One of the things that is hard for Christians to accept is divine judgment. I do not mean the simple fact of judgment, but that some of the judgments found in the Bible seem a bit extreme. We have God ordering the Israelites to conquer Canaan and to slaughter its inhabitants. Noah builds a boat to save a remnant of humanity, but saves only his own family. The rest are wiped out in a flood. We see God's own people, the Israelites, decimated and taken into captivity. Even when a remnant returns, most are still scattered all over the pagan world.
And those are just temporal judgments. Eternal judgment is far worse. Multitudes are cast into a Lake of Fire to burns forever after the Great White Throne Judgment. There are indications that the torment of unbelievers will last forever. It seems to go beyond what is just and necessary even for the worst of sinners.
The question we have to ask ourselves about this is twofold. First, are we willing to accept the Bible for what it says no matter how uncomfortable it makes us feel? Second, are we willing to set aside our own judgments on these matters and accept God's?
It used to be very simple. Those who believed in Christ and the scriptures accepted the judgments as being from God as the just punishment for sins committed. Those who did not believe the scriptures rejected the judgments, often calling them unjust.
Now we have a different situation. Some claiming to be orthodox Christians are now rejecting these judgments as relics of an ignorant and superstitious people or as errors added to the Bible by ancients who, unlike us, enjoy this sort of thing. Like many unbelievers today they say that God would never do those things. After all, did we not just pass through a period of history when the Nazis tried to commit genocide against the Jews. Was this not condemned by all?
But then we could respond that in order to stop the Nazis from committing such atrocities that we had to kill many thousands of them. We bombed their cities and decimated their armies. And we do not feel bad about it now. Why? Because we were preventing the evil from continuing and punishing those responsible. That is what God does when He brings judgment.
Those who deny that God brought the biblical judgments have set themselves above God and judged Him for His actions. I even read just today from the pen of an evangelical who said that God put the so-called Canaanite 'genocide' in the Bible so that we would despise genocide. Really? That's absurd. God did not order judgment on the Canaanites to teach us how bad genocide is. He did it to warn us of the consequences of our sins.
God judges sin. Those who reject Jesus, the sacrifice for our sins, will receive a greater judgment than we might think is due. This ought to cause us to fear and to live in the fear of the Lord. The book of Hebrews says that it is a "fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God." We have forgetten about this side of God. We only want to acknowledge the pleasant things that God promises us. We have forgotten his just judgments. "Therefore consider the goodness and severity of God: on those who fell, severity; but toward you, goodness,[f] if you continue in His goodness. Otherwise you also will be cut off." (Romans 11:22)
The greater His goodness is, the greater His severity is. None us wants to see people judged. (At least, I hope we don't.) We want people saved and set free by the power of God. That's why we have the Great Commission.
It's our job to preach the gospel to everyone. Yes, even to those of another religion. They are lost and they need a Savior. God loves them all. His love is unconditional, but His forgiveness and salvation are not. They require faith in the Risen Savior. Love drives us to seek and save those who are lost. Love does not pretend that divine judgment is not a reality; it makes us want to get this gospel to everyone as soon as we can.
Friday, April 5, 2013
Friday, March 15, 2013
Bible interpretation - Darwinist and Newtonian
It seems to me that evangelicals fall into two categories when it comes to Bible interpretation. I will call them "Darwinist" and "Newtonian". I am not writing this to attack the theory of evolution (which I might do another time) or to put forth the idea that physics proves the existence of God (which it does). Additionally, I am not interested in skeptics of the Bible, no matter how educated, as I generally don't bother with them at all. I am talking about Christians who say they believe the Bible gives us revelation from God.
The reason I am using the names of two scientists is because some like to imply that their approach to scripture is "scientific" though it is not nor can it ever be. Modernist tools for Bible interpretation, called the 'higher criticism', are not scienctific at all. Science cannot help us very much in intepreting the Bible. But since the term 'science' is presumptuously used in the field of Bible interpretation and scientific ideas are considered to be authoritative in our culture, I will use a couple of ideas from science and see if they have helped form our thinking with regards to the scriptures. I think they have.
First, I want to look at the Newtonian approach. Isaac Newton, who gave us an understanding of the basic laws of physics, showed us that all things in the universe function by the same set of laws. He demonstrated to us that physical laws are universal and that the whole of creation functions according these laws in a complete system without any outside agency necessary to make all things work together. Whatever new things we might discover or invent has no effect on the laws of nature themselves. These laws are fixed and permanent. The law of gravity still applies even when we learned to make airplanes that fly. Other laws of nature would tell us how to 'overcome' the law of gravity in order to fly, but this would not abrogate the law itself. Progress comes from applying the laws of nature and understanding them better, not by pretending that we can make up new ones.
What could this idea have in common with Bible interpretation? Quite a bit. The concept that there the laws and principles laid out in the Bible and that these are eternal, not subject to change, is an idea that has been around since the Bible was written. These biblical principles can be applied to new situations, but the Bible itself does not change. Laws against coveting your neighbor's things apply to things that we have now that they did not have. We have cell phones and cars and lots of other stuff. We cannot say that the laws against coveting do not apply in these situations because things were different back then. The outward things may be different but the law against coveting still applies. We just apply it to new things. We may think of ancient people as scientifically ignorant, but they were not ignorant of what coveting was. They understood it as well as we do.
This newtonian principle can be used with any eternal principle in the Bible. Notice that I said eternal principle and not all laws or principles. Many OT laws are no longer in force. We do not sacrifice animals anymore when we sin, we ask for forgiveness based on Jesus' sacrifice. Hence, there is no more need for animal sacrifices nor to keep many of the kosher laws and laws of uncleanness. They were never intended to be permanent. "The Law [of Moses] became our tutor until Christ came, so that we may be justified by faith. But now that the faith has come, we are no longer under a tutor." Galatians 3:24-25 These laws are compared to the instructions that we give to children like "don't touch the stove". This is to protect the child until he is old enough not to accidently burn himself. This "law" is not permanent for the child but performs a protective function until he is mature. But the child will always be governed by the laws of nature. He can always burn himself if he is not careful. There is a permanent principle that always applies.
We have to read the Bible carefully to determine which instructions were eternal and which were temporary. The apostle Paul told Gentile believers that they did not have to be circumcised but that they did have to obey the laws regarding sexual morality. Paul condemned the actions of a church member who was living with his father's wife, something specifically forbidden in Leviticus 18:8.
Well, what about this Darwin fellow? Are we talking about the creation vs. evolution debate? No, not directly, though we could apply it there. I want to focus on an approach to the Bible that Darwin's theory might back up. Charles Darwin postulated that we humans are not direct creations of God but that we evolved from lower creatures. Some have taken this idea of evolution and applied it to all sorts of things. They look at human progress and say that we have come from a primitive, even brutal, state and have evolved into modern, enlightened people. Our ancestors (supposedly) were illiterate, patriarchal, prejudiced and just plain stupid. They held many unscientific ideas and believed things like slavery and genocide were perfectly okay.
