The Fall Re-examined in the Light of Modern Science

Luke Janssen

Polling agencies (Pew; Gallop) have repeatedly found that a majority of Christians believe humans have always existed in their present form. Teaching from the pulpit (and often also from within the Academy) continues to hold in view a primal pair in a blissfully perfect Mesopotamian setting—the only sentient hominids on the planet—engaging in a single act of defiance which introduced death and disease, and set humanity down a path of rebellion against God.

However, many scientific discoveries now challenge these beliefs on many levels. These show humans arising through biological evolution out of an African origin together with other hominin species who had the potential to develop religious ideas (Neanderthals; Denisovans). Genetic evidence utterly precludes a primal pair. Fossil evidence of death and disease goes back millions of years. Temples and religious artefacts dedicated to a search for the Divine are scattered all around the globe.

These findings require a re-examination of certain Christian beliefs, something which the Academy is now beginning to do. One core tenet is that of the Fall. In what sense are humans fallen creatures and broken image bearers, and how do we better convey that theology to students of the Academy, to the laity in the pews, and to our unchurched neighbors? One appraisal of human history would suggest that humans have always been on an upward trajectory biologically, intellectually, morally, religiously, and theologically. I will argue that humans have not fallen from perfection, but from potential; not from the ideal, but from what could have been. God Saw that It Was Good, the Problem of Evil, and a Scientifically Informed Theodicy

Anjeanette (AJ) Roberts

The Scriptures and human experience make abundantly clear that we have limited perspective. Our limited perspective can lead to rushes in judgment in all manner of circumstances. This tendency certainly holds true in response to natural disasters, frequently categorized as natural evil due to the real destruction, pain, and suffering they cause. Natural evil seemingly subverts Christian claims of God's goodness and power and, thus, represents one of the greatest apologetic (and possibly personal) challenges we face today.

I propose that a greater understanding of nature, obtained through scientific discoveries, corrects our rush to judgment in the face of these natural phenomena and serves as the basis for a theodicy against natural evil. Three brief case studies—earthquakes, bacteria, and viruses— highlight how these evils are actually vitally important for human flourishing. These case studies invite us to revise our thinking about things we judge as evil primarily due to our impoverished understanding or perspective.

This scientifically informed theodicy against natural evil invites us to consider how we may similarly rush to judgment about the evils of adversity, pain, and suffering. There, too, we find hidden potential for much greater good. As other notable theologians and authors have done, I call for a consideration of how nature, Scripture, and the incarnation affirm God's good intentions in regard to the formation and maturation of the human soul in the midst of adversity and trials. Language, Empathy, and Morality: Adam’s Evolutionary Journey to Maturity and Guilt

Jay Johnson

In the last decade, science effectively ruled out an original “first pair” as the origin of our species, and 8 million Millennials transferred their allegiance from Jesus to “none of the above.” Those two facts are related. When asked, many dropouts say the literalist interpretation of Genesis 1–3 forced them into a dilemma—either evolution, or the Bible.

In reply, this paper reads the biblical and scientific narratives of human origins in concert to reveal some surprising resonances. It begins by sketching the story of human evolution from the start of the Homo genus through the “Out of Africa” migration and the “Great Leap Forward” of the cognitive revolution. How are these events related to ha’adam and imago Dei? The evolution of symbolic language allowed for the possibility of true morality. Only after acts became symbolized could they represent abstract classes of action such as “good” or “evil.” Multiple lines of evidence point to the period just before the “Out of Africa” migration as the time when humanity developed a lexicon of abstract words—the sine qua non for mature moral knowledge. Simultaneously, this was the birth of conscience. At that point, the “fall” was not only inevitable, it was historical.

This paper thus attempts to resolve two key questions in the evolution/Genesis dilemma:

 Can ha’adam and the “fall” be located in history?  Can the origin and transmission of sin be explained in an evolutionary context? God’s Agape: Multiple-Routes Design for the Universe

Chris Barrigar

Current Christian theologies of Creation and apologetics often fail to take sufficient account of a range of elements within mainstream scientific knowledge today. In particular, it remains unclear how such phenomena as randomness and contingency, probabilistic physics, thermodynamics, massively-large numbers, astrobiology, evolution, and multiple- realizability all fit with a teleological universe. Moreover, the apparent inability of such features to fit with a purposeful universe is frequently used by Materialists (atheists) to critique Theism. The author proposes a new account of God’s design of the universe, called “the Agape/Many-Routes account,” which contends that, and demonstrates how, these phenomena are strategically built into the universe by God in order to achieve God’s agape- love telos for the universe. This enables Christians to gain a more comprehensive picture of how contemporary science fits with faith, provides a powerful pro-evolution alternative to Intelligent Design (of Behe, Demski, et al.), and provides new resources in responding to a variety of Materialist arguments against Theism. The Mystery of the Watery Creation in Genesis 1

