The Proof of Adam’s Non-Existence (?)

Move over Hell, the historicity of Adam is back as the du jour controversy in evangelicalism. At least, I hope so. The next issue of Christianity Today features an excellent cover article by Richard Ostling, “The Search for the Historical Adam.” If you subscribe to CT, like I do, then you can read the article online; everyone else will have to wait until CT decides to post it for free, which usually doesn’t take too long. In the meantime, yours truly will provide an overview:

Ostling does a fine job summarizing the current state of the debate, which has shifted from geology, astronomy, and biology, to genetics. In the past, the debate over evolution was largely focused on the massive demonstrative evidence for an ancient and evolving creation. In particular, the age of the universe is settled in favor of an old earth. The details of evolution have been more difficult to assimilate, but many evangelicals have been happy to affirm some measure of evolution, so long as the historicity of Adam and Eve remains intact. Well, now that’s getting harder to do. With the huge advances in genetic research, including the complete map of the human genome, the historicity of Adam is on very shaky grounds, if there’s even any ground remaining. Ostling surveys the key players bringing this evidence to light within the evangelical community, including Dennis Venema’s articles published in the journal, Perspectives on Science and Christian Faith. In particular, you should check out this article by Venema on the genetic evidence for ancestral population sizes. The September 2010 issue of PSCF is dedicated to the topic. The second portion of Ostling’s article covers the exegetical debate: since the biblical authors assume a historical Adam, what are we to do as evangelicals committed to inerrancy or, at the least, infallibility of Scripture? Isn’t Romans 5 meaningless without a historical Adam? Ostling rightly recognizes that we need both players in this debate — the exegetes/theologians and the scientists — to come to the table and hear each other out.

As for myself, I don’t want to make a decisive judgment, one way or the other, at least not yet. The dogmatic questions and concerns are indeed important and not easily dismissible, yet we can’t take the position of Al Mohler, who judges empirical research altogether as inadmissible (as I discuss here and here). If the genetic evidence (against the historicity of Adam) is as strong as the astronomical and geological evidence (against a young earth), then we could see a rather large shift in evangelical intellectual opinion on the question of Adam. However, the age of the earth does not share in the importance of Adam to the biblical story line.

PCA geologists

[HT: Josh]

Here is a good, fairly brief, article on the conclusive evidence for the age of the earth. It is written by geologists who are members of the Presbyterian Church in America (PCA). For a more extensive analysis, see The Bible, Rocks, and Time by Young and Stearley, geologists at Calvin College.

Yes, I still find this topic incredibly interesting. There are still several high-profile theologians in American evangelicalism who use Romans 5 — death entered through Adam’s sin, therefore no death/evolution in the natural world before man — as the “evidence” that over-rules the unanimous consent of geologists around the world.

Evolution and how not to be a cult

A while back, I bemoaned the conversion of R. C. Sproul from evolutionist to Creationist (“The necessity of extra-theological norms”). But now I’m happy to see (ht: Chaplain Mike) that Bruce Waltke has come out saying that if evangelicals are not open to evolution, in the face of its unanimous support across the physical sciences, then we will become a cult (see video). I don’t know Dr. Waltke enough to know if this has been his long-held position or not, but it is quite refreshing to see (1) a conservative evangelical, (2) who is thoroughly Reformed, and (3) an influential Old Testament scholar make such a statement. The conservative Reformed world is where these sort of claims are the most contested — entire systems are in danger of collapse! Take away Adam, take away Jesus. That’s the view that I recently engaged on another blog. For what it’s worth, here are some bits of what I said in the comments:

…Israel, as such, did not exist at the beginning of creation (or of man), but they did eventually provide a protology which, probably not historical in large respects (the talking snake, the tree of knowledge, the rib for Eve, etc.), is authoritative for a theological anthropology that comprehends the (historical) place of Israel and her Savior.

…God does not inspire Scripture by over-riding, in this case, Paul’s assumptions about the historicity of Eden. Biblical inspiration can, and does, include the finite material, at hand, of the human authors. Yet, it is still infallible according to His purposes and intentions. Similarly, we don’t believe in a three-tier universe anymore (with heaven literally above the sky), even though several biblical authors were obviously working with this cosmology.

…We need the imputation of Christ’s works and merit because we are sinners, enslaved in sin and unable to make a perfect/eternal atonement, not because Adam’s guilt is imputed to us. Federal categories are not helpful here — this is about ontology — but federal representation is, indeed, helpful and necessary when we turn toward understanding the remedy of this ontology of sin. In other words, a federal soteriology does not require a federal protology. Sin entered the world with Adam (actually, Eve, or whoever the first humans were), and all subsequent generations have been born as sinners (and, therefore, guilty). However, this sin and guilt is fully our own since it constitutes the most fundamental part of ourselves (without which there is no “self”) — our will. It is as impossible to disown our guilt as it is impossible to disown ourselves. Thus, it is impossible to lay the blame elsewhere (Adam or whoever). Hence, federal categories are not helpful here and are actually misleading.

The Aesthetics of Sin: a commentary on Genesis 3

I’m reading through Genesis again, and I was struck anew by chapter 3, in particular, by the role of aesthetics in verses six and seven.