But now, according to social darwinists, we have evolved to the point where we realize that many of the things that seemed fine in the past are really evil. The biggest example of this is the issue of slavery which was practiced in nearly every society since time immemorial. Now we know better. What, then, does a Bible-believing Christian with this kind of mindset do? We have the Bible, written thousands of years ago which seems to teach that God ordered the Canaanite genocide and, at least, permitted, if not ordained slavery. How does that person deal with the Bible? Can this person accept the Bible as fully inspired by a good God? Or, better, what paradigm can a believer use to bring together his belief in the Bible and his social darwinist assumptions?
Well, for many, the key is in the idea of evolution itself. Since, as is assumed by many, people were lacking in understanding of what was truly just and moral, then God must have planted in the Bible seeds, so to speak,that would sprout later. God has put things in the Bible that we would only truly understand when we were more enlightened and evolved. There are projections in the Bible that we are supposed to pay attention to. They give us hints as to how we should apply the Bible today. Hence, we do not always follow even the instructions given to us in the New Testament, but we are to use our evolved understanding (our current modern ethos) to determine what we should do or not do.
So instead of taking our cue from the Bible where the marriage ideal is one man-one woman until one dies we see how marriage 'evolves' and try to figure out where it should be today. There is polygamy in the Old Testament, but Jesus and Paul insist on monogamy in the New. Today, some people say that legal marriage is unnecessary, but that modern people only need "loving, committed relationships", an abstraction marriage. So sex may occur outside the marriage bond as long as it is not casual or promiscuous. And now some are saying that two men or two women ought to be able to get married. After all, we think that "loving, committed relationships" are good for any couple and for society as a whole.
But then we have those pesky rules against homosexual activities of any kind. What to do with those? Well, reinterpret them, of course. And this is not that hard to do if you make certain assumptions. If you assume that the homosexual activities condemned in the Bible were only of a certain variety, then you can justify others. It is alleged by these "darwinist" intepreters that ancient homosexual behavior was only of the violent or promiscuous kind and that they were too primitive and ignorant and unevolved to have the kind of "loving, committed relationships" that the Bible is supposed to approve of. It does not matter to them that homosexual relationships are always emphatically condemned in the scriptures no matter what the circumstances. They simply assume that God only condemned it for a primitive and ignorant people who were incapable of the enlightened and egalitarian relationships that we now have.
I have to say that I find this kind of reasoning to be very ironic. The assumption that ancient people were prejudiced and that we are evolved and enlightened is nothing but prejudice against ancient people. It prejudges them as unenlightened and stupid. It prejudges the biblical writers as being unable to understand the revelation that they themselves wrote. Some Bible scholars who do not believe in literal Adam and Eve acknowledge that both Jesus and Paul believed in a literal Adam and Eve, but that they were mistaken. Really? This is human hubris at its worst. To presume that you know better than the Son of God the meaning of the Scriptures is nothing short of blasphemy. But let's move on.
Is it not true that progress has been made in many areas? Has God not raised up many who have helped us see things that we were blind to before? Is this not progress? Sure it is. We have to examine how this progress came about. It did not come about because someone saw the general direction the Bible was going and reasoned accordingly. No, these things come about by applying the eternal principles of the Bible that was previously ignored.
Our progress has come not because we did not understand new some revelation that the Bible only suggests. Rather it has come by someone calling us to heed the eternal principles that we have ignored. Newton discovered the law of gravity; he did not invent it. He did not say, "I think that we ought to adopt the law of gravity. This is progress!" No, he discovered a principle that was there all the time. Dr. Martin Luther King was not a progressive with regards to the Bible. He called us to live according to the principles that had always been there. One does not need to radically reinterpret the Bible to see that it speaks clearly against all racism and prejudice. The problem is not with the Bible. It is with us. The problem is, and has always been, human sin not a lack of evolution. The solution to this problem is not interpreting the Bible according to our current culture, but humbly applying the principles of the Bible even if they go against our own thinking.
The reason I am using the names of two scientists is because some like to imply that their approach to scripture is "scientific" though it is not nor can it ever be. Modernist tools for Bible interpretation, called the 'higher criticism', are not scienctific at all. Science cannot help us very much in intepreting the Bible. But since the term 'science' is presumptuously used in the field of Bible interpretation and scientific ideas are considered to be authoritative in our culture, I will use a couple of ideas from science and see if they have helped form our thinking with regards to the scriptures. I think they have.
First, I want to look at the Newtonian approach. Isaac Newton, who gave us an understanding of the basic laws of physics, showed us that all things in the universe function by the same set of laws. He demonstrated to us that physical laws are universal and that the whole of creation functions according these laws in a complete system without any outside agency necessary to make all things work together. Whatever new things we might discover or invent has no effect on the laws of nature themselves. These laws are fixed and permanent. The law of gravity still applies even when we learned to make airplanes that fly. Other laws of nature would tell us how to 'overcome' the law of gravity in order to fly, but this would not abrogate the law itself. Progress comes from applying the laws of nature and understanding them better, not by pretending that we can make up new ones.
What could this idea have in common with Bible interpretation? Quite a bit. The concept that there the laws and principles laid out in the Bible and that these are eternal, not subject to change, is an idea that has been around since the Bible was written. These biblical principles can be applied to new situations, but the Bible itself does not change. Laws against coveting your neighbor's things apply to things that we have now that they did not have. We have cell phones and cars and lots of other stuff. We cannot say that the laws against coveting do not apply in these situations because things were different back then. The outward things may be different but the law against coveting still applies. We just apply it to new things. We may think of ancient people as scientifically ignorant, but they were not ignorant of what coveting was. They understood it as well as we do.
This newtonian principle can be used with any eternal principle in the Bible. Notice that I said eternal principle and not all laws or principles. Many OT laws are no longer in force. We do not sacrifice animals anymore when we sin, we ask for forgiveness based on Jesus' sacrifice. Hence, there is no more need for animal sacrifices nor to keep many of the kosher laws and laws of uncleanness. They were never intended to be permanent. "The Law [of Moses] became our tutor until Christ came, so that we may be justified by faith. But now that the faith has come, we are no longer under a tutor." Galatians 3:24-25 These laws are compared to the instructions that we give to children like "don't touch the stove". This is to protect the child until he is old enough not to accidently burn himself. This "law" is not permanent for the child but performs a protective function until he is mature. But the child will always be governed by the laws of nature. He can always burn himself if he is not careful. There is a permanent principle that always applies.
We have to read the Bible carefully to determine which instructions were eternal and which were temporary. The apostle Paul told Gentile believers that they did not have to be circumcised but that they did have to obey the laws regarding sexual morality. Paul condemned the actions of a church member who was living with his father's wife, something specifically forbidden in Leviticus 18:8.
Well, what about this Darwin fellow? Are we talking about the creation vs. evolution debate? No, not directly, though we could apply it there. I want to focus on an approach to the Bible that Darwin's theory might back up. Charles Darwin postulated that we humans are not direct creations of God but that we evolved from lower creatures. Some have taken this idea of evolution and applied it to all sorts of things. They look at human progress and say that we have come from a primitive, even brutal, state and have evolved into modern, enlightened people. Our ancestors (supposedly) were illiterate, patriarchal, prejudiced and just plain stupid. They held many unscientific ideas and believed things like slavery and genocide were perfectly okay.