Alan Dickin

The creation accounts of Genesis are recognized as some of the most profound works ever composed, but are also acknowledged to be works of profound mystery. Why did God in his wisdom reveal creation in a way that appears to contradict a scientific account of origins? And why do the creation stories in Genesis 1 and 2 seem so different? Beyond their different perspective, these accounts describe acts of creation in a different order and in very different environments. Genesis 1 begins in water and describes the creation of plants, then animals, then man; Genesis 2 begins with dry dust and describes the creation of man, then plants, then animals. The watery context of Genesis 1 suggests a linkage with the story of Noah’s Flood, seen by many scholars as an act of ‘un-creation’ that returned the earth to its initial chaotic state. However, rather than Genesis 1 inspiring the story of un-creation in the Flood, it was more likely the experience of the Flood that inspired a vision of creation described in Genesis 1. This vision probably began with the chaotic watery darkness of the Flood, and its ordering of the Heavens and the Earth paralleled the re-ordering of the world after the Flood. The recipient of this vision would have heard the divine command and saw its creative power, but in turning his experience into words he spoke out of a pre-scientific world-view. From Boomers to Doomers: How Scientific Reductionism Gave Birth to Contemporary Nihilism

Jamin Hübner

The sense of meaningless in contemporary culture has been thoroughly noted by cultural critics, sociologists, mental health professionals, philosophers, and others. Yet it remains a puzzle for all to ponder: How can an age of increasing material prosperity yield increasing suicide rates and thriving city life lead to radical loneliness? My paper will suggest that the ethos of modern scientific reductionism is central in the loss of meaning, and that the modern scientific enterprise is inherently slanted towards anti-semantic (i.e., meaningful) outcomes. Using cognitive linguistics and the work of Owen Barfield as a springboard, this presentation will explain the mechanics of such big-picture “deconstruction,” offer a non-reductionist perspective on “causation,” and suggest steps we can take to avoid the temptation of hegemonic metanarratives and produce a more hopeful future. Alterations in Times, Seasons, and Biblical Text: The Impact of Horological Science on the Interpretation and Translation of Scripture

David Van Dyke

In advancing from the primitive precursors of sundials to today’s atomic clocks, the magnitude of human achievements in the science and technology of horology – the study and measurement of time – are almost unparalleled. Sustained scientific and technological efforts over many centuries has enabled the measurement of time with amazing accuracy and precision, and was foundational to the advance of the whole scientific and technological enterprise. But as historians of technology (e.g. Lewis Mumford, Technics and Civilization), and perceptive critics of our secular age (e.g. Os Guinness, Prophetic Untimeliness) have emphasized, it has also fundamentally influenced human thought and perception. Daily life in modern civilization is completely regulated by chronometric technology. This has undeniably molded the unconsciously-held bedrock assumptions of the modern worldview.

In reflecting on the challenges in interpreting early Genesis (Honouring the Written Word of God), theologian J.I. Packer suggested that “clock-time” assumptions play a significant role in literalistic approaches to Scriptural interpretation. This presentation will explore how assumptions rooted in daily practice of horological science, and the clockwork cosmological view derived from it, have profoundly influenced both Biblical interpretation and translation. The particular instance to be explored in depth is the evolution of the Hebrew text of the “refrain” of Genesis 1 into the rendering of such Reformation-era versions as the KJV, which continues to have a dominant role in shaping popular and theological views of the Creation Days. In Defense of Chaos: Leviathan, Unpredictability, and an Ethos of Wonder and Reconciliation

Alex Breitkopf

This paper will progress in three parts. First, using Riffaterre’s semiotic approach, particularly his “two-stages” of reading, I will explore the imagery of Leviathan as it is presented in the biblical text, especially in the book of Job. I will argue that the biblical imagery presents Leviathan—broadly understood in the ancient Near East as a creature/force of chaos (something hostile to the created order)—as something outside of human control and yet, in contrast to the ancient understanding, wholly part of the created order.

Second, after having done this, I will draw connections between the biblical presentation of Leviathan, as an uncontrollable yet integral part of creation, and “chaotic” natural systems—as written about by Tom McLeish (Professor of physics at Durham University)—such as earthquakes and storms, which exhibit patterns that are unpredictable by modern science.

Finally, taking these together, I conclude that chaos, understood as unpredictable systems or forces outside of human control, is an integral and intended part of the created world. This understanding, rooted in both a biblical worldview and modern science, suggests an ethos and ethic for our interaction with and our understanding of the natural world (human and non-human creation) that is grounded in wonder and reconciliation rather than in systems based on domination and control. Servanthood and Service: The Challenges of Implementing Biblical Perspectives within Natural Resource Management

Lynn Braband and Susan P Rupp

The intersection of a biblical vision with science can be particularly challenging when seeking to implement such a vision within science as applied to modern issues. We will explore some of the challenges within one area of natural resource management, wildlife biology, especially in seeking to use scriptural concepts in guiding our involvement. We will explain the paradigm undergirding modern wildlife management, the impact of an increasingly pluralistic society, and the implications within our areas of professional involvement. In the U.S.A. and Canada, the historical and legal system that undergirds the management of wildlife and similar natural resources has become known as the Public Trust Doctrine. This states that these resources are the property of the country’s citizens, with government agencies serving as trustees, holding the resources in trust for current and future generations of the public, who are the shareholders and beneficiaries. The public, however, has become increasingly diverse, consisting of multiple stakeholders with often conflicting value-sets. After reviewing some of the extensive research on the impact of sociocultural factors on these values and the increasing focus on the role of ethical analysis, we will describe how we seek to use biblically informed thinking, such as Imago Dei, servanthood, humility, and stewardship, in two areas: environmental consulting and human- wildlife conflicts. Love Is a Radical Way of Knowing

