Harold Coffin's diagrammatic presentation of ecological zonation to illustrate how, on the Whitcomb and Morris model, animals supposedly could have been buried in a roughly predictable order by rising flood waters.
In the morning seminar Dr. David Tyler, secretary of the Biblical Creation Society, considered the pitfalls and problems of "scientific creationism" in relation to the goal of a biblically-based perspective on origins. He highlighted past mistakes, often brought about by the desire for spectacular evidence for Creation. Whilst acknowledging what had been achieved over the years, he also recognised that many had been offended by the quality of evidence, especially when it later proved unreliable. Whilst evolutionists have many examples of "discredited proofs" in their records, Christians who believe the Bible need to exercise greater care in ensuring that the evidence they cite will stand up better to scrutiny and the test of time. Dr. Tyler suggested that greater care was needed in the future, with a higher level of working together. Care was also needed to research claims and theories more thoroughly and to keep informed of developments. He identified the goals of creationism as the development of a consistently Christian world view, the health and vigour of the Christian church, the education of our youth, and the social impact of society's view of origins. He encouraged those present to adopt a strategy which draws from the book of Nehemiah: restoring the broken walls by good leadership, teamwork, commitment, prayer and reformation.
In the afternoon Michael Garton, a geologist, considered the nature of the Flood. Noting that the term 'flood' is a familiar concept to us, he appealed to the unique Biblical expressions for this event (mabbuwl and kataklusmos) along with its short duration (40 days, not a year, for the mabbuwl itself) to argue for a much more violent and horrendous catastrophe. Neither popular images nor even creationist literature have appreciated the awesome power of the Flood, itself a type of the judgement at the Lord's return. As an expression of the Lord's anger, His declared purpose in the Flood was to "blot out", remove without trace, man and all land-dwelling, air-breathing animals. For these Biblical reasons, as well as compelling geological ones, Mr. Garton reasoned that there is a need to re-assess the popular explanation that the majority of fossils of land animals were formed during the Flood. These he believes are a record of continuing catastrophes in the centuries afterwards as the earth settled down from the environmental trauma of the Genesis Mabbuwl.
A follow-up discussion paper by Michael Garton
The meeting on 16 May considered the present state of Creationism, highlighting its areas of strength (e.g. the design argument), but also emphasising those areas where the presently generally accepted understanding is wrong, and needs to be reviewed. Following on from the meeting, here are some suggestions for the way forward, which take a most conservative approach to scripture. It will become clearer too why the church has largely ignored the Flood, how our efforts can be more readily incorporated into general evangelical witness, and the role you could play in taking this further.
The problems mentioned at the meeting cannot be ignored: we must face the fact that whilst some creationist arguments are good, we are getting the historical analysis seriously wrong. Quite apart from how this dangerously undermines our credibility and makes it difficult for God to honour our apologetic efforts, our primary concern must be to tell the truth.
One of the problems highlighted was an over-reliance on spectacular evidences for creation, such as the Paluxy footprints, which very often later prove to be wrong. It is far better to rely on solid, broadly based, general principles which are robust to any errors that are found in any small part of the argument. The truth of any scientific story lies in the accuracy of the details - a point very well made in the preface of Michael Behe's book "Darwin's Black Box" - it is all too easy to gloss over the difficulties with rhetoric. Details are harder to get across to other people, but the result is a secure base of truth which is unlikely to be embarrassingly discredited. Simplistic models ('the Flood is responsible for all geology') are appealing, but the reality is far more complex.
Some of us will therefore face a choice - to continue to use a simple argument that apparently provides a short term gain of which we may become ashamed - or to use a more complex argument with a more firm foundation. It is all too easy to become locked into a particular way of looking at things. Secular and church history provide many examples. We therefore need to make a conscious effort to keep an open mind.
It is often said that the model proposed by Whitcomb and Morris (W&M) is broadly correct and that with a little 'tweaking' any problems with it can be overcome. In fact it is fundamentally flawed, which is revealed by the fact that supporters of the model have individually branched out to develop a variety of mutually contradictory versions to try to deal with particular difficulties. Inevitably the original book is somewhat out of date - as is any scientific text several decades old - yet, despite the popular following, there is no consensus about a modern restatement.
W&M tried to build their scientific ideas upon the Genesis narrative in particular. However, they failed to place that exegesis within the broader context of scripture and God's dealings with rebellious men.