But now, according to social darwinists, we have evolved to the point where we realize that many of the things that seemed fine in the past are really evil. The biggest example of this is the issue of slavery which was practiced in nearly every society since time immemorial. Now we know better. What, then, does a Bible-believing Christian with this kind of mindset do? We have the Bible, written thousands of years ago which seems to teach that God ordered the Canaanite genocide and, at least, permitted, if not ordained slavery. How does that person deal with the Bible? Can this person accept the Bible as fully inspired by a good God? Or, better, what paradigm can a believer use to bring together his belief in the Bible and his social darwinist assumptions?
Well, for many, the key is in the idea of evolution itself. Since, as is assumed by many, people were lacking in understanding of what was truly just and moral, then God must have planted in the Bible seeds, so to speak,that would sprout later. God has put things in the Bible that we would only truly understand when we were more enlightened and evolved. There are projections in the Bible that we are supposed to pay attention to. They give us hints as to how we should apply the Bible today. Hence, we do not always follow even the instructions given to us in the New Testament, but we are to use our evolved understanding (our current modern ethos) to determine what we should do or not do.
So instead of taking our cue from the Bible where the marriage ideal is one man-one woman until one dies we see how marriage 'evolves' and try to figure out where it should be today. There is polygamy in the Old Testament, but Jesus and Paul insist on monogamy in the New. Today, some people say that legal marriage is unnecessary, but that modern people only need "loving, committed relationships", an abstraction marriage. So sex may occur outside the marriage bond as long as it is not casual or promiscuous. And now some are saying that two men or two women ought to be able to get married. After all, we think that "loving, committed relationships" are good for any couple and for society as a whole.
But then we have those pesky rules against homosexual activities of any kind. What to do with those? Well, reinterpret them, of course. And this is not that hard to do if you make certain assumptions. If you assume that the homosexual activities condemned in the Bible were only of a certain variety, then you can justify others. It is alleged by these "darwinist" intepreters that ancient homosexual behavior was only of the violent or promiscuous kind and that they were too primitive and ignorant and unevolved to have the kind of "loving, committed relationships" that the Bible is supposed to approve of. It does not matter to them that homosexual relationships are always emphatically condemned in the scriptures no matter what the circumstances. They simply assume that God only condemned it for a primitive and ignorant people who were incapable of the enlightened and egalitarian relationships that we now have.
I have to say that I find this kind of reasoning to be very ironic. The assumption that ancient people were prejudiced and that we are evolved and enlightened is nothing but prejudice against ancient people. It prejudges them as unenlightened and stupid. It prejudges the biblical writers as being unable to understand the revelation that they themselves wrote. Some Bible scholars who do not believe in literal Adam and Eve acknowledge that both Jesus and Paul believed in a literal Adam and Eve, but that they were mistaken. Really? This is human hubris at its worst. To presume that you know better than the Son of God the meaning of the Scriptures is nothing short of blasphemy. But let's move on.
Is it not true that progress has been made in many areas? Has God not raised up many who have helped us see things that we were blind to before? Is this not progress? Sure it is. We have to examine how this progress came about. It did not come about because someone saw the general direction the Bible was going and reasoned accordingly. No, these things come about by applying the eternal principles of the Bible that was previously ignored.
Our progress has come not because we did not understand new some revelation that the Bible only suggests. Rather it has come by someone calling us to heed the eternal principles that we have ignored. Newton discovered the law of gravity; he did not invent it. He did not say, "I think that we ought to adopt the law of gravity. This is progress!" No, he discovered a principle that was there all the time. Dr. Martin Luther King was not a progressive with regards to the Bible. He called us to live according to the principles that had always been there. One does not need to radically reinterpret the Bible to see that it speaks clearly against all racism and prejudice. The problem is not with the Bible. It is with us. The problem is, and has always been, human sin not a lack of evolution. The solution to this problem is not interpreting the Bible according to our current culture, but humbly applying the principles of the Bible even if they go against our own thinking.
Wednesday, January 9, 2013
Are We Reading the Bible Too Narrowly or Not Narrowly Enough?
You might think that those who believe that the Bible is the Word of God would interpret it pretty much the same way. After all, believing, as we do, that the Bible does not contradict itself (a corollary of the truth stated in the first sentence) severely limits how one can interpret most passages. You may be led to a pacifist position regarding warfare by reading the commandment "You shall not kill (murder)", but you should be dissuaded from that interpretation by considering the fact that God actually commanded the Israelites to go to war at various times and authorized the death penalty for a wide variety of offenses against His Law.
So there are limits as to how far we Bible-believing Christians ought go in our explanations of Bible passages. But that hardly stops us from disagreeing about practically any Bible verse. We all have different approaches as to how we interpret the Bible, and one way in which we differ is in how narrowly or broadly we apply certain truths.
Perhaps the most prominent example of this is the well-known passage in Philippians 4:13 which reads, "I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me." It is usually taken to mean that Jesus Christ will give us strength and ability for whatever task we have in front of us. If we have to do something that seems beyond our normal capability, God will gives the strength and power to do it, especially if God has called us to do that very thing.
There are some, though, that disagree with this view of what Paul is saying here. They argue that this verse of scripture does not mean that at all. Rather they think that the above view takes the verse out of context and gives it a meaning that the context does not support. And I partially agree. Here is the part that I agree with: The text in its context says:
"Not that I speak from want, for I have learned to be content in whatever circumstances I am. I know how to get along with humble means, and I also know how to live in prosperity; in any and every circumstance I have learned the secret of being filled and going hungry, both of having abundance and suffering need. I can do all things through Him who strengthens me."
In other words, Paul is not talking about God giving him the ability to do something that he is called to do by Him. Instead, he is saying that God has given him the ability to be either in a state of prosperity or in a state of need. It has to do with his material condition, not anything else. Paul could handle life when his needs were not met and he could handle life when things were going great.
Those who say this, who read the passage in its narrowest sense, have a good point here. By simply quoting verse 13 we are lifting the verse out of context and applying well beyond that context. It seems to take on a different meaning.
That's a pretty fair point. We always must be careful to interpret things in their context. Take a simple example. A man pushes an old woman, knocking her to the ground. Another man does the same thing. Are these bad men? Before we can say for sure, we must consider the context. The first man pushed an old woman off a bus. He is a bad man. The second pushed an old woman out of the way of a bus that was going to hit her. He is a good man. We must consider the context to judge what has happened.
Let's get back to our disagreement about the Bible passage. Is it right to take Philippians 4:13 and apply it to all kinds of situations that were not referred to in the rest of the passage? Many would say that we should not. We should only apply the verse to a person's material circumstances. This would be the narrowest reading of the text.
And we must take the passage in its context to determine its meaning. After all, if one lifts the verse out of context and applies it absolutely, it could be meant to say about anything. What if I quoted this verse and said that I was now going to leap over the Empire State Building because Christ will give my strength for ANYTHING. You would be right to say that I have interpreted the passage far beyond the original intention of the author. That is taking this scripture way too broadly.
