You wrote:
>>I for one do not have a problem with non-human, tool-making, weapon-making,
non-spiritual beings (even Darwin's finches make and use tools). I think
that it is risky to make these capacities (or even others commonly used) the
essence of humanity. The scriptures indicate that man is made in the image of
God, but doesn't go a long way to define that image except in knowledge,
righteousness, and holiness (as the Westminster Confession of Faith puts it)
and with dominion over the creatures.<<
First off, you are quite correct that tool-making is not necessarily
indicative of being in the image of God. But there is absolutely no
fossilizable trait which would indicate which fossil man is in the image of
God and which isn't. Thus, unfortunately, we both are left to argue this
position from weakness. But I think the data tends towards my position and
here is why.
Righteousness and holiness are not fossilizable but some forms of knowledge
are -- stone tools. Stone tools, according to a friend who has a weird hobby
of making these things take a couple of hours to do correctly and they take a
lot of skill. The stone tools found with Homo erectus are not like the simple
tools used by a bird or the stripped twigs used by chimps to get termites.
These tools are quite complex ( see Francois Bordes, The Old Stone Age,
McGraw-Hill, 1970) p 81,85, 89 for drawings) The assemblage consists of
scrappers, points, hand-axes, choppers and other things. It would appear
that this tool maker was quite smart. Homo erectus's have been found in
association with two different types of stone tool industries (see Encycl.
Brit. 1982, Vol 8, 1033.) This implies a certain amount of inventiveness.
The use of fire would also support my contention that H. erectus should be
human. I am unaware of any animal who has harnessed the use of fire and used
it to explore or live in caves. The earliest fire places are found in strata
just older than the first occupation at Chou' kou tien cave, China. This is
quite reasonable since to occupy a cave, light is required.
You wrote:
>> I have some problem with having speciation even in the human lineage after
the creation of Adam and Eve. Thus to say that Homo erectus or even Homo
sapiens neanderthalensis are fully human in the Biblical sense makes me much
more uncomfortable than the observation that these pre-humans have some human
characteristics.<<
Frankly, we can not be certain that there was speciation between us and the
H. erectus and neanderthal. At least we can't use the standard interbreeding
definitions.If an alien paleontologist found the bones of a pygmy and a
norwegian. Would he class them as separate species?
The one question you did not answer in your first paragraph is probably the
most important one of all in defining humanity. Religious awareness. While
I fully agree that the evidence for religious awareness in H. erectus is
meager (I outlined it in earlier posts), it is quite abundant in your
"pre-human" neanderthal. Neanderthal ritually buried his dead and their
burials are found from Uzbekistan, the Crimea, Iraq, Israel and Southern
Africa to France. Most of the European burials are babies (See Cambridge
Encycl. of Archaeology, Cambridge U. Press, p. 85) I would say in the case
of Neanderthal, the evidence is overwhelming that he was human.
Now for the $64,000 question, if any evidence such as the Golan Venus or
the laidout elephant carcass at Toralba Spain were to indicate religious
activity on the part of H. erectus, would they then be classed "human"? This
is what you didn't answer. I would frankly rather say it is possible, even
probable, and have some archeologist find evidence supporting religious
activity on the part of H. erectus, than say "it is impossible" only to be
disproven later. I know there is religious activity on the part of
Neanderthal, with meager evidence for it in erectus. Must I as a Christian
do what we have done for so many years -- namely, say "Such and Such is
impossible, the Bible says so" only to have science disprove that statement
later forcing an ignomious retreat once again?
My view prepares Christianity for whatever might be discovered, is your view
prepared for the same?
By the way, Neanderthal had brains as large as ours.
You wrote:
>>Along these same lines is a more general problem with Glenn's attempt at
harmonization. The civilization depicted in the early chapters of Genesis is
the civilization recognized in the anthropological and archeological record
as existing within the past 15,000-20,000 years. <<
and then quoted Davis Young's recent article in Christan Scholar's Review:
The Antiquity and the Unity of the Human Race Revisited.
>> But no amount of stretching genealogies can salvage the position because
Genesis treats Cain as the immediate son of Adam and Eve. The text
explicitly states that Adam lay with Eve, she conceived, and gave birth to
Cain. And Eve acknowledges the help of Yahweh in bearing Cain. But Cain and
Abel lived at the beginning of Near Eastern civilization according to Genesis
4 whereas his father Adam lived at least 40,000 years ago. To be sure, the
ages of the biblical patriarchs are very large, but we have no reason to
argue that Adam lived 30,000 years before begetting Cain! <<
Young's quote illustrates quite well how our assumptions can get in the way
of dealing with our problems. Everybody brings so many assumptions to the
table in this area and it is difficult to get everyone to realize what is and
is not an assumption.