[6] When the woman saw that the fruit of the tree was good for food and pleasing to the eye, and also desirable for gaining wisdom, she took some and ate it. She also gave some to her husband, who was with her, and he ate it. [7] Then the eyes of both of them were opened, and they realized they were naked; so they sewed fig leaves together and made coverings for themselves.

The forbidden tree, though forbidden, was still a part of God’s creation and thus “good.” As good, it shares in the aesthetics of God’s order and creativity. Eve rightly perceives the form of beauty given to the fruit (“pleasing to the eye”) and its benefit for sustenance (“good for food”). These two qualities are listed with the third quality given by the serpent: “desirable for gaining wisdom.” It is this third quality that exegetes and preachers typically emphasize, since it most clearly exhibits the motive behind Eve and Adam’s act of idolatry and subsequent Hebrew (and Gentile!) idolatry.

The significance of this tree is that it is not given by God for Eve and Adam’s benefit, while the rest of the garden was given for their benefit and, ultimately, for communion with Himself. The health and beauty that the couple enjoyed was supplied by God’s creation, and the pleasures of body and mind allowed for peaceful communion with each other and with God. Likewise, the innocence of their understanding was supplied by God and protected through ignorance of pride, sin, and evil. It is only with severance from God in an attempt at self-providence that evil and strife are known. Thus, by taking the fruit, Eve moves beyond the limits graciously given by God with an impossible attempt to “be like God” (v. 5).

That is the “wisdom” that was desired by Eve, though it is revealed as foolishness. However, its foolishness is masked by the aesthetic and beneficent justifications given. Every sin is justified by its beauty and its service to some supposed need. Examples are innumerable: the “healthy” sex life, the “culture” of learned society, the “expressions of authenticity” through fashion, et cetera, and the gratuitous acquisition of these goods. Their beauty is praised and their benefit endlessly proffered. Yet, it is not their beauty or benefit that is nefarious; indeed, they are beautiful and beneficial. The evil is present when their value is rendered as a service to the autonomy of the individual. When their benefit is praised because it serves the independence and self-sufficiency of the person, there is sin. When their benefit is praised because it facilitates communion with God and total dependence upon God, there is righteousness.

Once the fruit is taken in verse six, this evil potential for created beauty is the consideration of the very next verse. Eve and Adam immediately cover themselves. Their bodies, beautiful and good, are now subject to idolatry by the other person. This beauty is now necessarily masked in order to prevent its misuse in sin.  As such, the Christian stands in a tense relationship with the beauty of the world. Our depravity prevents us from receiving the world’s beauty without great temptation. Thus, we require a great diligence against using this beauty as a means for self-autonomy.

Creation, Redemption, and Homosexual Desire

Halden has pointed us to a very poignant reflection on homosexuality by Wesley Hill, asking the question, “Will the Church be the Church for homosexual Christians?” You should read it before you read my meager considerations below.

Hill is a committed Christian and “non-practicing” homosexual. Perhaps “non-practicing” is a curious way to put it; as is clear, he does not, and cannot, partition his male-attraction to a latent and unaffective part of his brain. It is constitutive of his experience and longings in the world, as he tries to make sense of Christ’s call to a moral order in a disordered reality. In his case, he is more aware than others that the disorder is not “out there.” It cuts across the deepest parts of our personality, with wounds that endure, despite the sincere intentions of a superficial faith (“I’m trading my sorrows”) or a creative reworking of God’s order (the liberal project). In the latter, we literally become the creators — usurpers of God’s creative holiness; in the former, we dismiss a creation that doesn’t really need to be redeemed.

Submitting to the Creator is all the more difficult when the disorder is not of our making, when we find ourselves (our very self) with desires, not in-themselves sinful, but nonetheless, if acted upon and made real in our relations, contribute to a subversion of God’s order. This is a hard truth, to say the least. Our longings — what we believe are proper objects of fulfillment — do not necessarily partake of the beauty and goodness which inheres in God. The sources of the disorder in these longings are not easily located, i.e., “why am I made this way” does not always have an answer, other than the classic Pauline-Augustinian answer: the Fall.

It is fundamental to secular anthropology that morality can be read off of nature, under conditions of “fulfillment” given from humanity itself; it is fundamental to Christian anthropology that morality must re-create nature, under conditions of “fulfillment” given by God. The secular and Christian hermeneutics are irreconcilable here. It is futile for Christians to argue against the sanctioning of homosexual practice using the secular presuppositions of an anthropology  “from below.” The Christian theorists of “natural law” must be tempered by this point. However, this is not to say that Christian morality “condemns nature” per se; rather, it “fulfills nature” as it is intended by its Creator. This is part of the larger fact that Christ did not come into the world to condemn it, but to bring it to holiness (by way of His sacrifice and our repentance).

So, the homosexual has an especially difficult cross to bear — a cross given in his creation as this particular human being, a homosexual human being. And if all of us were more honest about how deeply we are fallen, we would discover similar “creation-constituted” crosses, and probably many that are sexual and relational. Yet, our hope is found in a Cross that is neither taken away (Jesus was tortured and executed) nor sanctioned (Jesus conquered death). Our life in Christ is, thus, both a sickness unto death and a healing unto life. Our disorders must be borne and taken to our grave, so our faith can be revealed in the glory of a new creation. With this as our foundation, the necessary and fulfilling relations with homosexuals in the Church, that Hill eloquently pleads for, can be nurtured.