{"id":2749,"date":"2016-09-23T16:04:44","date_gmt":"2016-09-23T16:04:44","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.davidopderbeck.com\/tgdarkly\/?p=2749"},"modified":"2016-10-21T21:05:36","modified_gmt":"2016-10-21T21:05:36","slug":"origen-on-adam-conclusion","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/davidopderbeck.com\/tgdarkly\/2016\/09\/23\/origen-on-adam-conclusion\/","title":{"rendered":"Origen on Adam: Conclusion"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"800px-origen-768x911\"This the final post in my series on Origen and Adam<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Adam and the Rule of Faith<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

In my first post in this series<\/a>, I suggested that Origen could help us work through some of the philosophical, theological, and scientific problems associated with traditional Christian theological anthropology’s emphasis on “Adam.” \u00a0In a prior post I discussed the philosophical claim<\/a>. \u00a0My second claim about how to read the Biblical creation stories relates closely to the Christological emphasis in my discussion of the first claim.<\/p>\n

Origen read all of scripture through the lens of a Rule of Faith centered on Christ.\u00a0 This is particularly evident in Origen\u2019s treatment of the texts from the creation narratives that we examined above.\u00a0 In applying this method, Origen correctly relativized the \u201chistorical\u201d dimension of the text\u2019s literal sense without denying \u201chistoricity\u201d altogether.\u00a0 Origen suggested that interpreters should examine the text carefully to determine if it contains \u201cimpossible\u201d elements that we can conclude are not literally historical.\u00a0 With the knowledge the modern natural sciences has provided us concerning the natural history of the cosmos and human evolution, together with what we have learned from Biblical scholarship about the construction of these texts, we can continue to make such judgments, which can help us better understand what God intends to communicate to us in and through the text.<\/p>\n

Matter Still Matters, But So Does the Ideal<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

My third claim about the natural sciences also relates to the first two claims.\u00a0 On the one hand, Origen acknowledges the necessity and reality of \u201cmatter.\u201d\u00a0 If we wish to engage fruitfully with the natural sciences, we must do the same.\u00a0 That is, we must adopt some form of metaphysical \u201crealism.\u201d[1]<\/a>\u00a0 The material world we inhabit is real and it possesses an inherent rationality, stability and order that allows us to investigate its operations and causes and to draw conclusions with reasonable degrees of confidence about subjects such as the evolution of the cosmos and of the creatures of the Earth, including humans.\u00a0 Yet, contrary to the actual or at least methodological posture of the modern natural sciences, Origen understood that \u201cmatter\u201d is a created thing and therefore is not all there is.<\/p>\n

In many respects, ironically (and contrary to the claims of some na\u00efve modern Christian apologetics about the Big Bang and creation ex nihilo<\/em>) the modern natural sciences are agnostic about the eternity of matter.\u00a0 While mainstream \u201cbig bang\u201d cosmology does assert that our universe has a beginning, it also posits a singularity beyond which the concept of \u201ctime\u201d is meaningless.[2]<\/a>\u00a0 In some respects this is similar to Christian ideas about God\u2019s relationship to time and creation, but the singularity \u201cbefore\u201d the Big Bang is not a personal being, or any kind of being at all.\u00a0 The result is that \u201cmatter\u201d is all there is, and all there ever \u201cwas.\u201d Although there is no Aristotelian unmoved mover causing its eternal motions, there is simply nothing \u201cbefore\u201d matter, or at least nothing that can be known. Other increasingly popular modern cosmologies entail multiverses and repeat \u201cbig bangs\u201d that echo Greek opponents of Aristotle who thought matter and the universe were destroyed and recreated in endlessly recurring cycles. [3]<\/a> \u00a0In contrast, the Christian doctrine of creation, as understood by Origen, insists that matter has a transcendent source in God.\u00a0 Thus, while this ontology is metaphysically realist, it also draws on idealism, to insist that what is in a sense most real<\/em> is the transcendent, that is, God.<\/p>\n

Indeed, the relationship between the ideal and the actual, or the one and the many, concerning human nature, helps us understand why there could have been an \u201cAdam\u201d of history was neither a perfect superman nor the literal biological progenitor of all anatomically modern humans.\u00a0 The ideal<\/em> of Adam preexisted the historical first Adam in the Logos<\/em>, the person of the Son.\u00a0 In the incarnate Son, Christ, we see the actualization of the ideal Adam.\u00a0 Looking back from Christ, we see how the first Adam \u2013 whoever that representative person may have been in the flow of human biological evolution and early human history \u2013 was broken and flawed and therefore how humanity apart from Christ is broken and flawed.\u00a0 Looking forward from Christ, we see how humanity can be, is becoming, and will one day be healed.<\/p>\n

