NOTE: This document is for personal use only. It is not to be distributed in either print or electronic format.
Dalton D. Baldwin
Emeritus Professor of Christian Theology, Loma Linda University
FOR: Faith and Science Conference, Glacier View Ranch, CO — August 2003
In e-mail discussion many of the faith and science community have expressed serious reservations about an ongoing, progressive understanding of creation during which there is death before any human had sinned. For them, such a concept of creation denies that sin causes death, portrays an evil God, and denies the causal relation between our sins and the death of Christ so that the whole plan of salvation is destroyed. Any concept of creation that does these things should be rejected. The problem of this paper is: Does ongoing progressive creation deny that sin results in death, portray an evil God, and destroy the plan of salvation?
What makes people think that death before sin destroys the plan of salvation? I will try to summarize what I hear them saying with the hope that we can avoid talking past each other. I hear them taking the following positions:
1. Natural Immortality of All Created Living Things. They believe that in the beginning God created a perfect ecology in which there would be no death. All living things were naturally immortal in the sense that they would not have to eat of the tree of life to have extended existence. Genesis 1:31 says that everything that God had created was "very good." "Very good" means that there would be no death in any living thing. Each plant or animal was created with a naturally immortal nature.
2. Sin Causes Death. In the story of creation and fall, the newly created man and woman were told, if you eat the forbidden fruit, "you shall die." (Gen 2:17) Paul wrote, "For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord." (Rom 6:23) The word "wages" is used as a metaphor which here carries the meaning of "effect." Death is the effect of sin; which is the same as to say, sin is the cause of death.
3. The Divine Curse after the First Sin Announced Death as the Penalty for Sin. Into a perfect ecology in which there was no death, God introduced death as a penalty for the first human sin. Genesis 2:17 says that when you eat of the Tree of Knowledge, "you shall die." Romans 5:12 says "Sin came into the world through one man and death through sin, and so death spread to all because all have sinned." The death that came upon all human beings and on all living things was a penalty announced by the divine curse after the first sin. (Gen 3:14-19) God said that he would act changing the nature of living things so that they would return to "dust" from which they "were taken." Even soil was made less fertile. The whole "creation was subjected to futility." (Rom 8:20) These passages are interpreted to mean that God punished humans and all living things by changing their natures from immortal to mortal. This curse on the whole creation resulted in living things dying from old age, predation and other natural evil. This change of nature, losing immortality, is known as "the Fall."
4. The Process of Progressive Ongoing Creation is Driven by Death. Death, suffering, disease and serial mass destruction of species and sustainable habitats drives progressive creation. This means that death is a driving force in the production of more complex beings in progressive creation. If God were to use evil in his creation, this would reflect on the goodness of God. God is totally good and he does not and would not use evil in his creation.
5. Sin Caused the Saving Death of Christ. If there had been no sin, it would not have been necessary for the incarnate Christ to die. Justice requires that the penalty for sin must be carried out. When God forgives sinners who have faith and gives them eternal life, the death penalty for their forgiven sins is not yet carried out. When Christ bears the sin of those who have been forgiven and suffers their penalty of death on the cross, the just penalty for forgiven sin is carried out. Saying that sin causes the death of Christ is a way to focus attention on the crucial, saving value of the death of Christ.
With these basic convictions, it is easy to understand why an ongoing progressive creation during which there is death before sin would seem to destroy the plan of salvation. If people believed that before sin every living thing was immortal and that death would not occur unless it were caused by sin; it would be natural to feel that death before sin would deny that sin causes death. Then in turn, if sin does not cause death, sin would not cause the death of Christ. If God did not send Christ to live a life that revealed that God is love and to die for sinners, the plan of salvation would be destroyed.
With some awareness of my presuppositions you
will be better able to understand what I am saying, better able to identify what
is true about what I am saying, and better able to help me correct what is in
error. To the degree to which I am aware of them my presuppositions are as
follows:
I believe that the Bible is the final authority for doctrine
and practice.
I believe that the writings of Ellen White have authority for
doctrine and practice derived from the Bible and subordinated to the Bible. If
Ellen White says anything which is inconsistent with what the Bible as a whole
says, the contradictory EGW concept should be rejected. I say "Bible as a whole"
because Ellen White's rejection of slavery contradicts Leviticus 25:44-46 where
it is said that God approves of slavery, but the Bible as a whole disapproves of
slavery. The idea that God approves of slavery is a terrible theological error.
