A Christian friend said to me recently, “Some people cling to their own interpretation of a Bible passage only because they’ve never heard an alternative properly explained.” Working on that hypothesis, and because I believe it’s helpful for Christians to understand each other’s points of view, I have more to say about how we read the Bible. My focus is still on Genesis 1-3, Young Earth Creationism and alternative approaches to these chapters.

The comments on my Part 2 article, A Tale of Two Hermeneutics, were interesting, as always, and one comment made a similar, helpful point: “…it may be a common error for a person to conflate the inerrancy of Scripture with the inerrancy of their own understanding of it.” Another comment pointed out that God’s ‘rest’ on Day 7 was to introduce to humanity the idea of a day of rest – later, the Sabbath. This is certainly true, but does not in any way preclude in my opinion, Prof. John H. Walton’s proposal¹ that the Creation Week reflects the ANE tradition wherein worshippers held a one-week ceremony of inauguration for their god’s temple. Moses subverts this expectation by showing that a) God inaugurates his own temple and b) his temple is not a building but the whole Earth. 

Starlight and predation – two young earth dilemmas

Someone will ask, ‘So what is unhelpful to children about YEC?’ It’s the claim that it answers all possible questions they may have. Readers recommended that I read one of Jonathan Sarfati’s books, so I chose Refuting Compromise. Dr Sarfati is clearly a brilliant man and draws together much information in support of the YEC position. But even so, his response to the single most powerful objection to YEC – the starlight problem – was unconvincing. If starlight can be no older than a few thousand years, although appearing to be billions of years old, did God really create just the starlight arriving at the Earth in transit from stars which never actually existed? If anyone knows of an effective solution to that issue, please write a comment and point me to it.

There are differing but valid hermeneutics – or pairs of glasses – through which Christians read Genesis 1-3.

Another topic which is not effectively handled, in my opinion, is the issue of the origin of biological death, predation and carnivory (Sarfati: Chapter 6). The YEC interpretation says that no animals died before Adam sinned. Paul appears to confirm that in Romans 5:12 when he says that “death came to all men, because all sinned.” But please note that it says “death came to all men.” (Greek: ‘pas anthropos’). Walton comments: “… everything we know repudiates the absence of death… prior to the Fall…. Day Three describes the process by which plants grow. The cycle of sprouting leaves, flowers, fruit and seeds is one that involves death at every stage.” Besides, a biological system without death would deprive all creatures of their food! (Cows and other ruminants kill grass when they eat it). Similarly, to claim that there was no predation before the Fall is to argue that the original lions and tigers ate grass, or that their entire digestive biology was instantaneously and miraculously changed at the moment Adam and Eve fell.

Let’s explore that thought for a moment. Predators are meticulously designed (by God) ‘from the bottom up’ for the life they live. They must be swift and powerful. They need excellent sight and means of catching their prey. The digestive tracts of lions and tigers, for example, are geared towards their expected diet of raw meat. By contrast, ruminants have very different digestive arrangements. Was it human sinning that somehow caused a radical change from herbivore to predator? (It’s hard to believe that sin causes anything good). Or did the early lions and tigers eat grass and feel sick because of it? Or, finally, did God step in with a additional creation add-ons to make the change? I could believe that possible, but such a ‘second Creation’ would not be a convenient solution for the YEC interpretation. I think it’s fair to ask for an answer to that question, which children and teenagers are likely to ask.

A good creation

Someone will protest that predation does not qualify as ‘good’ and therefore cannot have been part of the original Creation. The aforementioned Walton tells us that the Hebrew word ‘tob’ has a wide range of possible meanings. He concludes: “Thus throughout Genesis One the refrain ‘it was good’ expressed the functional readiness of the cosmos for human beings.” Predation and scavenging are essential aspects of the current biology of the Creation, without which almost all life would long ago have been smothered by plant overgrowth and the bodies of dead animals. Before the Fall, “God saw all that He had made, and it was very good”. His incredible planning of the Heavens and the Earth had been entirely successful and His romance with humanity could now begin.

Predation and scavenging are essential aspects of the current biology of the Creation, without which almost all life would long ago have been smothered by plant overgrowth and the bodies of dead animals.

Someone will turn to Romans 8:20-21 and claim that the ‘decay’ or ‘corruption’ to which the ‘Creation was subjected’ refers to the effects of Adam’s sin and God’s cursing of the ground. There isn’t space here to deal adequately with that question.² But more immediately we can attend to death in Eden. Surely humans were exempt from death in Eden only because of their access to the Tree of Life. The punishment for Adam and Eve’s sin was to be ‘doomed to death’ and the means of that punishment was their expulsion from Eden and from that Tree. That is how human sin led to human death. We too die physically because we are excluded from the Tree of Life – until the death of Jesus on the Cross (another Tree of Life) becomes the promise of eternal life to us, prefiguring the ‘tree of life’ in Revelation 22:2.

So, to conclude, I stand by my assertion that there are differing but valid hermeneutics – or pairs of glasses – through which Christians read Genesis 1-3. We have been discussing the ‘Plain Reading’ of the YEC position and the cultural/ literary/ genre approach which reaches different conclusions. In fact, thirdly, some genuine Christians believe in Theistic Evolution, which puzzles me deeply. (In my opinion, the most important point of Genesis 1 is that it contradicts the theory of Evolution). But all these positions – these pairs of theological glasses – have evidence to call on and learned professors on their side, as well as a history of support. To me, that puts the Genesis 1-3 issues into the category of ‘disputable matters’.

The purpose of healthy theological discussions should be to help with that process of deciding.

Paul deals with such disagreements at length in Romans chapters 14 and 15. We should each determine where we stand on such questions. “Each should be fully convinced in his own mind” (Rom 14:5). The purpose of healthy theological discussions should be to help with that process of deciding.

However, these chapters are Paul’s protracted plea for mutual acceptance within the Body of Christ, irrespective of differences of belief and practice. Although he labels some believers ‘weak’ and others ‘strong’ in faith, he rules out any shibboleth (Judges 12: 6) based on secondary matters – and surely so should we. In normal fellowship, Paul writes, “…whatever you believe about these things, keep between yourself and God” (Rom 14:22). We have too much in common and there is too much at stake to allow such disagreements to divide us.

Andy Fraser is a retired pastor and university lecturer.

Notes

1. John H. Walton The Lost World of Genesis One pp.99-101

2.Jon Garvey gives answers in his book God’s Good Earth: The Case for an Unfallen Creation.