____________________<\/p>\n

[1]<\/a> For a good discussion of the issues here, see Alister McGrath, A Scientific Theology, Vol. 2:\u00a0 Reality (London:\u00a0 Bloomsbury T&T Clark 2007).<\/p>\n

[2]<\/a> See \u201cFoundations of Big Bang Cosmology,\u201d NASA, Universe 101, available at http:\/\/map.gsfc.nasa.gov\/universe\/bb_concepts.html<\/a>.\u00a0 This excellent summary provided by NASA notes that \u201c[i]It is beyond the realm of the Big Bang Model to say what gave rise to the Big Bang. There are a number of speculative theories about this topic, but none of them make realistically testable predictions as of yet.\u201d<\/p>\n

[3]<\/a> See <\/em>Mary-Jane Rubenstein, Worlds Without End:\u00a0 The Many Lives of the Multiverse<\/em> (New York: Columbia Univ. Press 2014).<\/p>\n

____________________<\/p>\n

Series Bibliography<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

Acts of the Second Council of Constantinople<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Aquinas, Thomas On Kingship<\/em><\/a>, Book 1, trans. Gerald B. Phelan and I.T. Eschmann (Toronto:\u00a0 The Pontifical Institute of Mediaeval Studies 1949).<\/p>\n

Aristotle, On the Heavens<\/em><\/a>, trans. J.L. Stocks (Oxford:\u00a0 Clarendon Press 1927), Books I and II.<\/p>\n

Balaguer, Mark, “Platonism in Metaphysics<\/a>“, in Edward N. Zalta, ed., The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy<\/em> (Spring 2016 Edition).<\/p>\n

Bammel, Caroline P. Hammond, \u201cAdam in Origen,\u2019 in Rowan Williams, ed., The Making of Orthodoxy:\u00a0 Essays in Honour of Henry Chadwick<\/em><\/a>, 62-93 (Cambridge:\u00a0 CUP 1989).<\/p>\n

Behr, John, The Mystery of Christ:\u00a0 Life in Death<\/em><\/a> (Crestwood:\u00a0 St. Valdimir\u2019s Seminary Press 2006), 90.<\/p>\n

Bouteneff, Peter Beginnings:\u00a0 Ancient Christian Readings of the Biblical Creation Narratives<\/em><\/a> (Grand Rapids:\u00a0 Baker Academic 2008).<\/p>\n

— \u201cChrist and Salvation,\u201d in Mary B. Cunningham and Elizabeth Theokrotoff, eds. The Cambridge Companion to Orthodox Christian Theology<\/em><\/a> (Cambridge:\u00a0 CUP 2008), 94; Timothy<\/p>\n

Dawkins, Richard, The Selfish Gene:\u00a0 40th<\/sup> Anniversary Edition<\/em><\/a> (Oxford:\u00a0 OUP 2016)<\/p>\n

Genetic Jewish Disease Consortium Website, available at http:\/\/www.jewishgeneticdiseases.org\/jewish-genetic-diseases\/.<\/p>\n

Graziano, Michael S., God, Soul, Mind, Brain:\u00a0 A Neuroscientist\u2019s Reflections on the Spirit World<\/em> <\/a>(Freedonia:\u00a0 Leapfrog Press 2010).<\/p>\n

Greek text file of Origen from Migne<\/a><\/p>\n

Jones, Steve, Martin, Robert and Pilbeam, David, eds., The Cambridge Encyclopedia of Human Evolution<\/em><\/a> (Cambridge:\u00a0 CUP 1996)<\/p>\n

Karkainnen, Veli Matti, Creation and Humanity:\u00a0 A Constructive Christian Theology for the Pluralistic World<\/em>, Vol. 3<\/em><\/a> (Grand Rapids:\u00a0 Eerdmans 2015).<\/p>\n

Kelsey, David, Eccentric Existence:\u00a0 A Theological Anthropology, Vol. 1<\/em><\/a> (Louisville:\u00a0 Westminster John Knox 2009)<\/p>\n

McFadyen, Alistair, Bound to Sin:\u00a0 Abuse, Holocaust and the Doctrine of Sin<\/em><\/a> (Cambridge:\u00a0 CUP 2000).<\/p>\n

McFarland, Ian, \u201cThe Fall and Sin,\u201d in John Webster, Kathryn Tanner, and Iain Torrance, eds. The Oxford Handbook of Systematic Theology<\/em><\/a> (Oxford:\u00a0 OUP 2007)<\/p>\n

McGrath, Alister, A Scientific Theology, Vol. 2:\u00a0 Reality<\/em><\/a> (London:\u00a0 Bloomsbury T&T Clark 2007).<\/p>\n

Migne, Jaques-Paul, Patrologiae Cursus Completus, Series Graeca<\/em><\/a> (Parise:\u00a0 Imprimerie Catholique\u00a0 1857), Vol. 11.<\/p>\n