I believe that revelation did not cease at the time of the
close of the biblical canon. Knowledge and wisdom are spiritual gifts. (1 Cor
12:8) "Every gleam of thought, every flash of the intellect, is from the Light
of the world." (Ed 14) Every hypothesis which turns out to be true is from God.
Theological, philosophic and scientific hypotheses should be tested for their
revealed character or truthfulness by checking for correspondence with perceived
reality, evaluating their consistency with prior revelation (Isa 8:20) and their
consequences or fruits (Mat 7:15-20) when put into action. Science is largely a
refined method of measuring consequences.
I believe that a careful evaluation of the correspondence of
our ideas with perceived reality, the consistency between our ideas and
measurement of the consequence of our ideas can sometimes help us to identify
erroneous features of what we had thought was revealed or true, and help us
develop correcting hypotheses.
I believe that God is totally good and that all his actions
are totally good. God is the source of good.
I believe that God is the creator of everything that is. He
is the source of novelty and order. Chance cannot produce novelty. Order is not
self-organized.
I believe that God is totally powerful and the source of all
the power anyone or anything uses in the world. Without God we can do nothing.
I believe that God created humans with free will with which
they can choose faith or sin, appropriate what they think is probably true or
probably error, enter into relationship with God or separate from God (Isa
59:2), choose life or death. All of these paired alternatives are synonymous. A
faith decision is to choose to appropriate what we think is probably true, is to
choose to enter into relationship with God and to choose life.
I believe that sin results in death.
I believe that the activity of Christ reveals, creates, and
saves.
I believe that Christ's incarnation, sinless life, and death
on the cross are necessary for salvation.
I believe that presuppositions can be evaluated and should be corrected when they are found to be faulty. Part of the value of this discussion will come from the improvement of our presuppositions. When you evaluate these presuppositions you will probably find many inconsistencies between them. When I evaluate them I find no inconsistencies. I hope that you will not focus so much on perceived inconsistencies in these presuppositions that you do not hear or understand what I am trying to say in the remainder of this paper. I hope that you will use my description of some of my presuppositions to better understand what I am saying in the rest of this paper before you help me to improve the consistency in my presuppositions.
The primary ideas in this discussion expressing reservations regarding an ongoing progressive creation are very valuable and true. They need to be made central in an adequate doctrine of creation. A sound understanding of creation is closely connected with and consistent with the understanding of salvation. The death of Christ in the plan of salvation is necessary for salvation and is important for understanding the relation between death and creation. That sin causes death is important for properly understanding the doctrine of creation and the doctrine of salvation. Let us evaluate each of the five major sections above.
1. Natural Immortality of Living Beings. I do not think that created animals and plants were naturally immortal. In the Genesis 2-3 story of the creation and fall the presence of the tree of life in the created garden (Gen 2:9) suggests that Adam was not naturally immortal. Later in the story God said, "See, the man has become like one of us, knowing good and evil; and now, he might reach out his hand and take also from the tree of life, and eat, and live forever." (Gen 3:22) Evidently humans were not created immortal but had to receive what is symbolized by the tree of life for extended existence. Their not being immortal meant that they would die from natural evil such as old age. The story of the fall teaches that sin is the cause of ultimate death. If the first human's were not created with an immortal nature, the other living beings would not have been created with an immortal nature.
2. Sin Causes Death. It is true that
sin results in death. Sin results in the ultimate death of the sinner. However,
when you say this, you seem to understand that all death is the result of sin.
Not all death results from sin. Psalm 104 is obviously talking about originating
creation because it mentions the creation of light, firmament, dry land,
vegetation, moon and sun, flying and swimming creatures, land animals and humans
in almost the same order as in the first chapter of Genesis. The Psalm points
out that the creation of vegetation is the creation of food for animals. "You
cause the grass to grow for the cattle, and plants for people to use." (Ps
104:14) It explains that God creates not only vegetation for food but also
living things for food for carnivorous animals. "The young lions roar for their
prey, seeking their food from God." (Ps 104:21)
In this creation Psalm the death of the "prey," which God
created to feed the lions, was not caused by sin. Death before the first human
sin from old age, predation, earthquakes and other forms of natural evil was not
caused by sin. It was also not caused by God. Death from natural evil after the
first human sin is also not caused by sin, and it is not caused by God as a
penalty for the first human sin. Let us call this death which is caused by
natural evil, natural death.