Nathan Kwan

The mechanistic worldview underlies the disciplines of science, technology and applied sciences. I define the mechanistic worldview as a material and reductionist worldview in the same category as logical positivism. I am interested in this topic because my undergraduate degree was in Engineering. I was exposed to a mechanistic worldview that was at odds with Christianity. The history of the 20th century has led to unintended consequences in the adoption of the mechanistic worldview, including Eugenics, the horrific scientific experiments in Nazi Germany during World War II, and the destruction of the environment.

Hans Von Balthasar is a critic of this mechanistic worldview in Theo-Logic 1. Balthasar suggests there is a difference between empiricism, which is the approximate method of knowing an object, and subjective knowing. Kierkegaard address a similar point by distinguishing between objectivism and subjective knowing. That is, ‘subjective’ knowing is a committed relationship between the subject and the object. In contrast, objectivism is a detached form of knowing. What is this subjective way of knowing? I propose that this subjective way of knowing is love. That is, love is a more mature and perfect way of knowing an object.

I will look at similar viewpoints shared by Henri Nouwen, Simone Weil, Wolfgang Pannenberg, C.S. Lewis, and Robert Jenson. I consider that Balthasar’s Theo-Logic and Love Alone is Credible are important in understanding his theological method, his understanding of love as a way of knowing, and his criticism of the modern worldview. Reconciling with the Earth, Caring for the Land

Linda Schwab

From both a theological and a scientific perspective, human beings are inextricably embedded in and inter-related with all the natural order. Scripture describes this relationship as a covenant, one in which humans bear a unique responsibility to knowingly praise God in daily life and work. The current ecological crisis is, therefore, also an ethical and spiritual crisis, manifested in both alienation from nature and the failure to recognize limits to wants and desires.

The vitally necessary response to this crisis is reconciliation. Reconciliation goes beyond “environmental stewardship” or “creation care,” because these phrases so often describe the “care” and “stewardship” of an absentee landlord. Reconciliation takes particularly effective form in care of the land, a practice open to and required of all in daily life. Land care also particularly acknowledges and supports the rural regions of this country, which are increasingly abandoned by the church.

The witness of Scripture on the vital necessity of land care is reflected in tradition, reason, and experience. Tradition, as the living interpretive encounter, ranges from ancient—such as John of Damascus and Athanasius—to modern. It includes not only scholars such as Ellen F. Davis but also writers whose theological contributions are less recognized than their literary ones, Gerard Manley Hopkins and Wendell Berry. My response to and synthesis of these sources is formed by a career in science and more recently by the work and life of a smallholder-farmer. “When I Consider Your Heavens”: Cosmology and Worship in the Scientific Era

Nathanael E. Lange

Although many Christians and scientists tacitly accept that science and religion endeavor towards wholly distinct, if not contrary, ends, there is a precedent in Scripture for the knowledge and understanding gained through scientific inquiry to serve to enrich believers’ worship. This paper will consider Psalm 8 as a model for this specific application of scientific insight. The paper will address the theological and anthropological impact of the psalmist’s cosmology, as well as how the relationship between the resultant theology and anthropology serves as a call to worship. It will then explore the potential theological and anthropological impact of a contemporary cosmology informed by prevailing scientific theory, and how the intersection of the consequent views of God and man might similarly call believers today to worship. “Wise and Sensible”: The Sheep of His Pasture

Margaret Flowers

On the sixth day of creation, the first animals spoken into existence by God are livestock (Gen 1:24–25). This placement gives domesticated animals special honor in creation. In ancient Israel, perhaps the most important variety of livestock was the sheep, used for clothing, for milk, for meat, and as part of the ritual sacrifices. Sheep were also a symbol for the people of God. However, today they are often pictured as not terribly intelligent – far from one of the wonders of creation.

Basing this description on today’s most specialized sheep breeds, many of which exhibit very strong flocking behavior and docility, loses richness and depth critical to the biblical text. Primitive breeds, in contrast, are typically more independent and alert in their behavior. They still need a shepherd’s protection, but their greater individual autonomy compares more closely to recognized human behaviors.

This is uniquely evident today in the sheep of Iceland, a primitive northern breed. A genetic strain of these, which Icelanders named “leadersheep,” have an exceptional ability to pick out a safe path and to sense danger and impending weather changes. The skillful shepherd works with the special abilities of these “wise and sensible” flock leaders. For over 500 years of Icelandic Bible translation, Micah 2:13 renders the one leading the flock as a “leadership sheep.” This powerful interpretive image, offering an intriguing perspective on God’s work with humankind, is one I too see in action on my farm.