NASA, \u201cFoundations of Big Bang Cosmology<\/a>,\u201d Universe 101.<\/p>\n

O\u2019Donovan, Oliver, Finding and Seeking:\u00a0 Ethics as Theology:\u00a0 Volume 2<\/em><\/a> (Grand Rapids:\u00a0 Eerdmans 2014).<\/p>\n

— Self, World and Time:\u00a0 Volume 1:\u00a0 Ethics as Theology:\u00a0 An Introduction<\/a><\/em> (Grand Rapids:\u00a0 Eerdmans 2013).<\/p>\n

— with O\u2019Donovan, Joan Lockwood, eds., From Irenaeus to Grotius:\u00a0 A Sourcebook in Christian Political Thought<\/a><\/em> (Grand Rapids:\u00a0 Eerdmans 1999).<\/p>\n

Origen, Contra Celsus<\/em><\/a>, trans. Frederick Crombie (Buffalo:\u00a0 Christian Literature Publishing 1884).<\/p>\n

—\u00a0 On First Principles<\/em><\/a>, trans. G.W. Butterworth (Notre Dame:\u00a0 Ave Maria Press 2013).<\/p>\n

—\u00a0 \u201cHomilies on Genesis and Exodus,\u201d in The Fathers of the Church, A New Translation, Vol. 71<\/em><\/a>, trans. Ronald E. Heine (Washington, D.C.:\u00a0 The Catholic University of America Press (1982).<\/p>\n

Philo, On the Eternity of the World<\/em><\/a>, in The Works of Philo, trans. Charles Duke Yonge (London: H.G. Bohn 1854-1890).<\/p>\n

Pope Benedict XVI, Great Christian Thinkers:\u00a0 From the Early Church Through the Middle Ages<\/em><\/a> (Minneapolis:\u00a0 Fortress Press 2011).<\/p>\n

Press, Gerald A., \u201cPlato\u201d and Lloyd P. Gerson, \u201cPlotinus and Neo-Platonism\u201d in Richard H. Popkin, ed., The Columbia History of Western Philosophy<\/em><\/a> (New York:\u00a0 Columbia Univ. Press 1999).<\/p>\n

Rubenstein, Mary-Jane, Worlds Without End:\u00a0 The Many Lives of the Multiverse<\/em><\/a> (New York: Columbia Univ. Press 2014).<\/p>\n

Runia, David T., Philo and the Church Fathers:\u00a0 A Collection of Papers<\/a><\/em>, Chapter Six (New York:\u00a0 E.J. Brill 1995).<\/p>\n

Sandel, Michael J., Justice:\u00a0 What\u2019s the Right Thing to Do<\/em><\/a> (New York:\u00a0 Farrar, Straus and Giroux 2010).<\/p>\n

The Mayo Clinic, \u201cSickle Cell Anemia,\u201d Causes<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Trigg Wilson, Joseph, Origen<\/em><\/a> (London:\u00a0 Routledge 2002).<\/p>\n

United Nations, Consolidated United Nations Security Council Sanctions List<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Venema, Denis, BioLogos Forum, \u201cLetters to the Duchess<\/a>.”<\/p>\n

von Balthasar, Hans Urs, Origen:\u00a0 Spirit and Fire<\/em><\/a>, trans. Robert J. Daly, S.J. (Washington D.C.: Catholic Univ. of America Press 1984)<\/p>\n

Ware, Timothy, The Orthodox Church<\/em><\/a> (New York:\u00a0 Penguin Books 1997)<\/p>\n

Wolfson, Harry A., \u201cPatristic Arguments Against the Eternity of the World<\/a>,\u201d Harvard Theological Review 59:4 (Oct. 1966).<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

This the final post in my series on Origen and Adam. Adam and the Rule of Faith In my first post in this series, I suggested that Origen could help us work through some of the philosophical, theological, and scientific problems associated with traditional Christian theological anthropology’s emphasis on “Adam.” \u00a0In a prior post I […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[78,50],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2749","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-origen","category-science-and-religion"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p824rZ-Il","jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/davidopderbeck.com\/tgdarkly\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2749","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/davidopderbeck.com\/tgdarkly\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/davidopderbeck.com\/tgdarkly\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/davidopderbeck.com\/tgdarkly\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/davidopderbeck.com\/tgdarkly\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2749"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/davidopderbeck.com\/tgdarkly\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2749\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2825,"href":"https:\/\/davidopderbeck.com\/tgdarkly\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2749\/revisions\/2825"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/davidopderbeck.com\/tgdarkly\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2749"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/davidopderbeck.com\/tgdarkly\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2749"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/davidopderbeck.com\/tgdarkly\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2749"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}