The Way Jason Lisle Views Worldview…and William Lane Craig (Part 3)

Last week, Jason Lisle put out his third installment in which he offers his critique of William Lane Craig’s new book, The Quest for the Historical Adam. Lisle’s post is entitled, “The Historical Adam: A Worldview Based on Fact or Fiction,” and the title alone is quite telling, for as I’ve noted in the earlier posts on Lisle’s critique, myth and fiction are two different genres of literature. The fact that Lisle continues to conflate the two and make that a central point in his argument tells me, at least, that his comments are not serious. In any case, in his post, Lisle specifically critiques WLC’s attempt to wrestle with the proper way to understand and interpret Genesis 1-11. One will be able to tell, based just on the quotations from WLC that Lisle provides, that WLC’s view can be pretty much summed up in the following way: Genesis 1-11 does have all the literary hallmarks of ancient Near Eastern (ANE) myth, but part of it really seems to give the impression that it is talking about something historical—how can we make sense of that?

I, for one, appreciate WLC’s honest attempt to seriously consider (and conclude to a degree) that Genesis 1-11 has all the hallmarks of ANE myth because, quite frankly, it does! Whether one ends up disagreeing with WLC, coming to his conclusions, or agreeing with my view that we need to just accept Genesis 1-11’s genre is ANE myth and that we need to be okay with the possibility that it isn’t meant to be understood as literal history—whatever one’s conclusion ends up being, I think it is safe to say that anyone who takes Genesis 1-11 seriously must take the time to wrestle with WLC’s points. It’s the responsible thing to do.

As we will see, though, it is quite obvious that Lisle has no interest in really doing that. With that, let’s see what Lisle has to say.

Opening
Lisle begins his post by talking about the 4^th of July. Without belaboring the point, here’s his point: Americans celebrate America’s Independence Day every 4^th of July because that was the date in history that the Declaration of Independence was signed. If it didn’t really happen, if instead someone said we are celebrating the events of the fictional movie Independence Day, then any celebration of the 4^th of July would be meaningless. Therefore, Lisle concludes, WLC’s claim that Genesis 1-11 acted as Israel’s “founding myth” is equally stupid and meaningless, because that would mean “the biblical worldview would be wrong since truth cannot be based on falsehood.”

Not only is Lisle demonstrating the inability to distinguish between two different genres of literature, namely myth and fiction, but he also putting on full display his false assumption that “truth” can only mean “historical fact.” On top of that, Lisle reflects another common characteristic of many YECists (like Ken Ham) when he then calls WLC’s Christian faith into question and accuses him of rejecting foundational Christian truths: “Craig professes to be a Christian.  And yet, he rejects the foundational truths of Genesis upon which the Christian worldview is based!”

From this point on in his post, Lisle follows the format he’s been using throughout his critique of WLC’s book. I’ll just follow along, summarizing the WLC quotes and then commenting on Lisle’s reaction.

QUOTES #1-3
In the first three of WLC’s statements that Lisle quotes, WLC says that Genesis 3 attempts to “ground natural phenomena in the primordial past” (in the actions of the serpent, the man, and the woman). And although it explains human misery as a result of sin, it doesn’t actual explain the origin of evil itself—after all, the serpent was already deceitful before the woman and man ate the fruit. In any case, WLC argues, it is quite clear that in terms of genre, Genesis 1-11 should be understood as having the characteristics of ANE myth.

Lisle responds by simply saying WLC is being inconsistent. On one hand, he claims Genesis 3 is the basis on which we are to understand things like sin and death, but on the other hand, he’s saying the story involving the talking serpent, the eating of a literal piece of fruit, etc. isn’t really historical. In Lisle’s mind, if something isn’t historical, then it’s not true. A “fictional” story can’t be the basis for truth. Of course, any scholar will tell you that “myth” is not the same thing as “fiction,” and that WLC is right when he defines “myth” as a decided non-historical story that articulates the worldview of a given society regarding how they understand God/the gods, humanity and the natural world. Simply put, Lisle is rejecting accepted genre categories, ignoring accepted the definition of “myth,” and then restating his provably false assertion: If Genesis isn’t literal history, then it explains nothing!

In addition (and this is something I simply didn’t get), Lisle says that WLC is “confusing style with substance.” Then Lisle asserts (I believe for the 143^rd time in his series!) that Genesis 1-11 is historical narrative and proceeds to go off on a tangent about how Genesis 1-11 is about origins, and that of course origin stories are about origins, and if simply “being about origins” is what characterizes “myth,” then the big bang theory and Darwinian evolution fits WLC’s definition of “myth.”

There’s one big problem with that—in the quotes Lisle gives, WLC doesn’t say that “being about origins” is what solely defines “myth”! The only time he even uses the word “origin” is when he points out (quite correctly) that Genesis 3 doesn’t tell us the origin of evil itself.

Lisle ends his comments on these first three quotes by offering what he considers to be a key characteristic of “myth”: It is a story made up by people who did not witness the events of the story. And therefore, the ANE myths, as well as the big bang and Darwinian evolution (!!!), all can be characterized as “myth.”

