Seven Days that Divide the World: Language, Scripture, and Science

This is the third post in a series. See the following links for parts one and two:

Introduction

Part One

In this post I will try to be a bit more charitable than I was in the last post on the subject. I understand what Lennox was doing in setting the stage for the debate at hand, but it seemed to insinuate a false equivalency between the two issues which I found misleading. And I overreacted, because I really don't like that sort of thing. Anyway, onto the next chapter.

Lennox begins chapter two with a brief section on language and how we ought to read all books, but especially the Bible. In short, the first question you ask is what the author was intending to communicate. Then, you ought to look to the most natural understanding of a passage. If something is poetry you ought to read the words poetically; if a work is historical then you should expect straightforward historical renderings. He also cautions us in reading texts from foreign cultures (such as the culture that produced Genesis), as if the natural meaning that we derive from a text is also the natural meaning that culture would derive. Sometimes there can be more than one natural meaning for a word. In Genesis, the word "earth" refers both to our planet as a whole and to the dry land mass, both of which are plenty accurate uses of the word earth. 

Also, literal understanding will not always work. Any person practicing common English today knows this one unassailable fact: whenever someone uses the word "literally" you can almost guarantee that whatever they say ought not to be taken literally. When I go for a fast run (in those halcyon days pre-Achilles injury) I would tell Owen I was flying, but of course I was only jumping from one foot to the other down a dirt road at a vigorous pace. Jesus tells us he is the door and the bread of life, but let us not attempt to walk through him or eat him. You get the point. We use metaphor all the time to convey a literal meaning. Language is confusing. But it makes sense to start with the most natural sense, and if that doesn't make sense then progress to the next level of meaning (metaphorical or otherwise). 

From this linguistic introduction, Lennox moves us into a discussion of how the Bible and science relate to one another. The Bible, obviously, does not speak to us in advanced scientific language. Calvin wrote in his commentary on Genesis: "Nothing is here treated but the visible form of the world. He who would learn astronomy and other recondite arts, let him go elsewhere." And this is intentional on the part of God, Lennox argues. Scientific understanding is constantly changing. If God inspired Moses to write Genesis in twenty-second century scientific terms no one would understand it (and people in the twenty-fifth century would complain about all of the errors it contained). Calvin wrote that "the Holy Spirit would rather speak childishly than unintelligibly to the humble and unlearned."

Furthermore, Augusine warned against tying our doctrine too closely a scientific interpretation in his work On the Literal Meaning of Genesis:

"Now, it is a disgraceful and dangerous thing for an infidel to hear a Christian, presumably giving the meaning of Holy Scripture, talking nonsense on these topics [knowledge of the earth and heavens]; and we should all take means to prevent such an embarrassing situation, in which people show up vast ignorance in a Christian and then laugh it to scorn. . . If they find a Christian mistaken in a field which they themselves know well and hear him maintaining his foolish opinions about our books, how are they going to believe these books in matters concerning the resurrection of the dead, the hope of eternal life, the kingdom of heaven, when they think their pages are full of falsehoods and on facts which they themselves have learnt from experience and the light of reason."

Stone cold, Gus. But salient. I am all for fighting for the right interpretation of Scripture and willing to endure ridicule for defending clear Christian doctrine, but if something has been proven false and we cling to it for its own sake then we are going to look silly to a lot of people and dilute the gospel message.

Lennox here suggests separating the matters that are core to the Christian faith from those that are less central and allow for variation in opinion. Beyond that, we also need to be prepared, he suggests, to distinguish between what Scripture actually says and what we think it means. As it relates to his fixed earth example, once Christians made peace with a metaphorical interpretation of the pillars of the earth they were still able to take comfort in the metaphorical meaning. The earth might not be literally fixed in place, but it is fixed in God's affections and stable by his Son who upholds creation with his own power (metaphorically of course).

The incident of the fixed earth (and this I agree is a good principle) teaches us to be humble and be prepared to distinguish between what the Bible says and what we think it says (or wish it says). We shouldn't tie our interpretation of Scripture to the science du jour, but neither should we avoid science altogether and abdicate that ground. Finding a balance is difficult, but so, contra our Prosperity brethren, is everything else in the Christian life.