Thursday, March 29, 2012

Reviewing the Adventist Review


March 15, 2012
Vol. 189, No. 8
http://www.adventistreview.org/index.php?issue=2012-1508

NOTE TO READERS:
WORD NEWS AND PERSPECTIVES is an important section of each magazine. I do not usually report on its contents because it is available at the online address I provide with every review.

GENERAL OVERVIEW
In this issue, I recommend two essays that are informative and inspiring. WHAT A RIDE! by Hyveth Williams is a short biography of her life that begins in a poor Jamaican family. The second, BURDENS TO CARRY by Sudha Khristmukti is her story of bicycling through one of the most horrific slums in the world to bring “two carefully balanced sacks of grain” to a poverty-stricken single mother and her infant daughter.

COMMENT
I recommend reading CHANGING THE DEBATE by Cliff Goldstein because it is a calculating, theologically divisive, destructive, and blatantly misleading Straw Man argument designed to vilify Adventist believers who disagree with him regarding the literal interpretation of Genesis 1 & 2.

The Straw Man fallacy is committed when a person simply ignores a person's actual position and substitutes a distorted, exaggerated or misrepresented version of that position. This sort of "reasoning" has the following pattern:

  1. Person A has position X. 
  2. Person B presents position Y (which is a distorted version of X)
  3. Person B attacks position Y. 
  4. Therefore X is false/incorrect/flawed.

This sort of "reasoning" is fallacious because attacking a distorted version of a position simply does not constitute an attack on the position itself. One might as well expect an attack on a poor drawing of a person to hurt the person. 
http://www.nizkor.org/features/fallacies/straw-man.html

In CHANGING THE DEBATE, Goldstein argues that those of us who believe God created the universe millions of years ago are Darwinists. His Straw Man argument goes like this:

  1. God created the universe millions of years ago
  2. God created the universe in 6 literal days approximately 6000 years ago
  3. People who don’t believe the universe was created in 6 literal days approximately 6000 years ago believe in Darwinian evolution
  4. Therefore, people who believe God created the universe millions of years ago believe in Darwinian evolution.

Cliff, I believe, along with lots of other people, that the universe was created millions of years ago. We do not necessarily believe in Darwinian Evolution. I don’t!

Here’s Cliff’s fallacious attempt to persuade.
“Those fighting Darwinism as a viable interpretation of Genesis are now deemed as narrow, parochial, and closed-minded. That’s a slick move, but a false one. We’re not talking about making things such as the belief that God created spotted owls before whooping cranes or salmon before goldfish tests of faith. We’re talking about an ideology that, at its core, destroys all that we stand for as Seventh-day Adventists…

"Any belief—sacred, secular, whatever—comes with challenges, and that certainly includes our belief in a literal six-day creation as depicted in Genesis 1 and 2. But that’s not the point. The point is the attempt to incorporate a radically alien theology into Adventism. And one of the latest tactics in that attempt is to change the debate in order to make those who reject this theology look narrow-minded, dogmatic, and parochial. Fortunately, the church isn’t close to falling for it.”

3 comments:

Inge Anderson said...

Andy, your own "review" of Goldstein's article is a perfect illustration of the straw man fallacy.

Your denigration of Cliff Goldstein's argument is directed at the straw man that Cliff's position is as follows:
"God created the universe in 6 literal days approximately 6000 years ago."

Goldstein did not say this in the article you "reviewed." And you will likely search in vain for any such statement from Cliff in his lifetime.

A perfect straw man easy to knock down.

In fact, Goldstein supports the position of the Adventist church, as clearly stated by Ellen White, that the creation account in Genesis covers 6 literal day. The Genesis says nothing about the creation of the universe and concerns itself only with this planet.

Adventists have long taught that other worlds were in existence when this earth was created. And Goldstein is well-read enough that he would likely have reached that conclusion without it being so well-documented in Adventist literature. While I have heard of Adventists who believe that the universe was created approximately 6000 years ago, I would not consider them mainstream because such a belief clearly conflicts with long-held Adventist beliefs.

In the article you reference Goldstein doesn't even describe people who don't subscribe to the Adventist belief as "believing in Darwinian evolution." You are making that application, not he.

