Here is the Script for Lesson 16…

To really understand the cosmological context implied by the Scriptures, we first have to jettison about 3500 years of scientific baggage and immerse ourselves in the pre-scientific world of the ANE. Or as some bible commentators like to put it “the view from Palestine”.

Now here is something that many Christians have probably never thought about: the people of God who originally received the Scriptures were no more advanced scientifically than the contemporary cultures surrounding them. Their ability to gather data about the universe was limited to the same powers of naked-eye observation, from the same terrestrial vantage point as the other Semitic cultures of the ancient Near East. And as a result, the Hebrew concept of the physical cosmos would have been structurally very similar to that of their pagan neighbors, except where God had directly revealed something different.

That might seem like an odd fact to dwell on, but consider this: the only way God’s people could have known of a different cosmology would have been for God to directly reveal it to them. And in the absence of any new information about the structure of the physical cosmos, the Hebrews would have simply believed what the rest of the civilized world believed. So if the cosmology revealed by the Scriptures is in fact similar to the popular belief at the time, then either (a) the scriptures are not from God, (b) God knows less about the universe than we do, or (c) giving the Hebrews a 21st century picture of the cosmos was not God’s intent. For the Christian, (a) and (b) are simply not viable options, so we are left with (c).

To help answer this question, we need look no further than then the creation account of Genesis. What better place to provide new cosmological insight than in the opening chapters of the Bible? But rather than correct the popular ANE misconceptions about the physical structure of the heavens and earth, we see Moses accommodating the creation narrative to his audience. For instance:

• The Hebrew universe consists of three levels: the heavens, the earth and the underworld
• Earth (land) is a disk or rectangle spread out over a watery abyss
• The sky is a solid dome or vault holding back the waters above the heavens and regulating the passage of precipitation, wind, and celestial objects through the expanse of heaven from “storehouses”
• The sun passes through the underworld after leaving the heavens each night to hasten back to the opposite end of the firmament
• The earth is fixed and immovable and the heavenly bodies revolve around it

Moses and the other biblical authors use these same basic elements, which were all part of the popular cosmology of the day, as the assumed context from which to tell God’s wonderful story of creation. The ancient Near-eastern concept of heaven and earth is literally the cosmological stage upon which the drama of creation, the fall, and redemption unfolds.

Now, conservative Christians don’t immediately like this idea. We seem to have bought the modern lie that all truth must be expressed in exact scientific terms, so anything that looks or smells like ancient mythology is deemed unworthy for God to use as an inspired medium of revelation. But who decided that? Myths and Legends were exactly how ancient man communicated information about the nature and character of the gods, and their relationship to the rest of creation. In fact, if you consider the entire history of human civilization, mythology has a much longer track record of expressing truth than science does. Who are we latecomers to assume that less scientifically advanced cultures are incapable of expressing ultimate truth in acceptable terms?

So what are the key differences between the ANE mythological worldview and the modern western scientific worldview? Well first of all, the modern scientific worldview treats the large-scale universe as a finely-tuned machine that operates precisely according to a strict set of immutable laws. And within this system, structures typically don’t exist unless they are first built. So any discussion about something being created must address the structural sub-components and the exact step-by-step sequence of their assembly. Now, I’m not being critical of this mindset. The scientific worldview has enabled mankind to advance human civilization beyond anything that the ancients could have imagined – but being a relatively recent invention, science is a lousy framework for interpreting scripture, or for addressing ultimate questions of meaning and purpose, which have been around much longer than science. For that, mythology still has the home-field advantage.

Now, the ancient mythical universe was a whimsical and unpredictable place – governed by a multitude of pagan deities with competing interests. The default state of the physical cosmos was primordial chaos, formlessness and emptiness. Since the concept of “nothingness” was not easily grasped by the ancient mind, physical matter was thought to eternally exist. So the pagan gods created things, not from nothing, but by imposing functional order on the primordial chaos. And without the constant attention of the gods, the universe would literally return to a state of formlessness and emptiness.

As a result of this worldview, life in the ANE was a constant struggle to please the gods, yet the pagan gods never told mankind what the rules were. So pagan worship was literally by trial and error. If it rained enough to keep the crops watered, the sacrifices were acceptable. If rain was withheld or if it rained too much, they had to try something else. Some people claimed to be in direct communication with the gods; and if their ideas worked, they were regarded as prophets; but if their ideas failed, they were punished by death. Except for perhaps astronomical phenomena, the seasons, and the cycle of life, the universe was anything but uniform and predictable as we moderns know it.

This was the conceptual world from which God’s people were called to be a separate nation. So it makes perfect sense that Moses would provide his people with a new creation story and a new law. But prior to leaving Egypt and receiving the Scriptures, Hebrew thinking would have had much more in common with the surrounding cultures, pagan as they were, than with 21st century western culture. So why is this important? Well, for the newly-liberated Hebrews following Moses and Aaron through the wilderness, they didn’t think like us. Cosmic functions were not primarily the consequence of material structure and natural laws, but rather of divine purposes. Something, therefore, did not exist until it was assigned a purpose and given a name. For instance, the clay at the bottom of the river didn’t exist until somebody dug it up and fashioned it into a vessel that served a particular purpose. As long it remained in the earth undisturbed, it was considered part of the primordial formlessness from which all things were fashioned.

Given this primitive ontology, creation of the cosmos would have had less to do with the gods assembling structures, and more to do with the gods assigning function and giving purpose to that which was formless and filling that which was void. And the gods accomplished these tasks by re-organizing the primordial chaos so the cosmos could accomplish its intended purpose. Since the pagan creation myths also began with a watery abyss that symbolized this primordial chaos, the biblical creation narrative wouldn’t have been a properly situated creation account unless it too began with these same primordial waters and addressed the origin of these same cosmic functions – which Genesis 1 clearly does.

