Mohler takes on 'theistic evolution'

Associated Baptist Press ^ | January 13, 2011 | Bob Allen

[balch3]

LOUISVILLE, Ky. (ABP) -- A Southern Baptist seminary president and evolution opponent has turned sights on "theistic evolution," the idea that evolutionary forces are somehow guided by God. Albert Mohler

Albert Mohler, president of Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, wrote an article in the Winter 2011 issue of the seminary magazine labeling attempts by Christians to accommodate Darwinism "a biblical and theological disaster."

Mohler said being able to find middle ground between a young-earth creationism that believes God created the world in six 24-hour days and naturalism that regards evolution the product of random chance "would resolve a great cultural and intellectual conflict."

The problem, however, is that it is not evolutionary theory that gives way, but rather the Bible and Christian theology.

Mohler said acceptance of evolutionary theory requires reading the first two chapters of Genesis as a literary rendering and not historical fact, but it doesn't end there. It also requires rethinking the claim that sin and death entered the human race through the Fall of Adam. That in turn, Mohler contended, raises questions about New Testament passages like First Corinthians 15:22, "For as in Adam all die, so also in Christ all will be made alive."

"The New Testament clearly establishes the Gospel of Jesus Christ upon the foundation of the Bible's account of creation," Mohler wrote. "If there was no historical Adam and no historical Fall, the Gospel is no longer understood in biblical terms."

Mohler said that after trying to reconcile their reading of Genesis with science, proponents of theistic evolution are now publicly rejecting biblical inerrancy, the doctrine that the Bible is totally free from error.

"We now face the undeniable truth that the most basic and fundamental questions of biblical authority and Gospel integrity are at stake," Mohler concluded. "Are you ready for this debate?"

In a separate article in the same issue, Gregory Wills, professor of church history at Southern Seminary, said attempts to affirm both creation and evolution in the 19th and 20th century produced Christian liberalism, which attracted large numbers of Americans, including the clerical and academic leadership of most denominations.

After establishing the concept that Genesis is true from a religious but not a historical standpoint, Wills said, liberalism went on to apply naturalistic criteria to accounts of miracles and prophecy as well. The result, he says, was a Bible "with little functional authority."

"Liberalism in America began with the rejection of the Bible's creation account," Wills wrote. "It culminated with a broad rejection of the beliefs of historic Christianity. Yet many Christians today wish to repeat the experiment. We should not expect different results."

Mohler, who in the last year became involved in public debate about evolution with the BioLogos Foundation, a conservative evangelical group that promotes integrating faith and science, has long maintained the most natural reading of the Bible is that God created the world in six 24-hour days just a few thousand years ago.

Writing in Time magazine in 2005, Mohler rejected the idea of human "descent."

"Evangelicals must absolutely affirm the special creation of humans in God's image, with no physical evolution from any nonhuman species," he wrote. "Just as important, the Bible clearly teaches that God is involved in every aspect and moment in the life of His creation and the universe. That rules out the image of a kind of divine watchmaker."

[D-fendr]

My apologies I was thinking creation rather than existence. Aquinas doesn’t argue that existence=caused. He argues that in the sense world all we observe are intermediate and end causes… the first cause must exist because these exist.

[kosta50]

I don't think I'm understanding the question, because all I have is: something that exists that is eternal, unchanging and uncaused.

Then how does that which is unchanging, eternal and uncaused "create" without becoming changed and temporal? And what caused it to create? The very act of creation (which requires a deliberate will) makes the creator subject to a cause (will).

[kosta50]

I don't know a serious (in my opinion) Christian theologian that believes God has vocal chords

The Bible is full of God "speaking". Do serious theologians not take that seriously? :) And what about the very pillar of Christianity being the Word of God?

[D-fendr]

When I say I know how to solve this math problem, I mean to say that I understand the problem and how I can solve it. It's not just mere cognition (awareness) of the problem.

The example I always use here is knowing A2+B2=C2 is knowing the formula and you can solve angle problems with it. But, for me, I didn't really know it until I put squares on the sides, then moved those same squares to the hypotenuse, and saw they fit.

The formula, problem solving can be an abstraction and you can follow certain rules without a deeper knowing.

Knowledge something is "true" is often an "aha" moment. There are students and scientist that both know the formulas and how to solve problems with them; some know on a deeper level. This is, IMHO, the difference in a Newton or an Einstein.

[D-fendr]

How do you know it wasn't lust?

I was a teenager, That experience I already knew, this was something different, that why it was confusing.

[kosta50]

Einstein used this thought experiment: Imagine you are traveling on a beam of light away from and looking back at a clock tower. Do the hands of the clock move?

Is the tower moving at the same speed too? I always used to think of ti as a trick question while thinking of the movie "Around the World in Eighty Days" where the traveler, moving east, "gains" a day. Of course, it is all artificial. If I intentionally slow down my car does it mean the time slows down because it will take me much longer to cover the same distance?

We could also ask a more simple question: when you are dead does the time move? If not, does that mean you are "traveling" at the speed of light or that you are just dead? :)

[D-fendr]

For each aspect of reality we must use the most adequate tool ("measuring stick")

And, for each aspect, the proper tool of knowledge: sense, science, reason/logic, religion.

