Theology in the Raw - 808: Is Adam a Historical Figure? Dr. Tremper Longman

Episode Date: August 6, 2020

The Bible seems to say that God created on man, Adam, and the rest of humanity sprang from his loins. (Creepy image, I know.) But the science suggests otherwise. In this conversation, Old Testament scholar Dr. Tremper Longman helps us navigated the thorny issue of the Bible and science as we consider both the biblical and scientific evidence for the historicity of a historical person named "Adam." Support Preston Support Preston by going to patreon.com Venmo: @Preston-Sprinkle-1 Watch the podcast on YouTube Connect with Preston Twitter | @PrestonSprinkle Instagram | @preston.sprinkle Youtube | Preston Sprinkle Check out his website prestonsprinkle.com If you enjoy the podcast, be sure to leave a review.

All right, friends, we've got Tremper Longman back on the show to talk about the historicity of Adam. And as you will hear in this conversation, in the wake of the Human Genome Project led by Francis Collins, the apparent biblical portrayal of every human coming from one pair, Adam and Eve, um, that there, there's some issues there. There's some conflict there. Now, anytime the Bible conflicts with science, I am not an advocate of just choosing science over the Bible. Um, sometimes science appears to say something and then is later corrected. Sometimes the so-called scientific consensus is not at all a scientific consensus. Scientists deal with interpretation and human fallibility. However, this one is a bit tricky. It is a bit tough. It does seem from the little that I've looked into it, and Tremper's looked into this 10 times more than I have. Um, the whole

idea that humans came from one human pair does not seem to match, um, the scientific evidence as, uh, that we know from the human genome project. And so Tremper helps us navigate that. And he suggests an alternative way of reading Genesis three. I say alternative, alternative to the typical assumed, I'll say conservative or literalist reading of Genesis three. And if anything, this is an engaging conversation. I really enjoyed listening to Tremper's perspective and I think he's a good guide for these kinds of conversations. I'm still, I don't know where I'm at on it. Honestly, I would need to look more into the science. As I said, in this podcast, you know, um, his, his, uh, the way he framed Genesis one makes

sense to me. I think that's, that's valid. It's a very valid way to read scripture. And I think his way of reading Genesis three, I think it's valid too. It's just a little bit harder to swallow. And I voiced that in this podcast. I'm like, I just, it does feel like we might be trying to make the text fit science rather than truly looking at what the text is saying. But I think his reading is valid. So I need to do more thinking on it. And I encourage you to do more thinking on it too. Okay.

I'll stop talking because hopefully you're interested enough to keep going. Um, so yeah, without further ado, let's welcome back to the show. The one and my friend, Trevor Longman. And probably a lot of you watching this watched the previous video where we talked about the age of creation. And so if you haven't watched that, I would recommend going back and doing that. It kind of gives you an introduction to just kind of the bigger picture of some of the issues between the Bible and science as it pertains to Genesis 1 and 2. For this video, I want to talk specifically about whether or not Adam in Scripture is a literal historical individual. Tremper, I don't even know what you're going to say here. This is so awesome. I kind of knew what you're going to say here this is so awesome i kind of knew what you're going to say about the creation uh story um but is adam a

literal historical figure um yes and no you should run for uh office you said individual, and then I would have said no. But this time, you said is. So here's what I think. And if we talked a little bit about that, this and the last one, I think a sensitive reading of Genesis 1 to 11 understands that it is theological history. That is, it is making historical claims about things that happened in the past. And I call it theological history because rather than economic history or military history, the emphasis is on God and his relationship with his human creatures. That's where the focus is. And, and I, by the way, I think myth is a, is a inappropriate term to use in relationship to Genesis one to 11. You can make a case for it because myths can be true. They can even be historically true, but the, um, but I don't think

it's a good term partly because of the, you know, contemporary, uh, understanding of myth as kind of like fiction and, and made up stories. Um, so, um, so it's not myth. And then, you know, um, So it's not myth. And then, you know, sometimes like Wayne Grudem in a recent chapter of a book that he wrote in a book that he edited, which was a critique of theistic evolution, he sets it up that way. You know, it's either myth or it's straightforward history. And it's kind of like you're setting up a straw person there. So my point is, it's, it's talking about real historical events, but it's using figurative language to talk about this historical events. Because while it's very well, the biblical author and ultimately God, who's the ultimate author of scripture, is interested in communicating to us in these

