More fun info about the hoop-jumping panties-twisting theologians at the link.Busily engaged in apologetics, BioLogos, an organization dedicated to getting evangelical Christians to accept evolution, has a new post on the never-ending kerfuffle about the meaning of Adam and Eve. It’s called “Why the church needs multiple theories of original sin,” and the author is Loren Haarsma, who has a doctorate in physics from Harvard and teaches the subject at Calvin College (he’s also the co-author, with his wife Deborah, of Origins: Christian Perspectives on Creation, Evolution, and Intelligent Design).
The cynical—but correct—answer to the title question is: “We need multiple theories because science showed that there isn’t an Adam and Eve, so we need to make up stuff to save the meaning of Jesus.” And indeed, that’s precisely what theologians do, though of course they don’t admit it. Instead, they pretend that the scientific results, which show that humans didn’t evolve from a single pair of ancestors, simply mean that we must reinterpret the Genesis story of Adam and Eve. But, as usual, theology cannot solve this problem, though Haarsma pretends that diligent theological study and proper interpretation of Scripture will yield an answer. It’s a prime example of how religious tenets are not only disproven by science, but, more important, how religion, unlike science, is powerless to find truth.
PS, incidentally, from a Christian-Orthodox background such as my own, the following interpretation isn't even controversial:
That's basically Orthodox theology. Death, to the ortodox (as I understand it) is a result of each human failing to live a godly life, and human failure somehow infects the universe.Other scenarios propose that Adam and Eve’s disobedience in Genesis 3 is a symbolic retelling of the story of every human who, over our long history, became aware of God’s claims on how they ought to live, and then disobeyed.