However, the ancient pagan gods of Israel’s neighbors were not all-powerful, so they were forced to divvy up the cosmic functions amongst themselves, and they were pretty unreliable when it came to the administration of their respective domains. The Hebrew creation narrative distinguishes itself from the pagan creation myths, not by introducing new science, but by replacing the many false gods with the one true god – the God of their fathers – the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. In other words, God is not giving his people new science; he’s giving them something much more profound than that. God is giving his people new theology accommodated to their pre-existing scientific worldview.

So, the best way to understand Genesis – or any ANE creation account for that matter – is not to ask questions like ‘what was built, when was it built, in what order was it built, from what material was it built or how long did it take to build’ – material structure and chronology were beside the point. The questions we should be asking are ‘what deities are responsible for organizing each of the essential functions of the cosmos and how reliable are those deities?’ ‘What do these deities require from us and how can we be certain the cosmos will not return to a state of formlessness and emptiness?’

For a primitive tribe of nomads who just walked away from the relative stability of Egyptian civilization and was heading into the chaos of the wilderness, understanding who controls the same forces of nature that will determine the outcome of their journey was a big deal. In fact, it was such a big deal that many Hebrews would have gladly remained as slaves under the protection of Egypt’s gods than face the uncertainty of the wilderness – which embodies the primordial chaos from which Egypt’s gods brought order.

So God simply unleashes the forces of natural destruction – in the form of plagues – on Egypt to encourage the Israelites to turn from Egypt’s gods and trust in Him alone. But even then, as soon as the Israelites felt the hunger pains of nature’s pitiless indifference, they turned against Moses and begged Egypt’s gods to deliver them.

In light of these events surrounding the writing of Genesis, how should we expect Moses to deliver the only true creation account? By what benchmark would the newly-liberated Hebrew people have judged the relevance, truth and reliability of Genesis? Would they have judged Moses’ creation story based on a 21st century scientific outlook that wouldn’t even exist for thousands of years, or would they have judged it against the creation myths of their pagan neighbors using only those scientific tools available to them at the time? By what benchmark should we then judge the relevance, truth and reliability of Genesis today? Modern science or ancient science?

Another way to think of it is this: Moses had to accommodate the creation narrative to somebody. Is it realistic for us to expect him to have accommodated the creation narrative to a modern audience – to satisfy our scientific curiosities? Or is it better to assume that Moses needed to accommodate the creation narrative to his original audience – to situate it in the ANE?

It is the opinion of many, including myself, that this is exactly what a plain face-value reading of Genesis reveals when we set aside our modern worldview and see the text through ancient eyes. We see God establishing the essential functions of the cosmos, setting in motion day and night, separating the waters above the heavens from the waters below, appointing the sea to its boundaries, spreading out the firmament to regulate the passage of moisture, wind, and celestial bodies through the sky, watering the land, causing vegetation to grow and seed to sprout, causing the seas and skies and land to bring forth life, and creating man in His own image – not to tirelessly work the land and grow food for the lazy gods (as in the Mesopotamian creation story) but to exercise stewardship of creation and to subdue the land for the glory of Yahweh!

In addition to accommodating the creation narrative to the scientific worldview of the original audience, the infinite wisdom of God can also be seen in the way Moses intentionally avoids introducing new cosmic structures and functions. For instance, there is no mention of planets, or Galaxies, or microbes, or of anything else not already known at the time. Not only would any new science have distracted the primary audience from the theological points being made, but a scientific portrait of creation would have needed updating every few hundred years or so – or whenever scientific discovery sheds new light on our finite understanding of God’s universe. And once revelation is sealed up, who would have the authority to do this?

But by limiting the creation narrative to a discussion about Yahweh organizing and establishing the essential functions of the cosmos, Moses gives us a timeless account that transcends the scientific consensus of any particular generation – truly making the creation narrative relevant to all generations! After all, the rising and setting of the sun, the waxing and waning of the moon, the circuit of heavenly bodies through the constellations, the changing of the seasons, the biological succession of Earth’s flora and fauna after their kind are all cosmic functions that every generation of God’s people can easily relate to – regardless of their technological advancement or lack thereof.

Let me close with this thought: In his book, Letter to a Christian Nation, atheist Sam Harris states that if the Bible were really God’s word, it would contain information that no ancient person could have possibly known about, like the invention of the world-wide web. He writes that something worthy of being called the “Word of God” should contain a passage like,

“In the latter half of the twentieth century, humankind will develop a globally linked system of computers – the principles of which I set forth in Leviticus – and the system shall be called the Internet.” (Page 60).

Most Christians obviously understand how utterly ridiculous such a demand would be. What does the internet have to do with the concerns of ancient Hebrews or first century gentiles? And what about 1000 years from now when nobody even remembers what the internet was? Should we really expect the Bible to include bits of culturally-relevant trivia just so 21st century Christians can trust it? Is that we are to know God’s Word is true and relevant?

Yet, many of us unknowingly approach Genesis with this same mindset! We assume that something worthy of being called the Word of God must contain a certain amount of accurate scientific trivia or it loses its authority. So we comb through the Scriptures looking for answers to scientific questions like: How old is the earth? Or what should the geologic column look like? Or how were the individual species created? For many of us, these habits will be difficult to break. It will be easier for our children if we teach them how to think properly about the relationship between God’s word and God’s world.

Well, that brings us to the end of the series. We covered a lot of technical material and wrestled with some challenging spiritual issues. In our struggle to provide our covenant children with best science education possible, I sincerely hope that you’ve found this series helpful. I’m Gordon J. Glover – Thanks for watching!

This entry was posted on Wednesday, March 11th, 2009 at 9:20 pm and is filed under Christian Education. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.