Every
now and then I get an email from someone who has read my online essay,
"The Scandal of the LCMS Mind" (The Daystar Journal [Summer 2005 issue]), and desires some clarification. Last week an LCMS vicar contacted me for just this purpose. He's given me permission to share his email
here:
Dear
Dr. Becker,
...I
have always struggled with the tension that exists, more generally in the
larger Christian community and more specifically in the LCMS, between theology
and science. This issue is nowhere more present for me than in the debate over
evolution. I recently read your article "The Scandal of the LCMS
Mind," and appreciated your insight on the issue. I especially liked your
distinction between "primary" and "secondary causes," how
theology seeks to understand the triune God, and science seeks to understand
the secondary causes (in this case the genesis of the cosmos). I also
appreciate your critique of those who reject a Copernican view of the cosmos in
favor of a literalistic reading of the scriptures. (Ironically, they reject
evolution on these same grounds.)
That
said, I am still wrestling with several concepts in your paper, and humbly ask
for clarification. (I understand you are a busy man, wearing many hats.)
1.
You state:
For example, scientific data about the reality of physical
death in the animal and plant kingdoms prior to origin of human beings (e.g.,
fossils of animals that lived long before the origin of human beings) must lead
those who interpret the Bible in light of scientific knowledge to restate the
nature of God’s good creation prior to the advent of human sin (e.g., such a
good creation must have included the reality of death prior to the existence of
human beings) and the character of the historical origin of sin (e.g., the
advent of sin is to be traced to the first hominids who disobeyed God’s will
but not necessarily to their having eaten from a tree in an actual place called
the Garden of Eden several thousand years ago).
The
seminary and many theologians sight death before the fall as their
primary concern with evolution. In your paper, you do not seem to hold the same
concern. I am wondering how you reconcile this issue, especially in light of
Romans 6:23? It seems like you are creating a disjunction between sin and
death. How does one do this in light of the gospel, namely that Jesus conquered
death and, thus, sin?
2.
Earlier, you state:
But “reason” has its limits, according to
Luther. Reason is given to human beings for use within the earthly
or natural domain. Here, reason has its proper role and
function. As noted above, Luther is even prepared to acknowledge
that the powers of human reason remain largely uncorrupted by
sin. For Luther, it was simply a matter of making proper
distinctions, especially between “the things of nature” and “the things of the
Spirit.” Only when transferred from the natural domain into matters
of the Spirit, does “reason” become a “whore,” according to Luther. Before
God (coram deo), reason is unreliable and of no use to human beings; but
within the world (coram mundo), reason is reliable and of great use to
human beings.
Before
God, reason is unreliable, because human reason is corrupt and cannot
comprehend the hidden God. Before the world, is human reason any less corrupt?
I understand that we use human reason to interpret the scriptures, but it seems
like you are suggesting that we let our interpretation of creation guide our
interpretation of the scriptures. Does this place reason on par with or above
the scriptures?
Again,
thank you for your response. I understand you have come under criticism for
discussing such things, and I by no means desire to criticize you in this
email. I am simply curious about your reflections on these issues.
Sincerely,
(LCMS Vicar--name withheld)
Here's
my edited response to him:
Dear
Vicar-------,
Thank
you for taking time to read my essay and to ask your two questions.
With
regard to your first question: I need to state clearly that the human
experience of death is revealed in the Scriptures to be a judgment from God for
human sin. The Scriptures clearly teach that sin and the death of human beings
are related, as your reference to Rom. 6:20-23 indicates. However, Paul is
not talking here about biological death among animals (and this would
include human beings insofar as they are animals, too), but about the death
that is experienced as God's judgment by human sinners. Paul's
teaching only make sense in reference to actual human beings who live
"on this side of Eden." In our present situation, the biological
death of human beings is now revealed to be a judgment from God.
Death now "exercises dominion over" human beings, "even over
those whose sins were not like the transgression of Adam" (Rom. 5:14).
The
Scriptures do not speak of "sin" in reference to animals, nor do
we understand their biological endings as a judgment of God (unless you
understand Rom. 8:20-21 in this way, but even there the reference seems to
be to the suffering and decay of human beings in the old creation who are
awaiting their revelation as the children of God, not to the biological death
of all creatures). The Scriptures speak of sin and "the dominion of
death" only in reference to human beings. The fact that animals have
died for millions of years before the appearance of the first human beings is
only problematic for those who insist on reading Gen. 2-3 as an actual
literal-historical account of a time of "innocence" and
"immortality" prior to an actual, literal "fall into sin,"
after which human beings became mortal. It is also problematic if one thinks
the Scriptures teach that the death of all creatures is the divine
judgment for the sin of the first human beings. As far as I can tell, the
Scriptures do not teach this. Gen. 3 should not be read as an historical
account of an actual event, but as a profound narrative that reveals what human
beings are before God: anxious, tempted, finite sinners who have come under the
judgment of God.
