“I believe in God the Father Almighty, Maker of heaven and earth.” (The
Apostles’ Creed)
When Christians declare of the opening chapter of Genesis
that it is a true account of creation, we are making four separate claims. We are firstly making a claim about the actual state of things in the natural
realm. We are also claiming that the
Bible has the authority to make
pronouncements about that natural realm.
Thirdly we are claiming the Bible is actually
correct in its declarations about the natural order. And fourthly we are claiming the account of
Genesis chapter 1 to be the Word of the Maker of heaven and earth who therefore
knows first-hand about these works. Each
of these claims is founded on the prior commitment that truth is absolutely paramount. After all, no Christian who cares deeply
about the correct interpretation of the creation days of the first chapter of
Genesis believes that its account of beginnings is fictional and so irrelevant
to truth. What is fundamental to this
question about the Christian declaration is that “truth” has a clear definition
that involves parameters.
I personally believe three things with respect to the
creation accounts in Genesis. I believe
they are the revealed Word of God (2 Timothy 3:16). I also believe they are correct in their
pronouncements about the natural order.
And I believe that the task of reconciling these two ideas involves the
challenge of taking truth seriously.
“Truth” by definition involves the actual
correspondence between perception and the actual
state of affairs under consideration.
The French language brings clarity to one important distinction in the
task of making judgments about matters of truth. The relevant words include both de facto and de jure. It is not difficult
to translate these words into English.
The former means that two entities can be reconciled in actual fact. That latter means literally “by right of right,” that is, a decision
has been made in a court of law by a judges’ decree. Truth however, which again means the actual state of affairs, cannot be
decided by decree. The truth of any matter in question can only
be ascertained by investigating the actual
state of the things that are being explored
.
Now to the point.
When the question is, which interpretation of Genesis One is correct,
there are five possible answers that can be logically held (I am not at this
point making judgments about which one is actually
correct.) It is firstly logically
possible for an interpretation of Genesis to be correct and for a scientific
pronouncement to be wrong. It is
secondly logically possible for reconciliation where an interpretation of
Genesis and a scientific pronouncement are both true. It is thirdly logically possible for the
interpretation of Genesis and the scientific pronouncement to both be
wrong. It is fourthly logically possible
for an interpretation of Genesis to be wrong while the scientific pronouncement
is true. And it is also logically possible that the opening
chapters of Genesis were never intended to be taken as a truth statement about
reality at all. The answer to which of
the above logically valid
propositions is actually true can
only be determined by investigating the actual state of the facts.
There is one other proposal that is also frequently offered
to the above question but which cannot qualify as a truth statement. Not even possibly so! That proposal is the suggestion that in the tug-of-war
between science and religion priority must be given to “the Word of God.” The reason this proposal is irrational is
that (with one qualification) it is not possible for the Bible to be correct if
it conflicts with the demonstrated findings of science. We are speaking of a logical contradiction. I have heard protests from Christians about
this. But I do not understand. We ought to relish the challenge. In the name of truth we can settle for no
less than reconciling these two realms.
Truth demands a unified, not a dual, field of knowledge. I can think of no example from the Bible
which opposes this statement.
The “qualification” I hint at above would be if the
scientific picture of the history of the cosmos were demonstrated to be
scientifically false. But it is
important to be clear about how the falsification of a scientific paradigm is
achieved. It is not sufficient for
Christians to diminish the scientific claim by theological pronouncement. What is required is the application of the
scientific method with respect to scientific data, and not merely theological nay-saying.
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