chapters that God created everything, including human beings. He's not interested in telling us how he did it. But yes, there is a historical reality behind the description of the creation of Adam and Eve. Uh, but I don't think that, um, should necessarily lead us to conclude that Adam and Eve are, uh, the first two Homo sapiens that sort of appeared out of nothing or emerged out of an evolutionary process. So there is a historical. And so theologians and biblical scholars like myself and N.T. Wright, who's written about this, and P. Danz, and Dennis Alexander, John Walton has talked about this. You know, as we think about it, you know, what we might imagine that Adam and Eve are, say, two individuals that are chosen out of a larger group, because one of the additional issues that it's not just evolutionary creationism, but the way

evolution works and the way our genes are, what our genes are presently telling us, according to my geneticist friends like Francis Collins and Dennis Venema and Jeff Schloss, is that there never was a time when there were two Homo sapiens and only two Homo sapiens on the earth. That at the very beginning of Homo sapiens, which is somewhere between two and 300,000 years ago, there were, you know, minimally, well, somewhere between 5 and 10,000 individuals. So what the Bible teaches clearly is that God created everything, including human beings. I think the story of Genesis 2 is not the story of the origins of Homo sapiens, but rather is the story that begins when God chooses either a group or

two specific individuals to endow them with the status of being his image bearers. to endow them with the status of being his image bearers. And this is very close, if not identical, to views held in the past generation by John Stott and Derek Kidner. And they refer to the Adam and Eve story as the story of Homo Divinus, you know, story. you know, story. And that's connected with the now pretty broadly consensus view that when you talk about the image of God, you're not talking about attributes. You're talking about a status, you know, you represent me in my creation. And then you can see both priestly and royal language in Genesis 2 that Adam and Eve are priests in God's

earthly sanctuary Eden. But they also you know, they're also commissioned to rule and subdue the earth as God's kind of vice kings in the area in, in the world. So you would say Genesis or Adam and Eve then aren't like composite representative figures,

but rather they were selected out of a group of homo sapiens to be. Yeah, I think that, yeah, I think that's, that's's the that's the view favored by say tom right okay um and i think he articulates that and surprised uh by scripture but also i've heard him lecture a lot maverick i've one of the coolest panels i was ever on was uh me representing the old testament tom representing the new testament, Tom representing the New Testament, and Francis Collins representing biology. Oh, gosh. I learned a lot from that one. So, yeah.

But another view is that God endowed a group to be his image bearers. Okay. to be his image bearers. And so there are, and there's some variability as to when that might have happened. So the Bible teaches some things very clearly that we stand by, that God, that as we say, who created human beings and all creatures,

it's God, but not how he did it, nor necessarily when this happened. So, um, we can speculate. Some people think it was like 12,000 years ago. Um, other people think 30,000 years ago to get into the weeds. I will once again, promote my book, you know, confronting old Testament controversies, pressing questions about evolution, sexuality, history, and violence. and violence. But my contention would be that I won't be able to spell out in the brief time we have together is that such a view does not compromise important doctrines like our creation, the fact that we were created, but that at the moment God conferred Adam and Eve with the status of being image bearers, that they were morally innocent, that sin and death, as Paul says in the Romans, entered on the heels of that first original sin and that that sin, um, affects us today. Now, where I would disagree with some is that I don't think that the way Adam and Eve sin affects us today is through

genetics. In other words, uh, we don't, we don't inherit sin like a genetic disease, but rather, first of all, Adam and Eve did what we would all do in their situation, A. And then B, that original sin so disrupted the cosmic and social order that it's impossible not to sin. Yeah. So would you say, though, the way Genesis 2 – because, I mean, the way Genesis 2 is describing the creation of Adam and Eve, it certainly is a little weird. I mean, taken from the side of Adam and, and, uh, you know, the Genesis two seven that you referenced, you know, got out of the dust of the ground and breathing light. There seems to be at least some figurative, you know,

images going on here. And yet it does seem, I don't know, like again, going back to what I said in the last video, you know, if we knew from genetics, if Francis Collins, you know, said, oh, clearly humanity came from one couple. Yeah. And this is a little bit different than how we framed it last time because you would say Genesis 1 doesn't give us an age of the earth. But if the science did say we came from one human pair,

then you would say then that's probably what Genesis is getting at, right? Well, no, I would say, yeah. So I don't know whether I actually articulated this phrase in our first time together, but I do think based on that two-book theology that science can help us read the Bible better. In other words, science, I mean the Bible, could support either of those views because it's not interested in telling us about that, but it would be compatible support either of those views because it's not interested in telling us about that. But it would be compatible with either of those views. Yeah.

