I agree with Joel on this:
But if you make YECism a foundational tenet of the Christian faith and proceed to attack other Christians who simply don’t buy YECism, well I’m sorry, but that, at the very least, is dipping your toes into heretical waters .
Well, now, that was a bit condescending. But you may have misread me: I’m just saying that the differences between versions of the statement are not significant, not that the A&E issue isn’t significant. What would you say are the important differences between statement versions?
The first version defined “traditional” far more broadly. It’s clear now that several understandings of Adam and Eve that fell under that definition were not actually in conflict with the evidence. Examples include the recent GAE in my book and the ancient GAE in WLC’s book.
The current definition equates “traditional” readings with a subset of YEC readings of Genesis. That’s just an absurd claim, as it excludes for example the Catholic tradition from its meanings.
I can also give more information not in public. There had been internal debate about this. Some of argued that they should just stop using the term “traditional”. They lost on the grounds that those in charge really want to say that evolution proves traditional readings are false.
So BioLogos has been quietly narrowing there definition of tradition with the goal of maintain a revisionist narrative.
They are free to do this, but no one should consider them an authority on this particular matter. They have a particular agenda that departs from best practices in advancing science.
But neither GAE nor ancient GAE can be considered traditional, can they?
Some bio information on Calvin Smith from a website seemingly prior to AiG affiliation.
Calvin’s interest in creation ministry, particularly as a speaker, arose primarily because of seeing its effectiveness in strengthening the faith and evangelistic efforts of those exposed to the truth of God’s Word through this type of work.
…Through intensive study, Calvin has become well equipped to talk about many aspects of science and history that relate to the creation/evolution controversy. He has consistently immersed himself in creation apologetics through seminars, classes, scientific papers and hands-on opportunities to study. When asked what formal science background he has, Calvin responds, “the same as Charles Darwin. His only formal training was in Theology!”
So apologist Calvin Smith has no qualification in science whatsoever. I’m not a scientist either, but I’m not the one inferring that researchers who have spent their careers advancing specialized knowledge are essentially deluded. As for his formal training in theology, I could not find any sort of CV there either, on his LinkedIn page or elsewhere.
The fundamental problem is that even if granting for the sake of argument Mr. Smith’s hermeneutics, exegesis, and theology to be orthodoxy, that does not serve to alter the vast consilience of data which renders AiG to be a house of falsehood and farce. If YEC is his theological posture, it would be more honest to just damn all science as blasphemy and sanctify ignorance as saintly duty.
The ancient GAE put forward by WLC is basically the vanilla Catholic traditional view, which BL was insisting for a decade they had disproven.
The recent GAE, I argue, isn’t the traditional view itself, but contains the traditional view (by BioLogos’ first definition!) unmodified within it. That’s a key argument of my book, that theologians have found tenable.
So yes, not only can they be considered traditional, that’s the friggen main point of both our books.
BioLogos disagrees. But that’s only tenable because they’ve been moving the goal posts to equate YEC with traditional. That’s pretty absurd. One of the reasons I left YEC was it’s grand departures from traditional readings of Genesis.
He also doesn’t know* that Charles Darwin had formal training in medicine, including some natural history.
*Or does but is lying.
You’re going to have to present some evidence of this. How far back does an idea have to go before you consider it traditional?
I would claim that the fault there lies in that definition of “traditional”, which, if it includes GAE, is overly broad. I know you really want to appeal to traditionalists, but this is a huge stretch.
In what ways does it depart?
And hey, Charles Darwin pretty much founded the field of evolutionary biology(and as such, he couldn’t have been “formally trained” by already educated evolutionary boilogists) and was actively engaged in research, developing both the fundamental theory, doing field observations, and performing experiments.
So I just don’t think it’s correct to say Mr. Calvin and Darwin had the “same formal training”. It would definitely be misleading to insinuate that they had equal science backgrounds.
