Genesis Versus Science: Which Camp Are You In?

Back in the day when I was a high school and college student (late 70’s, early 80’s), I recall young people wrestling with the issue of whether or not the opening chapters of Genesis require us to believe that the earth was created in 6 x 24 = 144 hours and that macroevolution could not possibly have occurred. Because I was brought up as a Roman Catholic, and the Catholic church doesn’t seem to have a problem with non-literal reading of Genesis, this was not a burning question for me personally. But I remember young evangelicals and their friends arguing about this a lot, and the vast majority aligned themselves with either of these two camps.

1. The world was created in 144 hours, evolution didn’t happen, and if you don’t believe that, you are stepping in deep spiritual doo-doo.

2. The world is billions of years old, evolution did happen, and if you don’t agree you must be ignorant, foolish or intellectually dishonest.

Although these two positions seem like polar opposites, their proponents did agree on one thing: the Bible and Science are at odds. If you believe one, you must discredit the other.

By the late 80’s and 90’s, I began to notice a third camp of young people who said, “It doesn’t really matter.” Perhaps they truly believed that the debate was not central to their Christian faith. (If it were, why isn’t it mentioned in the Apostles’ Creed? Why were many church fathers, including St. Augustine, willing to allow that the days in Genesis 1 might be longer than 24 hours?) Or perhaps they were just tired of anything that smelled like the conservative-versus-liberal battles that for too long had dominated politics, culture and theology, and they simply wanted to call for a time-out.

I myself joined that third camp. I didn’t want to take sides. If someone were to lock me in a bathroom and refuse to let me out until I voiced an opinion, this is what I probably would have said: “I believe that the universe and the earth are very old. I think that the creation events described in Genesis chapter 1 did not take place within six 24-hour periods. But I do not necessarily believe all the claims of evolutionary biology; theories of macroevolution are problematic, both from scientific and biblical standpoints.” However, I never needed to say that, because no one ever locked me in the bathroom.

Plenty of good people are hanging around this third camp. People who are popular and highly regarded in the evangelical world. For example, Tim Keller seems to be here. He is willing to allow that the world is very old, and he leaves the door open for some limited, theistic evolution. But his bottom line is that he really doesn’t know much about the creation process and would rather not adopt a strong stance. For this, he has received some mild criticism, especially from the young-earth creationism (YEC) crowd. But he is a without a doubt a very thoughtful, winsome, influential and devout Christian, and everyone whose opinion I respect also respects him.

More recently, I sense the emergence of a fourth camp of evangelicals who, with those in Camp 3, agree that the creation-versus-evolution thing is not one of the central issues of the Christian faith. But they have become more vocal in their opposition to YEC. They openly endorse theistic evolution and are even willing to drop the belief in Adam and Eve as historical individuals. (They do believe that humankind is in a fallen state and needs redemption; they just aren’t sure how it got to be that way.)

Members of this fourth camp include Francis Collins, Peter Enns (whom I blogged about last year) and the rest of the Biologos Foundation, along with many readers of Scot McKnight’s Jesus Creed blog.

For these people, the argument is not really about creation versus evolution. They frame it within a larger question of how we approach and understand the Bible. These people are sincere, devout Christians who really want to take the scripture seriously and uphold its authority as the word of God. At the same time, they want to take full account of scientific evidence (e.g., the fossil record) and reconcile it with scripture in an intellectually  honest way.

These people believe that the initial chapters of Genesis teach genuine spiritual truth, but they should not be read in the same way that one would read a modern science or history textbook; to do so would actually be a misuse of the Scripture, because these chapters are part of an ancient literary genre addressed to ancient readers who make very different scientific and cultural assumptions than we do today.

By adopting this stance, members of Camp 4 have picked a fight with large segments of the evangelical world which still describe the Bible as the “inerrant and infallible” word of God, and regard any erosion of these in- words as a dangerous trend that would undermine the foundations of historic Christianity. In response, the Camp 4 people would say that the creedal statements using the in- words were a 20th century overreaction to the spread of liberal theology which began to deny the historicity of the gospel accounts and even cast doubt on the resurrection of Jesus Christ. They maintain that it is possible to drop the in- words while still maintaining a high view of the Bible and upholding all the key tenets of the Christian creeds.

For the record, I am not yet ready to pull up my stakes and move my tent all the way over to Camp 4. But I do like and admire these guys. I have met Pete Enns and, as far as I can tell, he is the real deal, a man of solid Christian faith. And Francis Collins seems like a jolly good fellow as well. I admire their intellectual prowess and willingness to raise the tough questions that many in Camp 3 seem afraid to voice. Perhaps I can pitch my tent somewhere in between. Maybe I can hang out at Camp 3.14159.

What about you? Do you identify yourself with any of these camps? Does it even matter to you? If you count yourself as a believer in Christ and a member of one of these camps, what do you really think of Christians who pitch their tents elsewhere?