So in this case, if the science did show that we all went back to a single couple, then, yeah, that would be that would be compatible with the Bible as well. So, yeah, I was just going to say, yeah, when you're I mean, I also want to highlight the fact that these figurative depictions of the creation of Adam and Eve, who's not called Eve yet. But but but I think canonically we would make that connection. So is a figurative depiction in order to teach us important things like Genesis 2-7, first of all, is teaching us that human beings are part of creation. Yeah, we are animals like other animals, but we have a special relationship with God. And then another dimension of it comes out if we read it in its ancient context, because the Enuma Elish and Atrahasis, the Babylonian creation stories,

talk about the first human beings being created from the clay and the blood of a demon god into which all the gods spit so you can see that's a rather contemptible view of human beings being communicated by that idea and then when we look at the creation of eve from the side it's showing mutuality in the man and the woman not not from his head, not from his feet. They are equals, they are mutual. So they're not random figures. They are teaching us important things about our relationship to God, our relationship to each other. So going back, so Adam and Eve selected out of this group of homo sapiens, are the rest of the homo sapiens, what happened to them?

They don't bear God's image or are these questions we just don't have an answer to? Yeah, there are questions that are important to think about, especially for theologians. But there's no certain answers to it. But they're important questions to ask. And there are different scenarios. As a matter of fact, there's a book that I hope comes out soon written by Loren Harzma. Deb Harzma, who's the president of BioLogo's husband, is a physicist.

And the book, which I've read, shows different possible scenarios that demonstrate. I guess what I'm saying is there's more than one way to make the Bible and science compatible, not just one way. And and then on a more kind of. You know, a more another interesting idea has been floated by a geneticist, Christian geneticist from Washington University in St. Louis, Joshua Swamadas, where he argues that evolution happened like evolution happens, but that about 12,000 years ago, God did specially create a couple, Adam and Eve, He did specially create a couple, Adam and Eve, but then started intermarrying with others so that by the time you come to Jesus, everybody is genealogically related. His book's called The Genealogical Adam. I love Josh.

He's brilliant. But I have some serious reservations about this thesis. brilliant but i have some serious reservations about this thesis but it's certainly worth those who want to explore in this area yeah to um to take a look so you so when i go to the history museums and they show the evolution of humanity and these kind of pre-humanoid i don't even i know nothing i mean there's all kinds of classes and names right you can say all that's totally totally legit i mean my kids were asking me like, they're getting kind of weirded out, you know, cause I don't, I don't know this discussion. And they're like, wait, is this true? Is this, you know, what,

what about Adam and Eve and all this stuff? I'm like, I don't know. Let me talk to Tremper and Uncle Tremper. And, uh, but you would say that all that's like, no, that's pretty much, yes. That's the way it went down. Well, actually speaking of which I was in a meeting two days ago, and one of the other people in this small meeting was the person who put together the history of human origins at the Smithsonian, which I haven't seen yet, but I hear it's brilliant.

And my Christian friends I've seen have said, yeah, it really reflects contemporary science. And she's a Christian, too. And she's she's excited because she heard that I'm on the advisory council and to have a science Bible exhibit at the Museum of the Bible in Washington, D.C., which is going to deal with more than just evolution, but it's going to deal with other sciences as well. But it was going to open in November, but will be delayed because of COVID till spring, we hope. And but for those of you who are listening who get to DC after it opens, I can tell you it's going to be

an incredible exhibit. The Museum of the Bible is an incredible place to visit, period, here in Washington, DC. So bottom line is I won't vouch for every permutation of these theories, but generally speaking, it seems reasonable. And Preston, one of the reasons why I think this question has come up again, particularly over the past 20 years, is because of the sequencing of the human genome. Right. They're raising, I think, interesting questions, which I personally don't feel threatened by, like the fact that you and me being descendants of people from Europe have about two to four percent Neanderthal genetic matter in us. And and and people from various parts of Asia have Denisovan genetic material. So there's all kinds of interesting questions. Can you real quick, for somebody who has no clue what the Human Genome Project was, I mean, I just barely know.

