Genesis vs Science

Dearest Mark, you have raised a good question (which was only brought to my attention last night). I have been contending with this question for years. And I have come to no satisfactory conclusion; or at least the conclusion I deemed as intellectually persuasive and verifiable. Just like the discussion on heaven and our possible occupation in that celestial abode, no one knows for sure nor can anyone describe it with the persuasiveness of authentic, live photographs.

The genesis account of creation was the standard, accepted authority on how the earth and all earth life came about until the 17th century when religious scientists like Copernicus and later Galileo published works that contradicted the Catholic Church’s interpretation of the Bible. It used to be that the earth was at the center of the solar system (and the Ptolemy universe). Then, science reverently disproved it. And we know that science is correct. Before that, the Catholic Church applied Genesis literally and came up with the view that the earth was flat. But now, we will be laughed at if we teach our children that the earth is flat.

Then, an agnostic named Charles Darwin, once a devout believer, joined the fray and proposed in general that our common ancestor was an ape and the latter's common ancestor was a fish and the latter's common ancestor was a multi-celled organism and the latter's common ancestor was a single-celled organism and the latter's ancestor was a pool of goo and possibly, with a little stretch of the imagination, the formless slim (goo) came from another planet far, far away as alien's accidental droppings (or, possibly transported by a passing meteoroid). This was a direct attack on the Genesis account of the instantaneous creation of Adam and Eve.

Now, the debate is about how old the earth is. The young creationist says it is only 6000 years old (some say about 10,000 years old). However, the history books tell us that Sumerians were just learning how to make pottery about 6000 years ago! How do you reconcile that with Genesis?

Further, to be precise, science has established that the earth is 14.7 billion years old. This clearly and disturbingly clashes with the literal 6-day creation. At most, the earth, according to the literal interpretation of the Bible in Genesis, is 6000 years plus 6 day old. So, who is right and who is wrong - Science or the Bible?

Going back to evolution, some Christian scientists crowned it as “God's elegant plan for creating humankind". Others, especially Evangelical Christians who are equally intellectual, denounced evolution as devil's theory, a creation of evil and Charles Darwin was the devil! (so much for freedom of speech and competing ideas).

The truth is, our children in the future will be taught the theory of evolution in colleges or universities as an explanation for the origin of life without any reference to the 1st chapter of Genesis. Imagine respectable institutions of higher learning teaching a theory young creationists see as from the bowels of hell to your precious child and you can do nothing about it! Should we panic?

Alternatively, we can take the middle road, and generally agree with what a highly respected late scientist once said, "Either half my colleagues are enormously stupid, or else the science of Darwinism is fully compatible with conventional religious beliefs and equally compatible with atheism." (Stephen Jay Gould). Can the theory of evolution be religion-friendly?

After all said and done, what is my position?

I have written that evolution has significant gaps but it is nevertheless really elegant, scientifically verifiable to a large extent and intellectually persuasive (that is, if you take the time to study it and not just parroting what others had to say about it). In the end, like faith, it requires some faith to accept evolution. But it is not all irreconcilable with Genesis if we open our mind up to the fact that we serve a God who is far more creative than we can ever imagine and it is within God's abilities to do as he very well pleases: be it an instantaneous creation or a gradual still-equally miraculous evolutionary creation.

As far as I am concerned, the creation of humankind originated from a thought or an idea and not from some blind random mutation in response to some blind random environmental whims. The complexity of our DNA surely points to a designer just like a watch or a well-carved out sandcastle found on the beach points to a maker.

So, Mark, I admit I am digressing. Part of the reason is that I am trying to avoid answering your question and Zenn's because what is the right answer anyway? The sun and moon were clearly created on the fourth day (verse 16 to 19). So, the light on the first day which separated the Night from the Day, and where evening and morning were cosmically apportioned, befuddles or confuses the sincere reader seeking for a coherent and consistent explanation. Surely, this first light (before the created sun and moon) has to be God's light and the darkness should logically refer to the formless, void depth - possibly existing before space and time were created. Note that space can be bent by gravity and time can be warped by speed and gravity, thanks to Einstein. Thus, space and time are not absolutes.

So, before the beginning, space and time did not exist; only the light of God.

Mark, I invite you to imagine an eternity-universe before space and time came about and this eternity-universe may be different in scope and content from this present universe. This eternity-universe may very well be the home of disembodied beings like angels and demons. So, the darkness may be outside of the created heavens and earth. Or, it may be somewhere inside this created heavens and earth but in another dimension and in another form (note that scientists have recently discovered theoretically that there may be many dimensions not visible to the human senses - thanks to something call the string theory).

Mark, you may ask now: Michael, you are not helping. Well, I don't even know whether I am helping myself to understand what I am trying to help you to understand…?

So, how about the evening and morning before the fourth day when God created sun and moon? Maybe this refers to the division between the darkness of hell as a result of Lucifer’s rebellion and the light of God; both held in constant balance, tension and conflict.

Note that hell is enshroulded in perennial darkness because, even though God is light and his presence is everywhere, it is possible that His presence is felt in hell but not manifested or expressed. So, there is no light in hell. Understood? Prove-able? Go ahead, be my guest.

