Was there a real person named Adam who ate the forbidden fruit of Paradise? Is the Book of Genesis a collection of myths, or an account of history? Dr. William VanDoodewaard, my colleague at PRTS, has traced the beliefs of Christians through the ages on these important questions in his new book, The Quest for the Historical Adam. I am pleased to say that the book has arrived from the printer and is now available for purchase. Ligon Duncan called it “a must read on the subject of Adam and Genesis.”
Adam has long had his skeptics. When Martin Luther commented on the creation of Adam in Genesis 2, he said, “If Aristotle [the Greek philosopher] heard this, he would burst into laughter and conclude that although this is not an unlovely yarn, it is nevertheless a most absurd one.” Luther said that the mind of fallen men “shows in this way that it knows practically nothing about God, who merely by a thought,” made the first man out of the soil of the earth.
Presently there are a number of people who confess themselves to be Christians and yet believe that the human race descended from “a group of several thousand individuals who lived about 150,000 years ago,” and that first cohort of early humans had evolved from other primates similar to apes. In this view, Genesis 2 is understood to refer not to the literal creation of Adam and Eve, but as “a symbolic allegory of the entrance of the human soul into a previously soulless animal kingdom,” as one author said.
What are the pressures moving some professing Christians to deny the existence of Adam? One is the theory of macro-evolution. Some theologians claim that science “has shown beyond any reasonable scientific doubt that humans and primates share common ancestry.” Some Bible scholars have declared that the church must accept evolution. Even some who believe in an historical Adam try to fit him together with the evolution of hominids.
A second pressure is the comparison of Genesis to the myths and creation stories of other ancient near eastern religions. Since these pagan myths have some similarities to the creation and flood stories, we are told that we must also view Genesis as a book that does not claim to tell us historical truth, but only religious parables or myths.
However, if we deny the existence of the historical Adam, not only do we lose the literal meaning of Genesis and of the genealogies of Scripture, but we overthrow the foundation for our trust in Christ’s words (Mark 10:6–8) and His saving work (Rom. 5:12–19). We also lose the theological basis to say that human beings are not mere animals, but God’s representatives to rule over the animals (Gen. 1:26–28). We are stripped of one of our best weapons to fight ethnic division and prejudice (Acts 17:26). It is not an exaggeration to say that without a real Adam, we have no real Christianity. (See my article, “The Case for Adam,” in God, Adam, and You: Biblical Creation Defended and Applied, ed. Richard D. Phillips.)
Christians have discussed the interpretation of Genesis long before these particular pressures against Adam existed. Centuries before Darwin was born, believers in Christ had to respond to criticism from philosophies which had a different view of creation than that presented by a literal reading of Genesis. How have Christians such as Tertullian, Chrysostom, Augustine, Thomas Aquinas, Martin Luther, John Calvin, understood creation and Adam? How did people respond after the rise of the Enlightenment? How has the debate continued in the modern era? This is not a new discussion. Rather than trying to reinvent the wheel, we can learn much from the past.
Dr. VanDoodewaard’s book traces the discussion about Adam from ancient times to the present, and in so doing it allows us to listen to wise voices from the past about how to properly interpret the Bible. Since the question of Adam is particularly controversial today, The Quest for the Historical Adam is a crucial book for pastors, theologians, and the church as a whole. Ian Duguid, professor of Old Testament at Westminster Theological Seminary, says that the book is “an essential entry point to understand contemporary debate.” I heartily commend it to you.
For more information, see www.thequestforadam.com.
