Theistic evolution or non-theistic evolution

Of course. Their might be some on this board who feel it is their duty to strip away the Christianity from whomever they deem, but in the end it's God's choice and not theirs.

AFAIK-Everyone here is a Christian.

 

I'm certainly a Christian, and I post on the side of evolution around here . . . I'm even Baptist, imagine that.

 

Ditto here, Southern Baptist "evolutionist."

-Neil

 

IFB; Bible Believing Christian.

(Genesis 2:1) “Thus the heavens and the earth were finished, and all the host of them.”

 

NP

 

Roman Catholic

 

Some of the answers here are very sad. Why don't we just do away with Genesis 1 - 11 and go on from there.

The Bible is very specific in the early chapters of Genesis, it seems sad for someone to claim it is all made up.

Does everybody who believes in theistic evolution believe that these "ape men" finally reached a point and then God gave them a soul or they evolved that too?

 

You would be correct to say that the main thrust of debate centers on theistic evolution and young earth creationism and all the subtopics that come about.

I do not know of anyone on here who is not Christian. In fact, you may have noticed that this is a "Christian Debate Forum (All Christians)" meaning that everyone here has at least convinced the administrator that they are of a Christian denomination. No one seems so far out that I would suspect them of having come here under false pretenses. I think that most here, even those that support evolution, are Baptist.

Notice above that I expanded your intial wording to say "young earth" creationism. That is because since we that are here are all Christian, I suspect that we all would all be some form of Creationist. We just do not all believe in a recent creation or in a literal interpretation of Genesis. A number of us do not believe that the evidence seen in the world and universe God has given us is consistent with a recent creation and therefore that there is a different meaning for us in the creation account than just a retelling of history. Others strongly disagree. And that is the crux of the debate here, how old is the creation and how did the things we see here today get here.

This forum can be a bit tense. There are some that I wish would stick to more facts and less name calling before we all get on the bad side of the administrator and get this forum shut down (again). But in the end, we are all on the same side, even if it does not sound like it. I lurked on this board for a long time before I joined and I have been an infrequent poster. There used to be a time when this forum was full of atheists and it was a very rough time then. It was eventually shut down for a while and then came back in a manner where all posts had to be emailed to the administrator who would review it before adding it. That did not attract much attention. I am grateful that we have the forum back to its current state, even with the occasional un-Christian responses.

If you feel like it, jump on in, the water's fine. Most of us don't bite. Also, I have painted with a very broad brush here so don't think what I say is close to universal, just an opinion.

 

Welcome to the Creation vs. evolution forum, Robert H! you make a good point. The title is a bit of a misnomer. We’re all creationists here, but we’re creationists of all different flavors.

God’s Word isn’t a manual on how He created the heavens and the earth. My printer manual has more detail. The starting point of the Bible is God and we are all on the same page at that point. Concerning the how of creation though, we all have our various opinions. It’s my opinion that we will all be awed and humbled when God’s creative powers are finally revealed.

I’m closest to a view called Progressive Creationism. Not quite full-blown theistic evolution, but not a 6-day creationist either. It can be considered a “literal” view, but that’s debatable!!!

Rob

 

Quite frankly I think it's overwhelmingly obvious that Genesis isn't a history/scientific text. The point of Genesis isn't about how old the earth is.

You know, I keep hearing the "very specific" aspects of Genesis. The fact is, it's not very specific. How did plants live before the sun? God? Maybe, but the bible doesn't say *how* or *why* this was so.

Everyone has their own opinion. Mine is that God imbued man with a soul, it didn't evolve. I think that the difference between chimps and humans is a profound one.

 

As an example, I would go back to antiquity - to just about New Testament time or perhaps a century afterward, to the Jewish Bible commentary, the Midrash Rabbah, which says "until the generation of Enosh men wore the faces of monkeys". It's not much, but seems to me a very early religious sentiment supportive of evolution.

 

I basically agree with your view. Having just retired after a 40-year career as an engineer I find it impossible to accept the young earth view. I do believe that God is the ultimate source of all truth and scientists and engineers have been just scratching away on the surface of the real answer about creation. Scientific theories evolve over time as we begin to understand a little bit more.

For instance, Newton was thought to have absolutely defined the laws of motion and then along came a genius named Einstein (Time Magazine's Man of the 20th century). He basically said things behave differently around and past the speed of light. Einstein never accepted Max Plank's Theory of Quantum mechanics which said that on the sub-atomic level everything is probabilistic and mere observation changes the results of interactions. Einstein was essentially a Deist like many of our founding fathers but he said that "God does not play dice with the universe." The "Big Bang" theory, M theory and string Theory have added additional complexity with input from some very intriguing people like Stephen Hawking who is an atheist. Observations have supported these ideas to some degree.

My point with all of this is to say that God's ways and His thoughts are so far superior to ours that I don't think ever be able to define exactly how God created the universe until we see Him face to face. Scientific advances don't negatively impact my faith in the least. In fact, they just give me a greater sense of how great the God of All is. There is no conflict between science and religion. They address different realms, one the seen and the other the unseen.

I just don't believe God would trick us by giving us indisputable evidence that the universe is billions of years old when in reality it's only a few thousand years old. I agree that the clear dividing line is God's giving man an eternal soul which makes him different from the rest of creation. I would LOVE to find some theological support for seeing my beloved golden retrievers in heaven but I'll just have to leave that up to God!

 

There is no "indisputable evidence that the universe is billions of years old."

 

Would say that NO Christian should support Darwinism evolution, and even Theistic evolution is NOT supported at all in the scriptures, so while not a saving issue, the Christian who stands on the full inspiration/inerrancy of the Bible should not support either version of it!
I used to uphold it strongly, but the scriptures and the evidence form geology. bioloby, and respecially the origin of Life, will not support it!

 

There are different ways to prove something which depend upon what one is trying to prove.
When trying to prove a historical event one generally aims for a convergence of evidence.

So you're right, there is no indisputable evidence for an old universe; but there is a convergence of evidence from a multitude of disciplines.

Rob

 

There is, if you trust the science and scientists behind it.

 

Just a few days ago I was mulling over the situation of just how fortuitous it was that "evolutionary Eve" and "evolutionary Adam" just happened to evolve at the same time. Would have been to bad if evolutionary Adam had not evolved until after evolutionary Eve had already gone through menopause and was too old to bear children. It is extremely fortuitous that this double evolution in fact happened thousands of times just right for the species that multiply by heterosexual procreation.

 

Neither evolution view explains how God created Adam. nor how life itself started!

 

IF billions of year old, the Moon would have snapped out of it orbit long time ago, as it moves 2.5 " further away each year...