Theistic Evolution is Weak Scientism

o_mlly · Sunday at 11:40 AM

J. P. Moreland makes the case that theistic-evolution is merely a weak form of scientism.

"Theistic Evolution is a revisionist treatment of the Bible based on the idea that if the Bible is going to be even partly credible, it must be constantly revised to keep up with what contemporary science says. Thus, Theistic Evolution supports scientism, the view that the hard sciences are the only or vastly superior way of knowing reality."

River Jordan · Sunday at 1:02 PM

He's making the same error other fundamentalists make, where he thinks not reading Genesis as a literal scientific document is a recent development that only occurred in response to the discovery of the evolutionary history of life.

History shows that's wrong. Jewish and Biblical leaders and scholars were advocating a non-literal reading long before we knew about evolution (such as Maimonides and Origen of Alexandria).

I've seen fundamentalists make this mistake so many times I've concluded it must be something they need to believe and tell themselves.

BobRyan · Sunday at 2:13 PM

The idea that you "have to read the Bible as a literal scientific text book" did not work with the literal incarnation of Christ, did not work with the literal virgin birth, did not works with death, burial and resurrection of Christ. Does not work with the doctrine on the literal second coming of Christ.

All those events literally true without scripture having to function as science text book before one can believe that what it says is literally true.

BobRyan · Sunday at 2:17 PM

Evolutionism is a belief system that needs a lot of work

The idea that rocks, dust, gas and sunlight will eventually come up with a rabbit is the story of evolutionism as long as you add "a sufficient mass, and sufficient time and chance". It is a fairy tale of epic proportions

I suggest the evolutionist masters "step one". Show how to make an amoeba with your chemistry set and all the "intelligent design" you might wish to pour into it. (we'll give you "a pass" on the entropy part, just get your amoeba project rolling)

Job 33:6 · Sunday at 2:17 PM

o_mlly said:
J. P. Moreland makes the case that theistic-evolution is merely a weak form of scientism.

"Theistic Evolution is a revisionist treatment of the Bible based on the idea that if the Bible is going to be even partly credible, it must be constantly revised to keep up with what contemporary science says. Thus, Theistic Evolution supports scientism, the view that the hard sciences are the only or vastly superior way of knowing reality."

These people are fighting a losing battle, thinking that theistic evolution is "revisionist".

But in reality, you could talk to 99% of Hebrew scholars on Genesis and see very clearly that it isn't revisionist at all. It's actually more traditional than these modern intelligent design approaches. It is the fundamentalist positions that are, in actuality, revisionist.

Here is an example lecture on Genesis:

o_mlly · Sunday at 3:27 PM

Job 33:6 said:
But in reality, you could talk to 99% of Hebrew scholars on Genesis and see very clearly ...

In reality, I cannot talk to 99% of Hebrew scholars on Genesis and I don't think you can either. So not much to work on with that claim.

Your youtube link is 1-1/2 hours long. Could you give us the main points in your own words?

o_mlly · Sunday at 3:31 PM

Job 33:6 said:
It's actually more traditional than these modern intelligent design approaches.

What is your antecedent noun for "It's"?

If it's theistic evolution then do you have an argument to support your claim?

o_mlly · Sunday at 3:44 PM

BobRyan said:
I suggest the evolutionist masters "step one". Show how to make an amoeba with your chemistry set and all the "intelligent design" you might wish to pour into it. (we'll give you "a pass" on the entropy part, just get your amoeba project rolling)

ID theory is more comprehensive and more coherent explanation of observed phenomena (design in nature) then theistic evolution. The materialists mistakenly feel threatened and resist ID tagging it as a religion in error.

Job 33:6 · Sunday at 4:16 PM

o_mlly said:
What is your antecedent noun for "It's"?

If it's theistic evolution then do you have an argument to support your claim?

Non-concordist or non-grammatical historical readings of Genesis. Which is essentially the backbone of theistic evolution.

And if someone could defeat this approach to scripture, they could certainly defeat the theistic evolution approach to the Bible as well.

Job 33:6 · Sunday at 4:19 PM

o_mlly said:
In reality, I cannot talk to 99% of Hebrew scholars on Genesis and I don't think you can either. So not much to work on with that claim.

Your youtube link is 1-1/2 hours long. Could you give us the main points in your own words?

You can certainly read their books and commentaries. Do you read books? (a sincere question and I don't mean this in a judgemental way). The video is simply a lecture on a non-concordist reading of Genesis.

And to be fair, many of them are integrated into public spheres of communication. Many are responsive to emails, they provide public lectures, and communicate beyond their classrooms in a variety of platforms.

And an honest question: have you not heard of John Walton before?

2PhiloVoid · Sunday at 5:10 PM

o_mlly said:
J. P. Moreland makes the case that theistic-evolution is merely a weak form of scientism.

"Theistic Evolution is a revisionist treatment of the Bible based on the idea that if the Bible is going to be even partly credible, it must be constantly revised to keep up with what contemporary science says. Thus, Theistic Evolution supports scientism, the view that the hard sciences are the only or vastly superior way of knowing reality."

J.P. Moreland sometimes over-revs his assertions. I generally like him, but he's not a main source for me for several reasons even though I've read a couple of his books.

In the case of the issue he alleges in the OP video, I think he's only partially correct since I don't think it is applicable to ALL Theistic Evolutionists and I'm at pains to think of any clear examples of Christians who fit within a "weak scientism."

Fervent · Sunday at 5:23 PM

River Jordan said:
He's making the same error other fundamentalists make, where he thinks not reading Genesis as a literal scientific document is a recent development that only occurred in response to the discovery of the evolutionary history of life.

