Peter S. Williams
Access Research Network
February 21, 2002


Phillip E. Johnson has written several books about Creation and Evolution, and
he has some wise words of advice for anyone considering the matter: the best
way to approach a problem of any kind is usually not to talk or even think very
much about the ultimate answer until I have made sure that I am asking all the
right questions in the right order. [1] So Im not going to offer a definitive
answer to the question of Creation and Evolution in this paper. Instead, Im
going to provide a rough guide to the subject, some advice about mistakes to
avoid, and some suggestions about asking the right questions in the right order.
My first piece of advice is to start at the very beginning, with just the first
five words of Genesis: In the beginning, God created. . . If you need more
words to get your teeth into, go to John 1:1-3: In the beginning was the Word,
and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was with God in the
beginning. Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that
has been made. Word is a translation of the Greek term Logos, from which we
get the word logic. Logos is equivalent to what scientists like Stephen Hawking
mean when they talk about knowing the Mind of God. The belief that Logos came first, that Mind created Matter, is the fundamental Christian claim about
creation; and so this is the place to start when considering the relationship
between Creation and Evolution.

Its important to keep in mind the distinction between the doctrine of Creation,
which is something all Christians hold in common, and different pictures of
creation that Christians hold because they have different interpretations of
Genesis. As Phillip Johnson reminds us: The essential point of creation has
nothing to do with the timing or the mechanism the Creator chose to employ, but
with the element of design or purpose. In the broadest sense, a creationist
is simply a person who believes that the world (and especially mankind) was
designed, and exists for a purpose. [2] The place to start thinking about
Creation and evolution is with the doctrine of Creation, because once youve
worked that out, you are in a better position to evaluate different Christian
pictures of Creation. In other words, your first question should be:
Question One: Is the doctrine of Creation true?

Plato noted that all things do become, have become and will become, some by
nature, some by art, and some by chance (The Laws, book X), and he argued that either Mind comes before matter (and the world is basically a work of art), or matter comes before mind (and the world is purely the result of chance and
natural regularities). The doctrine of Creation says that Mind came before
matter the cosmos is a creation, a work of art. To be an atheist, on the
other hand, means being committed to a matter first view of things the
cosmos is not a work of art, and everything must, therefore, be the result of
nothing but natural regularities and chance. Darwins theory of evolution is an
explanation of biological reality in terms of a finely balanced combination of
natural regularities and chance working over long periods of time. You can see
that for atheism, evolution is not so much the result of an objective assessment
of the evidence as it is a necessary assumption brought to its interpretation.
Geneticist Richard Lewontin has let this cat out of the bag:

We take the side of science in spite of the patent absurdity of some of its
constructs. . . in spite of the tolerance of the scientific community for
unsubstantiated just-so stories, because we have a prior commitment to
materialism. It is not that the methods. . . of science somehow compel us to
accept a material explanation of the. . . world, but, on the contrary, that we
are forced by our. . . adherence to material causes to create . . . a set of
concepts that produce material explanations, no matter how counterintuitive,
no matter how mystifying. . . [3]

Moreover, says Lewontin, that materialism is absolute, for we cannot allow a
Divine foot in the door. . . [4] Lewontins rejection of the doctrine of
Creation has nothing to do with his science and everything to do with his
materialistic philosophy.

Richard Dawkins was described in the following terms by a recent popular science book: Dawkins, Oxford Universitys professor of the public understanding of science, and a vocal atheist, is quick to dismiss religious belief. He has
called anyone advocating a creator God scientifically illiterate. [5] (Of
course, such rhetoric dismisses around 40% of Dawkins fellow scientists as
scientifically illiterate in one ill-thought-out generalization! [6] )

Dawkins most famous book is The Blind Watchmaker, the title of which comes from William Paleys design argument from the similarities between the complex
workings of a watch, which we know has a designer, and the complex workings of nature, which by analogy probably have a designer too. [7] Dawkins admits that living things are analogous to watches, and that they appear to be designed. He even defines biology as the study of complicated things that give the
appearance of having been designed for a purpose. [8] In which case, why is
Dawkins so confident that design in living things is only apparent? Because,
although the subtitle of The Blind Watchmaker is Why the evidence of evolution
reveals a world without design, Dawkins excludes design on philosophical
grounds. [9] The kind of explanation we come up with, says Dawkins, must not
contradict the laws of physics. Indeed it will make use of the laws of physics,
and nothing more than the laws of physics. [10] Here, as philosopher William
Dembski notes, we are dealing with a naturalistic metaphysic that shapes and
controls what theories of biological origins are permitted on the playing field
in advance of any discussion or weighing of evidence. [11]

