Genesis: The Creation Story and Evolution

[BelievingDoc1]

Hi, this is my first post. I'm not presenting this with the expectation that it will persuade anyone one way or another, particularly if you're one of those who don't believe in God or if you believe in God but have decided that evolution falls outside the bounds of your serious consideration. I do think it's important that believers who are uncomfortable discarding scientific consensus on evolution have an opportunity to see that there are people who take scripture very seriously and believe that there are extraordinary allusions to evolution in scripture.

This link is to an article I wrote about the creation story and evolution. I’m blown away by Genesis and the reiteration of themes of evolution throughout the OT and NT. Perhaps some of you will find this approach to hearing and seeing the poetry of what is written as interesting as I find it to be.

http://drx.typepad.com/psychotherapyblo ... acc_1.html

[QED]

Welcome to the DC&R forums BelievingDoc1 how nice to have a "psychoanalytic psychologist's" take on these questions we debate here. But I have to ask you to think about reconstructing your Opening Post as a topic for debate. This is required by the Forum Rules. All you need do is summarize any point you wish to make in the form of a question for debate. If you only wish to present your material for the consumption an online audience then I can move this topic to a non-debating forum. Personally I hope you do come up with something to debate based on your conclusions about Genesis. Rationalisation seems to me to be an obvious candidate for a psychological analysis.

[seventil]

BelievingDoc1:

I enjoyed the read. One thing, however:

(From the article)

Genesis Depicts An Original Hominid Species That Did Not Use Language:

Genesis 2: 19-20
Out of the ground the LORD God formed every beast of the field and every bird of the air and brought them to Adam to see what he would call them. And whatever Adam called each living creature, that was its name.

This passage makes it clear that, in his original state, 'Adam' was a creature that did not use language. Representational language emerges from Adam, while God is portrayed as a curious observer of what will emerge as opposed to an engineer or divine designer of language. God likes to watch, according to this passage.

I think this passage is not very clear on the intelligence level of Adam, his language skills, or much of anything, really.

I am a Genesis libralist, so I like nearly any interpretation of the Creation account.

Could you expound more a bit on why you think this passage effectively explains an evolution of man from lesser species?

Edit: More specifically, can you discuss how the idea of God "Creating Adam in his image" affects your theory?

[BelievingDoc1]

The name of this site is 'Debating Christianity and Religion' and there I go missing the obvious. I rarely engage in debate either in my personal life or in my work, so I realize that I can be blind as a bat when this is what others want. Ordinarily, what I do is watch, wait and see what seems to reveal itself and then share what I see with others. Those who are interested in collaborating do so and those who don’t—don't.

But, this isn't my forum, so I do apologize for my blindness and let me take a stab at working with the format.

I'll offer my premises first and then a two part question for debate. Please forgive what may seem to be a stark presentation of my premises, but I am trying to lay out my position as a debatable one and it seems this naturally entails a way of speaking that can include some sharp edges and tight corners. This is not my preferred way of hearing or speaking with those who don’t share my beliefs.

I believe that both biblical literalists and many scientists can suffer a profound and unrecognized deafness to meaning and connotation. Both work so hard to nail everything down and actively extract meaning, that they fail to recognize the deeper connotations of language. Hearing linguistic connotation requires a more relaxed, impartial and evenly hovering attentional 'gaze.' An active and determined posture inclines both fundamentalists and many scientists to impose meanings that must be defended as singularly correct, while turning a deaf ear to compelling alternatives. Rather than letting themselves hear a choir, they harp with blind determination on single notes.

Both the fundamentalist and the scientist have beliefs about an immaterial life of sorts, yet ironically, both are inclined toward concrete literalism in their approach to hearing and seeing, and so become enamored with the illusions of the surface, even as they attempt to discuss immaterial matters. Extending the musical metaphor, they hear and sing melody, without recognizing counterpoint. Debate is the paradigm that both tend to prefer, turning their own eyes and ears from organs of reception into devices of imposition and action.

Meaning no disrespect, but rather having a profound respect and awe for God’s magnificence, scientists and fundamentalists strike me as reducing God to the musical equivalent of a kazoo player.

To those who hear the poetry of the Bible, how do you explain the layers of meaning that cannot be seen with the microscope or the telescope, but only heard with a heart in love with God and scripture that speaks of floods with hands and hills with feelings?

'Let the floods clap [their] hands: let the hills be joyful together'

If I were at the Louvre with a friend who stood one foot from 'La Jaconde,' and looking through binoculars declared that 'it is not a woman, it is a smudge of paint,' I would suggest that my friend put down the binoculars and step back a few feet, relax, just gaze and wait. 'Soon you might be able to see the woman,' I would say.