History shows that's wrong. Jewish and Biblical leaders and scholars were advocating a non-literal reading long before we knew about evolution (such as Maimonides and Origen of Alexandria).

I've seen fundamentalists make this mistake so many times I've concluded it must be something they need to believe and tell themselves.

What's almost ironic is that the fundamentalist rigor where Genesis "literalism" is treated as a non-negotiable item arose as a response to Darwin by theologians like Hodge and Warfield. So it is the recent development, and entirely reactionary.

o_mlly · Monday at 6:23 AM

Job 33:6 said:
You can certainly read their books and commentaries. Do you read books? (a sincere question and I don't mean this in a judgemental way). The video is simply a lecture on a non-concordist reading of Genesis.

And to be fair, many of them are integrated into public spheres of communication. Many are responsive to emails, they provide public lectures, and communicate beyond their classrooms in a variety of platforms.

And an honest question: have you not heard of John Walton before?

So, you cannot give the main points of your 1-1/2 hour youtube link?

Honest question, you don't understand Moreland's main point, do you? It appears not.

The issue under examination not biblical concordance. Moreland's main point is that theistic evolutionists embraces scientism giving primacy to fallible reason over faith which is simply bad theology. "I do not seek to understand in order that I may believe, but rather, I believe in order that I may understand" (Anselm of Canterbury).

Job 33:6 · Monday at 6:38 AM

o_mlly said:
So, you cannot give the main points of your 1-1/2 hour youtube link?

Sure I can.

The main point ultimately is that Genesis isn't a modern scientific textbook.

Nothing in the text is describing ex nihilo material origins (that's not what bara means).

The text is written through a lense of ancient isrealite cosmology:

Among other points.

o_mlly said:
The issue under examination not biblical concordance. Moreland's main point is that theistic evolutionists embraces scientism giving primacy to fallible reason over faith which is simply bad theology. "I do not seek to understand in order that I may believe, but rather, I believe in order that I may understand" (Anselm of Canterbury).

But theistic evolutionists of course maintain faith. The issue is concordism. I'm not talking about Biblical concordance, I'm talking about scientific concordism.

o_mlly · Monday at 11:30 AM

Job 33:6 said:
I'm not talking about Biblical concordance, I'm talking about scientific concordism.

What's the difference?

Fervent · Monday at 11:38 AM

o_mlly said:
What's the difference?

Biblical concordance is about word usage within the Bible, scientific concordance is how the Bible and science intersect.

Job 33:6 · Monday at 11:49 AM

o_mlly said:
What's the difference?

Scientific concordism is really about hermeneutics, the angle or lens we use when approaching the text. It asks: From what cultural or intellectual perspective are we interpreting the words of Scripture? For example, think about the word “café”: are we imagining a French coffeehouse, or an American-style place where people buy coffee?

Similarly, concordism asks whether we read biblical terms about creation from a 21st century, scientifically informed perspective, or from the ancient Israelite worldview that the text originally addressed. It’s essentially a question of whether the text is expected to align with modern science. This is different from word studies or using a tool like a Strong’s concordance, which simply track where words appear in the Bible without imposing an interpretive lens.

River Jordan · Monday at 11:58 AM

Fervent said:
What's almost ironic is that the fundamentalist rigor where Genesis "literalism" is treated as a non-negotiable item arose as a response to Darwin by theologians like Hodge and Warfield. So it is the recent development, and entirely reactionary.

Yes, and I believe the groups that later became "fundamentalists" didn't have a problem with scientists' realization that the earth is ancient. It was mainly after the publication of Darwin's seminal work and the notion that man is an evolved primate species that the fundamentalists began to push back and strongly advocate for a strict literal reading of Genesis (that and "higher criticism" in academia).

https://biologos.org/common-questions/how-have-christians-responded-to-darwins-origin-of-species

o_mlly · Monday at 12:11 PM

Fervent said:
Biblical concordance is about word usage within the Bible, scientific concordance is how the Bible and science intersect.

Thank you. Of course, Moreland is concerned with the latter.

All evolutionary science being inferential is necessarily provisional, i.e., the veracity of present claims is dependent on the next observation or the application of more cogent reasoning.

Ten years after Bacon published The New Organon, Descartes published three short works describing and applying the “correct” method for generating knowledge of nature. Descartes championed a mathematics-intensive, deductive approach that assigned a central role to mind and only a marginal role to experiment. Bacon claimed that the human mind was an obstacle to knowledge of nature—the problem, not the solution.

For Descartes, the mind is the solution, not the problem, as it was for Bacon. Moreland, I think, sees Bacon's point on the fallibility of the human mind.

Moreland recognizes the overwhelming temptation for theistic-evolutionists to fall from sometimes ambiguous biblical truth into scientific tentative untruth.

Job 33:6 · Monday at 12:14 PM

o_mlly said:
Thank you. Of course, Moreland is concerned with the latter.

All evolutionary science being inferential is necessarily provisional, i.e., the veracity of present claims is dependent on the next observation or the application of more cogent reasoning.

Ten years after Bacon published The New Organon, Descartes published three short works describing and applying the “correct” method for generating knowledge of nature. Descartes championed a mathematics-intensive, deductive approach that assigned a central role to mind and only a marginal role to experiment. Bacon claimed that the human mind was an obstacle to knowledge of nature—the problem, not the solution.

For Descartes, the mind is the solution, not the problem, as it was for Bacon. Moreland, I think, sees Bacon's point on the fallibility of the human mind.

Moreland recognizes the overwhelming temptation for theistic-evolutionists to fall from sometimes ambiguous biblical truth into scientific tentative untruth.

Having listened to morelands lecture, he never actually touches on the subject of scientific concordism at all.

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Theistic Evolution is Weak Scientism

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