Or maybe, this "evening and morning" should not be taken literally. One author's view is that the evening and morning refers not to the demarcation of night and day but describes God creating in a cycle with a beginning and an ending. The morning refers to the start of creation activity and the evening, the end or resting of creation activity. So, one should not interpret it literally. Some even suggested that the Genesis account should be read poetically. Mark, whatever floats your boat, poetry or literalism.

Lastly, Zenn wrote about not taking the first few days of creation (before humans came into existence) as literal 24-hour day. This is partly the gap theory to accommodate and reconcile science with the Bible. If science says that the earth, through fossil records and half-life of radioactivity isotopes, is 14.7 billion years, then maybe each day of the first five days represents an era or an epoch of much longer time period than the chronological 24-hour day. Maybe one day is millions and millions of years.

You see, before we came into being, time is irrelevant or a-relevant.

For example, let me ask you this question: if a log dropped in the middle of a dense, deep forest, and no one was there to hear it, does it make a sound?

If no human being heard it, the sound it makes, if we can call it a “sound”, is irrelevant. It is as good as saying there is no sound. Mark, you must be all geared up to throw in your view on this. But what I am trying to say is that all that the dropped log had created was mere soundless vibration. Right? And this vibration has to reach our eardrum for processing. And if it does, then our eardrum will resonate accordingly and feed it into our nervous system. From there, it goes to our brain for interpretation, that is, our brain will tell us the loudness of the sound, our memory system will tell us where we had heard the sound before, and our frontal cortex will make sense of the sound, that is, is it a warning of foreboding danger or a friendly sound?

You see, this is a complex system of processing only us human beings and animals can perform. Without us, living beings, can we call this “unprocessed, un-interpreted sound” a sound? It is basically just vibration, molecules bouncing off other molecules.

So, by extension, if we did not exist at all, what is time then? No one can read or tell time. Even if it existed, and we can call it “time” for lack of a better word, is it relevant?

Mark, my main point is that the whole universe, that is, the rotation of the earth, moon and planets, the division of night and day, the changes in the climate, the physics of gravitational pull, and the chemistry of life, makes sense because of us. We are the missing link to making sense of everything that is around us. Without us, nothing makes sense. Before we came on board, time could be a 24-hour day cycle, or a two-hundred-million day cycle. Time held no relevance, whatsoever.

In any event, if no one was there to tell time, time has lost it’s function permanently. Some even say that it was as if the whole universe was waiting for us to finally come along to make sense of it all. Mark, you dig?

So, my conclusion is that life is a mystery. Even scientists have to admit that they are knowing more and more of less and less. One author, professor emeritus James P. Carse, wrote that there are three kinds of ignorance. Ordinary ignorance is what you do not know because you have not asked or read to find out about it. It is not knowing because you were just not informed of it. All of us are ignorant of something. None of us are know-it-all.

Mark you may not know about divorce laws. And I may not know about the intricacies of the stock market. It is normal. We can dispel this ignorance by learning about them. By learning, our ignorance is converted to knowledge.

The second kind of ignorance is willful ignorance. This is the ignorance that comes with arrogance and dogmatism. It is a condition whereby “we are aware there is something we do not know, but choose not to know it.” These are the people you need to avoid or at least avoid engaging them in a debate because they are never wrong even when they are clearly wrong. These are the people who can turn black to white, argue until the cows are even afraid to come home, and make nonsense out of nonsense. They are the typical stick-in-the-mud (or cement) characters. When they have ossified or entrenched themselves in their own belief system, they will defend it with their life even when proven wrong by acceptable standard of measure. This kind of ignorance will harm you mentally and emotionally because you will never learn the truth even when it kicks you in the face a hundred times over.

Then, the last kind of ignorance is referred to as a higher ignorance. This ignorance is described as one that is “a result of long reflection, combining a deep reading of the thinkers who have gone before us with a continuing process of self-examination.” Mark, you fall under this category. You reflect about things. You query, you argue, you expose inconsistencies. The Bible is there for you to dissect, strip apart and debate. But at the same time, you admit your limitations. You know your search, like all scientific searches, however earnest and diligent, will bring you to a point where you can go no further. Unless you are God, you will have to admit your dependence on Him by trust and faith.

There is definitely a gap in our knowledge about Genesis. There even appears to be some inconsistencies that cannot be reconciled by human effort. So, what shall we do? Professor Carse suggests this, “To know God (or the mind of God), they typically said, is to be God; therefore, not being God, all things divine remain forever hidden from us.” The Bible in Deut 29:29 echoes the same sentiment, “The secret things belong unto the Lord our God, but the things which are revealed belong to us and to our children forever, that we may do all of the words of this law.”

So, God has secrets and it is locked up somewhere in this vast universe and He has kept it from us for reasons only our faith can console. This is where we will have to draw the line and accept that we have reached a knowledge traffic junction with red lights against us, telling us to stop and reflect. I sincerely believe that science and God work together hand in glove, and when science reveals some of the mysteries of God in the future, the red lights will turn green to beckon us to proceed forward. But then, we will reach another knowledge traffic junction and we will have to stop again for the next turn of the lights.

Mark, I therefore invite you to accept and embrace uncertainty in life and belief. And when in doubt, or plagued by doubts, let faith stand in the gap of your visceral need for certainty. We all should learn to find restful patience and calming peace in the face of uncertainty because the assurance is this: nothing stays uncertain for long. One day, all will be revealed - that is one certainty you can count on.

Have a victorious National Day!