Evangelicals Question The Existence Of Adam And Eve

Let's go back to the beginning — all the way to Adam and Eve, and to the question: Did they exist, and did all of humanity descend from that single pair?
According to the Bible (Genesis 2:7), this is how humanity began: "The Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul." God then called the man Adam, and later created Eve from Adam's rib.
Polls by Gallup and the Pew Research Center find that four out of 10 Americans believe this account. It's a central tenet for much of conservative Christianity, from evangelicals to confessional churches such as the Christian Reformed Church.
But now some conservative scholars are saying publicly that they can no longer believe the Genesis account. Asked how likely it is that we all descended from Adam and Eve, Dennis Venema, a biologist at Trinity Western University, replies: "That would be against all the genomic evidence that we've assembled over the last 20 years, so not likely at all."
Venema says there is no way we can be traced back to a single couple. He says with the mapping of the human genome, it's clear that modern humans emerged from other primates as a large population — long before the Genesis time frame of a few thousand years ago. And given the genetic variation of people today, he says scientists can't get that population size below 10,000 people at any time in our evolutionary history.
To get down to just two ancestors, Venema says, "You would have to postulate that there's been this absolutely astronomical mutation rate that has produced all these new variants in an incredibly short period of time. Those types of mutation rates are just not possible. It would mutate us out of existence."
And Venema is part of a growing cadre of Christian scholars who say they want their faith to come into the 21st century. Another one is John Schneider, who taught theology at Calvin College in Michigan until recently. He says it's time to face facts: There was no historical Adam and Eve, no serpent, no apple, no fall that toppled man from a state of innocence.
"Evolution makes it pretty clear that in nature, and in the moral experience of human beings, there never was any such paradise to be lost," Schneider says. "So Christians, I think, have a challenge, have a job on their hands to reformulate some of their tradition about human beginnings."
"The evolution controversy today is, I think, a Galileo moment," says Karl Giberson, who authored several books trying to reconcile Christianity and evolution, including The Language of Science and Faith, with Francis Collins. Giberson — who taught physics at Eastern Nazarene College until his views became too uncomfortable in Christian academia — says Protestants who question Adam and Eve are akin to Galileo in the 1600s, who defied Catholic Church doctrine by stating that the earth revolved around the sun and not vice versa. Galileo was condemned by the church, and it took more than three centuries for the Vatican to express regret at its error.
"When you ignore science, you end up with egg on your face," Giberson says. "The Catholic Church has had an awful lot of egg on its face for centuries because of Galileo. And Protestants would do very well to look at that and to learn from it."
NPR : August 9th 2011

 

I see.. So if it were up to you, you'd still have Galileo under arrest.. lol

 

DNA and what is inside it is absolutely observable. And what is inside it clearly shows common ancestry based on the tested and observed laws of genetic inheritance.
Now, in light of this, are you planning on throwing Gregor Mendel in jail too now..? lol

 

Millions of Christians around the globe accept and even teach the evolution of man.
Its not about "disproving the word of God".. Its about teaching science.
"The word of God" like all religious texts must be interpreted by us humans..
And not everyone interprets those passages as literal history.

 

In one of my other chat forums years ago, i came across a woman who was 100% convinced of geocentrism.
She insisted up and down till she was blue in the face that "the earth didn't move"..
And she based that opinion on HER interpretation of Bible passages like these.

1 Chronicles 16:30: "He has fixed the earth firm, immovable."
Psalm 93:1: "Thou hast fixed the earth immovable and firm ..."
Psalm 96:10: "He has fixed the earth firm, immovable ..."
Psalm 104:5: "Thou didst fix the earth on its foundation so that it never can be shaken."
Isaiah 45:18: "...who made the earth and fashioned it, and himself fixed it fast..."

Now, i doubt many of us here take THOSE passages literally, and think the Sun orbits a fixed earth..? Fair..?
So everyone here in the 21st century has accepted the science and no longer accepts this early interpretation..?
So if THIS interpretation can be wrong, then what about other passages which may also not be literal..?

 

Care to post some of these articles..? I'd love to read them..