Monthly Archives: March 2018

The creation of Israel

Posted on 29/03/2018 by Jon Garvey

Contrary to what many believe, the Bible does not teach that God stopped creating (Heb. bara) after the sixth day, though clearly the seventh day, God’s sabbath, draws a line under that special week of work. There are nevertheless a good number of references to God’s ongoing secifically creative acts scattered throughout the Old Testament. Some of those uses of the word relate to the creation of Israel as a nation, in Isaiah ch. 43.

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Balancing the books

Posted on 26/03/2018 by Jon Garvey

I was reading a Young Earth Creationist’s critique of Theistic Evolution last week. He made the (usual) case that because of accepting as authoritative the human findings of science over the word of God in the Bible, mainstream TEs have denied virtually every major doctrine of orthodox Christianity.

Posted in Creation, Science, Theology | 27 Comments

More on that methodological thing

Posted on 23/03/2018 by Jon Garvey

In the light of my previous post on methodological naturalism, Ian Thompson kindly made me aware of a book on the Victorian debate between the majority of theistic scientists, such as James Clerk Maxwell, and the naturalists such as Thomas Huxley and the X Club, who eventually triumphed in establishing their programme. It’s an enlightening read.

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Do not touch my anointed

Posted on 21/03/2018 by Jon Garvey

Once more I’ve posted a few comments on BioLogos and got into trouble. Well, that’s been the pattern since 2011, so it’s no surprise. The thread was the old and currently 827-comment-long Buggs/Venema/Swamidass conversation on the population genetics of human origins, a lull in which made me think it was timely to add the kind of cautionary note on the validation of models I’ve sounded here and here.

Posted in Adam, Creation, Science | 22 Comments

Genealogical Adam – isolated tribes

Posted on 19/03/2018 by Jon Garvey

One of the objections to the Genealogical Adam hypothesis is the case of isolated tribes who, perhaps, have never interbred with descendants of Adam in any plausible historical time-frame.

Posted in Adam, Creation, Genealogical Adam, History, Science | 8 Comments

The wisdom of predation

Posted on 15/03/2018 by Jon Garvey

Here’s a nice little news item along the lines of the story I referred to on wolves back in 2013, here. It shows one way the idea that we got from “fallen creation” teaching since the sixteenth century – that predators are a result of the fall and so are evil – has damaged our world. I explore this false, but near-universal, teaching of a fallen creation fully in my book, God’s Good Earth, which I’m pleased to say now looks like coming to publication at some stage not too far off.

Posted in Creation, History, Prometheus | 3 Comments

Methodologies, like theories, have limits

Posted on 12/03/2018 by Jon Garvey

I think my reply to the last critique made by Jay313 to my recent C S Lewis post warrants a longer treatment than an inline comment. So here it is as a post.

Posted in Creation, History, Philosophy, Science, Theology | 27 Comments

Genealogical Adam – another observation (from Equus)

Posted on 09/03/2018 by Jon Garvey

Here’s another small piece of corroborative evidence for the plausibility of the Genealogical Adam Hypothesis (that Adam is not the sole genetic ancestor of modern humanity, but is nevertheless our common genealogical ancestor, with all that entails for our spiritual solidarity with him as federal head).

Posted in Adam, Creation, Genealogical Adam, Science, Theology | 10 Comments

C S Lewis’s argument from reason

Posted on 06/03/2018 by Jon Garvey

In his 1947 book Miracles, C S Lewis presents an argument against naturalism that has become one of the most influential philosophical arguments of its type of the last century. Very briefly, it says that under naturalism, mankind evolved purely by natural selection, for survival alone. His brain, therefore, could only (by the very tenets of materialistic evolutionary theory) be orientated towards survival, and not truth. There is no way then, under naturalism, that one could rely on human reason to discover truths about the world – including, of course, naturalism itself.

Posted in Creation, Philosophy, Science, Theology | 18 Comments

Genealogical Adam – an observation from Eridu.

Posted on 02/03/2018 by Jon Garvey

As I’ve been studying the overall “shape” of biblical theology, in the light of recent work by Evangelicals like John Sailhamer, Seth Postell and a bunch of others including N T Wright, one of the common themes is that the ancient prophets had a much fuller grasp of the universal scope of salvation – we may even say, in a qualified way, of the gospel – than has been recognised either by older scholarship or “the man in the pew.”

Posted in Adam, Creation, Genealogical Adam, Science, Theology | 14 Comments