I’ve yet to work out if Gordon Cheng has had a cerebral bypass or if he is so full of himself that he just refuses to listen to the creationist argument flung at him. But quite possibly, because the dear lad doesn’t listen to anyone, he may have reconstructed his opponents’ argument inside his head quite differently to how they actually presented it. Straw-men are easy game, as we all know; it’s also a dishonest debate tactic.
Gordie says that if creationists take the days of Genesis as 6 literal days then they are bound by that hermeneutic to take all statements in Genesis literally. Thus, for example, the windows of heaven, as mentioned in the Flood history chapters, should be taken as actual glass windows sitting somewhere in the sky. Because creationists don't believe in glass windows in the heavens there is no epistemological warrant for taking the days of Genesis as 6 actual ones.
Son, if I were your teacher I’d fail you because you have misrepresented our argument. Listen carefully, dear lad.
Numbers are quantifiers. Subjects by themselves (i.e. without a quantifier preceding them) may or may not have a literal or non-literal take on them. Whether they do or don’t is irrelevant in the context of Genesis 1, Exodus 20 & 31. The reason is because quantifiers specify, and hence circumscribe, meaning. For example, if I enter a pub and ask the bar maid for 3 glasses of beer, I’m not met with a confused look and then asked are they literal or non-literal glasses. I’d be asked if I wanted middies or schooners, and then given 3 of them.
This is not rocket science, Gordon, though your difficulty in understanding plain language says something about your intellect (or possibly about the type of instruction you received at Boore, I mean, Moore College!).
May I suggest young man that you get a Cruden’s or Strong’s out and look up days and check all entries that have a number plus day. It’s the same in any language.
Actually, a thought just occurred that may go a long way to explain these men’s thick-headedness. Maybe, there’s a project underway at Boore, I mean Moore College, that wants to rewrite the language rules for all languages. They’ve begun with the one that says ‘a number plus an object informs you how many objects there are’ and they want to change it to mean ‘you don’t have to take it that way if one believes in evolution or that the world is 5 billions years old’. Man, are you guys brilliant or what! Can we come and sit at your feet?
John
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John, I am pleased by the knowledge, sincerity & clarity of thinking demonstrated by some of the Angloblogers and conversely amazed at the flippent boorishness and almost incoherent trivia of other comments. Yes I saw Gordon's comments about the days of creation and the windows of heaven and they are indeed foolish. If that's the best he can come up with he's got nuthin!
Does that mean I consider Gordon a fool? I have never met the man so don't know if he is a fool so will reserve my judgement. However if I had to judge him by what I read the decision is easy as some of his comments are truly ridiculous.
Craig Thacker posted (13/2) a calm
reasoned statement of why he believes what he believes and Owen Atkins says, wait for it.... '?you think?' If this is what passes for scolarly critique on the AngloForum then it is a pitiful state of affairs. If these guys are Moore graduates then it says little good about Moore.
Then Dave Lankshear comes up with this old canard:
‘Of course it doesn't — Genesis 1 and 2 were not written to give us a science lecture.’
What a gem. This comes straight from an anti-Christian website.
Fortunately Dave youse is right. Just imagine if Genesis was a science lecture- you would have to constantly change the story as new evidence proved bits wrong.
Thankfully Genesis isn't a science lecture as it is correct from the beginning and does not need to be upgraded. The God who was there at the beginning got it right first time.
It is obvious to me that many of these blogers begin by accepting the anti-God philosophy of evolution then reinterpret Genesis away from its plain meaning to suit their anti-Genesis bias.
Anglobloggers please note I DID NOT SAY TAKE IT L I T E R A L L Y.
By the way they don't seem to have noticed that AiG Australia changed it's name to Creation Ministries International almost a year ago. None the less Gordon and others continually refer to AiG and claim the said AiG doesn't answer their recorded messages or emails. I don't believe this is the truth as they have a reputation of answering all serious emails and even the frivolous ones when time permits. Methinks a few of the Anglonasties speak with forked tongue. Oh no that will confuse them. Now they think they actually have split tongues! Maybe I can challenge Gordie to email CMI -AiG no more Gordie- and then post the question and reply?? I wonder if he is up to the challenge or whether he prefers the convenient untruth?
By the way Gordon if you phone in business hours CMI will actually answer the phone and then you can ask your question. But this wouldn't be good would it as now armed with something CMI has actually said you would find it morally repugnant to make false statements about CMI's beliefs. Wouldn't he John?
This is presumably how Cheng "encourages" Christians, by advising:
* If there is an apparent conflict between God's infallible Word and the scientific theory of the moment, always reinterpret God's Word.