Antiquity and Arithmetic: A Rhetorical-Critical Reading of Noah’s Ark

Dustin Burlet

Noah’s ark is a topic that has caught the imagination of countless people throughout history— both ancient and modern. But if Noah was indeed a real figure, who not only existed within space and time but also built/victualed the ark and survived a cataclysmic Deluge while on board (all of which Scripture seems to markedly indicate), numerous questions arise concerning this Brobdingnagian vessel that demand our attention. To be clear, though many scholars note that the relations between the length, width, and height of Noah’s ark (roughly 450 feet long, 75 feet in width, and 45 feet in height) recapitulates the standard shape of most sea-faring vessels (30:5:3), many contemporary scholars also raise concerns about the dimensions of Noah’s ark due to established knowledge of ancient seamanship and naval engineering, which provide evidence signifying that Noah’s ark would have been impressively large compared to other ships in antiquity. Acute awareness of these matters, alongside increased cognizance of academic arithmetic in the ancient world (particularly within the Flood accounts of Atrahasis and Utnapishtim of Gilgamesh), lead one to consider the possibility that the dimensions of the ark may have been devised with a rhetorical effect in mind and that they may not be relative to the actual size of the vessel itself. This paper will thus examine the Noachic Deluge narrative using the methodology of rhetorical analysis to better ascertain whether or not the dimensions of the ark are hyperbolic numbers—purposefully exaggerated for rhetorical effect to make a (theological) point. The Ways of Interpreting God’s Objective World: Schemata, Paradigms, and Worldviews

Daniel Hitchcock

My paper explores the issue of interpretive frameworks by interrelating insights from psychology, philosophy of science, and Christianity. Following a three-fold strategy I will first highlight how subjectivity takes place at the level of the individual as explained by cognitive schema theory. Recent insights suggesting a possible neural basis of our interpretive frameworks will also be discussed. Second, I will show that, fundamentally, the same cognitive process lies at the heart of human social efforts and collaboration. Interpretive frameworks not only function for us as individuals but also in collective ways. This will take us into the domain of the philosophy of science which has shown that subjectivity manifests via shared interpretive frameworks. The process has been labeled in a variety of ways with the most recognized being ‘paradigms’. Third, I will address the implication that arises from all of this subjectivity. If we interpret the world via subjective frameworks, is not this a position of relativism? Is not this antithetical to the Christian faith, which upholds the notion of objective absolute truth? Several articulations of Christian worldview philosophy have provided an answer to help resolve the apparent conflict. It is based upon the biblical insight that the way we see and understand stems ultimately from the condition of our heart. In conclusion, I will argue that interpretive frameworks are fundamental to our God-given human nature and that to affirm their role in human functioning poses no threat to a biblical view of truth and reality. Why Have You Forsaken Me? Dying in Ecology and Theology

John Wood

Ecology is a life science. But why do ecologists, who spend their time studying the mechanisms of death, rarely name it? I am a Christian. But my Christian friends emphasize hope and new life, seldom talking about death. Yes, there is Easter and the regular celebration of communion, but as the ecotheologian Paul Santmire reminds us, we Christians “are unable to deny death. A religion [with] a crucified Messiah as its fulcrum hardly permits that.” I am challenged: do we believers practically deny the death we claim by faith?

“My God, my God. Why have you forsaken me?” These are some of the most fearful words ever spoken. Without God, in death we are utterly alone. We spiral into the oblivion of non-being – nothingness. Yes, talking about physical death is troubling for us. Yet here is Jesus facing his own death in a peculiar way – “for the joy that was set before him, he endured the cross” (Hebrews 12:2). Physical death was not optional for him, nor is it for us. Without the witness of his resurrection, death would leave us empty of relationship.

Physical death is the necessary gateway. But when death is framed solely as the enemy, our options appear limited. Today a convergence of economic and demographic pressures, together with ecological discovery and medical-technical developments, present unprecedented challenges to traditional notions of death. We need new insights and fresh theological resources to meet the challenging questions of caring for people in extremis and caring for the earth.

Moses as Scientist-Philosopher: A Chronological Analysis of Mosaic Authorship in Medieval Hexameral Literature

Ryan Smith

Scriptural interpretation and its relationship to scientific inquiry has been a consistent topic of research and debate in the modern period, but there has been comparatively little analysis of interpretative models from the medieval period. Recent research in medieval hermeneutics and interpretation, particularly in regard to authorial theory (such as Alastair Minnis’ Medieval Theory of Authorship: Scholastic Literary Attitudes in the Later Middle Ages) offer considerable opportunities to deepen our understanding of medieval interpretations of creation texts.

