Site for researching all meanings of Hebrew Bible.
Theology:Evolution
(This is a partial draft.)
It is commonly thought that Bible is incompatible with (macro)evolution.
At this page we will collect biblical arguments pro and against evolution.
First, for every reader of Bible it should be clear that there was no "independent" evolution, but that the creation was guided by the Creator. It is clear from Gen 1:1 saying that the Spirit of God was hovering over the Earth. His purpose was clearly to guide the creation.
On creation of man
If we accept Bible literally, people were created, not just descended from monkeys. It is clear from Gen. 2:17. Science discovered that people have DNA very similar to the DNA of monkeys, this can be explained in this way: People were created not by God right himself, but either by a student of God or by God but with the purpose to show the details of development to His students, and a student was not capable to create the entire DNA from scratch and so needed to base it on an existing DNA, the DNA of some kind of monkey.
Bible disagrees with modern science about the time period (as investigated by radiocarbon dating) of existence of man. But this can be easily explained by the fact that before the Flood the atmosphere of the Earth was different and thus radiocarbon dating produces wrong results when analyzing events before the Flood.
Biblical arguments
Next follow biblical arguments pro and contra evolution (together with counterarguments nearby). We should not put scientific arguments pro and contra evolution on this page because this would make this page too big and not manageable. Feel free however to add links to any materials both pro and contra evolution at the bottom of this page.
It is difficult to conclude whether God created the world in literal 7 days or in a longer period of time, using evolution. It is not just reading Genesis 1 and following your impression of it.
Biblical arguments against evolution
The first argument against evolution is: "It was created in 7 days and the days should be understood as literal seven days, because the word "day" is not used in Bible in a different sense (an arbitrary period of time)." First it is questionable whether the word "day" always means a literal day. Even if we find no evidence that "day" may mean a longer period of time, can we be completely sure about meaning of this word?
But there is the following support for the literal seven days. It is repeatedly said in Genesis that there was evening and there was morning. But if we saw Earth from the outside, we would see evening and morning all time at the sides of the Earth. It may mean just that during all these ages there were lighter and darker ends of the Earth.
The second argument against evolution is: grass was created on the third day but the lights (including Sun) in expanse of the sky appeared only at the fourth day. So opponents of evolution conclude that the grass was not able to grow without light. But it may be understood that before forth day the sky was covered by dense clouds and the Sun was just not visible. There was nevertheless enough light for plants to grow.
Gen. 1:30 says that before the Flood all animals were eating grass, and this contradicts to the scientific evolution theory. Counter-argument: Gen. 1:30 may be understood as a future event (after the Second Come of Christ), not the description of the situation before the Flood.
Biblical arguments pro evolution
Victor Porton translated the following verses in a way supporting evolution:
- Gen. 1:11 "Earth will sprout green plants producing descendant, fruit tree making fruit for its kind making progress of his offspring in it on the Earth".
- Gen. 1:25 "God has made relatives on the Earth by their kind" (if it is translated correctly, different kind of species are called relatives by Bible).
- Gen. 1:29 "grass offspring bearing seed making progress on the surface of the entire Earth, and all trees making progress in their seed of the tree, offspring bearing seed".
It is also difficult for creationism to explain, how predators and parasites have appeared.
Jesus says that serpents and scorpions are created by Devil: (Luk. 10:19) "Behold, I give you authority to tread on serpents and scorpions, and over all the power of the enemy. Nothing will in any way hurt you." Thus it is a liable theory that the evolution on the Earth was going under effect of both God and Devil.