To approach biology without Dawkins atheistic assumption doesnt mean ruling
out evolution as an adequate, or even the best available, scientific account of
biology; but it does mean letting the evidence speak for itself.
Dawkins fudges the issue here. According to him, Paley was right about the
complexity of nature, but wrong about its explanation: The only thing he got
wrong admittedly quite a big thing was the explanation itself. He gave the
traditional religious answer. . . The true explanation is utterly different,
and it had to wait for one of the most revolutionary thinkers of all time,
Charles Darwin. [12] Its crucial to realize that Dawkins has just pulled a
fast one. He has just implied that either Paley was right to argue that nature
is a work of art, or Darwin was right to argue that biological organisms are the
result of nature and chance. But of course, this is a false dilemma. Its
possible that Paley and Darwin are both right. The theist, no less than the
atheist, can acknowledge the existence of a blind watchmaker, simply by
attributing that blind watchmaker itself to Gods design!

Dawkins thinks that Darwin made it possible to be an intellectually fulfilled
atheist. [13] Before Darwin was that there was no naturalistic candidate for an
explanation to fill in the blank labelled blind watchmaker. Evolution fills
that blank. However, Dawkins is wrong to think that evolution undermines
Paleys watchmaker argument, contradicts belief in the doctrine of Creation, or
supports atheism. Darwins theory may fill in a blank created by the assumption
of atheism, but that doesnt prove atheism (or evolution). Father Christmas may
fill in a blank left by the assumption that parents dont deliver Christmas
presents, but that hardly proves the existence of Father Christmas!
The theory of evolution does not reveal a world without design as Dawkins
claims, because science is simply incapable of doing any such thing. Why is the
coffee getting hot? Scientific answer: because the microwaves are causing the
water molecules to vibrate. But why is this happening? Because I want my
coffee hot! This is an explanation in terms of design and purpose, and it
doesnt conflict with the scientific explanation. You dont have to choose one
explanation over the other.

Moreover, the fact that we can give a scientific description of the physical
mechanism of a microwave machine doesnt disprove the existence of a microwave machine designer! Similarly, a scientific description of a physical mechanism that results in living organisms would not disprove the existence of a designer of that system. Science doesnt reveal a world without design, atheism
demands a world without design. The theory of evolution is irrelevant to the
doctrine of Creation. As philosopher Keith Ward says, The argument that the
evolutionary process is incompatible with design misses the mark completely.
[14] I suggest that the next question on your agenda therefore ought to be:
Question Two: If we dont assume that matter came before mind, is evolution an
adequate explanation given all the available scientific evidence, or is there a
better explanation?

You see, someone who believes in Creation can afford to be much more open-minded about evolution than the atheist can be. As Alvin Plantinga writes:

a Christian (naturally) believes that there is such a person as God, and
believes that God has created and sustains the world. Starting from this
position. . . we recognize that there are many ways in which God could have
created the living things he has in fact created: how, in fact, did he do it?
. . . Did it all happen just by way of the working of the laws of physics, or
was there further divine activity. . ? Thats the question. . . Starting
from the belief in God, we must look at the evidence and consider the
probabilities as best we can. [15]

Question two is an interesting and important question but it isnt a crucial
question for everyone to answer. You could quite happily be a Christian, or
become a Christian, without having an answer to this question.
This isnt the place to look at the evidence for and against evolution. I
simply want to highlight the fact that evolution is not beyond question.
According to Dawkins, it is absolutely safe to say that, if you meet somebody
who claims not to believe in evolution, that person is ignorant, stupid or
insane (or wicked, but Id rather not consider that). Dont be intimidated by
this sort of bluster, Dawkins bark is a lot worse than his bite (just as his
logic is a lot worse than his rhetoric). There are in fact plenty of
well-adjusted, well-educated people who think that evolution is a questionable,
even a failed scientific theory on scientific grounds alone. In response to a
recent American television series on evolution, which claimed there is no
scientific controversy over evolution, 132 scientists signed a joint statement
saying: We are sceptical of claims for the ability of random mutation and
natural selection to account for the complexity of life. [16] Evolution may be
a wholly adequate theory, a partially adequate theory, or an inadequate theory,
but the right way to find out is to let the evidence speak for itself without
support from the atheistic assumption that the world must be able to do its own
creation.