This paper will partly remedy that deficiency by exploring Moses’s role as an author in Hexameral literature from its Christian inception until the late medieval period; with a particular focus on the increased use of Aristotelian logic and its interpretive implications in the late medieval period. This analysis will reveal steady assumptions throughout the period about the role of Moses as author in his moral excellence, his divine inspiration, and his philosophical and scientific wisdom, but will also reveal the increased interest in his historical situation to explain difficult aspects of the text. This paper will explore three interpretation tensions: between human and divine authorship, between the quadraplex sensus and the multiplex modus, and between the literal sense of the text and philosophical/scientific beliefs. Each of these tensions, and their various resolutions offer a lens to understand the various convictions that were at work in medieval interpretation and why the historical situation of Moses became much more significant in later interpretation. Experiments in Environmental Guerilla Journalism

Joshua Arp

In their recent studies of the book of Judith, both Benedikt Eckhardt and Michael Chyutin argue that the Second Temple period witnessed a Hasmonean literary hegemony. No one could enter the literary “party” without the proper “costume.” Judith’s anti-Hasmonean author, however, would not be stopped at the door. Instead, cleverly the author composed a tale that was acceptable on the surface but that smuggled a culturally subversive structural message.

Here the linguistic notion of surface structure versus deep structure is a helpful analogy, and as a “green” newspaper columnist I have wondered if today’s secularist media fortress can be breached by similarly smuggling structural contraband in surface-compliant disguise. In short, can a Christian journalist translate Christian structures into seemingly unrelated spheres? For example, I tried to write an environmental translation of Psalm 104 as my “secular” Christmas ecological column.

I call this endeavor “guerilla journalism.” To engage in guerilla journalism, it is necessary to contemplate the structural distinctives of the Christian worldview. Two of my mentors in this task are C. S. Lewis and G. K. Chesterton, and in this paper, I utilize them as conversation partners. Having charted the course, this paper not only gives examples of my own experiments in environmental journalism, but sets an agenda for further forays in this field and invites others to contemplate the possibility of pursuing this type of ministry in this and other disciplines. The Missing Link in the Science and Religion Debate: Taking the Problem of Human Sinfulness Seriously

Kerry Colling

Throughout history humans have been marked by conflict of all sorts. Although religion or religious ideas have been inherent in the most brutal political and military conflicts in our history, beginning in the twentieth century there has been a pervasive dispute between science and religion in North America. Some thinkers place the blame for this on the “warfare thesis” advocated by John William Draper and Andrew Dickinson White, who were motivated by anti- religious/anti-God sentiments. However, there has also been an “in house” war between those Christians who largely accept the findings of science and those who vehemently reject a majority of claims made by the scientific enterprise, since they find these claims at odds with their interpretation of pertinent passages in Scripture.

What has been largely ignored in our understanding of contemporary debates is the historic teaching on the nature of humans and our propensity to sin. Given this teaching, we should expect conflict and even warfare when science butts up against the claims of religion and faith, since those who advocate different positions are fallen human beings.

In view of this reality, those of us who are Christian need to acknowledge our own situatedness and strive to understand those with opposing views (whether they are other Christians or identify as atheists or agnostics) so that a path to healthy dialog ensues. This paper will survey a few recent studies in the science-religion debates and show how a Christian view of human nature, rationality, and faith may just take the heat out of the conflict, as well as foster new ways of dealing with the opposition. Reading Psalm 7 in Historical and Canonical Contexts: From Formulary Oath to Didactic Davidic Petition

Andy Witt

How does an ancient text, written in a specific historical context, speak with relevance to future generations?

Historical-critical study of Psalm 7 has identified it—and other psalms of individual lament—as having an original setting within a juridical context in ancient Israel. Some scholars have even argued that the psalm is the formulary which was spoken during the court scene pictured in 1 Kings 8:31–32.

While there is much in the content of the psalm that could speak to such a context, a canonical reading of the psalm calls for a reevaluation of the ongoing relevance of such a setting. The work of Brevard Childs and Gerald Sheppard has emphasized the need to recognize that “semantic transformation” takes place as a psalm has been recontextualized within its new setting as Scripture, in the book of Psalms.

In this paper, I argue that the biographical superscription of Psalm 7, which connects it to the life of David, provides such semantic transformation, which allows the psalm to speak to future generations of God’s people. In this new context, the figure of David functions as the persona through whom the psalm is voiced, allowing it to function not only as a prayer of David connected to his biography, but also as Davidic instruction for future praying persons. Through the superscription, then, Psalm 7 provides a model for understanding how semantic transformation might also take place in other psalms in the Psalter. Providence and Probability

E. Janet Warren

Providence, or God’s interaction with the world, is an important topic in Christian piety. People confidently claim specifics (“God answered my prayer for sunshine at my party), and generalities (“God will provide a way”). However, much is misunderstood. We confuse chance in the world with purposelessness and atheism, we confuse the Creator and his creation, and we confuse group and individual behavior. Furthermore, our cognitive processes are biased toward seeing patterns and meaning, and our sinful tendencies are toward certainty and self-justification. These misunderstandings can be clarified and our biases mitigated by increasing our knowledge of probability and randomness in the world and the Bible.

In this presentation, I suggest that an understanding of the nature of the world can enhance our understanding of divine providence. Creation is wonderful but complex and indeterminate; most occurrences result from multiple interacting processes, and are best described in terms of probability not certainty. Since creation reflects the Creator, scientific observations are compatible with Christian theology.