Our empathy with suffering animals makes us believe that an
ecology which includes predation is not "very good." (Gen 1:31) At one time I
thought that God originally created a balanced ecology where there was no death.
This ecology was marvelously complex with the byproducts of flora such as oxygen
essential for the existence of fauna and the byproducts of fauna such as carbon
dioxide essential for flora. It seemed to me that the "pruning" of a tree by
animals removing some of the foliage did not damage but benefited the tree. I
did not stop to think that when a human eats a wheat kernel, the living being of
that kernel is destroyed and that a corresponding "pruning" of animals would
amount to predation. The creation of predatory lions in the description of
creation in Psalm 104 and the presence of predation in the geological column
long before there were any human beings who could sin required me to reexamine
the value of predation. The goodness of predation in the present ecology for
maintaining the balance of nature and my conviction that a good God would not
create any thing that was not good, led me to believe that it must have been
impossible for God to create an ecology in which flora and fauna are mutually
dependent without predation.
Our intuitive understanding of omnipotence leads us to
believe that nothing is impossible for God; and, therefore, we might think that
God could create a stone so large that he could not move it. Such an act is a
self-contradiction. No stone could be so large that an omnipotent lifter could
not lift it. Saying that God is omnipotent does not mean that God can enact a
self-contradiction. The critics opposing the doctrine of free will advocated by
Arminius claimed that God had created free beings who received irresistible
grace. Such a creation is an enacted self-contradiction and is impossible.
Evidently creating an ecology in which there are four dimensional material flora
and fauna mutually dependent on each other cannot avoid predation. The only way
to avoid predation would be not to create four dimensional, mutually dependent
flora and fauna..
After this parenthesis on omnipotence and the possibility of
self-contradictory divine action, let us return to sin as the cause of death.
The causes that result in natural death are not initiated by sin. We should
differentiate between at least two types of death, natural death and spiritual
death.
The most important kind of death is the ultimate death which
is the result of the sinners own sin. Paul wrote, "I was once alive apart from
the law, but when the commandment came, sin revived ["sprang to life" NEB1]
and I died." (Rom 7:9-10) A child growing up, naively does not know that it is
wrong to covet. If, after learning how wrong it is to covet, a person
deliberately decides to covet; something in his or her spiritual center dies.
Let us call this type of death "spiritual death."
Paul wrote, "To set the mind on the flesh [choose to sin] is
death, but to set the mind on the Spirit is life and peace." (Rom 8:5) He must
have been referring to spiritual death, because he was still alive after that
death and able to repent and exercise faith. After sinning caused his spiritual
death, his deciding self continued to live just as Adam's natural life continued
after he sinned. Jesus told Martha that "everyone who lives and believes in me
will never die." (John 11:26). In harmony with that statement, the thief on the
cross, who believed in Jesus Christ, did not experience spiritual death as he
was dying. All spiritual death results from the sin of the one who dies.
Sometimes the word, "sin," is in the singular form when it
refers to the generic, spiritual-death-causing sin as in Romans 5:12. Each of
the descendents of Adam sinned many times. Each one of those many sins had a
death producing impact on the spiritual self. "For just as you once presented
your members as slaves to impurity and to greater and greater iniquity, so now
present your members as slaves to righteousness for sanctification." (Rom 6:19)
This habitually sinning thief now on the cross was able to choose to exercise
faith receiving eternal life even though the feelings, thoughts and values of
his heart had been damaged by the sin of Adam and billions of subsequent human
sins including his own. He was able to choose faith in spite of the results of
the fall. Apparently the second thief on the cross died spiritually as well as
"naturally." His spiritual death resulted from his own choice not to believe in
Jesus Christ.
