[_ Old Earth _] Is evolutionism compatible with the Bible?

[calvin]

And it isn't. For example God says that He used nature to produce living things.

Where does He say that? Book, chapter & verse please.
Gen 2:7 for example states that God 'formed' the man from the dust of the ground.
Note well that God forming does not equate to evolving by natural processes.
In deed it speakes of an active and deliberate action by God on a certain portion of ground. Not any kind of gradual change or modification from one life time to another.

 

[calvin]

Changing it to a literal event rather than a parable is a major revision. And that's what you did.

The Genesis account does not fit the definition of 'parable'.
It seems to me that to claim the account of Adam and Eve is a parable forces (by the same lack of logic) the rest of the creation accounts to be classed as fable.

 

[calvin]

For me, the biggest problem with teaching that man evolved and is shaped by evolution is the logical conclusion that man will evolve into better and better persons and someday, will no longer need salvation by Christ Jesus.

 

[calvin]

D. miranda

O. lamarckana

Even professional creationists have now admitted that speciation is a fact. Would you like me to show you? There's no point in denying it.

I googled those two names and could only find a little reference to O.Lamarckana. He/she is listed as having done some work with marine worms, but there was no mention of philosophical brief. No mention of them being creationist, not even theists. Can you post a link to where their philosophic beliefs have been published?

 

[Barbarian]

I googled those two names and could only find a little reference to O.Lamarckana. He/she is listed as having done some work with marine worms, but there was no mention of philosophical brief. No mention of them being creationist, not even theists. Can you post a link to where their philosophic beliefs have been published?

Far as we know, primroses don't have philosophical beliefs, and I doubt if any of them have every published in the literature about marine worms.

 

[Barbarian]

For me, the biggest problem with teaching that man evolved and is shaped by evolution is the logical conclusion that man will evolve into better and better persons and someday, will no longer need salvation by Christ Jesus.

That's already happened. So too late to worry about it. For example, Tibetans have evolved a number of ways to deal with surviving at high altitudes. Many Euoropeans have evolved almost complete immunity to Bubonic plague and to HIV.

And so on. Why would any of that matter to God? What possible favorable mutation would make us no longer need salvation?

 

[Barbarian]

Barbarian observes:
And it isn't. For example God says that He used nature to produce living things.

Where does He say that? Book, chapter & verse please.

Genesis 1:23 And God said: Let the earth bring forth the living creature in its kind, cattle and creeping things, and beasts of the earth, according to their kinds. And it was so done.

Gen 2:7 for example states that God 'formed' the man from the dust of the ground.

So two examples of God using nature to make living things. Notice both man and the other animals are created using the earth.

Note well that God forming does not equate to evolving by natural processes.

But we have His word that the earth brought forth living things as He intended.

In deed it speakes of an active and deliberate action by God on a certain portion of ground.

Every tiny part of creation is an active and deliberate action by God. When a drop of rain falls on the earth, it's a deliberate and active action by God. If He were to take His mind from us, we would not even continue to exist.

 

[Barbarian]

The Genesis account does not fit the definition of 'parable'.

St. Paul disagrees with you.
Hebrews 11:17 By faith Abraham, when he was tried, offered Isaac: and he that had received the promises, offered up his only begotten son; 18 (To whom it was said: In Isaac shall thy seed be called.) 19 Accounting that God is able to raise up even from the dead. Whereupon also he received him for a parable.

It seems to me that to claim the account of Adam and Eve is a parable forces (by the same lack of logic) the rest of the creation accounts to be classed as fable.

So you're saying that St. Paul's lack of logic forces Abraham to be a fable?

Can't agree with that.

 

[Cygnus]

For me, the biggest problem with teaching that man evolved and is shaped by evolution is the logical conclusion that man will evolve into better and better persons and someday, will no longer need salvation by Christ Jesus.

I wonder what the angels evolved from.

 

[Barbarian]

I wonder what the angels evolved from.

Why would beings who have no bodies, evolve? Evolution is something that happens to living things in the material world.

 

[calvin]

St. Paul disagrees with you.
Hebrews 11:17 By faith Abraham, when he was tried, offered Isaac: and he that had received the promises, offered up his only begotten son; 18 (To whom it was said: In Isaac shall thy seed be called.) 19 Accounting that God is able to raise up even from the dead. Whereupon also he received him for a parable.



So you're saying that St. Paul's lack of logic forces Abraham to be a fable?

Can't agree with that.

I think I am beginning to see the problem here with what you are suggesting.
You highlighted the word "Parable", yet even in such a brief dictionary as 'Thayer' there are 11 suggested meanings; hardly definitive is it?
Paul's use of that word when taken in context can hardly be taken to encompass the entire book of Genesis or any part of it save that short reference to Abraham demonstrating unquestioning faith in the Lord.
Or putting it another way, Abraham being all set to slay Isaac, had given him up for dead. So having been stopped from this and thus receiving Isaac back from the edge of death he did so in juxtaposition to a literal death.
Hardly a parable in the 21 century understanding of the word.

