At 03:38 PM 1/18/00 -0500, George Murphy wrote:
>> >Glenn wrote:
>> While you are absolutely correct that God endowed the land to produce the
>> critters, it was still the land that did it. Now where are we informed that
>> this was a one time gift to work only once and only on one planet. Nowhere
>> are we told that this gift had to work instantly. And in general no one
>> ever admits that there is a very strong case to be made that evolution is
>> both compatible with Scripture (and a non allegorical interpretation of it)
>> and is indicated by Scripture. This verse is really hard to interpret as
>> instant miracle, imo.
>
> These verses are certainly compatible with classical views of divine action
>in which God "co-operates" with natural processes, so that both God and
those processes
>truly act. & evolution can be seen as an important example of such
action. This is
>what I mean by Gen.1 being "open to evolution."
> However, Gen.1 says nothing about the earth & waters bringing forth life
>gradually, slowly, continuously, in accord with rational laws, or anything
like that.
Of course I must agree that the Bible says nothing about slowly or
continuously. I am not sure that one can entirely rule out the logical
implication of the earth bringing forth life in accordance with the
endowment God gave the land, i.e. in accord with rational laws. What God
endows is certainly rational and is law.
>It is compatible with evolution, but also with the idea that plants &
animals appeared
>full grown from the elements. In an exchange Fred Van Dyke & I had in the
ASA journal
>in June 1986, he said that my giving this "the appearance of agreement
with evolution"
>was "misleading" and suggested that it gave a picture like that of Aslan
singing the
>creation into existence in Lewis' _The Magician's Nephew_. He was
certainly wrong in
>his first claim but I have to agree with the second: Genesis itself (& I
think the
>Bible as a whole) doesn't rule out such a picture. & if it's spread out
over time it
>gives a variety of PC.
A variety of MEDIATED PC which is very rarely held. Most PC's want direct
divine action rather than anything mediated.
>
>> There is no statement of any change in any of these
>> living things
>> >once they have been brought forth.
>>
>> And no where is such a change ruled out.
>
> Agreed. But that's quite different from saying that such a change is
>"indicated".
>
>> THis to me opens up the biggest
>> misreading of the Scripture that Christendom has fallen into.
>
> Something of an overstatement given the way Christians have read things like
>works righteousness & pre-tribulation rapture into the Bible.
OK, I am not expert in those misreadings, just in the ones in Genesis.
>
> It is not in NRSV but is in RSV & also the Lutherbibel ("ein jeglicher nach
>seiner Art".) & KJV & NKJV which translate literally with the "tree"
convey the same
>sense. There is indeed no word corresponding to "each" in the Hebrew but
meaningful
>translation into another language sometimes requires such additions, as
Luther argued in
>rendering Rom.3:28 with "allein durch den Glauben" though there is no
single word
>corresponding to "allein" in the Greek. I would need somebody more expert
than I in
>Hebrew to set out the arguments for the Genesis verse.
> You may well be right that a prejudice in favor of fixity of species has
>influenced translation - though it's very unlikely that the RSV people,
often accused of
>"liberalism", had such a thought in mind. But to the extent that this is
the case it
>confirms my argument: Before evolution was taken seriously people tended
to read into
>the text their picture of the way things happened from their experience of
nature -
>which is what you're now trying to do with evolution.
Well, I have agreed with you that we all do this and I see no way for any
of us to avoid it to some extent. But since we all do it, it does give
quite a large latitude to our interpretations many of which have been
entirely overlooked.
>> Absolutely NOWHERE IN SCRIPTURE CAN A VERSE BE FOUND THAT SAYS "ANIMALS
>> (SUBJECT) REPRODUCE(VERB) ANIMALS (OBJECT) AFTER THEIR KIND"
>>
>> Christians have totally misread Genesis 1 in this regard as ruling out
>> evolution and it is the silliest thing around--making the Bible say
>> something it very clearly does not say.
>
> & it also doesn't say that new species can evolve.
No, but the general feeling among most of conservative christianity is that
it totally rules out evolution.
>> I would make a correction. It is a picture of kinds being made from the
>> earth and waters separately. Whether they were fully developed is totally
>> another question that the Bible may address with its wording.
>
> Yes, I overstated somewhat. But note that even those church fathers who saw
>the mediated aspect of creation here could understand it as creation of
fully developed
>organisms. Ephrem, e.g., in his commentary on Genesis, is quite clear
about this for
>the plants.
OK, but fully developed organisms might very well be merely single-celled
plants! They also are fully developed but not fully evolutionarily developed.
>
> ..........................
> We're completely in agreement that the Bible doesn't rule out evolution
>& that mediated creation provides an important opening for understanding
evolution
>theologically - though with rather different approaches to interpretation.
But to
>say that Gen.1 "indicates evolution" is, I think, an overstatement.
Here we may disagree. The earth/water mediation must mean something other
than magical appearance otherwise there is no difference between God
directly creating life and the land directly creating life at God's
direction. That difference is why I think the Scripture does teach evolution.
>
>
>>in fact, it clearly implies in Lev. 19:19 that the forms
>> can change.
>
> This text expresses the priestly concern with the proper separation between
>different "kinds" even though there may be no possibility of reproduction
between
>them - as is obvious in the prohibition on combining different kinds of
cloth in a
>garment. It isn't obvious that this regulation actually envisions the
possibility of
>some sort of trans-genic species in the mating of different animals.
(Gen.6:1-4 does
>suggest that for unions between humans and the "sons of God" but I'd
hesitate to press
>that mythic language.)
My point on this was that Nahmanides, contrary to what you asserted, did
believe that life could change form. He just didn't think it was the thing
that OUGHT to be done.
glenn
Foundation, Fall and Flood
Adam, Apes and Anthropology
http://www.flash.net/~mortongr/dmd.htm
Lots of information on creation/evolution
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