My take: I do not want to take Bible passages out of context and make them mean something that was not intended. But this does not mean that I will only apply them exactly the way that the author of the passage does. We must always remember that there is a divine author above the human author and a divine intention above the human intention.
Despite my assertion that we must interpret scripture in its context and not isolated from the verses around it, I also know that God is the author of the whole Bible and He has put principles in the Bible that we can use that may go beyond the immediate context. This is especially true when there are other scriptures that back up our application of a principle beyond the context.
So I do not have a problem with using the principle of Phil 4:13 "I can do all things through Christ" and applying it to things like God helping us in difficult circumstances of different kinds and God giving us the ability to do the things that He has called us to do. I think that is legitimate. There is an abundance of evidence in the Bible that God does give His people strength and ability for whatever they are called to do.
So - we do not want to be too narrow in our reading of the Bible, though we must understand the context of the passage. We do not want to absolutize it and make it say something way beyond the Bible. We can apply the principles of the Bible in the context of the whole Bible and not just the immediate context.
So there are limits as to how far we Bible-believing Christians ought go in our explanations of Bible passages. But that hardly stops us from disagreeing about practically any Bible verse. We all have different approaches as to how we interpret the Bible, and one way in which we differ is in how narrowly or broadly we apply certain truths.
Perhaps the most prominent example of this is the well-known passage in Philippians 4:13 which reads, "I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me." It is usually taken to mean that Jesus Christ will give us strength and ability for whatever task we have in front of us. If we have to do something that seems beyond our normal capability, God will gives the strength and power to do it, especially if God has called us to do that very thing.
There are some, though, that disagree with this view of what Paul is saying here. They argue that this verse of scripture does not mean that at all. Rather they think that the above view takes the verse out of context and gives it a meaning that the context does not support. And I partially agree. Here is the part that I agree with: The text in its context says:
"Not that I speak from want, for I have learned to be content in whatever circumstances I am. I know how to get along with humble means, and I also know how to live in prosperity; in any and every circumstance I have learned the secret of being filled and going hungry, both of having abundance and suffering need. I can do all things through Him who strengthens me."
In other words, Paul is not talking about God giving him the ability to do something that he is called to do by Him. Instead, he is saying that God has given him the ability to be either in a state of prosperity or in a state of need. It has to do with his material condition, not anything else. Paul could handle life when his needs were not met and he could handle life when things were going great.
Those who say this, who read the passage in its narrowest sense, have a good point here. By simply quoting verse 13 we are lifting the verse out of context and applying well beyond that context. It seems to take on a different meaning.
That's a pretty fair point. We always must be careful to interpret things in their context. Take a simple example. A man pushes an old woman, knocking her to the ground. Another man does the same thing. Are these bad men? Before we can say for sure, we must consider the context. The first man pushed an old woman off a bus. He is a bad man. The second pushed an old woman out of the way of a bus that was going to hit her. He is a good man. We must consider the context to judge what has happened.
Let's get back to our disagreement about the Bible passage. Is it right to take Philippians 4:13 and apply it to all kinds of situations that were not referred to in the rest of the passage? Many would say that we should not. We should only apply the verse to a person's material circumstances. This would be the narrowest reading of the text.
And we must take the passage in its context to determine its meaning. After all, if one lifts the verse out of context and applies it absolutely, it could be meant to say about anything. What if I quoted this verse and said that I was now going to leap over the Empire State Building because Christ will give my strength for ANYTHING. You would be right to say that I have interpreted the passage far beyond the original intention of the author. That is taking this scripture way too broadly.
My take: I do not want to take Bible passages out of context and make them mean something that was not intended. But this does not mean that I will only apply them exactly the way that the author of the passage does. We must always remember that there is a divine author above the human author and a divine intention above the human intention.
Despite my assertion that we must interpret scripture in its context and not isolated from the verses around it, I also know that God is the author of the whole Bible and He has put principles in the Bible that we can use that may go beyond the immediate context. This is especially true when there are other scriptures that back up our application of a principle beyond the context.
So I do not have a problem with using the principle of Phil 4:13 "I can do all things through Christ" and applying it to things like God helping us in difficult circumstances of different kinds and God giving us the ability to do the things that He has called us to do. I think that is legitimate. There is an abundance of evidence in the Bible that God does give His people strength and ability for whatever they are called to do.
So - we do not want to be too narrow in our reading of the Bible, though we must understand the context of the passage. We do not want to absolutize it and make it say something way beyond the Bible. We can apply the principles of the Bible in the context of the whole Bible and not just the immediate context.
Friday, October 19, 2012
Metaphorical nonsense
Well, it happened again. A self-confessed former "fundamentalist" Christian proclaimed on television that he now has a more enlightened view of the Bible. He fooled his family for over a year by telling them he was a homosexual when he was not. His fundamentalist family was shocked, of course, but his mother, at least, learned a supposedly valuable lesson.
After a lifetime of reading the Bible 'literally', he and his mother no longer do so. Seemingly because she loves her son who she thought was actually homosexual, she now does not read the Bible in such a way that makes her believe that homosexual actions are sinful. She now thinks it is okay, as does her son. (I wonder what she thinks about her son lying to her about a very serious matter. Maybe she takes the command not to bear false witness 'metaphorically' as well.)
Now what is the alternative to the supposedly archaic, unenlightened, literal reading of the Bible. The answer, of course, is to take the Bible metaphorically. This is what this young man asserts. But what exactly does it mean to take the Bible literally, or metaphorically.
Let's look at a couple of examples: First, we have the saying of Jesus, "I am the vine and you are the branches." When Jesus calls Himself a 'vine' and his disciples 'branches', should we take this literally or metaphorically? Well, it is obviously a metaphor. The most extreme fundamentalist in the world would not interpret this literally. No sane person does or ever would. Second, we have one of the ten commandments, "Thou shalt not steal." Is it possible to interpret this metaphorically? No, it must be literal. It's not a metaphor for anything.
What can we conclude from this? Very simply that we interpret literal passages literally and metaphorical passages metaphorically. Of course, that is exactly what fundamentalist and evangelical Christians have always done. There is no simple choice between literal and metaphorical interpretation. We have to make the choice for each passage.
How then should we interpret the passages that talk about homosexuality? Are they to be interpreted literally or metaphorically? To answer this we need to examine what kind of statements they are. We find, very simply, that they are among the statements in the Bible that tell us how we ought or ought not to behave. They are moral commands. As we have seen in the case of the commandment not to steal, it and all other commandments regarding morality must be interpreted literally. In other words, the moral law is always interpreted literally. This does not mean it lacks spiritual application, but we easily confuse the spiritual with the metaphorical. They are not the same thing.
Another person who insists that we must interpret the Bible 'metaphorically' says that if we interpret the Bible literally, then we must put homosexuals and adulterers to death because that is what the Old Testament says.