Am I wrong in seeing one of the issues here being the biblical use of the word human as contrasted with the species name Homo sapiens? The bible doesn’t use the word Homo sapiens anywhere, so I take it some would argue it plausibly could have just meant whatever “human” species when they wrote it, such as Homo heidelbergensis, maybe even Australopithecus, since it is strictly undefined?
I still can’t find anything in the various versions of the statement in your thread here* that would change the meaning of “traditional”, just minor differences in phrasing that don’t seem to affect the meaning. Could you explain?
*Talking about this one: The BioLogos Statement on Adam and Eve - #6 by swamidass
For the very brave (or bored?), part two is up:
You are not wrong. That is correct.
Perhaps I’ll write an article about it down the line.
And to be 100% clear, none of the issues about BL justifies this sort of criticism from AIG. That should probably be the focus here.
I didn’t mean to start a discussion about any particular criticisms. AiG seems to treat everyone equally badly. The more people they can offend, the more people than complain about how bad AiG is, the more they can claim that everyone else is against them.
Heads they win, Tails we lose.
To be clearer here about a key matter of fair play. They quote several BL people making “heretical” claims, but don’t actually link to the full context. That certainly should alert us to the likelihood of quotemining. It’s really not fair play.
To be fair, not everyone has a formal academic qualification. In my neck of the woods, there are those who say that they have attended the “University of Life”. So, surely the man needs to be judged on his work, not his CV.
Which brings me to… arghhhh. My eyes, my eyes!
From Calvin’s blog, November 2021. “The Holocaust Before the Holocaust | Answers in Genesis”: “Some logical conclusions of evolution have had truly devastating results. Undoubtedly the most well-known is the Jewish Holocaust, the “final solution” carried out in Nazi Germany during WW II.”
It’s hard to know whether to feel anger, sadness or pity. But it should surprise no-one that this intellectual giant should feel qualified (as an acolyte of Ham) to weigh in on “false teaching”.
That is appalling sludge. It’s far worse than the other articles we’ve been discussing, imho. Though all of them are bad.
It takes a special kind of insanity to think that a blind mechanical process like evolution occurring gives moral or logical justification for killing someone. How nature is ≠ how we ought to behave.
Weirdly, this loon seems to indirectly suggest that if evolution is true then we should kill anyone we deem somehow inferior. Is that actually his opinion? That if the process of natural selection really does happen in the wild, this means we have all the moral and/or logical justification we need to start murdering?
How does a human being become that confused?
From a lecture in 1893 by pastor Robert Forman Horton:
Some preachers, and many editors, have ingloriously resolved to avoid the dizzy heights of Truth, to conceal themselves in the valley of Tradition, and to anathematise those who have too much confidence in God and the Bible to follow their example. I am not careful to minimise the temptation which thus comes to a preacher, even to one who is veritably sent by God.
He often knows quite well that if he shuts his eyes to the facts, and blindly clings to the old unquestioning dogmatism, he will not only escape the throes of new knowledge himself, but he will be praised by the multitudes who hide in the valley of Tradition, and even hailed as a champion if he launches his thunderbolts against the truths which he has never ventured even to examine.
The Church swarms with people who have no spiritual sinew, and whose lungs cannot breathe the invigorating air of Truth: they take up the cry of that timid and decorous spinster who, on hearing an exposition of the Darwinian theory that men are descended from apes, said, “Let us hope it is not true, or if it is, let us hush it up.”
I count it to be the great trial and ordeal which God presents before His prophets in all ages—shall they sit easily in the slumberous bowers of an accepted Orthodoxy, or will they up and climb, and walk, even with Death and Morning, on the mountain horns?
LOL! Welcome to Peaceful Science @Tedinoz, you should fit right in. 
“Some logical conclusions of evolution have had truly devastating results. Undoubtedly the most well-known is the Jewish Holocaust, the “final solution” carried out in Nazi Germany during WW II.”
Smith writes, as if a thousand years of antisemitism just didn’t happen.