Another straw man created by you

He does write this:
"For years I’ve been asking someone to give me a reinterpretation of the texts, based on the Darwinian worldview, that doesn’t undermine almost everything we believe: the trustworthiness of the Bible, the origin of sin and death, the character of God, and the meaning of the cross. The explanations, the few I’ve seen, would be laughable were the issue not so serious. (My favorite, still, is the theological argument that animals don’t feel pain. This deep insight gets God off the hook for the billions of years of suffering that evolution inflicted upon these unfortunate critters until the good Lord finally managed to eke a couple of homo sapiens out of the imbroglio.)"

This clearly refers to the Darwinian teaching of the evolution of man through billions of years of striving for "survival of the fittest." I have no idea whether you subscribe to such a theory of our origins, so I will not build a straw man by assuming that you do. But I do know educated Adventists who do, and it is reasonable to assume that Goldstein does too and is referring to them.

Andy Hanson said...

Inge,
Thanks for your comment! The literal creation story, a la Genesis, says clearly, that the sun, moon, and stars were created during a six-day period. That’s the universe! That is an integral part of the current, official, New-Earth Adventist fundamentalist theology, and Cliff is an all defender of that position. Cliff’s words make that clear:

"Any belief—sacred, secular, whatever—comes with challenges, and that certainly includes our belief in a literal six-day creation as depicted in Genesis 1 and 2."

Now here is your statement: “Adventists have long taught that other worlds were in existence when this earth was created.”

That indicates to me that you are not a literalist and are out-of-step with the current Adventist theological position. We have that in common. I was baptized at 12, many years before the Adventist Creed was created, and I was not asked to affirm a literal six-day creation or a belief in a “young earth.” And I, too, was taught that “other worlds were in existence” when the earth was created.

My critique was designed to challenge people to take a look at what they are committed to, intellectually, when they defend a literal reading of the Bible. And then, of course, there is the universal flood story.

Moving on. Here are your words regarding Cliff’s comments about Darwinism: “In the article you reference Goldstein doesn't even describe people who don't subscribe to the Adventist belief as "believing in Darwinian evolution." You are making that application, not he.”

Cliff’s words in this article:

What these posts reveal, however, is an attempt to change the debate. Those fighting Darwinism as a viable interpretation of Genesis are now deemed as narrow, parochial, and closed-minded. That’s a slick move, but a false one. We’re not talking about making things such as the belief that God created spotted owls before whooping cranes or salmon before goldfish tests of faith. We’re talking about an ideology that, at its core, destroys all that we stand for as Seventh-day Adventists.

Finally, thanks for your comment! I believe you and I may be closer theologically than either of us suspect.

Best wishes, Andy

Andy Hanson said...

Inge,
Thanks for your comment! The literal creation story, a la Genesis, says clearly, that the sun, moon, and stars were created during a six-day period. That’s the universe! That is an integral part of the current, official, New-Earth Adventist fundamentalist theology, and Cliff is an all defender of that position. Cliff’s words make that clear:

"Any belief—sacred, secular, whatever—comes with challenges, and that certainly includes our belief in a literal six-day creation as depicted in Genesis 1 and 2.

Now here is your statement: “Adventists have long taught that other worlds were in existence when this earth was created.”

That indicates to me that you are not a literalist and are out-of-step with the current Adventist theological position. We have that in common. I was baptized at 12, many years before the Adventist Creed was created, and I was not asked to affirm a literal six-day creation or a belief in a “young earth.” And I, too, was taught that “other worlds were in existence” when the earth was created.

My critique was designed to challenge people like you to take a look at what you are committed to, intellectually, when you defend a literal reading of the Bible. And then, of course, there is the universal flood story.

Moving on. Here are your words regarding Cliff’s comments about Darwinism: “In the article you reference Goldstein doesn't even describe people who don't subscribe to the Adventist belief as "believing in Darwinian evolution." You are making that application, not he.”

Cliff’s words in this article:

What these posts reveal, however, is an attempt to change the debate. Those fighting Darwinism as a viable interpretation of Genesis are now deemed as narrow, parochial, and closed-minded. That’s a slick move, but a false one. We’re not talking about making things such as the belief that God created spotted owls before whooping cranes or salmon before goldfish tests of faith. We’re talking about an ideology that, at its core, destroys all that we stand for as Seventh-day Adventists.

Finally, thanks for your comment! I believe you and I may be closer theologically than either of us suspect.

Best wishes, Andy