“In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. . . God said, “Let there be light,” and there was light” (Gen 1:1,3). These first verses of the Bible hold indescribable wonder for some people, and yet others dismiss them as mere poetic fantasy. One could even argue that the precise meaning of the first chapter of Genesis is one of the most contested Biblical debates. How should Christians interpret the chapter? Should they take it completely literally, or is it imagery and symbolism meant for interpretation? Any student of faith wonders about these questions at some point. They want to seem credible and trustworthy scholars, but they cannot abandon their faith in God. This has been true ever since ancient people scoffed at the idea that a man could rise up from the dead after being laid in a tomb for three days. Over the centuries, the church has not always had the best relationship with science, especially when it comes to the interpretation of Scripture. Darwinism is only one of the areas of Christian and secular debate about the words of the Bible. Darwin’s theory of evolution suggests that all life on earth came about naturally through the process of evolution, by which creatures change and mutate into other creatures, becoming more and more suited to their environment. Evolution has had a strong conflict with the church over the years because many believe it offers an alternative to intelligent creation.
Charles Darwin was not actually an atheist who wanted to take down the idea of God. The son of an atheist, his sisters nonetheless took him to church for his entire childhood, but he never, even as a child, had a real personal relationship with God. His father sent him to medical school in Edinburgh, but he hated dissection, blood, and dealing with corpses (Mitchell). However, he learned a lot about natural science and met many people with radical scientific views who converged in Edinburgh as they had been banned from English schools (Desmond). Darwin left Edinburgh and began training at Cambridge to become a clergyman. However, he never had any passion for the calling, and simply took it up because it would give him “plenty of time to. . . follow his natural history pursuits” (Mitchell). After Cambridge, he left for a voyage to South America on the HMS Beagle, where he observed birds and had the ideas that led to his writing On the Origin of Species where he first gives evidence for his theory of evolution (Desmond). Darwin really wanted his studies to help in the advance of science. Charles Darwin was an agnostic; he believed that man could know nothing about God (Mitchell).
Darwin published two major works on evolution, On the Origin of Species and The Descent of Man. The Origin of Species laid out the theory of evolution, and The Descent of Man applied it to humans. When he published On the Origin of Species in 1859, some Christians did object to it, but the theory of evolution was actually not completely new. In fact, one of the Origin’s strongest advocates in America was botanist Asa Gray, a firm Christian who had been studying evolution for years already. Gray believed that evolution did not point to atheism but realized that people could start using it as an excuse to rule out God. In the decades that followed, many intellectuals rejected evolution, especially the evolution of man, as they believed the idea conflicted with the story of creation in the Bible and the fact that man was created in God’s image. However, many acknowledged that God could have used evolution to create the world (Christians). The immediate response to Darwin’s publication was not a negative one, in fact, many in the Christian community supported and argued for evolution.
In the United States, evolution only became a real controversy many years after On the Origin of Species was published and decades after Darwin’s voyage on the Beagle. According to Pew Research, the Protestant church in America underwent a gradual split from the 1890s to the 1930s. The more theologically liberal protestant churches separated from the more theologically conservative ones, and evolution was a major component of this split. Teaching evolution in schools had also become a nationwide controversy, as many had doubts that teaching children Darwin’s theory would weaken their faith or promote social Darwinism, the idea that some races or nationalities are more advanced than others. Among these was William Jennings Bryan, a Christian politician and opponent of evolution, who took part in the Scopes “monkey” Trial, probably the most famous court case to do with evolution. The case was a representation of the debate going on all over the country; the defendant, John Scopes, had broken a Tennessee law restricting the teaching of any theory that opposed the creation story (Darwin). Even until modern times, young earth creationists have debated with Darwinists about the age of the earth and the origin of man. Though other issues have taken the forefront in more recent years, evolution is a concept that splits even those within the church.
One of the greatest things that people can do is examine God’s beautiful creation. Science is an in-depth examination of the world, God’s masterpiece, and is, therefore, a kind of worship; by knowing creation, we know God better, and by seeking Him we worship him. Nothing revealed by science can challenge God. Though science is important, it should never take place before God. It is of this world. Differences in scientific opinions, like those in political stance and personality type, should be put aside to worship God. What one believes about evolution does matter; it just matters less than the love for God that we share with other believers. For years, evolution has been one area where Christians battle the world and each other, but in the end, if God chose to use evolution, He could have done it. If He chose to create the world in seven literal days, He could have done that too. Evolution, while important, holds much less importance than the worship of God.
Works Cited
“Darwin in America: the evolution debate in the United States.” Pew Research Center, 6 February 2019, www.pewresearch.org/religion/2019/02/06/darwin-in-america
Desmond, Adrian J. “Charles Darwin.” Encyclopedia Britannica, 15 April 2023, https://www.britannica.com/biography/Charles-Darwin.
“How Have Christians Responded to Darwin’s “Origin of Species”?” Biologos, 1 August 2022, biologos.org/common-questions.
Mitchell, Tommy. “Was Charles Darwin a Christian?” The New Answers Book 4, Answers in Genesis, 9 November 2019, answersingenesis.org/charles-darwin/.
Photo Credit: https://www.sciencephoto.com/media/392571/view/charles-darwin-british-naturalist