Re: [asa] Saving Darwin: What theological changes are required?

Karl, could you explain what exactly oumean by a "literal Adam and Eve?" Do
you mean literally the first biological humans from which all biological
humans alive today are directly descended? In that case, I probably agree
with you. But I don't understand why there couldn't possibly have been a
literal individual whom God related to in some special way as federal
representative of emerging humanity. To me, that would constitute a
"literal" Adam. Do you contend that science precludes even that
possibility? Or is it just that you would not consider this sort of thing a
"literal" Adam?

On Mon, Jun 9, 2008 at 9:46 PM, karl.w.giberson@enc.edu <gibersok@gmail.com>
wrote:

> At some point we have to say we know enough to take a firm stance. IIn
> 1632 Galileo believed the church MUST move past literal readings of
> biblical references to a stationary earth. This was too early,
> perhaps, but we are certainly at that point now, and have been for
> quite some time. It is really hard to conjure a scenario for a
> literal Adam and Eve with what we now know of natural history. Adam
> and Eve, by the way, mean "Man" and "Woman" in Hebrew. Would we
> assume a similar story in English was about a fellow literally called
> "Man"?
>
> 2008/6/9 David Opderbeck <dopderbeck@gmail.com>:
> > Ted said: Both Mike Behe and Francis Collins have recently argued that
> the
> > genetic evidence is a slam dunk (and please note, ID critics, that Behe
> has
> > been saying this for a long time). If so, then maybe the time is now for
> a
> > rethinking. But "must" seems a stretch, at least to many.
> >
> > I respond: we "must" rethink and address this clear evidence is
> different
> > than saying we "must" give up on Adam as any sort of historical person,
> > IMHO, and this is where I just don't get the "must." We perhaps (I
> think,
> > clearly) "must" rethink biological mongenesis. That is different than
> > suggesting that science now demands what amounts to the even more massive
> > theological, doctrinal, and hermeneutical paradigm shift that, it seemeth
> to
> > me, goes along with no historicity at all to Adam and the fall.
> >
> > Instead of demanding, why not humbly but firmly suggest a real and
> > meaningful dialogue? (The theologians seem for the most part as guilty
> of
> > using "must" as the scientists on this issue).
> >
> > On Mon, Jun 9, 2008 at 7:41 PM, Ted Davis <TDavis@messiah.edu> wrote:
> >>
> >> My turn now to vote and to comment on this question, which I've been
> >> thinking about for a long time. I'll keep my response short, however,
> or
> >> I'd never have time to write it.
> >>
> >> I know Karl Giberson quite well, and have known him for many years.
> >>
> >> Overall, as should be well known here, my approach to religion/science
> >> interaction is probably closer to the "complementarity" model than to
> any
> >> other specific model, including concordism, conflict, confirmation, and
> >> some
> >> others I won't label. I don't necessarily think that Karl's use of the
> >> word
> >> "must" is improper, in this context, though I would not use that word
> here
> >> myself. In some historically famous instances, such as the controversy
> >> about heliocentrism, I do believe that the church "must" respond by
> giving
> >> up cherished interpretations of certain passages of scripture. But
> when,
> >> how, and why should all be in our minds. In the Copernican case, for
> >> example, there was no direct "proof" of the earth's motion before the
> >> discovery of the aberration of starlight in the early 18th century, but
> by
> >> that point many Protestants had already accepted heliocentrism and the
> >> debates about the Bible and the earth's motion were mostly already
> over--I
> >> ignore here the fact that even today, one can still find believers in
> >> geocentricity. Catholics weren't yet allowed officially to believe it,
> >> but
> >> I find it hard to believe that numerous Catholic scientists did not
> >> believe
> >> it at that point. When, then, did heliocentrism become pretty obvious
> to
> >> those with working knowledge of astronomy? When did it become pretty
> >> obvious to theologians and biblical scholars that something had to be
> >> done?
> >> By the early 19th century, to be sure, the logic that Galileo employed
> >> against his own opponents concerning the interpretation of scripture was
> >> being used widely to support the acceptance of a similar logic
> concerning
> >> the age of the earth. Modern creationists mostly accept Galileo's logic
> >> in
> >> astronomy, but deny its validity on the earth's age. "Must" they accept
> >> the
> >> latter, esp if they accept the former? "Must" thoughtful Christians now
> >> accept common descent? Is the evidence for it now comparable in
> strength
> >> to
> >> the evidence that the earth moves or that the earth is billions of years
> >> old? Both Mike Behe and Francis Collins have recently argued that the
> >> genetic evidence is a slam dunk (and please note, ID critics, that Behe
> >> has
> >> been saying this for a long time). If so, then maybe the time is now
> for
> >> a
> >> rethinking. But "must" seems a stretch, at least to many.
> >>
> >> If the time is now, then what about the "how"? How should the
> evangelical
> >> church do this rethinking? IMO, this has to come mostly from the
> inside,
> >> and be done mostly by theologians and pastors and biblical scholars who
> >> decide on their own that maybe the scientists are right about this.
> >> Historically, it's sometimes been the scientists who take the lead on
> >> this,
> >> and then the others follow along. The key point here now is that we
> have
> >> today a group of scientists who accept the divinity of Jesus and the
> >> bodily
> >> resurrection -- that is, their christology is orthodox on crucial
