Digital Faith

God and Science

Here's a second and final post on Collins and Giberson's The Language of Science and Faith: Straight Answers to Genuine Questions (Intervarsity Press, 2011). I'll again pull a few examples from their question and answer discussion, here from the second half of the book.

Straight Answers to Gospel Questions: Evolution

Time to fire up the blog for a few posts on the latest entry in my Now Reading box, The Language of Science and Faith: Straight Answers to Genuine Questions (2011, InterVarsity Press). The authors are Karl W. Giberson and Francis S. Collins, accomplished scientists (a physicist and a geneticist, respectively) who have each previously authored their own excellent faith and science books. This one is written in a question and answer format and appears to be aimed at the basic Evangelical or conservative Christian believer who has not previously given much thought to faith and science issues but is now trying to reconcile conservative or even fundamentalist doctrines with modern science. As such, it is very well suited to most LDS readers, especially bright seminary or college students who have followed the CES curriculum but find that it leads them to a dead end. There are few LDS resources to recommend (LDS religion teachers and leaders generally can't even admit there is a faith and science problem), which is why I read and review helpful books by non-LDS authors.

Genesis 1: Theories of Creation

In the middle part of The Lost World of Genesis One, Walton details his theory of the cosmos as God's temple, based on his view of Genesis 1 as an account of functional creation (rather than material creation) and drawing on parallels with other Near Eastern creation accounts. If that idea grabs you, you should read the book. Myself, I know what temples are and I know what the Universe is, and I don't see conflating the two as an advance in my understanding of either. But it is certainly interesting reading.

Genesis 1 Is Functional Creation

In propositions 2 through 6 of The Lost World of Genesis One author John Walton supports his view that Genesis 1 describes how function is bestowed on pre-existing matter. Obviously, the view he is opposing is the orthodox view that Creation is describing the creation of matter out of nothing or ex nihilo. LDS readers won't have a problem with this part of the argument, which tracks the LDS view of Creation quite comfortably.

Genesis 1 Is Ancient Cosmology

That's the first of 18 propositions discussed in John Walton's The Lost World of Genesis One (hat tip: Ben S.). He continues that Genesis "does not attempt to describe cosmology in modern terms or address modern questions. ... [The Israelites] did not know that stars were suns; they did not know that the earth was spherical and moving through space; they did not know that the sun was much further away than the moon, or even further than the birds flying in the air."

Walton also reminds us that "there is no concept of a 'natural' world in ancient Near Eastern thinking. The dichotomy between natural and supernatural is a relatively recent one." That certainly does highlight a problem with the way some today try to turn Genesis into a description of natural events as outlined by modern science: Big Bang, life, human evolution, etc.

N. T. Wright on Paul

In this last of my series of posts on Paul I will do a short review of N. T. Wright's What Saint Paul Really Said (Eerdmans, 1997). It's a fine little book (192 pages; seemed shorter) that, along with Sanders' Paul: A Very Short Introduction (OUP, 2001), will give any LDS student of Paul a quick introduction to the current scholarship. After reading both books, my quick summary, with slight exaggeration, is:

1. To understand Christianity, one must understand Paul.
2. No one understands Paul.

Paul at General Conference

My recent posts on Paul haven't proven too popular, but I'm still pursuing the topic. I noticed Elder D. Todd Christofferson's use in General Conference of terms drawn from Pauline theology to explain the LDS view of the Atonement:

Our witness is this: We know that justification, or forgiveness of sins, through the grace of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ is just and true. And we know also that sanctification, or purification from the effects of sin, through the grace of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ is just and true to all those who love and serve God with all their mights, minds, and strength.

A Revolutionary Paul

Continuing with this series of posts on Paul, here's what N. T. Wright (in What Saint Paul Really Said) says about E. P. Sanders:

It is a measure of Sanders' achievement that Pauline scholars around the world now refer casually to "the Sanders revolution." ... [T]here is no denying that he has towered over the last quarter of the century much as Schweitzer and Bultmann did over the first half.

I don't have Sanders' major work Paul and Palestinian Judaism, but I do have Sanders' short book Paul: A Very Short Introduction (OUP, 2001) which summarizes his views on Paul. What did Sanders say that now makes earlier views of Paul seem so dated?

Reading Paul's Letters

My last post was titled "A Mormon View of Paul." This post is more about the view of Paul that comes from reading Paul's own letters. It is easy to read Paul's letters through the lens of the gospels (which were written decades later), Orthodox Christianity (which emerged centuries later), Protestant scholarship (millennia later), and Mormonism (a fairly recent development). It requires real effort to bracket these later developments in order to try to understand Paul on his own terms. [Whether you agree with Paul as understood on his own terms is another matter, of course.]

Highlights From Hardy

Times & Seasons has posted a 12 Questions interview with Grant Hardy. He gives serious and detailed responses, a real treat for anyone who has read Understanding the Book of Mormon: A Reader's Guide (OUP, 2010) and incentive for anyone who hasn't read it yet to go out and find a copy. Here are a few one-liner highlights from the interview responses, with my brief comments in italics following the bolded quotation.