finitum non capax infiniti

Dr. Waltke’s seventh chapter is entitled “The Gift of the Cosmos” and focuses on the cosmogony portrayed in Genesis. For anyone who is familiar with Dr. Waltke’s work, this chapter will bring to mind some of the discussions found in his Genesis commentary (which I recommend). Straightaway Waltke brings up some of the common misapplications of the Genesis creation narratives by those who are concerned with refuting Darwin on a Biblical level. Waltke does not affirm Darwinism, as he shows that it’s worldview cannot be supported by those who are faithful to Scripture; he is simply warning his audience to read the creation narratives on their own terms, not in terms of modern debates. Waltke writes, “Instead of metaphysical questions that shape culture, questions about dinosaurs, a young earth theory, and such dominate the evangelical landscape” (174). I could not agree more with Waltke’s assessment here (as I’ve blogged on this topic often).

Waltke then explains how the original audience would have understood the creation narratives and how their context shaped the narratives. Because Israel was constantly confronted with pagan cosmogonies and cosmologies, the Biblical creation narrative is “a cosmology designed to counteract the mythic way of looking at the world” (176) in that is presents how “One personal, benevolent God overcomes a primordial chaos of an abyss blanketed in darkness to create a habitable world and its inhabitants” (176). He proposes a “theological interpretation of Genesis 1.” One of the reasons is because of “The intense debate between creationists and other scientists—between “zappers” and “oozers”—over this text results from a misreading, an attempt to read the narrative through a lens not intended by the implied author” (177).

Working on proving the validity of a “theological interpretation,” of which I agree, Waltke outlines and discusses the first creation narrative. The discussion is very helpful for the purposes of this volume. For those who desire a more indepth look at the first creation narrative, I would point you towards Dr. Waltke’s Genesis commentary mentioned and linked above.

When discussing the literary form of Genesis 1.1-2.4a, Dr. Waltke’s main polemic seems to be against labeling it as myth. While the narrative does take on the form of an ancient Near Eastern cosmogony, it does not borrow the theology inherent in those cosmogonies, nor does it present its content as merely mythological. Rather, Waltke argues for the creation narrative to refer to actual, real history, but not in a way that is guided by modern scientific treaties or modern ideas of correct historiography. Although Waltke agrees with Hexham’s definition of myth, “a story with culturally formative power,” as describing the first creation narrative, the term ‘myth’ has too many modern connotations, such as “not true” or “non-fiction” or even “fantasy,” to be rescued and used for the first creation narrative.

Waltke then concerns himself with the fact that both creation narratives are “not straightforward history” (190). Anyone who picks up Genesis and reads both stories can see this, yet modern evangelicalism seems dead set on harmonizing both accounts, as if they can prove Darwin wrong, Ken Ham right, and user in the eschaton all in one fell swoop. Waltke points out that if you attempt to harmonize the accounts, you will actually have to let go of the 24 day theory: “It strains the reader’s credulity to believe that Adam is formed and placed in the garden, receives instructions from God regarding the trees, names all the animals—both domestic and wild—according to their nature, falls into a coma, undergoes an operation that involves removing his rib cage, wakes up, has time to reflect upon his wife’s being, and composes a poem celebrating his wife’s equality with him all within the daylight hours of the sixth day. the narrative suggests a less than literal plot and a longer period of time in the story being represented” (193).

Waltke then gives eight reasons why the creation narratives should not be read as science:
1) “the writer’s aim is exclusively religious” (194)
2) “an orthodox doctrine of inspiration confesses that the Old Testament incarnates divine truth in the human form of its time and place” (195) [as a side note, I'd like to have this statement engraved on a golden pen and given to the entire faculty and board at Westminster]
3) “biblical narrative is creative literature, employing patterns of structure that differ from a linear pattern of thought” (196)
4) “scientific literature avoids rhetoric, but the biblical narrator uses the full range of figures of speech in his rhetoric to win his audience to his point of view” (196)
5) “the Bible, unlike science, is mostly concerned with ultimate origins, not proximate origins” (196)
6) “whereas science endeavors to give a total and coherent explanation of phenomena, Genesis is not concerned to give a total explanation of origins” (196) [Waltke is referring to his discussion on the lack of data concerning the creation of water and the Serpent]
7) “those who want to use Genesis as a scientific textbook normally contend for a young earth because of the genealogies in Genesis 5 and 10. But these genealogies have an unknown number of gaps. They function to show either that the last named person is a descendent of the first named person or to show the relationships of people, not to compute the age of the earth” (197)
8 ) “the narrative does not fit the genre of scientific literature writing because its method of validation lies outside the realm of scientific investigation. The ultimate validation of Scripture comes from the witness of the Spirit who leads us into all truth” (197)

Waltke then makes comparisons between ANE cosmogonies and Genesis, explains those similarities, explains the contrasts between ANE cosmogonies and those of science, and then compares Genesis 1 with both the cosmogonies of the ANE and science. His conclusion is that Genesis 1 conforms more to ANE cosmogonies than anything else.

At the end of the chapter Dr. Waltke briefly traces the creation theme through different blocks of literature in Scripture.

I’d like to backtrack a little to Waltke’s conclusion regarding his evaluation of Genesis 1 and the cosmogonies of the ANE and science. In the conclusion of this section, Waltke affirms theistic evolution and then makes sure to define what, exactly, that means. I find myself in agreement with Waltke and have been for quite sometime. I draw attention to this because I have gotten some rude and even scornful reactions from Christians when I affirm my position (I actually had a professor in my undergraduate studies tear up my paper on theistic evolution and make me write another, unrelated paper!). Here is Waltke’s explanation of his view of theistic evolution:

By “theistic evolution” I mean that the God of Israel, to bring glory to himself, (1) created all things that are out of nothing and sustains them; (2) incredibly, against the laws of probability, finely tuned the essential properites of the universe to produce ‘adam, who is capable of reflecting upon their origins; (3) within his providence allowed the process of natural selection and of cataclysmic interventions—such as the meteor that extinguished the dinosaurs, enabling mammals to dominate the earth—to produce awe-inspiring creatures, especially ‘adam; (4) by direct creation made ‘adam a spiritual being, an image of divine beings, for fellowship with himself by faith; (5) allowed ‘adam to freely choose to follow their primitive animal nature and to usurp the rule of God instead of living by faith in God, losing fellowship with their physical and spiritual Creator; (6) and in his mercy chose from fallen ‘adam the Israel of God, whom he regenerated by the Holy Spirit, in connection with their faith in Jesus Christ, the Second Adam, for fellowship with himself” (202-03).

Much of this is a result of the influence of Francis Collins’ The Language of God: A Scientist Presents Evidence for Belief on Dr. Waltke, which he mentions in the footnotes. That was actually a book I cited in the paper that my dear undergraduate systematics professor tore up. I guess I should have double spaced!

What are your thoughts on the evolution, creation, Ken Ham, ID issue?