But, once again, this is not interpreting passages according to their kind. While passages that tell us what to do or not do must be interpreted literally, we also must distinguish between different kinds of commands. God told us not to commit adultery, for example, and the OT punishment was death. However, there is a difference between the moral law and the civil law given to the ancient Israelites. The civil law enforced the moral law. The moral law is for all people at all times. The civil law was for Israel when they were a nation. Jesus refused to apply the civil law when the moral law was violated. Remember the woman caught in adultery and brought to Jesus. Jesus effectively made the Jews put down their stones, refused to condemn her, but did tell her to 'go and sin no more'. Jesus affirmed the moral law without applying the civil law from the OT. (The Jews were no longer self-governing; they were under Roman rule.)
Jesus took the moral law literally. He affirmed its verdict on sin, but He also came to wash away our sins. That is much different, and much better, than saying that our sins are okay. They are not.
Those who mock "fundamentalists" who interpret moral commands literally by saying that they prefer a "metaphorical" interpretation of the Bible have no clue what they are talking about. It is not even an intelligent argument, much less enlightened or modern. No, they use this to put down those they disagree with on moral matters all the while pretending that they know more about the Bible than the people who actually study and believe it. They pretend to be morally and intellectually superior to those they look down on. Meanwhile they justify behavior that God clearly condemns.
Just as bad, they pretend to honor a Bible though they will not submit to as God's Word. I have much more respect for a person who comes right out and says that they do not believe the Bible is God's Word than one who pretends that they honor the Bible while they refuse to submit to its teaching. This is nothing but hypocrisy.
After a lifetime of reading the Bible 'literally', he and his mother no longer do so. Seemingly because she loves her son who she thought was actually homosexual, she now does not read the Bible in such a way that makes her believe that homosexual actions are sinful. She now thinks it is okay, as does her son. (I wonder what she thinks about her son lying to her about a very serious matter. Maybe she takes the command not to bear false witness 'metaphorically' as well.)
Now what is the alternative to the supposedly archaic, unenlightened, literal reading of the Bible. The answer, of course, is to take the Bible metaphorically. This is what this young man asserts. But what exactly does it mean to take the Bible literally, or metaphorically.
Let's look at a couple of examples: First, we have the saying of Jesus, "I am the vine and you are the branches." When Jesus calls Himself a 'vine' and his disciples 'branches', should we take this literally or metaphorically? Well, it is obviously a metaphor. The most extreme fundamentalist in the world would not interpret this literally. No sane person does or ever would. Second, we have one of the ten commandments, "Thou shalt not steal." Is it possible to interpret this metaphorically? No, it must be literal. It's not a metaphor for anything.
What can we conclude from this? Very simply that we interpret literal passages literally and metaphorical passages metaphorically. Of course, that is exactly what fundamentalist and evangelical Christians have always done. There is no simple choice between literal and metaphorical interpretation. We have to make the choice for each passage.
How then should we interpret the passages that talk about homosexuality? Are they to be interpreted literally or metaphorically? To answer this we need to examine what kind of statements they are. We find, very simply, that they are among the statements in the Bible that tell us how we ought or ought not to behave. They are moral commands. As we have seen in the case of the commandment not to steal, it and all other commandments regarding morality must be interpreted literally. In other words, the moral law is always interpreted literally. This does not mean it lacks spiritual application, but we easily confuse the spiritual with the metaphorical. They are not the same thing.
Another person who insists that we must interpret the Bible 'metaphorically' says that if we interpret the Bible literally, then we must put homosexuals and adulterers to death because that is what the Old Testament says.
But, once again, this is not interpreting passages according to their kind. While passages that tell us what to do or not do must be interpreted literally, we also must distinguish between different kinds of commands. God told us not to commit adultery, for example, and the OT punishment was death. However, there is a difference between the moral law and the civil law given to the ancient Israelites. The civil law enforced the moral law. The moral law is for all people at all times. The civil law was for Israel when they were a nation. Jesus refused to apply the civil law when the moral law was violated. Remember the woman caught in adultery and brought to Jesus. Jesus effectively made the Jews put down their stones, refused to condemn her, but did tell her to 'go and sin no more'. Jesus affirmed the moral law without applying the civil law from the OT. (The Jews were no longer self-governing; they were under Roman rule.)
Jesus took the moral law literally. He affirmed its verdict on sin, but He also came to wash away our sins. That is much different, and much better, than saying that our sins are okay. They are not.
Those who mock "fundamentalists" who interpret moral commands literally by saying that they prefer a "metaphorical" interpretation of the Bible have no clue what they are talking about. It is not even an intelligent argument, much less enlightened or modern. No, they use this to put down those they disagree with on moral matters all the while pretending that they know more about the Bible than the people who actually study and believe it. They pretend to be morally and intellectually superior to those they look down on. Meanwhile they justify behavior that God clearly condemns.
Just as bad, they pretend to honor a Bible though they will not submit to as God's Word. I have much more respect for a person who comes right out and says that they do not believe the Bible is God's Word than one who pretends that they honor the Bible while they refuse to submit to its teaching. This is nothing but hypocrisy.
Thursday, July 26, 2012
Spong is wrong
I trust that my readers know that when I speak of a "liberal" or "progressive" Christian that I am not referring to some political point of view. I mean those in the church who use that term about themselves and who may or may not hold progressive political views. "Progressive" Christians are those who deny one or more of the essential doctrines of the Christian faith or, at least, think that they have a better idea than the biblical authors of what constitutes truly Christian faith and practice(morality). They think that the Bible is basically a human book whose authors had some good ideas about God and maybe from God but were so culture-bound that they could not possibly know what we know now. Supposedly, we have progressed beyond what the ancients knew and, seemingly, beyond what our own grandparents knew.
Some years ago the well-known "progressive" Episcopalian bishop, John Spong, declared that Christianity must change or perish. He thinks that conservative or fundamentalist Christianity is holding back the church from reaching the larger culture. The church, in his view, is to reject the deity of Christ in favor of a merely human Jesus. We should no longer believe that the Bible is inspired or inerrant and that its moral precepts need be followed. Instead, it should be replaced with updated views on theology and morality. He uses as evidence the increasing secularism of our society. He says that unless the church 'catches up' with the modern world it will disappear into history.
However, many years ago one conservative scholar pointed out that it is the increasingly progressive mainline churches that are in serious decline while the conservative denominations are growing. (The most progressive mainline churches are the United Church of Christ and the Episcopal Church.) The Episcopal Church in 1970 had three million members. In 2000, that number had plummeted to 1 million.Since 2003, when they ordained the first openly homosexual bishop, the church has dropped to 600,000 members. That's an 80% drop in only 42 years. And that's while the US population increased by 50%. The Episcopal Church used have 1.5% of the population; it now has .2%.
Some have countered this argument by noting that the Southern Baptists Convention (the largest denomination in the US) has declined as well and they are mostly conservative churches. But a closer examination of the numbers tells the full story. Southern Baptist churches are in places in the US that are generally losing population and their losses reflect that fact. The losses correlate to the population decline, about 6-8%. Demographic changes cannot explain an 80% decline.
