A friend calls our attention to commenter Ted Davis’ series of columns at BioLogos, observing that it is “pretty good.” Here’s the latest.
The friend praises Davis for acknowledging that before the modern era, most writers assumed that the universe was created in six literal days, though some ancient sources take a different approach.
That makes sense. There are statements you don’t question if you have no particular reason for doing so, and you are really more interested in something else anyway.
Seventeenth century England, for example, was rocked by claims about what government should be like. The king, Charles I, ended up getting beheaded in 1649.
In other news, Isaac Newton, born in 1642, was trying to understand gravity. Who and what do you think got more public attention in the turmoil of the ensuing decades – which included a failed experiment in republicanism?
But whose name do we immediately recognize today? Really good science is for the ages, not necessarily for its day. (And Newton was really, really, into Biblical literalism. So?)
Besides, it’s nice to see BioLogos doing something useful for once. There is no good reason for spending their Templeton grant money on providing every theology crank with a platform. Why NOT spend it on showcasing people who actually know something?