Can you real lay-level overview of what went down years ago? Well, it'll have to be real lay level. It's Francis Collins, who's the head of this project. He's now the head of the National Institutes of Health. He's Tony Fauci's boss, but he also is the founder of BioLogos. Indeed, maybe the best thing I could say is go to the biologos.org web page where you will find people like Francis Collins explaining this. Uh, but basically it's, um,

you know, looking at our genetic code and, um, yeah, I better just leave it at that as i said at the beginning of the last session i'm not a scientist so i don't make a fool of myself but um but i can tell you that um you know that that's one important line along with other important lines that demonstrate that we do have common ancestry with other primates and other creatures. Oh, okay. So that, and that's been, you would say that's not a theory. It's not one view. I mean, it's pretty much, it's two plus two equals four kind of, maybe not quite that much, but. Well, I think what people should understand is theories, we use, we use the, we sometimes use theory as a kind of like, that's our best guess, right? In science, a theory always remains a theory. It never graduates

to say a law. The difference is, are there well-evidenced theories or are there less well-evidenced theories? And as quoting well-evidenced theories. And as for quoting Francis Collins again, he says there's more evidence in favor of evolution than there is for gravity. So that's what we mean by, that's what we mean by a strongly evidence theory. But, but, and so I, I do encourage all your listeners to explore. So BioLogos, you'll find scientists like Collins and Schloss and Benema and Schwamadas. You'll find pastors like Tim Keller talking about this issue, John Ortberg and others.

You'll find biblical scholars like me and John Walton and Richard Middleton and N.T. Wright and others. So so if you're interested in this, that's a really great resource to go to. And it's not just, it started really, uh, I'm paraphrasing its mission statement, but it's kind of like make the evangelical world safe for evolutionary creationists. It's not trying to convert people, but it's more like saying, Hey, you know what? Uh, we're, we're actually Christians. We're not going to hell, at least for that. What would you say? So BioLogos, I've been on there a few times, not recently, but really helpful, clear, and high-quality stuff,

the videos and just really great stuff. Again, great stuff, even if you don't agree or you just want to explore it. It's kind of the go-to place. What do you say about the, you know, Genesis 3 and Romans 5 says that death was introduced through the sin of Adam. So how do we have death happening, assuming death was happening for many thousands of years before Adam? Right, Right. So I would suggest that it's talking about human death and more specifically death of, you know, if Homo Divinus had not sinned. Okay. There would not have been death in Homo Divinus''s experience it's not talking about animal death okay and animal death would include pre-homo divinus homo sapiens in my mind okay um and um there's a really good book written

by a seventh-day adventist pastor uh after he wrote this book i'm not so sure he's still a seventh-day adventist pastor but it's an excellent book. Because Seventh-day Adventists, you know, you go back to the beginning of the night, and I love, first of all, some of the Old Testament people I most respect are Seventh-day Adventist scholars. But on this point, I think they're wrong, okay? They're mostly, if not all, young earth creationists. Okay. And indeed, if you go back to the beginning of the 20th century, because at the end of the 19th, after Darwin, there were some negative reviews from Christians. But a Christian, again, like B.B. Warfield said, you know what?

If we're talking about God acting through his providence, that is through secondary causes, then evolution can be compatible with the Bible. Okay. But it was really at the beginning of the 20th century as part of a culture war where certain Seventh-day Adventists and dispensationalists, theologians started pressing a more literalistic reading of Genesis that came into conflict with the Bible. You would know that the term fundamentalist comes from a book that was published around there called The Fundamentals. But what people might not know is that there are three articles on science in that book, and two of them are pro-evolution. Really?