It is also noteworthy that the overseas growth of mainline denominations are conservative and evangelical. Progressive Christianity is no more popular in third world countries than it is here. That alone should wake them up since they claim to speak for the poor and disadvantaged. Those same poor recognize their spiritual needs and the progressives have nothing of real substance to offer them. Like Esau, they have traded their birthright for a pot of stew. They didn't know that they could have kept the true faith and helped the poor with their physical needs as the conservatives have been doing all along.
Additionally, Progressive Christians like to take credit for any progress that the church has ever made. They love to point to the civil rights movement as an example of progressivism. But the civil rights movement was successful because it was based on a conservative reading of the Bible. I used to hear Martin Luther King's speeches on the radio and he always quoted the Bible and called us to live up to it. True progress comes from taking seriously the Bible we proclaim as true, not from denying it.
Another area where we have truly progressed is in the area of women in ministry, especially ordained ministry. Sadly, many women scholars and ministers have been told that they must hold progressive views of the Bible to justify their ministry. However, we do not have to see the biblical writers as patriarchal or culture-bound. We do not have to throw out the principles they taught. Those principles are eternal - they are not subject to change. We cannot change the Word to suit our feelings.
It is unnecessary to alter one's view of the Bible as the eternal Word of God to make needed change. A case in point: Pentecostals, who are among the most conservative and literal interpreters of the Bible, have always had women ministers. How is this? Because they recognized that there were women that were called to ministry and they realized that the Bible did allow for them. In denying them, the church had previously misunderstood and misapplied the scriptures supposedly against women in ministry.
Once again, as in the case of the civil rights movement, God led the church to rightly divide the Word rather than to "progress" beyond it.
As far as Spong's statement is concerned, I would say with Jesus about the church, "the gates of Hell [and progressivism] will not prevail against it".
Some years ago the well-known "progressive" Episcopalian bishop, John Spong, declared that Christianity must change or perish. He thinks that conservative or fundamentalist Christianity is holding back the church from reaching the larger culture. The church, in his view, is to reject the deity of Christ in favor of a merely human Jesus. We should no longer believe that the Bible is inspired or inerrant and that its moral precepts need be followed. Instead, it should be replaced with updated views on theology and morality. He uses as evidence the increasing secularism of our society. He says that unless the church 'catches up' with the modern world it will disappear into history.
However, many years ago one conservative scholar pointed out that it is the increasingly progressive mainline churches that are in serious decline while the conservative denominations are growing. (The most progressive mainline churches are the United Church of Christ and the Episcopal Church.) The Episcopal Church in 1970 had three million members. In 2000, that number had plummeted to 1 million.Since 2003, when they ordained the first openly homosexual bishop, the church has dropped to 600,000 members. That's an 80% drop in only 42 years. And that's while the US population increased by 50%. The Episcopal Church used have 1.5% of the population; it now has .2%.
Some have countered this argument by noting that the Southern Baptists Convention (the largest denomination in the US) has declined as well and they are mostly conservative churches. But a closer examination of the numbers tells the full story. Southern Baptist churches are in places in the US that are generally losing population and their losses reflect that fact. The losses correlate to the population decline, about 6-8%. Demographic changes cannot explain an 80% decline.
It is also noteworthy that the overseas growth of mainline denominations are conservative and evangelical. Progressive Christianity is no more popular in third world countries than it is here. That alone should wake them up since they claim to speak for the poor and disadvantaged. Those same poor recognize their spiritual needs and the progressives have nothing of real substance to offer them. Like Esau, they have traded their birthright for a pot of stew. They didn't know that they could have kept the true faith and helped the poor with their physical needs as the conservatives have been doing all along.
Additionally, Progressive Christians like to take credit for any progress that the church has ever made. They love to point to the civil rights movement as an example of progressivism. But the civil rights movement was successful because it was based on a conservative reading of the Bible. I used to hear Martin Luther King's speeches on the radio and he always quoted the Bible and called us to live up to it. True progress comes from taking seriously the Bible we proclaim as true, not from denying it.
Another area where we have truly progressed is in the area of women in ministry, especially ordained ministry. Sadly, many women scholars and ministers have been told that they must hold progressive views of the Bible to justify their ministry. However, we do not have to see the biblical writers as patriarchal or culture-bound. We do not have to throw out the principles they taught. Those principles are eternal - they are not subject to change. We cannot change the Word to suit our feelings.
It is unnecessary to alter one's view of the Bible as the eternal Word of God to make needed change. A case in point: Pentecostals, who are among the most conservative and literal interpreters of the Bible, have always had women ministers. How is this? Because they recognized that there were women that were called to ministry and they realized that the Bible did allow for them. In denying them, the church had previously misunderstood and misapplied the scriptures supposedly against women in ministry.
Once again, as in the case of the civil rights movement, God led the church to rightly divide the Word rather than to "progress" beyond it.
As far as Spong's statement is concerned, I would say with Jesus about the church, "the gates of Hell [and progressivism] will not prevail against it".
Saturday, June 30, 2012
Rush to Judgmentalism
One of the worst things about the current political atmosphere is the "rush to judgment" by one side when the opposition takes a position it does not like. (For my readers who want to read something spiritual and not political, hold on! My real point is spiritual.) By "rush to judgment" I mean how the motives of those who take a position are impugned by those on the other side.
If someone takes a position against affirmative action, for example, those in favor have often said that those who take such a position are racist. If this is not judgmentalism, I don't know what is. In fact, it is the worst form of judgmentalism, because it does not even involve an actual sin on the part of the person who is being judged.
Regular, old-fashioned judgmentalism is simply condemning someone who has sinned as if we were better than they are. We look at them as if they were not worthy of love or forgiveness. This is, at least, understandable. When someone does something evil, we are appalled by it. We hate it, but we have to make sure that we do not hate the sinner.
In our politics today, a person is often judged based on their views. Unfortunately, the same thing happens in the church. If someone espouses a particular view or theology, then they are often judged as evil or heretical. (I am not, of course, talking about actual heresy which is easily spotted.)
Two examples:
1. Replacement Theology. This is the view that the church has replaced Israel in the plan of God. The OT prophecies regarding Israel not yet fulfilled are being fulfilled in the church. Those who take this view do not believe that modern-day Israel is like biblical Israel. It is not the fulfillment of God's promises to Israel.
Dispensationalists take the opposite view. They see Israel and the church as separate entities in God's plan with modern-day Israel being a prophetic fulfillment. Hence, they are big supporters of the nation of Israel. (This is my position.)
However, it greatly distresses me when a dispensationalist calls replacement theologians "anti-Semitic". That is judging someone without knowing what is in their heart. Historically, there has been some anti-Semites among them, but that is not the basis of their theology. We should never assume that someone holds a particular view because their motives are evil.
2. Prosperity gospel. Years ago, I heard of a preacher who taught that God wished to prosper Christians financially. Immediately, I assumed that it was just a greed-driven theology. Then I actually listened to what was taught. I found that my assumptions were wrong. This preacher was not saying what I thought he was saying.
My judgment of him as 'greedy' had no basis in fact.