[D-fendr]

I think it does [change] in the special theory of relativity

Then I don't understand what you were saying by "it's absolute length doesn't change."

I am not aware that any object can travel at that speed without sucking up the energy of the whole universe.

'Tis a thought experiment.

[reasonisfaith]

Science is but a raft whose journey depends entirely on the river of logical thinking. Where the waters become chaotic the raft flips over, or runs aground.

(To believe that the raft can carry the river is the product of foolishness multiplied by apathy.)

Nor can science float itself—it must be carried by a current, straight and true.

[D-fendr]

They philosophers and scientists may be aware but they fall into their own pit.

As do we all. We can't get very far in any discussion without assuming, at the least for the discussion, that we can know something.

[kosta50]

The speed of light is the same for all observers. It's independent of the motion of the light source and of the frame of reference of the observer. So maybe "which time did he use" is irrelevant.

But here is the problem: we know that light doesn't travel at the same speed in different media, such as glass. If it didn't lenses would be worthless.

Snells law or refraction is validated by the fact that light does slow down when it encounters glass. Such encounter causes the wavefront to become "deformed" or "retarded" relative to the portion of the wavefront that is still traveling outside of glass.

This "retardation" or deformation of the wavefront is responsible for causing a plane wave to become spherical with focus at its center. Also, depending on the shape of the surface encountered, it can become aspherical and cause optical aberration at the focus.

A skillful optical engineer will introduce another element, glass or mirror, or even set of elements, into the light path to deform the deformed parts of the wavefront so that that it returns to a spherical front,and form an aberration-free image of an object.

[D-fendr]

Then how does that which is unchanging, eternal and uncaused "create" without becoming changed and temporal?

I used the laws of physics as an example. We're talking about something that is not in the temporal, finite, changing world. Our usual concepts are not likely to apply.

The very act of creation (which requires a deliberate will) makes the creator subject to a cause (will).

I think that's anthropomorphic and if you have a cause for the first cause, it's no longer the first cause, and the problem of why anything exists remains.

And I don't agree that the fact that creation exists requires the first cause to be caused. Still don't see the logical argument there.

[kosta50]

Then I don't understand what you were saying by "it's absolute length doesn't change."

I don't see how it changes. If I slow down my car it will take me much longer to reach the same destination. Since speed = distance over time, I could say the time or the distance was "stretched". It can be "true" depending how you look at it. I don't see how in reality the distance changed.

[kosta50]

And, for each aspect, the proper tool of knowledge: sense, science, reason/logic, religion

I don;t see hwree rleigion comes in.

[D-fendr]

That's why we can say that animals "recognize" things but don't necessarily know (understand) what it is.

I think the difference here is consciousness of human beings. That's where cognition is different in us and animals.

[kosta50]

Let me try this again: :)

And, for each aspect, t he proper tool of knowledge: sense, science, reason/logic, religion

I don't see where religion comes in.

[kosta50]

I was a teenager, That experience I already knew, this was something different, that why it was confusing.

Maybe the difference is in intensity. anyway, everyone defines love as something different.

[reasonisfaith]

It seems you might be distracted. Again, to clarify: my comments don’t ask you to depend on people, or oblige you to insist that you “have no desire to discredit individuals.” I’m only asking that you investigate certain ideas for yourself. Your mistake is to reject the ideas because you don’t trust particular people, such as me—the anonymous poster—and others whose work I reference. In looking for truth, only the ideas need be held accountable.

But your handicap is relativism. It cripples everything you think and everything you say. For example, your statement “It’s factually true,” is subject to becoming “It’s factually untrue,” while yet referring to the same “it.” This change from true to untrue is random, unpredictable and can happen at any moment. It is the nature of the death of leftist ideology—meaninglessness.

Meaninglessness plagues the mind of the everyday liberal with that gnawing sense of emptiness, the unquenchable yearning for authenticity. Unquenchable, until progressivism is abandoned. I hope you can free yourself of this obstacle to truth, as I hope for any neighbor.

(I’m not asserting you’re a leftist. But it’s clear you’ve unknowingly adopted leftist thinking.)

Think of it this way: relativism separates the torque of your engine from solid ground. This is why your vehicle is at a standstill. Take the thing out of neutral. But hold on tight.

Reality can be scary without trust in the Lord God, Creator of the Universe, he who is before all things and to whom all glory belongs. He is your Creator, as he is my Creator.

May God bless you and bring you wisdom, according to his will.

[kosta50]

My apologies I was thinking creation rather than existence. Aquinas doesn’t argue that existence=caused. He argues that in the sense world all we observe are intermediate and end causes… the first cause must exist because these exist

Creation = existence. before I create my side table, it does not exist. Before creation the world did not exist. That which is created is caused into existance. This does not explain the "existence" of the uncaused.

[D-fendr]

Maybe the difference is in intensity.

No, other "regions" are involved. It's qualitative not quantitative.

anyway, everyone defines love as something different.

There's a lot of similarities. That's why my friend and I could discuss and compare, there's a commonality of experience.