First, I review the statistical concept of probability and the concept of randomness and its usefulness in the world. Then I review cognitive science research on decision making: we tend to make quick, emotional judgments, ignore sample size, base rates, and randomness, prefer anecdotes to statistics, and exhibit multiple biases. Next I review probability and randomness in the Bible and Christian theology, noting, with consideration of interpretive nuances, that these are compatible. Randomness respects freedom, allows for creativity, and increases possibilities. I also discuss providence in relationship to probability theory and suggest that middle-ground models best approximate the state of the world. In conclusion, I propose that probability theory is a helpful tool for Christianity; if understood and employed with humility and wisdom, it can quantify uncertainty, improve our judgments, enhance our faith, and inform our pastoral care. Creating the SuperCrip: Disability, Gene Editing, and the Imago Dei

Nathan Stenberg

With the genesis of CRISPER-babies and genome engineering, the idea of creating a “designer” human quickly shifts from fantasy to reality. This new technology has left ethicists, theologians, and philosophers pondering how such technology should be used. In the disability community there is great debate between whether gene editing will become a new form of eugenics, used to eliminate whole groups of disabled people in the name of social betterment, or if it will provide individuals with disabilities an opportunity to achieve a prosperous life free of their medical disabilities. How might the biblical vision of the imago Dei give guidance on how to incorporate a theological perspective within discourse around disability and the boundaries of gene editing?

This paper will address this question by first offering a brief introduction to how Christian intellectual history and creation theology has influenced scientific thought around genetics and disability by engaging with Terence Keel’s new monograph Divine Variations: How Christian Thought Became Racial Science. Second, an exegetical account of the imago Dei (Genesis 1:26– 28) with a lens of disability will be utilized to give a theological perspective to the conversation around disability and the potential for gene editing.

Ecological Wisdom, God’s Wisdom, and Human Vocation in Creation

Jeff Wheeldon

The title of this year’s conference—God’s Wisdom and the Wonder of Creation—brings to mind the Global Greens Charter, the foundational document of a political movement to which every Green Party in the world belongs. The first principle of the Charter is “Ecological Wisdom”, which is defined in terms of an acknowledgement that “human beings are part of the natural world,” a statement of respect for “the specific values of all forms of life, including non-human species,” and the further acknowledgement that “human society depends on the ecological resources of the planet, and must ensure the integrity of ecosystems and preserve biodiversity and the resilience of life supporting systems.”

Such a definition of “ecological wisdom” challenges some long-entrenched theological notions of anthropocentrism, and aligns well with a stewardship model of theological anthropology that situates us within what Richard Bauckham calls “the community of creation”. But if human vocation can be described theologically in ways that are analogous to this definition of “ecological wisdom”, then another point of the Global Greens’ description of ecological wisdom becomes even more poignant: that the Indigenous peoples of the world are recognized for having maintained a more integral relationship with the community of creation than settler cultures, and as such their cultures and nations are upheld in gratitude as an example or even an embodiment of ecological wisdom. In this frame, the dehumanizing treatment and cultural genocide of Indigenous peoples around the world takes on a distinct theological significance beyond the increasingly obvious racism that has historically and continues to frame settler/Indigenous relations. From an ecotheology perspective, attempts to destroy the cultures of Indigenous peoples threaten to eradicate the stewardship role of humanity altogether, destroying the last vestiges of the function for which humanity was created.

This paper intends to briefly examine Bauckham’s “community of creation” in comparison to the Global Greens’ notion of “ecological wisdom” in order to establish a resonance that opens the rest of the Global Greens’ statement to theological implications, and then to expand on the ethical implications that arise from it in relation to the cultural genocide of Indigenous peoples in North America.

Christ of the Neanderthals: Redefining the Imago Dei in Light of Modern Paleoanthropology

Brett Potter

Recent work in paleoanthropology has brought to the foreground the diverse array of hominids who not only pre-dated, but lived alongside Homo sapiens for thousands of years. Scientists call these closely-related species by names such as the Neanderthals and Denisovans, but we are only just beginning to understand just how closely related modern humans are – even in terms of inherited DNA—to these “other” humans, and to how their history is bound up with our own.

The existence of these alternative “human” communities raises a primary question for theological anthropology – what do Neanderthals mean for our definition of “human”? New approaches are needed. For example, Rahner’s short book Hominization is fixated on the question of anthropogenesis: how, or at what point, did human beings become “human” from a theological perspective? Was there a process of “ensoulment” by which primitive humans transitioned into creatures with eternal souls, fashioned in the image of God? These kinds of approaches, however, fall prey to an essentialist view of the human being – the idea that there is a central set of characteristics which cleanly and clearly mark out the human, theologically speaking, over against any “sub-human” species. However, our emerging picture of Neanderthals – that they were in fact intelligent, artistic, and formed complex societies – calls this essentialist approach into question.