If you have decided your answers to our first two questions, you are now in a
good position to ask a third question:

Question Three: Which picture of Creation is the most plausible one?
This is an interesting and important question but it isnt a crucial question
for everyone to answer. You could quite happily be a Christian, or become a
Christian, without having an answer to this question. Christians certainly
shouldnt elevate belief in any particular picture of Creation into anything
more than the peripheral issue that it is. Augustine made a great deal of sense
when he said that:

anyone who thinks that he has understood the divine scriptures or any part of
them, but cannot by his understanding build up this double love of God and
neighbour, has not yet succeeded in understanding them. Anyone who derives
from them an idea which is useful for supporting this love but false to say
what the writer demonstrably meant in the passage has not made a fatal error,
and is certainly not a liar. [17]

If you do want to ask this question, there is no shortage of interpretations you
could adopt without making a fatal error or being a liar. In-between the
extremes of a completely literal young-earth creationism and an essentially
non-literal creationism (often associated with theistic evolution, but
compatible with other scientific theories), you might adopt an essentially
literal old-earth or progressive creationist interpretation. But as
Professor J.P. Moreland warns: there are sufficient problems in interpreting
Genesis 1 and 2 to warrant caution in dogmatically holding that only one
understanding is allowable by the text. [18]

Giving a responsible but non-dogmatic answer to our third question involves
asking a whole bunch of subsidiary questions. As theologian David Winter
explains: The phrase The Bible says . . . begs a lot of questions . . . What
does the Bible say? To whom is it saying it? What is the context, background
and literary form of the passage in question? Is it to be taken literally, or
figuratively, or allegorically? [19]

With Alvin Plantinga I will merely say that the proper understanding of the
early chapters of Genesis. . . is a difficult area, an area where I am not sure
where the truth lies. [20] What I am sure of is that truth is one, and that
all truth is Gods truth. There cant be any conflict between Gods Word and
Gods World, although there can be conflicts between incorrect human
understandings of Gods Word and Gods World. As theologian Charles Hodge
warned: Theologians are not infallible in the interpretation of Scripture.
[21] Nor are scientists infallible when they think about nature.

Because all truth is one, and all truth is Gods truth, we shouldnt
compartmentalize our understanding of Scripture from our understanding of
science, or vice versa. Plantinga writes that:

in understanding the issues involved in. . . biology or whatever, we should
use everything we know. . . We must approach a topic like evolution from the
perspective of faith. . . as well as that of current science. . . what one
must do, in cases of apparent conflict [between science and theology], is try
to see how strong the case is for supposing that God teaches [some
proposition] P in the Scripture under consideration, how strong the evidence
from reason and science for the denial of P is, and then try to come to some
resolution. Perhaps in some cases where the scientific evidence is very
strong and the evidence for Ps being what God intends to teach weak, we
should move to another understanding of P; in cases where the evidence from
science and reason is weak and the evidence for Ps being what the Lord
intends to teach strong, we should reject the bit of science in question. [22]

For people who believe in the doctrine of Creation, the fundamental question is
not what is the best scientific account of reality but what is the best
account of reality given everything we know? This only seems odd on the
assumption that, as Richard Lewontin asserts, science is the only begetter of
truth. But of course, the claim that science is the only begetter of truth
isnt something that science can establish as being true! Its a philosophical
claim, and a self-contradictory one at that; in which case, there must be more
truth than can be known through science, and Christians are right to seek to
understand reality by employing what we think we know from Gods Word as well as what we think we know from Gods World. Our picture of creation (as distinct from the doctrine of creation) may not be the best place to start this project of integration, but it shouldnt be excluded from the process. To do so would be like a jury deciding a murder case purely on the basis of the forensic
evidence, without taking into account the testimony of witnesses: we cannot. .
. pursue theology without bringing to that study all that we know about the
world, nor can we. . . pursue science without bringing to that study all that we
know about God [23]

