Baptist Spirituality

Did St. Augustine of Hippo of 5th-century fame ever read Charles Darwin of 19th century fame?

In Scientific Creationism, Henry Morris argues that the seven days of creation are literal 24-hour periods. Echoing other creationists, he states that the word in Genesis 1 for day (yom in the Hebrew) means a 24-hour period and that people who refuse to take each creation day as a literal 24-hour period are teetering on apostasy, utilizing a “biblical exegesis” that is “out of the question for any real believer in the Bible” (p. 244). Worse, those who take each day as an era are using language “synonymous with evolution” (p. 228, emphasis original).

In the fifth century, St. Augustine wrote that the seven days of creation are not literal 24-hour days, but eras that contain the wonders and work of God’s creative majesty.  He called them “divine days,” which were “God-divided”, according to Daniel Vestal (Vestal, 40).

If we take Morris seriously, then must we assume that St. Augustine had a prophetic insight to the work of Charles Darwin?

With all of the debate, theories, and books over the past three centuries concerning God’s creation in Genesis 1 and 2, it seems all one could do is make a decision, plant your flag, and read joyfully in utter abandon and obedience to God, which is the likeliest way we’re supposed to read God’s Word in the first place.

The problem with Henry Morris’ arguments (and other creationists of his camp) is that they treat their understanding of creation as both the only biblical option and the only scientifically historical option. Yet, such literalism is not a product of thousands of years of interpreting scripture, but the rise of scientific methodology resulting from the Enlightenment era only in the last 400 years. While Morris argues that Darwinism is an inappropriate lens to view geology and the Bible, he fails to acknowledge how his own lens, borrowed from scientific modernity (with all of its scientific theory), is the lens through which he subjugates the Bible.

Walter Brueggemann, in his Interpretation commentary on Genesis, states,

As much as any part of the Bible, this text has been caught in the unfortunate battle of ‘modernism,’ so that the ‘literalists’ and ‘rationalists’ have acted like the two mothers of 1 Kings 3:16-28, nearly ready to have the text destroyed in order to control it” (p. 25).

Reading the creation narrative from a long-earth perspective was not unique to St. Augustine. Rabbis of the day argued that the creation narrative was more liturgical and theological than literal. We can surmise that, no, St. Augustine did not read Darwin. We can also surmise that Morris is utilizing a more novel approach to the interpretation of scripture that coerces the text to his (very human) understanding of the Bible resulting from contemporary debates rather than traditional exegesis.

With these conclusions, how might we redeem the beautiful movement of God’s creation to bring not debate, but doxology and praise? Is there a way to sift through the science and the creation narrative in a way that doesn’t divorce the Bible from what we know of science, the origins of the universe, and our world? How can we tamp down Morris’ claims that one must implicate a long-creation view as a view that “inevitably leads eventually to complete apostasy” (Morris, 247)?

By now, I received word that I did not win a grant that would have provided a 12-week sabbatical deeper into the world of cosmology. Instead, I have planned an eight-week retreat in 2026 to focus on my own self-studies of cosmology. Between now and then, however, I am aspiring to dig deeper in the wonderful poetic text of Genesis 1 and 2, perhaps one of the greatest pieces of literature and theological treatises in all human history. I intend to provide stepping stones for readers freeing the text from its divisive, contemporary moorings.

With all of the debate, theories, and books over the past three centuries concerning God’s creation in Genesis, it seems all one could do is to make a decision, plant your flag, and read joyfully in utter abandon and obedience to God, which is the likeliest way we’re supposed to read God’s Word in the first place. At the end of the day, we need only recognize that, of all the things we can say of Genesis 1, it is that the various interpretations of origins won’t be on any theological test to enter eternity. In fact, I am sure that when we reach God, the whole debate will have faded like a long forgotten memory.