This paper suggests that rather than a structural approach which defines the imago Dei in particular anthropocentric ways, we ought to pursue a relational paradigm which would see humanity defined Christologically—in other words, in relation to Christ (as is the case in Gregory of Nyssa). Theologically, this allows Christ’s “taking on human flesh” to extend beyond a narrow conception of the human to a broader range of enfleshed creatures, reframing questions of origin into questions of relationship. Technology, Time, and Living the Sabbath

Jeffrey McPherson

That we live in a world fundamentally transformed by technology is obvious to everyone. Whether or not this transformation is good, evil, or neutral is, however, the subject of much debate. While it seems impossible in the 21st century to live without technology, we do not often consider how the technological worldview has transformed the mode of our thinking and our relationship to the world around us. This paper will argue that our technological age (which transcends simply using technology as a tool) dictates the mode of our thinking and mediates our relationship with reality in such a way that we become alienated from our true nature.

Furthermore, this paper will argue that the biblical worldview offers an important corrective to the technological worldview. Keeping the Sabbath, which is an essential part of the law, encompasses so much more than simply following a given set of rules. Living the Sabbath requires a transformed heart which prioritizes sacred space and time, dedicating them to the service of God and others. It is in keeping the Sabbath, properly understood, that we can be reoriented to the world around us and reconnected to our true nature.

This paper will focus on the concept of time as a means to explore the relationship between the technological and biblical worldviews. Samuel Taylor Coleridge on “Our Place among the Infinities”: The Cosmic Scope of a Developing Theistic Vision

J. Gerald Janzen

In The Age of Wonder (2008), Richard Holmes explores “How the Romantic Generation Discovered the Beauty and Terror of Science” (the book’s subtitle). Coleridge’s prominence in this narrative is indicated in the lengthy list of citations in Holmes’s Index.

A leading Romantic poet, and for a time a prominent political essayist and editorialist, Coleridge was also a lifelong avid reader of scientific journals from astronomy to chemistry and physics. Born two years before William Herschel’s first large telescope opened human eyes to the vastness of the cosmos, thereby raising afresh (and, for some, disturbingly) the question of “Our Place among the Infinities,” Coleridge’s eyes were first opened to that vast cosmos by his clergyman father, and before that to an even deeper mystery by his mother; and the cosmic scope of his theistic vision perdured throughout his life.

I shall present and comment briefly on half a dozen of his texts, tracking the development of his vision from the implicit faith of childhood, through the oft-asserted quasi-pantheist sentiments in his poem, The Eolian Harp, to a fusion of Trinitarian cosmic vision and implicit faith in his old age. Becoming New Creations: Pauline Anthropology in Our Technological Age

Frederick David Carr

Rapid technological advances have led to new anthropological challenges. Specifically, humans are transforming ourselves through recently-developed technological means, and, in turn, these alterations are transforming our conceptions of what it means to be human. Discussions about such changes occur in diverse academic disciplines, the media, religious institutions, and casual conversation. As philosopher Cressida Heyes argues, our language—at the popular level in the West—commonly presupposes forms of anthropological dualism. Contemporary discussions of alterations like sex changes, cosmetic surgeries, and systematic dieting typically assume the existence of a seemingly static, “essential self” inside of a body that must be changed to conform to this true self. One also finds a kind of dualism at play in the publications of organizations like the 2045 Initiative who aims, according to their manifesto, to achieve, the “transfer of individual human consciousness” to a non-biological body. Although these diverse human transformations differ in their aims, they share dualistic convictions that a presumably stable “self” exists distinctly from the body that it inhabits.

As theologians develop theological-anthropological perspectives to address the challenges of our technological era, fresh engagements with the Scriptures are not merely helpful; they are urgently needed. This paper seeks to contribute such an engagement by offering some anthropological insights from Paul’s letters. The paper will argue that Paul’s letters envisage the human person not as a static entity but as a psychosomatic whole that is constituted by ongoing processes of transformation in Christ, and whose selfhood is grounded in realities that are not intrinsic to the person. These insights drawn from Pauline theology exhibit tensions with the normative dualisms of contemporary discourse, and they challenge notions of an autonomous self in a disposable body as starting points for conceptualizing self-transformations in the present age. Revelation through Mystery: The Breadcrumbs in Creation

Candice Fazar

How can paradoxes in physics help the believer to grapple with paradoxes in the faith? Challenges in physics, such as wave-particle duality and the relativity of space and time assert that the things we claim to know are only part of the truth. Thus, even the knowable world of physics has at its very heart things that cannot be known. It is in accepting and appreciating the unknowable things about the physical world that we gain a deeper appreciation for and understanding of the mysteries of faith. We follow the breadcrumbs left behind by the Artist and Author of creation to seek a new revelation of his likeness. And each mystery we manage to grasp—even though as peering through a glass darkly—brings us a little closer to Him. Wells, Springs, and Commodification: Water Rights and Hagar’s Tribulations