Harold Coffin's diagrammatic presentation of ecological zonation to illustrate how, on the Whitcomb and Morris model, animals supposedly could have been buried in a roughly predictable order by rising flood waters. |
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Scientifically, three fundamental problems may be cited. First, although the evangelical witness we want to give is that the horror of the Flood judgement speaks of God's sudden judgement to come (Luke 17), in effect the W&M thesis argues for a gradual and tranquil flood. They explain the fossil record as being largely the progressive flooding and burial of ever higher ecosystems (see diagram). The more mobile animals are thus supposed to have survived well into the Flood year. Yet, even if the Flood only approached the violence of modern floods, places of refuge and preservation of whole ecosystems for so long is untenable if the cataclysm is global - and the scenario is in any case inconsistent with the volumes of sediment the W&M model admits was being moved around.
A second scientific problem concerns the primary purpose of the judgement - destruction of life. Fossil tracks of land-dwelling animals and birds only occur in the upper part of the geological record in any place and become more abundant in the more recent strata. W&M correlated the end of the Flood with these higher strata where there is ever increasing evidence of living activity. Yet no entire destruction of life is apparent, nor is there any mechanism for achieving it, since there can be little doubt that the waters had largely retreated from the continents when many of the fossil tracks were being made.
A third objection is familiar to biologists: destruction of plant and/or animal life always leads to successive stages of recovery and recolonisation (e.g. during the regrowth of a forest clearing). The biologically expected post-Flood successions cannot be fitted into W&M model; their absence led Joachim Scheven in the 1960s to begin developing the sort of model that was discussed at Rochdale.
The Way Forward
Many of the influential creationists profess at least some scientific training and are consequently in danger of interpreting scripture mechanistically. The full force of the Genesis record can only be properly appreciated by understanding it in the context of the whole of scripture. God's dealings with rebellious men are seen in many examples: the antediluvian world, Pharaoh, Sodom, the events leading up to the Lord's return. We can see God freely offering grace, but then, as the natural man's true nature begins to manifest, progressively more severe testing follows. Eventually the point of no return is reached and judgement becomes inevitable. The Flood was of course the most spectacular example. In each of these examples (or types of the coming judgements), when the final and inevitable judgement came, total destruction fell suddenly and violently.
The primary witness of the Flood must be to the Lord's return and the Final judgement, and the time when the elements will melt with fervent heat causing the total annihilation of the physical world. It is in this context that we should reflect on the discussion we had about the sudden and violent beginning of the mabbuwl, the blotting out of life during the Flood and the destruction of the land - all types of the judgement at the end of the age.
In so far as the church is prepared to be faithful to the Lord, the Flood in context of the Lord's return is not an isolated event, a discussion about scientific issues, or disputes about words, but part of the evangelical witness to the need for a Saviour to rescue us from the inevitable course our rebellious nature otherwise charts for us.
If looking at scripture afresh leads us to question cherished notions, so be it. For example, fossils have a long history of being linked with the Flood but scripture does not require - nor even mention them. The association is a product of how we envisage the Flood to have been, not what scripture describes.
Practicalities
When we consider earth history, we must continue to warn of the fallacy of uniformitarianism. The world that then was perished, and all geological activity is either from the Flood, an ongoing consequence of it, or was the result of later judgements.
We will need humility to acknowledge that we have failed to appreciate post-Flood events (and remember that the same analysis of grace-testing-judgement needs applying to the events after the Flood that led to Babel. That God's dealings then had considerable geological consequences is reflected in the Peleg continental division). Failing to appreciate post-Flood events has led to incorrect interpretations of the rocks and of the fossils. The successive tiers of rock types and fossils is far more consistent with the post-Flood recolonisation model suggested by Joachim Scheven than the W&M destruction of successive ecological zones.
Realising, along with Job, that we neither have nor ever will have all the answers is a vital, winsome and (often) seemingly lacking creationist argument. If we, of all people, have hitherto failed to appreciate the awesome horror of the Flood - so horrendously violent that it did what scripture testifies - destroyed the earth and blotted out the land-dwellers - and have mistakenly thought that the many, relatively more gentle, post-Flood events were to be regarded as part of the real Flood - can we not build our own change of mind into our witness of the need to flee from the wrath to come?
© Randall Hardy, 1999.
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