Karl Giberson is a Christian scholar and scientist who is at the forefront of the current “creation/evolution” debate in the United States. Among his other accomplishments, he has taught at the college level for over 30 years, written numerous books, and served as vice-president at BioLogos from 2009-2011. And, as far as Ken Ham and Answers in Genesis is concerned, he is a very dangerous man. Why? Because in their eyes, he is an apostate: someone who grew up believing Henry Morris’ The Genesis Flood was gospel truth, who eventually became convinced that young earth creationism was not convincing, and who now believes that evolution is the means by which God creates the world.
I first came across Dr. Giberson when I read his book Saving Darwin a few years back. At the time, I was just researching the different views on the creation/evolution debate for a course unit I was teaching at the local Christian high school where I worked. At the time, I cared very little about the whole supposed controversy, but I felt, given the nature of the course, I needed to address it. As I’ve said before in other posts, I wasn’t a young earth creationist, but neither did I believe evolution—honestly, I didn’t know anything about it. It just didn’t interest me—nothing in science interested me. It wasn’t my thing.
Ironically, the more I read up on the creation/evolution debate, the more I became convinced of two things: (a) there is nothing convincing at all about young earth creationism—it is neither scientific nor biblical; and (b) learning about evolution actually made me interested in science…a bit. If you have been following my posts, you know my recent story. That desire to understand the issue better, coupled with my audacity to question Ken Ham, led to me essentially being labeled an apostate as well.
In any case, Dr. Giberson most recent book, Saving the Original Sinner, takes the reader on a bit of a historical journey by providing an overview of how Christians for the past 2,000 years have treated the story of Adam and Eve. For anyone interested in learning about just how Christians throughout the centuries have interpreted and used Genesis 2-3, this is a great book to get your bearings. In the next few posts, I am going to review Dr. Giberson’s book. After that, I will then write another post in which I then discuss the “review” that Answers in Genesis gave of Dr. Giberson’s book.
Introduction
If someone were to ask Dr. Giberson, “What inspired you to write this book?” I’m sure he would point them to the introduction: it’s the same reason why I’m writing my book, The Heresy of Ham. Like me, he, as well as countless others, have been deeply hurt by a very militant and dangerous segment within the Evangelical world—the young earth creationist movement (YEC).
It is in his introduction that Dr. Giberson introduces the reader to not only the basic claims of YEC groups like Ken Ham’s Answers in Genesis, but also to their determined efforts to destroy any Christian scholar or scientist who crosses their path. In their minds, to question the historicity of Adam is to destroy the Gospel itself. As Southern Baptist president Al Mohler has said, “The denial of an historical Adam and Eve as the first persons of all humanity and the solitary first human pair severs the link between Adam and Christ which is so crucial to the Gospel” (2). Giberson points out that self-appointed “gatekeepers” like Mohler have made a concentrated effort to censure and even destroy the careers of countless Christian scholars and scientists: Howard Van Til, Richard Colling, Peter Enns, Bruce Waltke, John Schneider…the list can go on—all because of the singular fact that these scholars do not hold to YEC.
Given this reality, the goal of the Giberson’s book is pretty straightforward: to answer the basic question, “Is YEC correct when it claims that its view of Adam and Eve has been the way Christians for the past 2,000 years have always viewed Adam and Eve?” The answer, as Giberson conclusively proves beyond the shadow of a doubt, is a resounding, “No.” When one looks back over the course of the past 2,000 years—from Philo, to Augustine, Aquinas, Dante, Francis Bacon, Columbus and the early explorers, slave owners, abolitionists, modern day young earth creationists and theistic evolutionists—it is abundantly clear that the story of Adam and Eve in Genesis 2-3 has been read and understood in a host of different ways.
The reason for that, Giberson argues, is that Christians throughout history have tried to interpret and apply the story of Adam and Eve to address concerns that were pressing upon their society at the time. In other words, they looked to the story of Adam and Eve in an attempt to make sense of their own world and to give a certain worldview and order to their society. The story of Adam and Eve, thus, is a formative story, and as Giberson states, has always been used mythologically.
My only bone of contention with the introduction has to do with this last point about the story of Adam and Eve being used mythologically. Now, I agree with Giberson on this point, but having taught in Evangelical schools for 16 years, I fear that someone who doesn’t understand what the proper understanding of the genre of myth is will be frightened by Giberson’s statement, and might not read any further. For that reason, I think it would have been better to take a paragraph or two to more fully explain what exactly “myth” entails. Most people think “myth,” “fairytale,” and “lie” are all synonyms. We need to reclaim a proper definition of these terms if we expect to use them in any meaningful way.
In any case, Giberson’s aim for the book is clearly spelled out in his introduction: (A) YEC has made certain claims about both science and the Bible, and has also claimed their view has been the view of the Church throughout history, (B) YEC “gate-keepers” have made an organized effort to silence and destroy the careers of any Christian scholar who questions them, and (C) history itself shows that such claims of YEC are not true.
With that, Giberson proceeds to take the reader on a tour of Christian history. In my next post, I will review the first five chapters of Saving the Original Sinner. I will do my best to be succinct! I think you will find it is an engaging and thought-provoking book.