That does not mean that no prosperity preachers are greedy or have wrong motives. But it does not mean that I have no right to judge them without examining what they have to say. All deserve a fair hearing without pre-judgments.
I guess it is just (sinful) human nature to judge people who hold positions that we are strongly against. In recent years, I have heard harsh criticisms of many of this nation's founding fathers because some of the prominent ones were slaveholders. Some have said that we must conclude that the Constitution was only written to maintain the rights of rich, white men. Really? Does the actual document read that way? No. It is neither a racist or sexist document.
Let's quite making assumptions about those we disagree with. I know that wrong ideas can do a lot of harm. But we do not help the situation by judging those whose views we oppose. Harmful ideas are best done away with by dealing fairly with everyone and fairly with their ideas as well. Make a real argument without ad hominem attacks.
Don't just disagree without being disagreeable, but disagree without assuming that you know the motives of someone you do not know.
If someone takes a position against affirmative action, for example, those in favor have often said that those who take such a position are racist. If this is not judgmentalism, I don't know what is. In fact, it is the worst form of judgmentalism, because it does not even involve an actual sin on the part of the person who is being judged.
Regular, old-fashioned judgmentalism is simply condemning someone who has sinned as if we were better than they are. We look at them as if they were not worthy of love or forgiveness. This is, at least, understandable. When someone does something evil, we are appalled by it. We hate it, but we have to make sure that we do not hate the sinner.
In our politics today, a person is often judged based on their views. Unfortunately, the same thing happens in the church. If someone espouses a particular view or theology, then they are often judged as evil or heretical. (I am not, of course, talking about actual heresy which is easily spotted.)
Two examples:
1. Replacement Theology. This is the view that the church has replaced Israel in the plan of God. The OT prophecies regarding Israel not yet fulfilled are being fulfilled in the church. Those who take this view do not believe that modern-day Israel is like biblical Israel. It is not the fulfillment of God's promises to Israel.
Dispensationalists take the opposite view. They see Israel and the church as separate entities in God's plan with modern-day Israel being a prophetic fulfillment. Hence, they are big supporters of the nation of Israel. (This is my position.)
However, it greatly distresses me when a dispensationalist calls replacement theologians "anti-Semitic". That is judging someone without knowing what is in their heart. Historically, there has been some anti-Semites among them, but that is not the basis of their theology. We should never assume that someone holds a particular view because their motives are evil.
2. Prosperity gospel. Years ago, I heard of a preacher who taught that God wished to prosper Christians financially. Immediately, I assumed that it was just a greed-driven theology. Then I actually listened to what was taught. I found that my assumptions were wrong. This preacher was not saying what I thought he was saying.
My judgment of him as 'greedy' had no basis in fact.
That does not mean that no prosperity preachers are greedy or have wrong motives. But it does not mean that I have no right to judge them without examining what they have to say. All deserve a fair hearing without pre-judgments.
I guess it is just (sinful) human nature to judge people who hold positions that we are strongly against. In recent years, I have heard harsh criticisms of many of this nation's founding fathers because some of the prominent ones were slaveholders. Some have said that we must conclude that the Constitution was only written to maintain the rights of rich, white men. Really? Does the actual document read that way? No. It is neither a racist or sexist document.
Let's quite making assumptions about those we disagree with. I know that wrong ideas can do a lot of harm. But we do not help the situation by judging those whose views we oppose. Harmful ideas are best done away with by dealing fairly with everyone and fairly with their ideas as well. Make a real argument without ad hominem attacks.
Don't just disagree without being disagreeable, but disagree without assuming that you know the motives of someone you do not know.
Thursday, June 21, 2012
Inerrancy and science
At one time, the Bible held a place of supremacy in Western civilization. Various groups certainly disagreed about what the Bible meant. They did not disagree about the fact that the Bible was not only inerrant, but authoritative. Sadly, this is no longer the case. With Enlightenment skepticism and the "higher criticism" that followed, belief in the Bible eroded.
The question is: what has taken the Bible's place in the Western mind? I think the answer is simple. It is science. When scientists say something, it is taken as absolute truth. What happens if someone believes that the Bible is the Word of God and inerrant, but he lives in a society where science is king? Well, there is bound to be conflict. Furthermore, what happens when a person believes both the Bible and in science and the two seem to contradict? You get the current arguments we have between Bible scholars who accept all scientific theories, and creation scientists who accept the Genesis account of creation (interpreted in a very literal fashion) and reject some of the theories accepted by the Bible scholars.
So, in the evangelical world we have a starnge thing. We have Bible scholars who prefer what science says about our origins, and we have scientists who prefer the Bible's explanation (traditionally interpreted). Evangelical scholars who accept the theory of evolution (it is really the hypothesis of evolution) often call creation scientists 'non-scientists' because they "operate outside the [accepted] sphere of science". But this only really means that they reject the hypothesis of evolution and possibly the idea that the universe is quite old. (I say possibly because not all creationists are young earth creationists.)
The first time I ran into this was in college. I came into college as a young believer who knew little of the Bible and thought he knew a lot about science. For me, the first chapter of Genesis was quite challenging. I believed in the hypothesis of evolution, but Genesis seemed to contradict it. I was studying economics and not science, but I had confidence that scientists must be right about this. What puzzled me was the fact that it was the evangelical science students and not the evangelical humanities or social science students who were the quickest to set aside evolution in favor of the Bible. So I asked the science students about this and they explained to me how science actually works and what science can do and what it cannot do. I also read up on the matter.
Science studies the physical world and the natural laws that govern it. They can do experiments based on a hypothesis and get understanding of the natural world. But regarding the past or future it can only really guess. You cannot do an experiment to see if the universe was created in a certain way. Science cannot "know" when the universe was born. It can give educated guesses based on a little knowledge and lot of assumptions. To cut to the chase, I found that evolution was on very shaky ground despite the seemingly universal acceptance of it by scientists. (It's not as universal as we have been led to believe.) So I chose to reject evolution and accept what the Bible says while leaving room for believers to disagree about just how to interpret Genesis 1 and other creation passages.
But if evolution is on shaky ground, then why do scientists accept it so readily? Scientists, like everyone else, are human and, despite their professionalism, can be prejudiced. They have used evolution to explain everything. It replaces God as the source of everything. Without it, they think they will destroy the foundation of science. Of course, they would do no such thing.
Here is what is so odd about this: This is exactly what the Catholic Church did with Galileo's idea that the earth goes around the sun. It contradicted, not the Bible, but their own Aristotelian philosophy that said that the sun must go around the earth. Catholic theology was built on Aristotelian philosophy and any challenge to this philosophy was seen as a challenge to the whole of the Catholic faith. (I realize that this runs contrary to high school textbooks who insist that Catholicism was anti-scientific. The Vatican was a leader in promoting scientific endeavors.) Galileo was a faithful Catholic who was not an Aristotelian, but a Neo-Platonist. This was the Catholic Church's real objection to Galileo.