> >> points--but who then also accept common descent driven by natural
> >> selection.
> >> That's new territory in the past 100 years, and reason to think/hope
> that
> >> the theologians will indeed take positive notice. Time will tell, and
> >> historians aren't in the business of predictions. At least this one
> >> isn't.
> >>
> >> At the same time, I agree strongly with Polkinghorne's affirmation
> (Belief
> >> in God in an Age of Science, p. 87) that "theology is as entitled as
> >> science
> >> to retain those categories which its experience has demanded that it
> shall
> >> use, however counterintuitive they may be. [for example] Jesus Christ
> >> will
> >> continue to be understood in the incarnational terms discussed [above]."
> >> There are some non-negotiables here, IMO, although my judgment of what
> >> those
> >> are may differ from the judgments of others. Jesus isn't a bad place to
> >> start looking for those non-negotiables: unlike some of the leading
> >> science/theology people (fill in Barbour, Peacocke, and Haught, e.g.), I
> >> think that the full divinity and bodily resurrection of Jesus (the
> former
> >> indeed partly an inference from the latter) are absolutely crucial to
> any
> >> dialogue with science that is to go by the adjective "Christian." On
> the
> >> other hand, a theory of the fall (if I may call it that), like a theory
> of
> >> the atonement, is not the same thing IMO as the fact of the fall and the
> >> fact of the atonement. We are sinful creatures, responsible for what we
> >> choose to do and capable of great moral depravity (if I keep going with
> >> that
> >> I'll start to sound like Calvin, who IMO had this part mainly right),
> >> whether or not there was a first couple who "fell" from innocence; and
> we
> >> needed and still need the sacrifice of the crucified God to redeem us,
> >> whether or not the details of that transaction are precisely as Anselm
> >> conceived them to be. The dangers of denying the fall and atonement, in
> >> the
> >> factual sense I am referring to, are not merely theological--though
> >> "merely"
> >> here is not meant to suggest that theology isn't very important.
> Rather,
> >> they are also deeply cultural, social, and intellectual. We tend to
> start
> >> believing in salvation by our own works, or even that salvation is not
> >> necessary because we are not really sinful to begin with. Eugenics was
> so
> >> widely popular with liberal Protestants 80 years ago in no small part
> b/c
> >> of
> >> this fundamental heresy.
> >>
> >> Now my votes.
> >>
> >> 1. We must abandon thinking of Adam and Eve as real people or even
> >> surrogates for groups of real people
> >>
> >> PROBABLY, though this may depend on how we conceive of them. There are
> >> two
> >> main empirical problems with an historical, separately created Adam &
> Eve
> >> ca. 6000 years ago (note please I am talking about the antiquity of
> >> humanity, not the antiquity of the earth). One, the genetic evidence
> >> (above) makes it really, really hard to support their separate creation.
> >> Two, the biblical context of cities and agriculture makes it really,
> >> really
> >> hard to push the first couple back as far as hominids seem to go--some
> >> tens
> >> of thousands of years, at least. They painted the walls of caves, made
> >> tools, and buried their dead long before cities and agriculture, when
> Adam
> >> &
> >> Eve show up in Genesis. I know there might be clever ways to work all
> of
> >> that out, but I find them quite unpersuasive myself.
> >>
> >> 2. The Fall must disappear from history as an event and become, instead,
> a
> >> partial insight into the morally ambiguous character with which
> evolution
> >> endowed our species
> >>
> >> SEE ABOVE. The fall must be a fact, a crucial and non-negotiable fact,
> >> about who we are and what we are capable of doing. Regardless of how we
> >> got
> >> here, here we are and here we find ourselves. I'm starting here to
> sound
> >> like Harry Emerson Fosdick, of all people (I'm not usually so friendly
> to
> >> his ideas), and as he once said, "Origins prove nothing in the realm of
> >> values." Amen. Otherwise, mentally and physically handicapped persons
> >> really are not worth as much as the rest of us. This is profoundly
> >> important.
> >>
> >> 3. We must consider extending the imago dei, in some sense, beyond our
> >> species.
> >>
> >> WHY? For starters, let's define as clearly as we can what the "imago
> dei"
> >> is, and what it is not. Is it the gift of creating, as the Renaissance
> >> artists and writers surely believed? Is it rationality? Dignity
> (itself
> >> pretty vague)? All of these things? None of them? Whatever it is,
> only
> >> humans have it, according to Genesis, and I believe that the theological
> >> content of Genesis *is* its revelational content, so I could be very
> hard
> >> to
> >> persuade on this one. (But, don't ask me precisely what the imago dei
> is,
> >> b/c the Bible doesn't say and I don't know either.)
> >>
> >> Ted
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >> To unsubscribe, send a message to majordomo@calvin.edu with
> >> "unsubscribe asa" (no quotes) as the body of the message.
> >
> >
> >
> > --
> > David W. Opderbeck
> > Associate Professor of Law
> > Seton Hall University Law School
> > Gibbons Institute of Law, Science & Technology
>
>
>
> --
> Karl Giberson, Ph.D,
> www.karlgiberson.com
> Professor of Physics, Eastern Nazarene College, Quincy, MA
> Director of the Forum on Faith & Science, Gordon College, Wenham, MA.
> Phone: 781-801-2189
> Fax: 617-847-5933
>
> "A person without a sense of humor is like a wagon without springs --
> jolted by every pebble in the road." Henry Ward Beecher
>

-- 
David W. Opderbeck
Associate Professor of Law
Seton Hall University Law School
Gibbons Institute of Law, Science & Technology
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