Of Dawkins, it can only be said that when it comes to a belief as pivotal as the existence of God, the slightest degree of doubt can be perilous. If you cannot be absolutely certain God does not exist, you are best advised to err on the side of caution. It should be noted that uncertainty on the part of Dawkins is nothing new. His infamous bus campaign a few years ago didn't exactly inspire people to embrace unbelief with gusto. Beneath the surface, the good professor is far more angst-ridden than he will ever let on.
Now, as far as ++Rowan is concerned, much of what he said was, predictably, incoherent and irrelevant. You cannot say, on the one hand, that human beings evolved from non-human ancestors but, on the other hand, are still "in the image of God." That is directly counter to the creation narrative, however "literally" one takes it (more about that shortly). The basic doctrine that human beings fell because of sin from a state of perfection to a state of corruption simply cannot be reconciled with the idea that human beings evolved from a lower form of life.
It must also be noted, sadly, that ++Rowan is not a particularly able defender of biblical authority. He said the Genesis account of creation was not to be taken literally. How many times do we have to go down this road? Let's go over the basics one more time.
The Bible is a (divinely inspired) work of literature. Even ++Rowan accepts the divine inspiration part. How else is a work of literature to be "taken" (that is, "read") if not "literally," that is, as a work of literature?
To say that one does not "take the Bible literally" is to say that one does not "take" the Bible as literature. If the Bible is not "taken" as literature, how is it to be "taken" at all? How seriously can a work of literature be "taken" if it is not "taken" as a work of literature?
So, when discussing the Genesis account of creation, it is utterly foolish to say, "This should not be taken literally." Yes, there is a deeper truth being conveyed through this divinely inspired literary work which may require an interpretive method that goes beyond wooden literalism, but to appreciate that truth, one must first appreciate the Genesis account precisely as a divinely inspired literary work. In other words, we must first "take" that account "literally."
James+,
ReplyDeleteI'm going to have to take issue with two things in this post.
First is your use of the terms "literal & literally." - You seem to equate "literally" with recognizing something as literature. That seems to be a very unusual way of using that word. It certainly doesn't match a dictionary definition or the way the word is usually used. Rather, for something to be literal usually means "in accordance with . . . [the] strict meaning of a word or words; not figuratively or metaphorical."
Which is to say that if one were to take seriously the "literature" or poetic or apocolyptic genres, one would certainly not take them "literally," because such literature does involve the figurative and metophorical sense of words.
This weekend, I had the opportunity to attend the Climacus Conference at St. Michael the Archangel (Antiochian) Orthodox Church in Louisville. There, I talked with one of the presenters about the position of reading the first two chapters of Genesis, not "literally," but liturgicaly, poetically,theologicaly and soteriologicaly (which might answers to your question as to how one might read it, if not literaly).
In fact, we were reminded of how cautious the Church Fathers when it came to tying their theological undestanding of Genesis to the cosmologies of their day. They did not always succeed in keeping such things seprate, but they certainly seem to have tried to do so.
The second issue concerns your statement, "You cannot say, on the one hand, that human beings evolved from non-human ancestors but, on the other hand, are still 'in the image of God.' That is directly counter to the creation narrative . . ."
I disagree. - Some time back I watched a dvd about "genetic Adam." It was made from a scientif point of view, tracing genes back to one ancestor. The reference to Adam was not intended to identify this one ancestor with the (literal!) biblical Adam, but rather simply as identifying him (metaphorically)as the first universal ancestor.
At any rate, the dvd, posited the evolutionary theory, but said that something must have made this one man, who would become our universal ancestor, different from others. (I don't really recall, but, perhaps, a new self-awareness, etc.)
Now, if one were to accept the science of one genetic ancestor and understand evolution as God's process of creation, one could easily identify that which made "genetic Adam" different as God's infusion of God's own image, etc. In fact, such a view would retain a literal (rather than metaphorical or figurative) Adam, with a literal Fall into sin, etc.
While I am not promoting this view, I just think that your statement goes too far in insisting that a theistic-evolution understanding necessitates a denial of our being created in the image of God.
Tood+,
ReplyDeleteI would distinguish between reading the Bible "literally," meaning here to read it as the kind of literature it was intended, and "literalistically," which is a wooden interpretive method which imposes the same set of rules on, say, a passage that is clearly intended to be understood as metaphor and a passage that is intended strictly as an historical account. Most Scripture, of course, doesn't fit into just one neat category. I can interpret Genesis "literally" and understand much of it as poetry, liturgy, etc. whereas I could only understand it as history if I interpreted it "literalistically." I do believe Adam was an actual, historical person (I can't see reconciling Paul's first Adam/second Adam any other way), but I also believe there are deeper truths conveyed poetically, liturgically, and soteriologically in the Genesis narrative which can be overlooked if vindicating the absolute historical accuracy of the account is one's paramount concern.
James+,
ReplyDeleteI would suggest that the word you are looking for, then, is "literarily," not "literally." As I mentioned, not only is the way that you have used the term not consistent with common usage (and I would suggest, not the way that ++Rowan used it), but it is inconsistent with the "literal" definition as found in dictionaries.
On the other hand, "literarily" does fit your usage.
My 2 cents. - Not literaly, but figuratively speaking! :0)