Ellen White makes this distinction between two types of
death, natural and spiritual. "'The wages of sin is death; but the gift of God
is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.' Rom 6:23 While life is the
inheritance of the righteous, death is the portion of the wicked. The penalty
threatened is not merely temporal death, for all must suffer this. It is the
second death, the opposite of eternal life." (4 SP 364)
Since the death which "is the wages of sin" is in parallel
contrast with "eternal life," it must be spiritual death. The death that
resulted from Adam's first sin and subsequently in all human beings when "all
men sinned" (Rom 5:12) was spiritual death. Spiritual death is the "wages of
sin. Natural death from natural evil does not result from sin.
3. The Divine Curse after the First Sin
Announced Death as the Penalty for Sin. I suspect that the idea that death
from natural evil was imposed on living things in nature as a penalty for Adam's
sin has been influenced by Augustine. He thought that the spiritual death of all
human beings resulted from the divine penalty for Adam's first sin. The term
"Fall" for Adam's first sin is not used anywhere in the Bible. It appears that
the writers of the remainder of the Old Testament did not mention the first
human sin, perhaps because they focused on contemporaneous sin. Augustine was
the first Christian theologian to elaborate a doctrine of the fall. He
understood that Paul taught that when Adam sinned, God punished the whole human
race by changing human nature from a nature with original righteousness to a
nature with original sin. A human with original righteousness is sinless and
immortal. A human with original sin is spiritually dead at birth. His doctrine
of original sin was a doctrine that the humans who were born after the fall were
spiritually dead at birth. With Augustine's original-sin-nature people could not
freely choose whether or not to sin. They had no free will. They sinned no
matter what they chose. All of the descendents of Adam are born sinners and
spiritually dead. In this understanding of the fall, spiritual death is not the
"natural" result of sin but a penalty "created" by God.
We need to carefully analyze the difference between "result"
and "penalty." These terms have enough overlapping meaning to be used as
synonyms. We can mean the same thing by saying, "Some poverty is the result of
laziness," as we mean by saying, "Some poverty is the penalty for laziness."
However, the dominant meaning of the two terms is different. The result of
murder is spiritual death of the murderer, loss of the victim to the human
family, and significant changes in the feelings of friends: and these results
are caused by the murderer's sin. The human penalty for murder may be the death
penalty, life in prison, or a certain number of years in prison followed by
parole. The penalty is decided and caused by an actor or actors other than the
murderer. Adam's first sin resulted in his own spiritual death. This death was
not a penalty in the sense that God was the acting cause of the death.
The spiritual death of people with original sin was a penalty
in the sense that God was the acting cause of the death. It would seem to me
that a God who would penalize the whole human race for Adam's first sin by
"creating" a new human nature that is spiritually dead at birth is an unjust
God. A God that would penalize all of the immortal beings in nature for Adam's
first sin by recreating them with mortal natures is an unjust God. I believe
that God is a just God and he did not penalize all living things for Adam's
first sin by introducing death into human nature and into the ecology.
You might say that the introduction of death into the perfect
ecology was a divine act because it is God speaking in this curse, and that it
is sinful hubris to judge God's penalty as unjust. In the mid-nineteenth century
many sincere, conscientious supporters of slavery felt that abolitionists were
destroying the Bible because they said that slavery was a sin. Owning slaves was
not a sin because God initiated slavery in the inspired curse on the sons of
Ham; and God approved of slavery in Leviticus 25:44-46. Certainly we recognize
that this story connecting slavery to human sin should not be interpreted to
mean that God actively instituted slavery in the "curse" on the descendents of
Ham. God did not "institute" death in the whole creation in the curse pronounced
after the first human sin.
4. The Process of Progressive Ongoing
Creation is Driven by Death. I can understand why you feel intuitively that
death is a driving force needed in progressive creation. One time in an academy
physics class the teacher helped us understand the nature of a vacuum and the
nature of atmospheric pressure by pumping most of the air out of a five gallon
honey can. The can was crumpled into a wad of metal. We intuitively thought that
the cause of crumpling the can was the vacuum, the absence of air in the can.
This would amount to nothing causing something. The teacher explained that the
absence of air in the can did not crumple it. It was the force of the
atmospheric air pressure outside of the can which caused the crumpling.