If I were at the Louvre standing before the same painting with a different friend who was given permission to examine the painting with a spectrometer, and if that friend stated that the painting is nothing more than an object that can be described in terms of properties of light over a portion of the electromagnetic spectrum, I would suggest putting down the spectrometer, stepping back from the painting and gazing at the painting because there is an image of a woman that can be seen if you would only allow yourself to see.

But, with words, with poetry, how does one explain the need to step back from the surface, to see and hear, rather than impose oneself on the poem or the narrative? How does one explain the process of allowing the beautiful, expanding meaning that is God’s creation itself, to spill out, rather than extracting meaning as if it’s a decayed tooth that must be pulled? How do you explain the living word to those who have the inclination to nail it down?

I don't think it can be explained. To know about such things has more to with the phenomenology of consciousness than it does with a position one can actively decide to adopt or reject. The difference is akin to seeing in color or in black and white based upon having eyes that see either one way or the other.

There are two questions I would like to pose. Do you believe that many evolutionists and many creationists are essentially two sides of the same phenomenological coin and is this why they are at such loggerheads? Do both fundamentalists and scientists fail to hear the poetry of the other because neither hears the poetry of the whole?

QED, thanks for your kind comments. I will get to your questions in another post. As you can see I tend to be expansive in my responses and, so it will take a bit of time to respond thoughtfully, but I will do so.

Thanks for your patience with the false start on my part and I will be more attentive to the format in the future. If you feel my original post would fit best in another category, feel free to move it there.

[micatala]

Welcome to the forum, BelievingDoc. Hope you enjoy yourself.

Do you believe that many evolutionists and many creationists are essentially two sides of the same phenomenological coin and is this why they are at such loggerheads?

Good question. I have been on the forum for quite a while now. Your question brings to mind an interesting phenomenon I have noticed in evolutionary debates which bring in the scriptural issues.

Both the fundamentalists and many of the atheists insist on taking a very literal interpretation scripture. The former because they insist the literal interpretation must be true. The latter, I think, because they insist the Bible is not only false in many of the details, but is essentially totally false in that it has not truth in it at all. By saying the only possible interpretation of the Bible is the most literal, most simplistic one, they give themselves an easier straw man to beat up on.

Do both fundamentalists and scientists fail to hear the poetry of the other because neither hears the poetry of the whole?

I would generally agree. Both the poetry and what many would term the 'mythical truths' of the Bible seem to be missed, or what I might term "actively ignored" by many in both camps.

[McCulloch]

Damn you micatala!

[M]any of the atheists insist on taking a very literal interpretation scripture. [...] ecause they insist the Bible is not only false in many of the details, but is essentially totally false in that it has not truth in it at all. By saying the only possible interpretation of the Bible is the most literal, most simplistic one, they give themselves an easier straw man to beat up on.

You really want to make our job harder here, don't you?

If I were to believe that there was a God of some sort, the more poetic figurative interpretation of Genesis would make much more sense to me. The problem is that it is usually not the non-literalist Christians who wish to impose their religious values on the rest of us and so they are the ones we tend to disagree with the most.

[micatala]

Damn you micatala!

[M]any of the atheists insist on taking a very literal interpretation scripture. [...] ecause they insist the Bible is not only false in many of the details, but is essentially totally false in that it has not truth in it at all. By saying the only possible interpretation of the Bible is the most literal, most simplistic one, they give themselves an easier straw man to beat up on.

You really want to make our job harder here, don't you?

Yes, I take perverse pleasure in disagreeing with as many people of as many different viewpoints as possible, hoping to make all unhappy at the same time.

. . . and besides. What fun would it be if your job was too easy?

If I were to believe that there was a God of some sort, the more poetic figurative interpretation of Genesis would make much more sense to me. The problem is that it is usually not the non-literalist Christians who wish to impose their religious values on the rest of us and so they are the ones we tend to disagree with the most.

Yes, you have a point. ANd the most disappointing thing is that many of the most contentious issues are really the least important. WHo is harmed by two people having sex? Who is harmed if person A prays differently than person B? Who is really harmed if the ten commandments are displayed in church but not the courthouse? What real difference does it make if we evolved from another species rather than being "instantaneously created"?

At least in the U.S., we are free to worship (or not) as we see fit, to associate with who we will, to engage in dialogue, regardless of how one feels about the above issues.

[QED]

There are two questions I would like to pose. Do you believe that many evolutionists and many creationists are essentially two sides of the same phenomenological coin and is this why they are at such loggerheads?

