Book Review: Four Views on the Historical Adam

The debate over origins within the Evangelical community continues to morph into new issues. With the continued influence of critical scholarship on evangelical scholars, it has become more and more acceptable to interpret Scripture as an almost purely human work, with the authors trapped within the worldviews of their neighboring cultures, and God accommodating His truth to match their mistaken scientific perspectives. This has now led to differing perspectives on the reality and role of Adam and Even in the history of mankind.

To this new debate, Zondervan has contributed another helpful comparative work in which four “Evangelical” views on whether Adam is a historical person or not are presented with interaction between the for contributors. I found this very helpful and would commend it to anyone wishing to stay current with the continuing debate over the age of the earth and exactly how God created it.

Dennis Lamoureux presents us with a distinctly minority view within evangelicalism in his chapter, “No Historical Adam: Evolutionary Creation View.” He sees the Genesis account as an example of God accommodating revelation to the scientific level of the original audience “in order to communicate inerrant, life-changing spiritual truths” (41). He considers nature as “the Book of God’s Works” that reveals truth equal to the “Book of God’s Words,” the Bible (42). Genesis 1-11 is “a unique type of literature (literary genre) that is distinct from the rest of the Bible” (44). He argues that “the Holy Spirit graciously descended to the level of the inspired authors and used the science-of-their-day as an incidental vessel to reveal inerrant Messages of Faith”(55). He eventually concludes: “Adam’s existence is based ultimately on an ancient conceptualization of human origins: de nova creation. To use technical terminology, Adam is the retrojective conclusion of an ancient taxonomy. And since ancient science does not align with physical reality, it follows that Adam never existed” (58). Ultimately the examples of accommodation he uses from the New Testament proves to be hermeneutically unsound and are readily answered by the other three respondents.

John Walton gives us a second view on Adam in his chapter entitled, “A Historical Adam: Archetypal Creation View.” He argues that Adam and Eve were real people, but not especially the first humans. They only represent all of humanity but were not the original parents from whom all of humanity came (89). He believes their role in subsequent Scripture (NT) is always archetypal and therefore need not be historical figures (90). He sees them and their literary role based on the ANE literature and is therefore using that literature to interpret Genesis 1 and 2 (90-91) though he later admits that there are no parallels among the ANE creation accounts (98-99). For him the description of Adan’s creation is literary and archetypal rather than literal (98). He uses poor hermeneutics and misses the figurative language and figures of speech, all of which point to literal things. Often he uses arguments from silence to discuss or explain passages and make them archetypal uses of Adam. I would describe his approach as creating a literary category the authors of Scripture were not thinking in.

C. John Collins addresses the issue from an Old-Earth model in his chapter entitled, “A Historical Adam: Old-Earth Creation View.” In his view the six creation days “are God’s workdays, analogous to human workdays and not necessarily the first six days of the whole universe. Genesis 1 presents God as if he were a workman, going through his week, so that we can celebrate the creation as a magnificent achievement” (145, italics his). He, too, builds much of his argument from ANE literature, and even argues they did not take their stories literally (152). I would disagree in that there is nothing in their literature to indicate that they did not take their stories literally. In fact, it is far more likely that they did! He is very helpful in answering evolutionists and has some great insights. For example, he argues, “To the extent we base our inference entirely on, say, features of DNA, to the exclusion of other relevant kinds of evidence, we must also include such things as the aspects of human existence that are universally human and that are uniquely human” (165, italics his). He then shows the difference between humans and chimpanzees and gorillas in such things as language acquisition, art, craving for justice, and a sense that things are not the way they should be, all which he feels may constitute the image of God.

Finally, William D. Barrick addresses the issue from a Young Earth model in his chapter, “Historical Adam: Young Earth Creation View.” He spends little space defending his Young Earth view, which is good. His arguments tend to be more theological and focuses on the impact the story has on theology (219). He responds well to the misuse of ANE literature, and should be quoted at length “Similarities between the Israelite and the Mesopotamian materials need not require Israelite dependence on the Mesopotamian. Past and present scholars sometimes overstate the similarities while understating the differences. Genesis 1 does not offer a specific or direct ideological polemic. The biblical account of creation contains no description of God at war in any cosmic conflict among the gods, nor any victory enthronement motif, as one sees with these ancient Near Eastern myths. … With regard to the historicity of the biblical Adam, the Genesis account distinguishes itself from the ancient Near Eastern stories by the clear declaration that God created only one human pair (monogenesis) as compared to the polygenistic beliefs of other ancient peoples in the region.” (224)

Reading this book has renewed my interest in the origins debate as well as alerting me to the dangers of accommodating ourselves to science or extra-biblical sources, all of which are limited in what they can and do tell us about origins. I recommend it for those who wish to know more about the hermeneutical issues and the impact these views have on other areas of theology. It does matter what we believe about origins, not so much with regard to our justification, but very much with regard to our trust in the Scriptures.