Death is no more necessary for progressive creation than for
sudden creation of the whole range of creatures with varying degrees of
complexity. In progressive creation God gradually introduces increasingly
complex good design over time. In the progressive creation of living things, all
of God's creative action produces better more abundant life. None of God's
creative action produces death. Death contributes nothing to progressive
creation.
5. Sin Caused the Saving Death of Christ.
It is very important to emphasize the crucial importance of Christ's death for
human sin. Our sin caused the death of Christ in the sense that if humans had
not sinned there would have been no necessity for the incarnation, sinless life
and death of Christ. Our sins are indirectly responsible for the death of
Christ.
However, saying that Christ's saving death is "caused by," is
the "wages of," is the "result of" sin is a strange way to use the word "cause."
Usually when we say A causes B, we think of A as directly active in the
production of B. Our sins are directly active in causing our own spiritual
death. Our sins are not directly active in causing the death of Christ any more
than the vacuum was directly active in causing the crumpling of the honey can.
"Our loving God causes the incarnation of Jesus Christ who died a saving death"
is a better way to use the word "cause" in relation to the death of Christ.
I readily understand why most people believe that justice in
dealing with sin requires proportioned retributive penalty. There are many
statements in the Bible that portray justice with regard to sin as proportioned
retribution. For example Deuteronomic legal principles include, "If the one in
the wrong deserves to be flogged, the judge shall make that person lie down and
be beaten in his presence with the number of lashes proportionate to the
offense." (Deut 25:2) And further, "Show no pity: life for life, eye for eye,
tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot." (Deut 19:21)
There is even a story that supports substitutionary
retribution. After a three year famine the author of the story thought that
David "inquired of the LORD" and the response was, "There is blood guilt on Saul
and on his house, because he put the Gibeonites to death." (2 Sam 21:1) They
thought that God withheld rain as a penalty for failure to enact retribution for
Saul's unjust slaughter of some Gibeonites. Therefore David delivered seven
descendents of Saul to the Gibeonites who "impaled" them "before the Lord." (2
Sam 21:9) After this substitutionary retribution, the story says that "God
heeded supplications for the land" and presumably caused it to rain. (2 Sam
21:14) Killing these descendents of Saul was terribly unjust in the light of
other passages that reject substitutionary retribution.
In the Bible there are a few statements that reject
retribution as a way to deal with sin. In the Sermon on the Mount Jesus said,
"You have heard that it was said, 'An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.'
But I say to you, Do not resist an evildoer." (Mat 5:38-39) Again Jesus said,
"You have heard that it was said, 'You shall love your neighbor and hate your
enemy.' But I say to you, Love our enemies and pray for those who persecute you,
so that you may be children of your Father in heaven; for he makes his sun rise
on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the righteous and on the
unrighteous." By saying these things, Jesus explained that natural evil like
drought is not divinely enacted retributive penalty for sin. He also rejected
the idea that justice requires proportioned retribution.
These principles are already stated in the Old Testament. The
Psalmist says that a substitutionary "sacrifice" (Ps 51:16) would be of no value
in dealing with his sin. He prayed for "broken and contrite" repentance (v. 17),
forgiveness (v. 1) and the creation of "a clean heart" (v 10). When God answered
this prayer, he created spiritual life. He created biochemical conditions on
neurons which produced better feelings, thoughts and actions. Salvation by the
divine creation of spiritual life was not conditioned on any proportionate
retribution.
Both Jeremiah and Ezekiel rejected substitutionary
retribution poured out on the descendents of sinners. "The person who sins shall
die. A child shall not suffer for the iniquity of a parent, nor a parent suffer
for the iniquity of a child." (Ez 18:20; cf Jer 31:30) And even the sinner does
not need to die for those sins if he by faith accepts forgiveness and the
writing of God's law on his heart. (Jer 31:31-33) "Cast away from you all the
transgressions that you have committed against me, and get yourselves a new
heart and a new spirit! Why will you die, O house of Israel? I have no pleasure
in the death of anyone says the Lord GOD. Turn, then, and live." (Ez 18:31-32)
Ezekiel knew that sinners cannot cast away their transgressions and get new
hearts in their own strength. They must by faith accept a new heart created by
God. "A new heart I will give you, and a new spirit I will put within you; and I
will remove from your body the heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh." (Ez
36.26) This saving creation of a new heart is not conditioned on any
substitutionary retribution.
