As sympathetic as I am to those who want to squash Glenn wrt his comments
on Kline and as sympathetic as I am to Kline's arguments, I find it a bit
disturbing that we so quickly move to an attitude of "let's accept the
exegesis of the experts" in this forum. After all, the esteemed editor of
PSCF urged us to discuss this paper. Does that simply mean that we
summarize it and attempt to understand it or are criticisms allowed? I
think that Glenn's concerns are fair and ought to be addressed as part of
the give and take of this conversation. He expressed some concerns and we
ought be able to do better than simply say that Meredith Kline is brilliant
scholar and that we ought to accept his views. I happen to disagree with a
great number of brilliant Biblical scholars on numerous issues. The reason
I accept Kline's views is because I think he is correct.
The issue here Glenn, I think, is that the text itself suggests that we
ought not attempt to derive scientific data (chronology, ages, etc.) from
the text. Thus, even concordists schemes such as yours, even though well
meant, are not necessary. The text simply isn't trying to convey that kind
of information to us. It's not that God is not telling us the truth or
anything of the sort. The Genesis text is not trying to address scientific
questions. Thus there is no "being consistent with the Biblical account"
wrt our scientific theories.
I think that the picture changes (and I think that Kline would agree) when
you get to Genesis 2 and following (although even here we must be sensitive
to literary genre and the covenantal purpose of the text.
TG
_____________________________________________________________
Terry M. Gray, Ph.D. Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry
Calvin College 3201 Burton SE Grand Rapids, MI 40546
Office: (616) 957-7187 FAX: (616) 957-6501
Email: grayt@calvin.edu http://www.calvin.edu/~grayt