Yeah. So you are a fundamentalist. I'm a fundamentalist in the sense that I affirm the five fundamentals, yes. I'm not a fundamentalist if that means reading Genesis in that kind of flat way. Yeah, yeah. So if I'm just being honest, like when I hear you talk about the age of the earth in Genesis 1, I'm like, ah, that makes sense. Yeah, right. When I hear you talk about the age of the earth in Genesis one, I'm like, ah, that makes sense. Like I, um, with the Adam stuff that it does feel a little more,

not you, but just the view. Like we are trying to cram. We're like, we got a bit more of a burden to try to make Genesis two and three fit the scientific evidence where you were Genesis one. I I'm with you. it doesn't sound like we're trying to make it just that genesis one isn't interested in that would you agree with that

that this says a little bit like oh we're kind of there's no question there's no question but that this issue is more um controversial more complex yeah a little bit uh. But but I don't think the I don't think you should read the idea that we don't have kind of a pat set sort of way of harmonizing that to rather we have eight or 10 different ways. But as, you know, especially when we remember that the Bible isn't interested in telling us that. And we have this, what I think is obviously figurative depiction of the first. I mean, you do get, I mean, a lot of people point to the fact that Genesis 4, Cain's afraid of all these people, you know. Yeah. You know, who they marry. Oh, so that does actually fit better with the. Yeah.

What I'm saying is you're not getting a neat. The other view has questions it has to answer too. Right. It's not like, oh, if it's just plain sense, straightforward history. Right. It's not like, oh, if it's if it's just plain sense, straightforward history. Right. There are other questions like where is the place? Well, one more thing, Trevor, I'll let you go. So Garden of Eden. So the description of the location of the Garden of Eden, you know, you got four rivers. So the description of the location of the Garden of Eden, you know, you got four rivers.

You have really kind of going out of your way to describe a real geographical, seemingly historical place. Would you agree with that or do you think that that argument is overplayed or are these two different questions? Well, I think actually it's not as straightforwardly obvious that it's a historical place in that you have a mention of four rivers, right? The Tigris, the Euphrates, the Pishon, and the Gihon. And it says that the rivers flow out of there, right? Right. It does, yeah. So the Gihon we know as a stream in Jerusalem. Tigris and Euphrates flow out of Armenia to the Persian Gulf.

The Pishon, we have no idea what that is. So a friend of mine, Dick Averbeck, a very fine Old Testament scholar, has made this argument. He mentions the Tigris and Euphrates. very fine Old Testament scholar, has made this argument. He mentions the Tigris and Euphrates. These are real rivers. This has to be historical. And then I remind him of something called mimesis. Mimesis is a literary term that talks about how – and I'm not equating Genesis 3 with out-and-out fiction,

because I've already said there is a historical reference here. But even, say, a historical fiction will use real rivers, real cities, to create a, you know. So that's an argument that you want to pay, I want to and do pay attention to, but I don't find it pushing me toward a more straightforward reading. Well, it would be similar to like the parable of the Good Samaritan or something where just parables in general will draw on real trade routes and – yeah. Okay. That's a better example than I can use.

Thank you. Yeah. Okay. Well, thank you example. Yeah. Okay. Well, thank you so much for your time. And I know that probably a lot of people watching are going to completely disagree, be outraged, whatever.

So, but that's, these are conversations we need to have. And I would say, whichever view you hold, make sure you give a charitable, fair, you know, listening to the other side because

we're and the big point that i will be black and white on is there's a solid bible believing solid christians on both sides of this i mean i don't know you know i'm sure biologos was really excited to get tim keller's name on there because most people would see him as like, you know, this is kind of like the, if we have a Billy Graham kind of figure, he would be the closest. Um, so yeah, anyway,

I, I'm still wrestling with that, man. I just, I, I don't have, uh, yeah.

Um, especially the Adam one. I just need to do a lot more thinking and research on it. So you've, you've helped me in that journey. Appreciate it. Thank you, Preston.

All right. Take care. All right. Thanks for listening to theology in the raw.. Appreciate it. Thank you, Preston. All right. Take care. All right. Thanks for listening to Theology in the Raw. I don't know about you, but I still have a lot more thinking, a lot more studying, a lot more reading to do on this question of the origin of humanity. Woo. He makes a good case.

I don't know. He's a smart dude. Still got questions. Still got a lot of reading to do. Hope you enjoyed it. If you'd like to support the show, you can go to patreon.com forward slash Theology in the Raw. That's patreon.com forward slash Theology in the Raw. Support the show for as little as five bucks a month.

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