*Similarly, the job of a Christian at university is not to apply biblical principles to his subjects, but to adapt the biblical teachings to the fashion of the day. But because we are Moore College evangelicals, this only applies to Genesis
(and all the NT passages that refer to it); other parts of the Bible are still authoritative (at least for now) so we are not consistent as liberals are.
* Christians who take the plain meaning of Genesis should be mocked at every term, thus they are an exception to the need to encourage Christians as my book professes to do. That is, anyone with the same view of Genesis as the New Testament authors, Josephus, most Church Fathers, and almost all the Reformers. What would they know, because we have Martin Shields, who has discovered that Genesis really doesn't mean what it says! And we should also mock modern Hebrew experts [who would leave the up-himself Martin Shields in the dust] believing in Genesis as written. That includes believing scholars such as Dr Ting Wang, who lectures Hebrew at Stanford U, Andrew Steinmann of Concordia U, Robert McCabe of Detroit Baptist TS, Steven W. Boyd of The Master’s College in Santa Clarita, California; as well as top Hebraist James Barr, who had no doubt what Genesis 1 was intending to teach although he didn't believe it.
* The greatest philosopher of all time was David Hume, and he refuted design arguments for God. Christians should ignore that Frederick Ferré, in Introduction to "Natural Theology", pointed out that Paley wrote 30 years after Hume and his argument is not vulnerable to most of Hume's objections. And at all costs, Christians should ignore the fact that even the unbelieving John Earman, Professor of the History and Philosophy of Science, University of Pittsburgh, has totally demolished Hume in "Hume’s Abject Failure: The Argument Against Miracles" (Oxford University Press, USA, 2000).
* The more a scientist hates God and mocks the Bible, the more reliable he is; conversely the more a scientist believes the Bible, the less he should be trusted. Hence Cheng's trusted ally Owen Atkins praises the scientifically and ethically discredited Bible-mocking former Australian Humanist of the Year Ian Plimer (see www.creationontheweb.com/plimer), and various other atheistic sites e.g. by a Joyce Arthur who is mainly an abortion activist not a scientist.
* Corollary: the greatest scientists of all time were the anti-Christians Hutton, Lyell, Darwin and T.H. Huxley, who were motivated by the desire to discredit biblical Christianity.
* There is crappy design in nature. Believe me and my Moore colleagues, although we have no scientific qualifications, and don't under any circumstances believe the Ph.D. scientists at CMI. (It is thus perfectly reasonable on the Anglican blog for non-scientists like us to tell Ph.D. creationists that they should believe the evolutionists/long age "science" and thus reinterpret Genesis 1 as non-historical.) And ignore the fact that any alleged bad design is a poor reflection on God whether He designed it directly or via evolution.
Ktisophilos
I gotta say, if I had not read it myself, I would have called you a liar...but I have!!!
I can hear the sound of men in white coats comin' now for those guys. Move aside Mr Orwell, we have found someone who is clearly better at making black appear light, the irrational, rational.
Tim
Well Tim, now Gordie has suggested that the view of Genesis held by Basil, Luther, Calvin and Wesley could be the result of Satanic deception:
"One other possibility (whether it is better or worse than a lie others can judge) would be to consider creationism as a demonically inspired distraction. Since Satan is cleverer than we are, it just might work."
Then he prattles:
"I'll just note once again that although this issue is trumpeted as being fundamental to the gospel, we are once again talking about trilobites rather than the lordship of Jesus, his life, his death, his resurrection and his eagerly awaited return."
Notice that he omits the fact that Jesus is also our Creator! Not surprising for one who wants to accept the word of misotheistic biologists that living things made themselves via death and struggle over millions of years.
He also omits the fact that the whole reason that He, the Last Adam came to die then conquer is that the first man, Adam, brought death into the world with his sin (1 Cor. 15:21-22, 45). Also, Jesus is our "kinsman redeemer" (the literal translation of Is. 59:20) which means He is our blood relative by virtue of being descended from Adam (Luke 3:38). He also saved only those who share in flesh and blood, humanity, not angels (Heb. 2:14).
So go on, Gordie, tell us how to evangelize the Australian Aborigines. After all, the dating methods that Moorites accept place them in Australia >40,000 years ago. So how can they be descendants of the first man Adam, and thus be saved by blood relationship with the last Adam, their kinsman redeemer? Indeed, how can they even be descendants of Noah, who according to the Apostle Peter was one of only eight people who survived the Flood (1 Pet. 3:20, 2 Pet. 2:5)?
Logically, if all humans today comes from those eight, and the Aborigines predate Noah, then they can't be human. So maybe Gordie will follow the early Darwinist churchian Charles Kingsley, who thought that we should not preach the gospel to the Aborigines because they were not evolved enough. Or else he could repent and trust God's propositional revelation rather than fallible dating techniques by people who weren't there.
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