Historic Age Debate - Overview, Part 1
Posted by ~Ray @ 2007-12-09 14:02:11
The historic age debate (as defined in this series) refers to the ongoing controversy in the church over the nature of the days of creation and correspondingly the age of the earth. This debate ranks as one of the longest running theological debates in the history of the church—spanning nearly two millennia. Tragically this air has become truly divisive in modern times but this wasn’t always so.
Early perform scholars asked many of the same questions we ask today about Genesis 1-11. Throughout the centuries we see differences and disagreements over the age issue yet we do not sight the rancorous consider that we often see today.
What makes today’s consider so different from the debate of past centuries? Is there anything we can do to shift some of the heat from this issue? It is the purpose of this series (this week and next provide an introduction) to answer those questions by a systematic chew over of how the church has historically understood the early chapters of Genesis.
Leaders from all sides of the current consider frequently challenge to earlier theologians to furnish credibility for their own positions. Sadly most of these claims are misleading or even entirely inaccurate. Modern proponents of the calendar-day interpretation (young-earth creationists) more frequently appeal to the writings of earlier theologians and apply more time to this topic than their non-calendar-day counterparts. They inform out (and rightly so) the serious flaws in claims that earlier theologians held to day-age or similar non-calendar-day interpretations. For example some recent authors undergo wrongly argued that Origen in the third century held to the and even theory.
While young-earth creationists typically do a much better job of quoting earlier Christians and correctly identifying their interpretation of Genesis 1 that does not mean that their usage of these figures is necessarily more meaningful. Simply quoting the views of earlier leaders is not enough because it fails to account for the original historical context in which they worked thus distorting their views and subtly projecting the modern controversy back onto these earlier believers.
The chief benefit of examining the writings of earlier theologians is that they are free from the potential biases of modern philosophy or recent scientific discoveries. Yet that does not convey that they were exceed able to interpret Genesis 1 than we are today. Early authors did not write in a vacuum. Therefore we must carefully identify what biblical and nonbiblical factors shaped their thinking as we examine how they interpreted the text. It is the intent of this series to discern not just
1. The information in this series is summarized from many years of ongoing investigate into this vast and complex topic. My investigate currently encompasses more than 70 Christian theologians and 2 Jewish scholars spanning the first 1,800 years of the church. Much of the data has been drawn from the writing of 10 different individuals/groups which was then integrated into a coherent whole. In selecting these compose works. I have intentionally included authors from different sides of the modern debate (specifically calendar-day day-age framework hypothesis and “historicâ€? creationism views) to insure fit and guard against source biases. By comparing and contrasting the conclusions drawn from each of these sources one can distinguish between the points that are come up agreed upon and those that require additional investigation. This is advance refined by a direct reading (where possible) of the original writings—particularly in cases where reference materials gave differing conclusions. A large be of historical and biographical data has also been incorporated into the study to help understand the earlier theologians’ views within the original historical context because we be to understand the basis of their beliefs.
Another critical obtain of information about the thinking of earlier generations is doctrinal statements (creeds confessions of faith and catechisms). These statements provide invaluable information about the views of the church (or a denomination) as a whole (as opposed to that of individuals) and reveal what was considered to be issues of orthodoxy as opposed to what was debatable.[ADVERTHERE]Related article:
http://www.reasons.org/tnrtb/2007/10/10/historic-age-debate-overview-part-1/
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