 

[calvin]

Every tiny part of creation is an active and deliberate action by God. When a drop of rain falls on the earth, it's a deliberate and active action by God. If He were to take His mind from us, we would not even continue to exist.

Hardly a sound argument in defence of evolution is it.

 

[Barbarian]

Hardly a sound argument in defence of evolution is it.

A sound argument for evolution would include things like fossil record, observed speciation, the huge number of transitional forms (and even better, the lack of transitionals where there shouldn't be any), genetics, the hierarchy of taxa, and so on.

Scripture is merely consistent with evolution which is, as you say, not the best argument for evolution.

 

[calvin]

Barbarian observes:
And it isn't. For example God says that He used nature to produce living things.



Genesis 1:23 And God said: Let the earth bring forth the living creature in its kind, cattle and creeping things, and beasts of the earth, according to their kinds. And it was so done.

Gen 2:7 for example states that God 'formed' the man from the dust of the ground.

So two examples of God using nature to make living things. Notice both man and the other animals are created using the earth.



But we have His word that the earth brought forth living things as He intended.



Every tiny part of creation is an active and deliberate action by God. When a drop of rain falls on the earth, it's a deliberate and active action by God. If He were to take His mind from us, we would not even continue to exist.

I'm thinking to meant to post Gen 1:24 not verse 23.
Have you also read verse 25? Gen 1:25 And God made the beast of the earth after his kind, and cattle after their kind, and every thing that creepeth upon the earth after his kind: and God saw that it was good. Kjv.
Well now what do you know?
God made..... no evolution involved here at all. In deed, the act of making the various life forms "after their kind" pretty well forbids us from suggesting evolution of any sort had a role to play in God's scheme of things.

 

[Barbarian]

I'm thinking to meant to post Gen 1:24 not verse 23.
Have you also read verse 25? Gen 1:25 And God made the beast of the earth after his kind, and cattle after their kind, and every thing that creepeth upon the earth after his kind: and God saw that it was good. Kjv.

Yep. The problem is, creationists don't like the way He did it.

Well now what do you know?
God made..... no evolution involved here at all.

Doesn't say that. He just didn't tell us how He did it. Some things, like evolution, He left for us to figure out.

In deed, the act of making the various life forms "after their kind" pretty well forbids us from suggesting evolution of any sort had a role to play in God's scheme of things.

Only if you don't think God was capable of making evolution.

 

[calvin]

Only if you don't think God was capable of making evolution.

God is capable of anything he deems appropriate.
I just don't think He would use evolution in any flavour and not declare it to us.
When He said He 'made', if He used evolutionary processes, then He did not make at all, He would be a deceiver.......I think you must be mixed up a bit here. The deceiver is not God, but just a serpent.
I'm glad that I am descended from a special creation (Adam), and not from an Oak tree or something similar.

 

[Barbarian]

God is capable of anything he deems appropriate.
I just don't think He would use evolution in any flavour and not declare it to us.

So he didn't tell us about blood circulation or protons, or quantum electron states, and therefore, none of those are real? Don't think that's a very good argument.

When He said He 'made', if He used evolutionary processes, then He did not make at all, He would be a deceiver......

If He used evolution that means He didn't make life? So then because he used earth, the Bible is telling us He didn't make life? No, that doesn't work, either.

I think you must be mixed up a bit here. The deceiver is not God, but just a serpent. And since God is not a deceiver, there's really no way to conclude that He doesn't use nature to produce life.

I'm glad that I am descended from a special creation (Adam)

All creation is special, no matter how He does it.

 

[calvin]

So he didn't tell us about blood circulation or protons, or quantum electron states, and therefore, none of those are real? Don't think that's a very good argument.

No, you are right on the mark there, as you say "So he didn't tell us about blood circulation or protons, or quantum electron states, and therefore, none of those are real?" your argument is indeed not a very good one at all.
Can you not do better?
If Genesis listed all the details available, even Methuselah would not have lived long enough to read the whole of Genesis. So we come back to sufficient disclosure that contains no deceptive words and has no room or licence to insert evolution of any flavour. Apparently we need to know that. God created all that exist and it would be good for you to learn that.
John 1:3 All things were made through him, and without him was not any thing made that was made.Esv Notice that the word used for 'made' does not recognize a long process, but looks to a completed work.
When the Lord God made something it was made as a finished work.
This is why we are taught that on the seventh day God rested from all the work that He had done.
This is a lesson that needs to be taken to heart.
You should be able to see that there is no room for evolutionary thinking. Even if evolution had been used, it would have come to an end by the seventh day, and looking back, we would find no evidence of evolution.

 

[Cygnus]

So he didn't tell us about blood circulation or protons, or quantum electron states, and therefore, none of those are real? Don't think that's a very good argument.

But God did tell us how he made Eve from Adams rib...which is the furthest thing from the T.O.E.

 

[Barbarian]

But God did tell us how he made Eve from Adams rib...which is the furthest thing from the T.O.E.

You're just assuming that the parable of man and woman being of one flesh, was a literal history. As you learned earlier, that can't be true.