Does God's use of evolution equal "God making mistakes"?

[gluadys]

The literary style of Genesis is very much obvious, the Church Father believed it, the Apostles believe it, Jesus taught it, why shouldn't you believe it as well? They all believed Adam was real, the fall was real, the creation in six days were real, the earth is young, etc. I just cannot see why now it must change, other than science dictates so.

Picky point, but I am seeing this error in several recent posts (not all yours). "Literary" is not an alternate spelling for "literal". Please use "literal" when that is what you intend.

 

[SBG]

Hm, well my apologies. I will try much harder to have correct english on these informal boards.

My apologies, hope no one was hurt by my misusage of a word.

 

[Remus]

YCE's kan't spel.

 

[gluadys]

But really, I am rather disappointed that the so many self-claimed enlightened on evolution are unable to think of this, understand this, and comprehend this.

I do understand what you are proposing. I just disagree with it. I have seen many attempts to insert evolution into a literal Genesis, and Glenn's comes the closest to making sense. But you reject much of Glenn's approach too.

I think it significant that you also make it clear that only parts of evolution could fit with a literal Genesis. But evolution can't be divided into acceptable and non-acceptable parts. Its force depends on the concurrence of all its lines of evidence. You cannot accept mutation and not accept common ancestry. They go together. You cannot accept that bacteria evolve and not accept that humans evolved. They go together.

 

[SBG]

I do understand what you are proposing. I just disagree with it. I have seen many attempts to insert evolution into a literal Genesis, and Glenn's comes the closest to making sense. But you reject much of Glenn's approach too.

I think it significant that you also make it clear that only parts of evolution could fit with a literal Genesis. But evolution can't be divided into acceptable and non-acceptable parts. Its force depends on the concurrence of all its lines of evidence. You cannot accept mutation and not accept common ancestry. They go together. You cannot accept that bacteria evolve and not accept that humans evolved. They go together.

Well I guess you want to accept evolution at the cost of the Genesis.

I just fail to see that because of A, B must be true. Even still you miss my point and it is a disappointment that no theistic evolutionists has been able to understand this, let alone think of it.

 

[SBG]

YCE's kan't spel.

Yeah, lol. I guess those mistakes we make get to people.

 

[gluadys]

Well I guess you want to accept evolution at the cost of the Genesis.

I just fail to see that because of A, B must be true. Even still you miss my point and it is a disappointment that no theistic evolutionists has been able to understand this, let alone think of it.

And you still fail to understand that it is a YEC assumption that says accepting evolution costs us Genesis. That is the false either/or thing that Vance is always on about.

Evolution has not cost me Genesis at all.

 

[SBG]

And you still fail to understand that it is a YEC assumption that says accepting evolution costs us Genesis. That is the false either/or thing that Vance is always on about.

Evolution has not cost me Genesis at all.

I don't remember making this claim about Genesis. If it doesn't pertain to me as something I have said, why do you use it against me?

Or course it didn't cost you Genesis, you have this neotheology thing going on where science tells you what to believe in the Bible or not to believe in tihs case.

I can see it now, Noah prophecies to them and then a local flood hits and they now have an opportunity to escape God's wrath, not by turning to God, but on their own accord. Excellent theological story.

 

[gluadys]

I don't remember making this claim about Genesis. If it doesn't pertain to me as something I have said, why do you use it against me?

Post 25 just a little higher on this page.

 

[SBG]

My apologies, I was think on the terms of a literal historical Genesis. I should have said that originally.

 

[Scholar in training]

I would propose that the answer is no. I think it is our own bias which views a process such as evolution as "trial and error". I think we need to step back and consider that, to God, a system which allows for the rise and fall of species, growth and modification, success and failure based on the rules He, Himself, established, might not be "full of mistakes" after all. He did not create a single species and then see it fail. He simply could have created a *system* which *allows* for success and failure. The system He created would not be mistaken at all. It would be happening EXACTLY how He created it to happen: life and death, success and failure, modification and development.

God would want death to occur? That kind of thinking makes Him malignant, doesn't it?

 

[Vance]

I will have to say it again for the nth time, no TE on this board says that God is a deceiver or can ever be a deceiver. What they say is that BECAUSE God can't be a deceiver, it makes it HIGHLY unlikely He would create a universe which looks, tests, and acts in every instance like it is old and like there was never a global flood.

And AiG uses this SAME argument with regard to the "light created halfway" argument which used to be used by Creationists a lot, and which still shows up every now and then. They point out that this is a VERY bad argument to use because God CANNOT deceive, and thus would not create deceptively.

So, no TE ever says that God is a deceiver. In fact, it is their absolute faith that God IS NOT a deceiver that leads many of them to the TE point of view.

Some YEC's on the other hand, seem to be less solidly based on this point. When I asked YEC's not long ago what would happen to their faith if they found out tomorrow without doubt that the earth WAS billions of years old and that Man DID evolve from earlier life forms, a disturbing number of them (including a couple who still post here now) said that this would destroy their faith completely because it would mean that Scripture could not be trusted.

That sums up the danger I see in that type of YEC teaching in a nutshell.

 

[shernren]

God would want death to occur? That kind of thinking makes Him malignant, doesn't it?

The Bible says for a fact that God kills some people. That kind of thinking makes Him a cosmic Hitler, no? XD

You might as well say God should not have created a creation into which death could enter.

And literal historicity is an artefact of Enlightenment reasoning. The Bible predates the concept of literal historicity. And where does the Bible itself tell us it should be read historically? Why, only in the parts that were written as history! So if God Himself didn't tell us to read the Bible as a complete history why should we presume that He wants us to?

And I'm struggling with that myself. =P