marginalized view among anti-evolutionists until the 1960
release of "The Genesis Flood" - ie. Anti-evolutionism won the day in
the 1920's within Evangelicalism (turned fundamentalism) with little to
no help from flood geology. I think it was almost a non-factor. But
given that Price et al tarnish the good name of your profession, maybe I
should shut up before you bury me in historical evidence to the
contrary.

* The perception that German militarism was Darwinian,

* Rise of Eugenics, giving a moral reason to reject evolution

I don't know enough on these to comment but it makes sense.

* Radiometric age dating precluding a short time-scale
(10-20,000years) for humans

Sorry. I'm not sure I understand why this affected the move away from
TE as being an option. Can you elaborate?

thanks,

On 12/17/07, Michael Roberts <michael.andrea.r@ukonline.co.uk> wrote:

        Thanks TED, There was a shift in the USA from 1880 onwards but
it does not
        seem to be paralleled in Britain, where most evangelicals took
TE for
        granted until about 1980, though there was a bit of OEC argument
by people
        like Merson Davies and Douglas Dewar and Fleming of the diode
which gave
        rise to the Evol Protest movement in the 1930s.
        
        This can be seen in the early days of Christians in Science
(founded in 1944
        as Research scientists Christian Fellowship) which was strongly
TE in
        contrast to the ASA of the 40s which at a simplification was
OEC/YEC and
        breaking out of a fundamentalist mode. (I have a very high
regard for the
        founders of the ASA who did an excellent work, though nitpickers
would say
        that they were anti-evolutionist, which in many ways was true)
        
        
        The $64000 question is why was there this change from 1880 to
1920
        
        My suggestions are that it was for several reasons ;
        
        
        * the rise of Dispensationalism encouraging biblical
literalism,
        
        * reaction to Modernism and Biblical Criticism,
        
        * The conflict thesis of science and religion being
regarded as
        "actuality" by both sides
        
        * influence of McCready Price on flood geology creating
doubt but not
        rejection,
        
        * The perception that German militarism was Darwinian,
        
        * Rise of Eugenics, giving a moral reason to reject
evolution
        
        * Radiometric age dating precluding a short time-scale
        (10-20,000years) for humans
        
        
        
        Michael
        
        ----- Original Message -----
        From: "Ted Davis" < TDavis@messiah.edu
<mailto:TDavis@messiah.edu> >
        To: <asa@calvin.edu>; "gordon brown" <gbrown@Colorado.EDU>;
"Michael
        Roberts" < michael.andrea.r@ukonline.co.uk>
        Sent: Monday, December 17, 2007 3:59 PM
        Subject: Re: [asa] Park Street church
        
        
>I intersperse my comments among Michael's below.
>
> Ted
>
>>>> "Michael Roberts" <michael.andrea.r@ukonline.co.uk>
12/17/2007 2:36 AM
>>>>
> Thanks Randy.
>
> I thought you had given me another Anglican clergy who was YEC
in about
> 1910
> to add to my tally of one - Griffith Thomas. I have searched
for years for
>
> YEC Anglicans and had only found one from 1855 to 1970.
>
> Hague adopts a very literalistic sounding view of Genesis but
implicitly
> accepts geology as his last paragraph shows ;
>
> The attempt of modernism to save the supernatural in the
second part of
> the
>
> Bible by mythicalizing the supernatural in the first part, is
as unwise as
>
> it is fatal. Instead of lowering the dominant of faith amidst
the chorus
> of
>
> doubt, and admitting that a chapter is doubtful because some
doctrinaire
> has
> questioned it, or a doctrine is less authentic because
somebody has
> floated
>
> an unverifiable hypothesis, it would be better to take our
stand with such
>
> men as Romanes, Lord Kelvin, Virchow, and Liebig, in their
ideas of a
> Creative Power, and to side with Cuvier, the eminent French
scientist, who
>
> said that Moses, while brought up in all the science of Egypt,
was
> superior
>
> to his age, and has left us a cosmogony, the exactitude of
which verifies
> itself every day in a reasonable manner; with Sir William
Dawson, the
> eminent Canadian scientist, who declared that Scripture in all
its details
>
> contradicts no received result of science, but anticipates
many of its
> discoveries; with Professor Dana, the eminent American
scientist, who
> said,
>
> after examining the first chapters of Genesis as a geologist,
"I find it
> to
>
> be in perfect accord with known science"; or, best of all,
with Him who
> said, "Had you believed Moses, you would have believed Me, for
he wrote of
>
> Me. But if you believe not his writings, how shall you believe
My words?"
> (John 5:45,46).
>
> TED: I was pretty sure that Dana would be on this list. The
more I see
> OEC
> comments (which I think this is, agreeing with Michael) from
the early
> 20th
> century, the more I keep hearing the echo of Dana. Sometimes
it's
> explicit,
> as here, but not always. Dana's "sound bites" are usually of
the type
> above: he was fully committed to a concordist reading of the
"two books of
> God," and that approach continued to make sense to American
evangelicals
> *and fundamentalists* until it was tossed out by the YECs in
the 1960s (an
> excellent example would be John C. Whitcomb's booklet, "The
Origin of the
> Solar System" (1963).
>
> All those mentioned were NOT YEC. Dana actually accepted
evolution. Dawson
>
> was a geologist etc.
>
> TED: Dana accepted pretty much all of evolution--Except human
evolution,
> where even in the last edition of his Manual of Geology
(1890s) he
> affirmed
> that humans have a separate origin. He liked to paraphrase
Genesis on
> this,
> to leave his readers with a clear implication of special
creation without
> exactly using that term. And Dawson was also a special
creationist,
> probably more so than Dana. Neither obviously was a YE
creationist.
>
> Was Hague writing to the gallery for the Fundamentals?
>
> TED: No, not in my opinion. Somewhere between 1880 and
1920--the period
> in
> which the movement later called "fundamentalism"
emerged--evangelical
> scientists and clergy became disillusioned with theistic
evolution, I
> think
> (though I am not sure) mostly for theological reasons; and
they became
> more
> and more wary of atheistic evolution, which they equated with
any version
> of
> evolution in which God did not play an explicit active role,
such as
> creating humans ex nihilo, or at least by guiding evolution in
a
> scientifically evident manner, through a created internal
principle of
> order
> that would ensure the progressive nature of the unfolding
creation. A
> nice
> example of this is George Frederick Wright, a leading advocate
of
> evolution
> in the 1870s and 1880s who, in the years before World War One,
wrote an
> anti-evolutionary essay for The Fundamentals. The problem
was, in his
> opinion, that evolution had become the basis of a philosophy
to exclude
> design/purpose from the universe; therefore it needed to be
opposed. If
> all
> of this is starting to sound familiar, it's b/c these issues
just haven't
> gone away. Phil Johnson would be right at home with Dana, and
with
> Wright's
> essay in The Fundamentals--but not (I suspect) with Wright's
essays from a
> few decades earlier.
>
> Ted
>
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