I honestly think the loggerhead is more a reflection of the fact that the two sides are attempting to play the same game by two different sets of rules. This is compounded by the notion in some peoples minds that there has to be an answer to every question. I've seen one signature line here quoting Sherlock Holmes saying "when you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth". Yet this overlooks the validity of the enquiry in the first place. For example, if we ask "who killed the caped avenger" then we can conduct a world-wide investigation establishing everyone's alibi -- bar yours! This is just one demonstration of the sort of logical fallacy that I would say is not unfairly applied in the spirit of stepping back and looking at the wider scene. Such a step in this sort of misleading direction is virtually guaranteed to deliver a misleading conclusion.

Do both fundamentalists and scientists fail to hear the poetry of the other because neither hears the poetry of the whole?

I do know that the fundamentalist is totally deaf to the poetry of cosmology which seems capable of describing universe(s) without a personal God as a necessary ingredient. But what is the poetry that scientists can't hear? I've heard all sorts of poetry that could be said to capture certain aspects of the world, but it tends to portray an essence that at best is ambiguous when properly audited but more often simply reflects the hopes and wishes of its subjects. As within mathematics once we suspend the tiniest of rules we can arrive at any conclusion we like using the modified system.

[Jose]

Both the fundamentalists and many of the atheists insist on taking a very literal interpretation scripture. The former because they insist the literal interpretation must be true. The latter, I think, because they insist the Bible is not only false in many of the details, but is essentially totally false in that it has not truth in it at all. By saying the only possible interpretation of the Bible is the most literal, most simplistic one, they give themselves an easier straw man to beat up on.

I speak for myself here, not having a very clear window into other people's minds, but....there is little debate over evolution with theistic evolutionists who consider a reasonable way for god to have created. One can, at best, discuss philosophical issues like why god would choose one way or another to do the job. That discussion seems rather hypothetical to a non-theist, however. Where the debate about evolution comes to a head is with the biblical literalists who insist that scripture proves evolution cannot be possible. In this flavor of the debate, one has few options. One is to explain patiently, as one might to a tree, the vast evidence from which the theory of evolution has been developed. Perhaps, one hopes, some of the information will be heard and considered. This approach runs aground, however, on the belief that mere consideration of evolution forever damns one's soul. It also runs aground on the belief that when scripture and the earth itself conflict, scripture takes precedence.

Another approach is to point to bits in the bible that cannot be literally true. Rather than trying to win the other guy to your side, this approach attempts to convince them of the folly of their own belief. This approach runs aground on the simple fact that people tend not to consider their beliefs to be folly, and resent it when others suggest that they might be in error.

Never having looked at this from the worldview of a biblical literalist, I can't really imagine what it's like. Not having looked at it from the worldview of a biblical metaphoricalist (or whatever), I also can't imagine the puzzle it must pose to know that the bible is metaphorical and full of broad beauty, yet see that literalists appear blind to that larger message. I hear that this is the case; I also hear that literalists tend to think of the metaphoricalists as apostates, perhaps somewhat akin to heathen, since they have left The Way and taken up False Beliefs.

One does, after all, hear occasional debates about biblical literalism among Christians--debates that can become quite heated. I prefer to stick to simpler things like evolution, where the issues can be addressed with hard data rather than through semantic nuance.

[micatala]

Another approach is to point to bits in the bible that cannot be literally true. Rather than trying to win the other guy to your side, this approach attempts to convince them of the folly of their own belief. This approach runs aground on the simple fact that people tend not to consider their beliefs to be folly, and resent it when others suggest that they might be in error.

Yes, you make a good point.

Perhaps a softening of tactics might be more effective. Rather than try to convince a person of their 'folly' or attempt to prove they are in error, it might work instead merely to convince the person that multiple legitimate viewpoints that are consistent with the Bible are possible. There are certainly precedents for this.

For example, most Christians belong to some sort of church or denomination, many staying with the same church for years. Even so, many (certainly not all, and maybe not even a majority) would allow that there is no 'one right church' or 'one right denomination.' They allow that some divergence in church doctrine is OK, as long as it is not on an 'essential matter.' Yes, of course, what is an essential matter does vary quite a bit from person to person, church to church. Still, you can get Christians who disagree to say to each other "even though I do not accept your viewpoint, I can understand where you are coming from."

I have noticed that when creationists debate with atheists or others who they see as not very close to their belief system, they become much more combative and instransigent. It becomes much more an 'us versus them' discussion. However, the very same creationist might be capable of having a more civil discussion, including even 'ambiguity', with a person who they perceive has an overall worldview closer to their own.

For many creationists, especially YEC's, the jump from their worldview to 'standard evolutionary theory' is just too big. Perhaps, though, they can be 'incremented along' towards at least being open to other possibilities?

I don't know. Maybe I am being too optimistic, or I am just temporarily off my rocker on a Saturday night after too much outdoor work today.