Conclusion

Lets go back to the beginning: In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was
with God, and the Word was God. He was with God in the beginning. Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made. (John 1:1-3) This is the Christian doctrine of Creation. But John goes on to tell us
that: The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his
glory, the glory of the One and Only, who came from the Father, full of grace
and truth. (John 1:14) Whatever you make of the scientific merits of the
theory of evolution, and whatever you make of the relative merits of different
pictures of Creation, so long as the doctrine of Creation is true, then John
1:14 might be true as well. Is it true that the Word became flesh and made
his dwelling among us. . . full of grace and truth? is a question that trumps
all the other questions weve asked, because if it is true, its a truth that
dwarfs every other truth and which can change your life forever. [24]


[1] Phillip E. Johnson, The Right Questions, (IVP, 2002), introduction.
[2] Phillip E. Johnson, Darwin on Trial, (IVP, 1993), p. 115.
[3] Richard Lewontin, Billions and Billions of Demons, New York Review of
Books, January 9, 1997.
[4] Lewontin, Billions and Billions of Demons, New York Review of Books,
January 9, 1997, my italics.
[5] Julia Hinde, Does God Exist?, Harriet Swain (ed.), Big Questions in
Science, (London, Jonathan Cape, 2002), p. 2.
[6] e.g., a 1996 survey still found 40 percent of US scientists believed in
God. - Julia Hinde, Does God Exist?, ibid, p. 4.
[7] c.f William Paley, Natural Theology @
www.hti.umich.edu/cgi/p/pd-modeng/pd-modeng-idx?type=HTML&rgn=DIV1&byte=53054870;
Richard Swinburne, The Argument for Design @
www.faithquest.com/philosophers/swinburne/design.html
[8] Richard Dawkins, The Blind Watchmaker, Preface, p. x.
[9] Jonathan Wells, Icons of Evolution, (Washington DC: Regency Publishing,
2000), p. 204.
[10] Dawkins, The Blind Watchmaker, p. 151, my emphasis.
[11] William A. Dembski, What Every Theologian Should Know about Creation,
Evolution and Design, p. 6, my italics.
[12] Dawkins, The Blind Watchmaker, (London: Penguin, 1991), p. 41.
[13] Dawkins, The Blind Watchmaker, p. 6.
[14] Keith Ward, God, Faith & The New Millennium, (OneWorld), p. 119.
[15] Alvin Plantinga, Evolution, Neutrality, and Antecedent Probability: a
reply to Van Till and McMullen, p. 5-6.
[16] cf. www.arn.org/docs2/news/100scientists0929.htm
[17] Augustine, On Christian Teaching, p. 27.
[18] J.P. Moreland, Scaling the Secular City, (Baker, 1987), p. 214.
[19] David Winter, But This I Can Believe (London: Hodder & Stoughton, 1980), p.
112.
[20] Alvin Plantinga, Evolution, Neutrality, and Antecedent Probability: a
reply to Van Till and McMullen, p. 2.
[21] Charles Hodge, Systematic Theology, 3 vols (Grand Rapids, Michigan: Baker,
1992), 1:59.
[22] Alvin Plantinga, Evolution, Neutrality, and Antecedent Probability: a
reply to Van Till and McMullen, p. 5 & 9.
[23] John Stek, quoted by Plantinga, Methodological Naturalism? Part 2,
Origins & Design, 18:2.
[24] c.f. R.T. France, The Gospels As Historical Sources for Jesus, the Founder
of Christianity @ www.leaderu.com/truth/1truth21.html; Peter Kreeft, The
Divinity of Christ @
http://catholiceducation.org/articles/religion/re0020.html; links to resources
on the resurrection @ http://members.tripod.com/~vantillian/resurrection.html;
William Lane Craig vs Brian Edwards, Did the Resurrection Really Happen? @
www.gospelcom.net/rzim/radio/easter.shtml (mp3 File)
Copyright 2003 Peter S. Williams. All rights reserved. International copyright
secured.