ABANDON SHIP!!! ... Episcopalians First, The Rest Can Make Their Own Arrangements!

In the comments section of a recent blog I asked a person named Geoff to indicate where in the Bible he got support for a long age view of the world. His short reply was "Nowhere."

This blog attempts to outline how the Church in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries came to overthrow the Scriptural chronologies which support an earth commencement date measuring something in the thousands of years. Space prevents all players being mentioned but sufficient are included to fairly represent the course of events. Remember, I take up events from the late eighteenth century because prior to that contrary views to a young earth (under 10,000 years) were not influential.

William Whiston (1667-1752) was Isaac Newton's successor in Mathematics at Cambridge University. He argued for a global Flood but added 6 years to Archbishop Ussher's earth commencement date of 4004BC because he held that each day of creation week was of one year's duration. His interpretation of Creation week was later used by those who supported a day-age theory for Genesis 1.

Alexander Catcott (1725-79) used geological arguments to defend the Genesis account of a recent creation and global Flood which produced the geological record. However, John Whitehurst (1713-88) argued that the earth was much older than humans and that, although the Noachian flood was a global event it was not responsible for most of the geological record. Certain geologists on the continent denied the global Flood and argued for a much older earth. Comte de Buffon (1708-88), Pierre Laplace (1749-1827) and Jean Lamarck (1744-1829) developed philosophically naturalistic explanations for earth history, each accommodating a long age for the earth.

The faith of Christians in a straight-forward reading of the biblical narratives concerning Creation and the Flood was under attack. Deists worked with atheists to shake the confidence of Christians in the Genesis cosmology.

In the years 1790-1820 geology became a separate field of scientific study. Also at this time the Neptunist-Vulcanist debate emerged . Neptunists believed water was the principal cause for geological change whereas Vulcanists held to internal heat of the earth being the major factor. Abraham Werner (1749-1817) of Germany and James Hutton (1726-97) of Scotland were the respective founders of the two positions. Each mostly studied the rocks in their own locality and developed their 'world view' of geology from this. Hutton's work remains most influential because of its uniformitarian proposition ie everything in the rock record can be explained by present day processes such as erosion, sedimentation, volcanoes and earthquakes. Hutton was a deist. His work allowed for a very long, virtually limitless, age of the earth.

In 1807 the Geological Society of London was established. The 13 founding members were wealthy, cultured gentlemen, who lacked geological knowledge but made up for it by their enthusiasm to learn. From the outset the Society was dominated by men who held to a long-age view of the earth. This then introduced the stage when dismantling of Christian faith in the Scriptural chronology of earth history really accelerated.

In the early 1800s George Cuvier (1768-1832), working from the study of fossils in the Paris basin, developed a theory which sought to reconcile science with religion but only from a post Flood history. He regarded the fossils to be the remains of creatures created then subsequently destroyed by catastrophic events prior to the Flood. By necessity he believed the earth had a long antiquity prior to the Flood. William Buckland (1784-1856) was a clergyman of the Church of England. He was also a leading geologist as well as lecturer in mineralogy and geology at Oxford University. He spread the catastrophist message initiated by Cuvier. Two of his students, Charles Lyell and Roderick Murchison went on to be leading geologists and destroyers of faith in the Genesis record.

Initially, Rev Buckland held that geology was consistent with Genesis and that there was a global Flood. However, his position was weakened by accommodation of 'day-age' but preference for the 'gap theory' of origins. Later, after criticism, he abandoned his initial weak attempt to reconcile Scripture and his observation of the world. His position now became that of relying on geological 'evidence' over textual evidence (Biblical) because, as he disclosed in personal correspondence, the latter was susceptible to deception or error.

Rev Adam Sedgwick (1785-1873) was Buckland's counterpart at Cambridge University. He too was a strong advocate for old-earth catastrophism. They were supported by Rev William Conybeare but catastrophists were 'knocked for six' in the period 1830 to 1833 when Charles Lyell published his three volume Principles of Geology which was strongly uniformitarian in its approach to geology. Lyell had a supporter in Presbyterian Minister Rev John Fleming. It is Lyell's (and Hutton's) uniformitarian view which prevails in most circles although the Church still has those we would call catastrophists, particularly those who are gap theorists.

Perhaps few in the Church who support Lyell's uniformitarian view are aware of his disclosure in correspondence 11 Aug 1829 to his ally Roderick Murchison "I trust I shall make my sketch of the progress of geology popular. Old [Rev John] Fleming is frightened and thinks the age will not stand my anti-Mosaical conclusions and at least the subject will for a time become unpopular and awkward for the clergy, but I am not afraid. I shall out with the whole but in as conciliatory a manner as possible."¹ and to fellow uniformitarian George Scrope on 14 June 1830 he said "... If we don't irritate, which I fear we may (though mere history), we shall carry all with us. If you don't triumph over them, but compliment the liberality and candour of the present age, the bishops and enlightened saints will join us in despising both the ancient and modern physico-theologians. It is just the time to strike, so rejoice that, sinner as you are, the Q[uarterly] R[eview] is open to you."²

The Church was not without clergy and laymen who defended the Scriptural chronology of earth history. Some were both theologically as well as geological trained and experienced. However, they lacked support and the 'day' was carried by the long agers. The 'ship of faith' in the word of God had been dealt a serious blow. Significantly, it was clergy of the Church of England (call it Anglican, call it Episcopalian) such as Rev William Buckland, Rev Adam Sedgwick, Rev William Conybeare, Rev George Stanley Faber, Bishop John Bird Sumner and E.B. Pusey who aided and abetted, who abandoned ship. The sorry state continues today with Moore Theological College, Sydney, Australia churning out old earth believers. They are aided and abetted by an Archbishop and Bishops who think likewise. As occurred in the past, they are quick to run with deists and atheists to reject theologians and scientists who point to Scripture and geology demonstrating an earth only thousands of years old.

I close this blog with some insightful words of Rev Granville Penn (1761-1844), grandson of William Penn of Pennsylvania fame. Rev Penn was an upholder of the Scriptural chronology. For those who profess to have a reasonable theology of God and yet propose an old earth chronology he said "The vast length of time, which this sinistrous choice is necessarily obliged to call in for its own defense, could only be requisite to the Creator for overcoming difficulties obstructing the perfecting process; it therefore chooses to suppose, that He created obstructions in matter, to resist and retard the perfecting of the work which He designed; whilst at the same time he might have perfected it without any resistance at all, by his own Creative act ... To suppose then, a priori, and without the slightest motive prompted by reason, that His wisdom willed, at the same time, both the formation of a perfect work, and a series of resistances to obstruct and delay that perfect work, argues a gross defect of intelligence somewhere, either in the Creator or in the supposer; and I leave it to this science, to determine the alternative.³"

References

1. The Geologic Column - John K. Reed and Michael J. Oard, Creation Society Books, 2006, p17
2. Ibid, p18.
3. Comparative Estimate - Granville Penn (1825) Vol. 1, p124-127

Sam Drucker