[Fwd: Book Review - The Creationists]
Ed Colijn
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Sat Aug 22 18:45:45 CDT 1998
Dit is een multi-gedeelten-bericht in MIME-formaat.
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Ed Colijn
edcolijn at bart.nl
The Indonesian Nature Conservation Database
http://www.bart.nl/~edcolijn/
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From: Danny Yee <danny at STAFF.CS.USYD.EDU.AU>
Subject: Book Review - The Creationists
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http://www.anatomy.usyd.edu.au/danny/book-reviews/h/Creationists.html
title: The Creationists
by: Ronald L. Numbers
publisher: University of California Press 1992
subjects: religion, history of science
other: halftones, references, index, US$16.95
Much has been written for and against creationism, but its _history_ is
poorly documented -- and poorly understood by both critics and proponents.
In _The Creationists_ Numbers offers us an intellectual and institutional
history of creationism, or more accurately of "creationism" as it is
now understood. As he writes:
During the early decades of the twentieth century, few
creationists, even among hard-shell fundamentalists, insisted on
a young earth or a fossil-producing flood. Some naive readers of
the Bible no doubt assumed that the date 4004 B.C. found in the
margins of the first chapter referred to the original creation
of the earth, but except for the Adventist disciples of Ellen
G. White they almost never committed such beliefs to writing.
By applying the unquestionably orthodox day-age and gap theories
to Genesis 1, even the staunchest defenders of biblical inerrancy
could accommodate the claims of historical geology. But by the
end of the century ... the very word _creationism_ had come to
signify the recent appearance of life on earth and a geologically
significant deluge.
It is this story -- of an intellectual revolution in creationism -- that
Numbers tells, but he spends little time on "big picture" generalisations
(the quote above is from a brief conclusion). He concentrates instead
on the key individuals, on their backgrounds, their relationships with
one another (informal and organisational), the challenges they faced,
and the development of their beliefs.
This is not obviously exciting material: the people involved are often
obscure, and offer little drama -- no great tragedies and not much
in the way of comedy, either. Numbers also refuses to be lured by
high profile, public events such as the encounters with scientists and
anti-creationists in legal conflicts and public debates. There is no
blow-by-blow description of the Scopes Trial, for example; it is the
light that trial sheds on creationists such as Bryan and Price and on
their views of one other that interests Numbers.
Despite this he has produced a dramatic and readable volume, almost
novelistic in its feel. (It is also a solidly scholarly work, but
the ninety pages of detailed references are left to the endnotes.)
It achieves objectivity and even-handedness not with an artificial
detachment but with a powerful, all-embracing empathy. Numbers'
contagiously sympathetic understanding succeeds in making the ideas,
concerns, and lives of his subjects matter to the reader, despite the
large and changing "cast".
In the years immediately following publication of _The Origin of Species_,
evolution rapidly swept America. Many had qualms about an animal lineage
for man, but there was hardly "a scientist or cleric who rejected the
antiquity of the earth, denied the progressive nature of the fossil
record, or attached geological significance to the Noachian flood".
One notable early exception was the pastor George Frederick Wright.
Outside scholarly circles, anti-evolutionism was more widespread,
however; it was connected with the fundamentalist movement right from
the beginning. This popular support for creationism was illustrated by
William Jennings Bryan's anti-evolution crusade in the 20s.
Scientific credentials were far and few between amongst creationists,
and those they had were flaunted. But it was the self-taught Harry Rimmer
who reached the widest audience during the second quarter of the century.
The Seventh Day Adventist George McReady Price was the leading proponent
of flood geology during the first half of the century. His message fell
largely on barren ground, however, and the association of flood geology
with Adventism was to complicate creationist attempts at organisation.
The Religion and Science Association (RSA), set up in 1935, aimed to
be an elite group of trained scientists. Irreconcilable differences,
doctrinal and exegetical, between the organisation's officers lead to
its self-destruction within a few years. The founders of the Deluge
Geology Society tried to avoid the fate of the RSA by restricting
membership to believers in "six literal days" and "the Deluge as the
cause of the major geological changes since creation". Despite this,
the society was soon riven by disagreements (and personal animosities)
and lasted less than a decade. The key point of conflict was again
the age of the Earth, with Molleurus Couperus leading advocates for
"pre-Genesis time" and an old Earth.
The oldest anti-evolution organisation in Great Britain was the
Victoria Institute, founded in 1865. Over time most of its members
had moved towards theistic evolution, leading anti-evolutionists such
as Douglas Dewar and Lewis Merson Davies to set up the harder-line
Evolution Protest Movement in the early 30s. This never gained much
credibility amongst evangelicals, however. In the United States the
American Scientific Affiliation, founded in 1941, was turned against flood
geology by the criticisms of J. Laurence Kulp, and towards progressive
creation or theistic evolution by Russell L. Mixter and J. Frank Cassel.
This contributed to the broader fundamentalist-evangelical split.
After decades in the wilderness, a turning point for flood geology and
young-earth creationism came with the publication in 1961 of John C.
Whitcomb and Henry M. Morris' _The Genesis Flood_. Another key event was
the setting up by Walter E. Lammerts and others of a Creation Research
Advisory Committee, which was to evolve into the Creation Research
Society (CRS). The CRS didn't require the acceptance of flood geology
or a young earth by members, but was eventually, after some conflicts,
dominated by those holding such beliefs.
One consequence of the struggle to get creationism into schools was a
shift towards a "scientific creationism" in which religion was downplayed.
Some of the pitfalls facing creationist attempts to do science research
can be seen in the career of Clifford L. Burdick, who was considered
a bit of a loose cannon even by his fellow creationists. (His career
was also notable for claims of discrimination and censorship by the
scientific establishment.) The CRS looked long and hard for "Ph. D.'s in
geology who take Genesis 6-9 seriously", with several apparently promising
candidates defecting. Two creationist research institutes were set up,
the Institute for Creation Research and the less well known Adventist
Geoscience Research Institute; both faced similar problems to earlier
creationist organisations.
There may be relatively few creationist scientists, but creationism can
draw on a broad base of support amongst the wider community. Numbers
compares its influence and standing amongst Lutherans, Pentecostals,
Mormons, and other denominations and religions. He concludes with a
brief account of the spread of creationism outside the United States.
--
Disclaimer: I requested and received a review copy of _The Creationists_
from the University of California Press, but I have no stake, financial
or otherwise, in its success.
--
%T The Creationists
%S The Evolution of Scientific Creationism
%A Ronald L. Numbers
%I University of California Press
%C Berkeley
%D 1992
%O paperback, references, index
%G ISBN 0-520-08393-8
%P xvii,458pp,16pp halftones
%U http://www.ucpress.edu/books/pages/2575.html
%K religion, history of science, evolution, geology
22 August 1998
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Copyright (c) 1998 Danny Yee (danny at cs.usyd.edu.au)
http://www.anatomy.usyd.edu.au/danny/book-reviews/
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