I’m sorry, but you can’t just make up your own special definitions and characteristics of “myth” that have no connection to reality and then uses that absurd definition to categorize actual scientific theories that you don’t like, just so you can dismiss them out of hand. And I’m sorry, but I don’t know of one Biblical scholar or Literature scholar who defines the genre of “myth” that way. Given that reality, I must pose this challenge to everyone who reads Lisle: Who do you think has more knowledge and scholarly expertise when it comes to the proper definition and literary characteristics of ANE myth? Actual Biblical and Literature scholars or a YECist astrophysicist who has absolutely no education or expertise in Biblical Studies or ancient literature…and who has argued that there can be time zones throughout the universe, and that explains why we can measure light from millions of light years away?

QUOTES #4-8
In the next group of quotes that Lisle gives from WLC’s book, WLC wrestles with the apparent interest in history that he feels can be found in Genesis 1-11. Most notably, he mentions the genealogies in Genesis 1-11 and how they eventually connect up to Abraham, who is clearly portrayed as a real person in history. That being said, WLC acknowledges that “mere chronology” in a story doesn’t automatically mean the given story is actual history. Like I said, this is what WLC is wrestling with in the quotes Lisle provides. He’s trying to figure out how Genesis 1-11 seems to be myth in one sense, but history in another.

On one hand, I understand why WLC, and many people, see the genealogies in Genesis 1-11 and immediately think, “Oh it must be historical,” but I think that assumption would be wrong. When it comes to the genealogies in Genesis 1-11, my view is that they aren’t trying to give an actual, historical genealogy. They are serving a literary function to highlight the divide between the woman’s offspring and the serpent’s offspring articulated in Genesis 3:15. I write more about in in this post, if you are interested. Still, I appreciate that WLC is actually trying to honestly wrestle with what he’s reading.

So, how does Lisle react to WLC admitting that seeing the genealogies in Genesis 1-11 and how they are linked to Abraham seem to suggest they are really historical in some way? You’d think Lisle would voice his agreement. Well, not so much… Lisle clearly cannot process nuance and ambiguity. WLC is trying to wrestle with (A) how Genesis 1-11 has a lot of characteristics of ANE myths, but (B) how the genealogies seem to suggest real history—and he’s trying to make sense of it all. Lisle doesn’t see the need to even try to do that. Instead, (for the 236^th time) he simply asserts, Genesis 1-11 is literal history! There’s no doubt the author intended for it to be literal history! There are genealogies with the Patriarchs in Genesis 12-50 and Genesis 1-11 is written IN THE EXACT SAME WAY! End of story! Historical narrative gives details and fiction doesn’t! Genesis 1-11 is historical narrative!

I don’t know what this says about me, but Lisle’s constant repetition over and over again throughout his comments in these posts reminds me of an old South Park episode in which Rob Reiner was pushing a “Stamp Out Smoking” campaign in South Park because smoking was unhealthy and bad for you. Throughout the episode, Reiner, clearly overweight, is constantly stuffing his face with cake and routinely doing a number of pretty deceptive and immoral actions in order to get smoking banned in South Park. And whenever he is confronted with his own unhealthy eating habits or his questionable tactics, he just gets angry and screams, “There will be no more smoking!”

QUOTE #9
In the final quote Lisle gives from WLC, WLC refers to the “artificial symmetry” of the ten antediluvian ancestors from Adam through Noah that is then followed by ten postdiluvian ancestors from Shem through Abraham. That, along with the admittedly fantastic lifespans of the antediluvians indicates to WLC that we are not dealing with simple, straightforward history.

WLC is correct on that. Again, I applaud him for taking into serious consideration all the things he brings up in his book. He’s not just dismissing everything in Genesis 1-11 that indicates that it is in the genre of myth (and pretty much everything in Genesis 1-11 indicates that!). He gives the impression that he is honestly trying to understand and interpret Genesis properly.

Well, not surprisingly, Lisle doesn’t see it that way. First, he takes issue with how WLC characterizes the ante-/post-diluvian ancestors. Anyone who is literarily competent will get what WLC is saying. You have ten ante-diluvians from Adam to Noah…THEN THE FLOOD…then ten post-diluvians from Shem to Abraham. Well Lisle, in the manner of a true wooden literalist says, “No! Shem was actually born before the flood, so he counts as an ante-diluvian, and that makes it 11 to 9! That’s not asymmetrical! Ha!”

He then says, even if they are symmetrical (and they are), that still doesn’t prove they’re not historical. After all, in 1835 Mark Twain was born and Haley’s comet was seen, and then in 1910 Mark Twain died and Haley’s comet was seen again—and nobody suggests that Mark Twain was a fictional character!

I’m not kidding—that really was his argument.

As for the fantastic long lifespans, Lisle’s reacts by wondering why WLC would think that living 900 years isn’t possible? After all, the New Testament teaches that we will be resurrected and live forever. If WLC believes that, then why can’t he believe Genesis 1-11 is historical (despite all its mythological characteristics) and that people before a global flood (for which there is no solid evidence for) could have lived for 900 years?

What Lisle doesn’t get is that it isn’t a matter of “God couldn’t have done it that way,” as it is that extremely long lifespans are (again) a characteristic of ANE ancient writing about primordial times (i.e. the mythological realm).

Long story short, WLC seems at least to seriously wrestle with how to understand Genesis 1-11, while Lisle simply does little more than stamp his foot and scream, “No! There will be no more smoking!”