Ezekiel knew that their belief that justice requires
proportionate retribution would lead them to regard as unjust God's saving
creation of a new heart without retribution. "Yet you say, 'The way of the Lord
is not just.' Hear now, O house of Israel: Is my way not just? Is it not your
ways that are not just?" (Ez 18:25) One of the divine purposes behind the
incarnation, sinless life, and saving death of Christ was to show that God is
just when he bypasses retribution for sin and creates eternal life in those who
have faith. God did not cause the incarnation so that he could place forgiven
sin on Christ ending his life as a substitutionary retribution. "He did this to
show his righteousness, because in his divine forbearance he had passed over the
sins previously committed." (Rom 3:25) He did this to show that he was just when
he passed over retribution for forgiven sin.
If God can and does justly save sinners without substitionary
retribution for their sins, how can our sins cause the death of Christ in the
sense that if we had not sinned it would not have been necessary for Christ to
die? Why was Christ's death necessary to accomplish God's saving purpose? People
had been taught that God poured out proportionate retribution on sinners who
could not help but sin. They had been taught that natural evil such as disease,
poverty and death were divinely enacted penalties for their sin. They,
therefore, felt that God was a vengeful, unjust tyrant. Christ had to become
incarnate, live a sinless life and experience death to show that "natural" death
was not a penalty for sin. The people had to see that the death of the incarnate
Christ was directly caused by the sinful human decisions in the Sanhedrin and
the Roman government and not by a god who relentlessly penalizes sinners with
proportionate retribution. Christ had to die a death like being lifted up on a
cross in order to "draw all people" to himself. (John 12:32) People needed to
see the incarnate God experiencing crucifixion for sinners in order to realize
that God is not an unjust, vengeful tyrant. They needed to see the incarnate God
being crucified to realize how much God loved them. They had to realize how much
God loves them in order to be drawn to him. "No one can come" for salvation
"unless drawn by the Father." (John 6:44) Christ had to die for sinners in order
to accomplish God's saving purpose in the world.
Our sins caused the death of Christ in the sense that if we
had not sinned; the incarnation, sinless life and death for our sins would not
have been necessary.
Does a progressive ongoing creation deny that
sin causes death, portray an evil God and destroy the plan of salvation? There
is no conflict between a progressive ongoing creation and sin causing death. The
ultimate result of sin is death.
A god who would retributively punish nature and descendants
for an ancestor's sin by directly causing storms, floods, disease, and death is
unjust. The God who progressively creates increasingly complex forms of order
and progressively saves sinners who have faith by creating biochemical
conditions on neurons which produce a more abundant life is a maximally
powerful, just, good and loving God.
The plan of salvation is a plan for the deliverance of
sinners from the bondage of sin and death. Progressive creation does not destroy
that plan. The death of Christ is part of that plan. No one can be saved without
being "drawn" by God. God's drawing action is not irresistible grace. A human
with free will cannot be drawn to a God who is seen to be unjust. The death of
Christ showed that the "natural" death of Christ was not a divine penalty for
his sin because he was sinless. The death of Christ showed that it was not
unjust for God "pass" over retribution for forgiven sin. Since the death caused
by sin is not caused by God, and since it is unjust to penalize beings other
than the sinner for the sinner's sin; we can know that God did not respond to
the first human sin by penalizing all of the beings in the created ecology by
introducing death into the ecology. The ongoing progressive creation of
biochemical conditions on neurons which result in more abundant eternal life is
part of the plan of salvation. The plan of salvation includes the design for
God's ongoing progressive creation.
Dalton D. Baldwin is Emeritus Professor of Christian Theology at Loma Linda University where he taught for over 30 years. 11581 Richardson Street, Loma Linda, CA 92354. 909-796-9206. Bardalwin@AOL.com
--------------------
1The Greek word translated "revived" is a form of anazao. Arndt and Gingrich explain that in Romans 7:9 the word means "spring into life (with the loss of the force of ana)," in analogy to anablepo when it means receive sight. A Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament, p. 53. The Greek prefix ana means "again." The Greek word blepo means "I see."