This is the event at which I’m speaking on Friday evening:
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Further reading on the Creation-Evolution [...] Part two of a two-part article first published in Christianity magazine in [...] Writing anything on creation and evolution within these pages feels akin to sticking a sign on my back reading, ‘Kick me!’ I’m exposing myself to attack from one side or another – or maybe from every side! What drives me to stick my head above the parapet is a couple of strong convictions. First, I am absolutely convinced that Christians who disagree should be discussing the issues in a loving, gentle, humble way rather than attacking each other. It seems to me that attacking each other is becoming more common as the debate becomes more polarised. My second conviction is that by focusing on controversy, we are missing significant opportunities to communicate the good news of Jesus Christ in a world which desperately needs to hear it. So here are ten things you need to know about the creation/evolution debate. Wherever you’re coming from on this issue, I would encourage you not to instantly write off things you disagree with, but give them some more thought. If we’re ever going to sort this issue out it seems to me that we have to approach the questions more open-mindedly than perhaps we’ve ever done [...] What does Genesis 1 say to us today? The writer of Genesis would have been very aware of various creation stories believed by the surrounding pagan nations in the Ancient Near East. Those of the superpowers – Babylon, Assyria and Egypt – would have been very influential on the whole region. It was vital that Israel had a right understanding of God and his creation. Genesis 1:1 – 2:3 knocks many of these pagan myths on the [...] What is the purpose of Genesis 1? I said in the previous article that we are mistaken to go to Genesis 1 with a scientific agenda – to ask scientific questions about the age of the earth and so on – because that’s not what Genesis 1 is for. It’s purpose is theological not scientific. It is interested in meanings and relationships not mechanisms. So we should be expecting to see Genesis addressing questions that would have been asked by people in the Ancient Near East back when it was written. The same questions are, in fact, still being asked by people today – although in very different terms. But before we can get to those big answers to big questions, we must get to grips with Genesis 1 and find out more about it. This is a basic principle of all good Bible study. When we come to any passage of Scripture, the question burning in our minds is, ‘How is this relevant to me in my world?’ But before we can answer that question we must ask a more fundamental one – ‘What was God’s original intention in this passage?’ Or, if you like, ‘How was this relevant to the people who first heard or read this in their world?’ The first thing we must do is to see Genesis 1 in context – both its context within Genesis (and the whole Bible) and its historical context. This is called the literary-cultural approach to biblical interpretation. So, how can we answer that fundamental question, ‘What was God’s original intention in this [...] How do we understand Genesis 1? So far in this series we have seen two reasons for the apparent conflict between science and faith. First, science and the Bible have different agendas (‘how?’ versus ‘why?’). Second, the issues are not as clear-cut as people on both sides like to think. As a result, the debate tends to be viewed in very polarised terms. Either God created everything in six twenty-four hour days, or the universe and life came into existence by chance and have steadily evolved. There are at least three reasons why this polarisation is a [...] What really matters in the science-Christianity debate? Planet Earth may have had its 6000th birthday in the last few years. In 1650, Archbishop James Ussher calculated its age by adding up the ages of people and reigns of kings in the Old Testament. He concluded (conveniently) that Creation had happened 4000 years before Jesus’s birth. This gave a date of 4004 BC – a scholar named Joseph Scaliger had already noticed that Herod had died by 1 AD,1 so Jesus must have actually been born in 4 BC at the latest. Ussher even somehow narrowed it down to 9 am on 23 October, although, he said, the action must have started around 6 pm on the previous evening. On 20 October 1996, The Observer carried an article ridiculing Ussher’s calculation, by Mark Ridley, an Oxford zoologist. And rightly so. Ussher counted in such a way as to get 4000 years between the creation and incarnation because of a Jewish tradition that the earth would last 6000 years made up of three 2000-year phases. The Messiah’s coming must usher in the third and final 2000 year period, so the world would end on 23 October 1996 – or perhaps at 6pm the evening [...] Can we be so sure of what we think we know? In the previous article we looked at one reason for the apparent conflict between science and faith: they have different approaches. Science is concerned to understand the space-time world of matter and energy. It wants to know how things work. Christian faith is concerned to understand more than that. The Bible shows us that there is far more to this world than simply what’s physical: there is a supernatural, spiritual dimension to life. There is a Creator who brought the universe into being and who wants a relationship with the creatures he’s made. There are real angels and a real devil. There really is spiritual warfare (Ephesians [...] |
Tony Watkins is a writer and speaker on Christian faith and contemporary culture, with a particular interest in film. He is the Managing Editor of Culturewatch. |
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Copyright © Tony Watkins 1994-2010 - All Rights Reserved |
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