Now we have the scientific 'consensus', which now plays the role that the Vatican did in times past, who insist that if evolution can be successfully challenged, then the all of science, especially biology, is in danger. The whole thing will come apart because they want a naturalistic science that leaves God out.
Okay. I have to get back to inerrancy and Bible scholars who accept evolution and reject the Bible's version of what happened. These scholars generally reject inerrancy. (Please read the last post on inerrancy if I have lost you here. Inerrancy means that the Bible is true on whatever subject it speaks about - including scientific matters.) These scholars teach that those who wrote the Bible had little understanding of science and could not possibly be able to write anything other than what they believed in that day. Being pre-scientific, they must have written error or a general poetic version of creation rather than what actually occurred.
But they assume too much. Certainly, the ancients did not have the scientific language that we have and used terms that were common in their day. And they used poetic images that were not meant to be taken literally. We make a mistake, however, in attributing too much ignorance, or lack of divine revelation, to those whom God had revealed His Word. God is able to make us understand things that go way beyond our cultural limitations.
One example is Psalm 8. We are told that the ancients viewed the universe as a very small place with the sky and stars just a couple of miles over their heads. Supposedly, they had no clue as to the vastness of the universe. However, Psalm 8 says, "When I look at your heavens, the work of your fingers, the moon and the stars, which you have set in place, what is man that you are mindful of him, and the son of man that you care for him?" Well, the psalmist seems to understand the vastness of the universe especially in comparison to himself. So the ancients, at least God's people, were not as ignorant as we like to think. Plus, they had revelation from God. Revelation includes, not just ideas about God, but facts about all kinds of things.
The problem is not that some "fundamentalists" reject modern science. Indeed, many of them work in the sciences themselves. The problem is that Bible scholars do not really understand what science is and what it can or cannot do. A hypothesis is not a fact. They should be more skeptical of the "conclusions" that scientists come to and more believing regarding the Bible that they are supposed to be experts on. I know that experts like to believe what experts in other fields say. That is nice, but it really leads to an elitism that shuns all criticism and becomes self-satisfied and, ultimately, self-deceived.
The question is: what has taken the Bible's place in the Western mind? I think the answer is simple. It is science. When scientists say something, it is taken as absolute truth. What happens if someone believes that the Bible is the Word of God and inerrant, but he lives in a society where science is king? Well, there is bound to be conflict. Furthermore, what happens when a person believes both the Bible and in science and the two seem to contradict? You get the current arguments we have between Bible scholars who accept all scientific theories, and creation scientists who accept the Genesis account of creation (interpreted in a very literal fashion) and reject some of the theories accepted by the Bible scholars.
So, in the evangelical world we have a starnge thing. We have Bible scholars who prefer what science says about our origins, and we have scientists who prefer the Bible's explanation (traditionally interpreted). Evangelical scholars who accept the theory of evolution (it is really the hypothesis of evolution) often call creation scientists 'non-scientists' because they "operate outside the [accepted] sphere of science". But this only really means that they reject the hypothesis of evolution and possibly the idea that the universe is quite old. (I say possibly because not all creationists are young earth creationists.)
The first time I ran into this was in college. I came into college as a young believer who knew little of the Bible and thought he knew a lot about science. For me, the first chapter of Genesis was quite challenging. I believed in the hypothesis of evolution, but Genesis seemed to contradict it. I was studying economics and not science, but I had confidence that scientists must be right about this. What puzzled me was the fact that it was the evangelical science students and not the evangelical humanities or social science students who were the quickest to set aside evolution in favor of the Bible. So I asked the science students about this and they explained to me how science actually works and what science can do and what it cannot do. I also read up on the matter.
Science studies the physical world and the natural laws that govern it. They can do experiments based on a hypothesis and get understanding of the natural world. But regarding the past or future it can only really guess. You cannot do an experiment to see if the universe was created in a certain way. Science cannot "know" when the universe was born. It can give educated guesses based on a little knowledge and lot of assumptions. To cut to the chase, I found that evolution was on very shaky ground despite the seemingly universal acceptance of it by scientists. (It's not as universal as we have been led to believe.) So I chose to reject evolution and accept what the Bible says while leaving room for believers to disagree about just how to interpret Genesis 1 and other creation passages.
But if evolution is on shaky ground, then why do scientists accept it so readily? Scientists, like everyone else, are human and, despite their professionalism, can be prejudiced. They have used evolution to explain everything. It replaces God as the source of everything. Without it, they think they will destroy the foundation of science. Of course, they would do no such thing.
Here is what is so odd about this: This is exactly what the Catholic Church did with Galileo's idea that the earth goes around the sun. It contradicted, not the Bible, but their own Aristotelian philosophy that said that the sun must go around the earth. Catholic theology was built on Aristotelian philosophy and any challenge to this philosophy was seen as a challenge to the whole of the Catholic faith. (I realize that this runs contrary to high school textbooks who insist that Catholicism was anti-scientific. The Vatican was a leader in promoting scientific endeavors.) Galileo was a faithful Catholic who was not an Aristotelian, but a Neo-Platonist. This was the Catholic Church's real objection to Galileo.
Now we have the scientific 'consensus', which now plays the role that the Vatican did in times past, who insist that if evolution can be successfully challenged, then the all of science, especially biology, is in danger. The whole thing will come apart because they want a naturalistic science that leaves God out.
Okay. I have to get back to inerrancy and Bible scholars who accept evolution and reject the Bible's version of what happened. These scholars generally reject inerrancy. (Please read the last post on inerrancy if I have lost you here. Inerrancy means that the Bible is true on whatever subject it speaks about - including scientific matters.) These scholars teach that those who wrote the Bible had little understanding of science and could not possibly be able to write anything other than what they believed in that day. Being pre-scientific, they must have written error or a general poetic version of creation rather than what actually occurred.
But they assume too much. Certainly, the ancients did not have the scientific language that we have and used terms that were common in their day. And they used poetic images that were not meant to be taken literally. We make a mistake, however, in attributing too much ignorance, or lack of divine revelation, to those whom God had revealed His Word. God is able to make us understand things that go way beyond our cultural limitations.
One example is Psalm 8. We are told that the ancients viewed the universe as a very small place with the sky and stars just a couple of miles over their heads. Supposedly, they had no clue as to the vastness of the universe. However, Psalm 8 says, "When I look at your heavens, the work of your fingers, the moon and the stars, which you have set in place, what is man that you are mindful of him, and the son of man that you care for him?" Well, the psalmist seems to understand the vastness of the universe especially in comparison to himself. So the ancients, at least God's people, were not as ignorant as we like to think. Plus, they had revelation from God. Revelation includes, not just ideas about God, but facts about all kinds of things.
The problem is not that some "fundamentalists" reject modern science. Indeed, many of them work in the sciences themselves. The problem is that Bible scholars do not really understand what science is and what it can or cannot do. A hypothesis is not a fact. They should be more skeptical of the "conclusions" that scientists come to and more believing regarding the Bible that they are supposed to be experts on. I know that experts like to believe what experts in other fields say. That is nice, but it really leads to an elitism that shuns all criticism and becomes self-satisfied and, ultimately, self-deceived.
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