A
theological reading of these early chapters of Genesis discloses to oneself and
to other human beings our own incapacity for good, our sense of common guilt
with all other human beings, and our need for redemption. We are aware of
ourselves as creatures of God, created in the image and likeness of God for
relationship with God and for freedom and creativity in the world (and in this
sense, every human being has a sense of an "original perfection" before
God, to use Schleiermacher's phrase, a time of innocence/perfection that
has been lost to them), but we also are aware that we are now estranged from
God, enslaved to sin, adrift in the world, disconnected from God's
will, mortally judged, and in need of Christ's salvation. The
revelation of God's law clarifies and intensifies this estrangement and divine
judgment.
One
need not interpret the stories in Gen. 1-3 as reports about two actual events
in the past, "creation and fall," or hold to the (non-biblical) notion
that all biological death is the result of the actual sin of two human
beings in the past, to arrive at a true theological understanding of human
beings as fallen creatures, as theologians from Schleiermacher to Tillich have
also correctly underscored.
My
reading of Rom. 6:20ff. is that every human being, from birth, is a slave to
sin. We can only talk about human beings as sinful creatures. We know of no
human being who is not a sinner, save One, Jesus. To the extent that human
beings are biological animals, their lives are conditioned by the same
conditions that affect all other creatures. They are finite and mortal. But
unlike other creatures, human beings have been created for freedom and
creativity within creation and we continue to reflect the image and likeness of
God (albeit in a distorted manner because of our sinful condition), and we are
also aware of our estrangement from God, that we are "slaves to sin,"
and incapable of saving ourselves.
There
is no escaping the fact that our deaths are closely connected to our
experience of God's judgment against our lives, that our lives do not go on
forever, that they come to an ending, and that they are put into the divine balance,
so to speak. But Christ, the new human being, has freed those who are enslaved
to sin from the judgment of God, has united them in himself through
baptism into his death and resurrection, and has invited them to trust that so
united they will be brought through death into eternal life. (As to the
ultimate future of God's other creatures, I am agnostic.)
With
regard to your second question: human reason and our senses are preserved
by God and they give us reliable knowledge of God's creation, as Luther's
explanation to the First Article indicates. Despite Luther's criticism of the
wrongful use of "reason" in theological matters, he freely
acknowledged its rigorous use in natural philosophy (what we today would call
"the natural sciences"). Melanchthon had an even more positive view
of reason in these areas than did his elder colleague. To deny the power of
reason to uncover accurate knowledge in nature is to deny God's preservation of
our reason and senses vis-a-vis the things of this world. When the Scriptures
refer to matters of this world that are also investigated by people using their
God-given and God-preserved reason and senses, then the latter investigations
are helpful for identifying false interpretations of those same Scriptural
passages. That is why I have criticized those who reject the Copernican
theory in favor of a literalistic reading of all those biblical passages that
refer to the immovability of the earth, to the earth resting on pillars, to the
four corners of the earth, to the sun moving around the earth, and so on. A
basic hermeneutical principle is that one should read a passage literally
unless there are good reasons for adopting a figurative or symbolic reading. In
the case of the above cosmological passages, extra-biblical knowledge has
provided solid reasons for adopting figurative readings of those passages. If
we did not allow the natural sciences to inform our reading of the cosmological
passages in the Scripture, then we would have to insist with Dr. Pieper that
indeed the Copernican theory is wrong because a literal, straight-forward
reading of the Bible indicates that the earth does not move, that it
is resting on a foundation (or on pillars), and that the sun does move around
the earth (Josh. 10; Ps. 19; etc.). Thankfully, the
Augustinian-Lutheran-Melanchthonian approach to biblical interpretation allows
the natural knowledge of nature, gained through the use of God's reliable
gifts of reason and the senses, to shed light on how we are to interpret
biblical passages that also refer to the cosmos. Such knowledge now
assists us in eliminating false readings of the narratives in the early
chapters of Genesis and to minimize the tensions to which you
referred regarding the interpretation of the Bible in light of scientific
knowledge of the natural history of the earth.
Hope
this helps to clarify.
Warm
regards,
Matt
Becker