Rebecca Copeland

Although biblical authors had no conception of anthropogenic climate change, they did navigate socio-ecological challenges similar to those that climate change is creating today, including new patterns of precipitation and limited access to potable water. In this presentation, I argue that ecomimetic interpretation, or reading with close attention to the non-human characters in biblical narratives, is a strategy that can identify those ecological similarities in spite of the cultural divide that separates 21st century Western interpreters from biblical contexts. To do so, I will apply ecomimetic interpretation to Genesis 16:1–16 and 21:8–21. In the first passage, Hagar flees Sarai’s abuse, and a messenger of God finds her beside a spring and orders her to return. In the second, Abraham casts Hagar out of his household with their son Ishmael, and when they have run out of water a messenger of God rescues Hagar and the child by revealing the presence of a well. Although interpreters have generally sought to justify either Abraham’s or God’s actions in these pericopae, identification with the bodies of water and the hydrogeological conditions of the land represented in these stories reveals a critique of the commodification of both water and women that remains relevant today. The Chaotic Waters and the Womb: Pastoral Implications of Conceptual Metaphors surrounding Birth and Adoption in Science and Scripture

Kristin Helms

Since the publication of George Lakeoff and Mark Johnson’s work on conceptual metaphor theory, scholars of cognitive linguistics have increasingly recognized that metaphors pervade our conceptualizations of the world in all areas of life, including both science and religion. It is also well recognized that metaphors have limits, hiding the aspects of a thing that are not illuminated by the specific metaphor. Because many metaphors that dominate cultural conceptions of the world go unnoticed, we do not typically consider the ways in which they are silently empowering and limiting our understanding. When we hit the limits of our understanding within the framework of our unrecognized metaphors, and we feel trapped. In such situations, introducing an alternative metaphor can enable us to see our experiences of reality in a new way.

This paper will explore the pastoral importance of supplementing scientific metaphors with biblical theological metaphors surrounding the concept of the mother’s role in childbirth. At present, most women in America conceptualize their ability (or inability) to give birth in terms of the conceptual metaphors used in medicine, particularly THE WOMB IS A MACHINE. While this useful metaphor generates fantastic breakthroughs and generally safer births, it faces limits, especially in its ability to address pastoral issues faced by women who are also persons, not mechanical objects. By exploring the particular theological metaphors in Exodus 2:1–10 that BIRTH IS CREATION and MOTHERS ARE GOD’S CREATING REPRESENTATIVES, the paper will discuss how the Scripture usefully illuminates alternative aspects of birth hidden by THE WOMB IS A MACHINE, most notably in its presentation of adoption as an actual form of birthing a child into the world, drawing the child out of the chaotic waters. This has significant pastoral implications for women in processing experiences of birth. Evolutionary Creationism: Scientific and Biblical Perspectives

David S. Barnes

Evolutionary Creation is a key bridge in bringing together, at least in dialogue, young earth creationists, those embracing intelligent design, and humanists. Evolutionary Creation is defined in this paper as affirming that God is the creator and sustainer of the universe, and that God has used evolutionary processes to create some and perhaps virtually all the vast diversity of present and extinct life. Evolutionary Creation accepts that evolutionary processes provide the best current scientific model for the diversity of life and do not compromise biblical inerrancy.

The paper explores the biblical and scientific basis of both Young Earth Creationism and Evolutionary Creation. It considers the significance of the ancient understanding of the cosmos in the Bible, which was accepted in one or more forms from Babylonian and Egyptian antiquity to the Genesis account, and then addresses Galileo’s innovations in the seventeenth century. The paper will present aspects of Young Earth Creationism (including its position on human evolution) critiqued from the perspectives of C. S. Lewis, John Stott, Billy Graham, and Pope John Paul II (all of whom were open, in various degrees, to the science of evolution).

The paper also considers the influence of culture wars on science/faith issues, including those addressed by Evolutionary Creation. It also reviews the Gallop and Pew Research Center poll data on the perceptions on origins among scientists and the general public and reflects on the significance of theological concepts beyond the limits of scientific critique

From World Picture to Worldview: Reading Genesis 1 in Ancient and Contemporary Contexts

J. Richard Middleton

At first glance our modern scientific picture of a universe of immense size and age seems to be in tension with the biblical picture of the world, especially as found in Genesis 1. After all, this text claims that God created “the heavens and the earth” (that is, the cosmos) in six days (then rested on the seventh); and by some calculations (using the genealogies in Genesis) this took place no more than 6,000–10,000 years ago.

But going beyond the assumed contradiction in time scale, there are the widely differing understandings of the size and structure of the cosmos when we compare the Bible with modern science. The world picture that we find both in Genesis 1 and in many other biblical texts seems to assume a flat earth founded upon the waters (with the netherworld somewhere “down there,” either in or below the subterranean waters). At the extremities of the earth were the distant mountains that extended down into the underworld waters and up into the heavens or sky. These mountains were thought of as the “pillars” that supported the dome (or “firmament”) of the heavens, envisioned as a sort of roof over the earth, which held back the cosmic waters above.

This paper will mine the ancient world picture (German Weltbild) or cosmology or “cosmic geography” (a favorite term of scholars) that the Bible assumes in order to discern the normative worldview (German Weltanschuaang), the distinctive and abiding theological vision, revealed precisely through this ancient world picture. Indeed, without attending to the significance of this ancient world picture, we would miss the important theological claims of Genesis 1, its theological vision or normative worldview that is relevant to any cosmology.