I agree that Cain was the immediate descendant of Adam. But that does not
require me to believe that Cain lived 5-10,000 years ago at the beginning of
Mid-eastern civilization. Davis Young makes a gross assumption here that is
not to be found in my Bible. I simply can not find anywhere in Genesis
chapter 4 where it states that this occurred at the beginning of near-east
civilization. Davis may be correct that it occurred then, in which case, I
am clearly wrong. But I find no Biblical statement to back up his assertion
here!
What I am arguing for is that the earlier civilization, started by God
through Adam was destroyed in the flood. The loss of technology afterwards
made for a long, long dark age. And the original civilization may not have
been very big.
Davis Young continues:
>> The biblical and scientific data pertaining to the antiquity and
unity of the human race seem to force us toward positions that are fraught
with serious flaws. Perhaps the weaknesses of these positions are sending a
signal that careful reexamination of the fundamental premise regarding
literal historicity is in order. Or perhaps others can achieve satisfactory
solutions without abandoning the fundamental premise. In any case, my aim
has been, not to solve the problem, but simply to encourage Christian
theologians, anthropologists, archeologists, and paleontologists to
collaborate in honest, forthright assessment of the available evidence and in
development of a position that preserves the fundamental biblical doctrines
of man, sin, and salvation."<<
I agree with the first sentence. There is no position which is flawless.
But then I am not aware of many human scientific, philosophic or theologic
endeavors which lack them. And I agree that all assumptions should be
examined (including the time when Cain lived as well as the assumption of
historicity which I accept). But here is the problem.
Young's position leads to the abandonment of the historical nature of
Genesis. He writes:
>>"2. The failure of literalism and concordism suggests tht the Bible
may not be expected to provide precise 'information' or 'data'
about the physical structure and history of the planet or cosmos."
Davis A. Young, Scripture in the Hands of Geologists, Part Two,"
Westminster Theological Journal, 49, 1987, p. 294<<
First off I want to say this. I respect Davis Young greatly. I know the
struggle he has had to go through because of the geological data. Anyone
involved in the geosciences faces that difficulty because the ICR approach
does not work and until last year I had no idea how to work this problem.
But, that having been said, if we abandon the concept that Genesis 1-11 has
historical content, then in my opinion it becomes just another Salamander
story. (that was the story one tribe had about how the world was created).
With that view of scripture, I have two questions:
1. On what moral authority then, do we tell the New Guinea tribesman to
believe our "salamander" story rather than his fish tale? Aferall, neither
one tells us anything historical or scientific about the earth!
2. Dr. Young said that his goal was not to try to solve the problem. That is
fine, but does not the lack of a solution, leave our college bound children
at the mercy of predatory naturalists who delight in destroying their faith?
After all, THEY DO HAVE AN ANSWER WHICH SOLVES 95% OF THE OBSERVATIONAL
DIFFICULTIES. Do we tell our children, "Believe us, we can't explain
anything but we're nice guys!"?
I am not trying to be facetious here, but to me this is a serious problem
that Christianity must face. Our adversaries have ready-made explanations for
where Homo erectus fits, why he acts human, we don't. Last night when I was
doing that syllogism, I remembered some creationist had said that H. erectus
was human. I tried to find the quote but was amazed to find that most of the
creationist books I have only make brief mentions, if that, of Homo erectus.
Homo erectus does not appear in the index of Darwin on Trial and is given
only a brief mention on page 85.
In re-looking for DoT I found the quote I was looking for. See Morris,
Scientific Creationism, general edition p 174. He states
"It may well be that Homo erectus was a true man, but somewhat degenerate in
size and culture..." I knew I had seen that quote somewhere.
Terry wrote:
>>It's not that I oppose Glenn's efforts, but I see the problems of his very
ancient date for the origin of Adam to be very severe. Of course, as he has
been telling us the problems of not accepting an ancient date are also very
severe.<<
Yes, but problems are for solving. What I outline in my book I think makes a
big dent in those problems.
Terry wrote:
>>The major scientific problem that remains with my "harmonization" is the
polymorphisms in the MHC genes that seem to pre-date the chimp-human (body)
split. See Ayala's article in Scientific American, December (I think) 1993.
From this sort of data one can estimate the population size of the
transition population and it comes out to 500-10,000. This is difficult to
square with a single ancestral
Adam and Eve.<<
My view has less of a problem with that although, it too has some
difficulties there. Any ideas on how I could solve it within my framework?
glenn
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