The Ruach of God

Alice C. Linsley


In the ancient world the order of creation was viewed as hierarchical and fixed. This was based on the observation of patterns in nature. In the time of Abraham's Kushite ancestors, the observation of the fixed movement of the heavenly bodies was done by a caste of priests. They noted the constellations have a clocklike movement, the seasons are linked to the 12 lunar cycles, and the Sun directly over head marks mid-day.  The stars also suggested a fixed order in creation, as did the winds associated with the breath or spirit of God.

The ancient Afro-Asiatics perceived boundaries in the nature order. The boundaries were fixed within the hierarchy or pyramid of kinds. The Biblical "kind" is not synonymous with the word "species."  Because of mutation and adaptation there are many more creatures now than there are kinds. Kinds refers to the original essence of a created entity (think Plato's eternal Forms). Creationists believe the essence of an entity never disappears. The Biblical "kind" represents an essentialist worldview.

The Afro-Asiatic priests saw boundaries in earth's geometry. This is reflected in the wisdom literature of Job, Proverbs and Ben Sira. From the tops of high mountains they noted the curvature of the Earth at dawn and dust. They "oriented" themselves by facing east as the Sun rose.  They conceived of the cosmos as God's sacred pyramid or temple. As the Sun rose, God entered the temple from the east.  As the Sun set, God left the temple toward the west. Rulers were buried in pyramids with the hope that they would rise with the Sun and lead their people in procession to immortality. St. Paul refers to this belief when he writes about how Christ rose from the grave, leading captives in his train. (Ephesians 4:7-9)

This is the symbolism of the sand scarab which comes out of the sand when the Sun rises and returns to the sand as night approaches. The sand scarab represents the Sun's journey and repose in death. The female sand beetle lays her eggs in the sand and when the eggs hatch, she is no longer, because she gives her body to be eaten by her newborn young (cf. Jesus' words, "This is my Body given for you...").

For Abraham's Horite ancestors, the Sun and the scarab spoke to them of their deity, HR (Horus in Greek). He was regarded with his father Ra as the marker of boundaries. Horo (oros in Greek) refers to boundaries. From horo come the English words harmony, hour, horizon and horoscope. Today "horoscope" connotes astrology, but the word originally meant observer of the hours, from hora (time or hour) and skopos (observer or watcher). Horite priests were ardent observers of the heavens and thought about the cosmos in terms of divinely established boundaries and celestial patterns.

In the time of Abraham's Nilotic ancestors, the priests of Horus (called "Horites" in the Bible) were dedicated to observation of the planets and constellations. They believed that the pattern of the heavens was mirrored on earth. They observed that the planets and the constellations have an orderly clock-like movement and they perceived as that being the same order on earth. They conceived of this order as fixed and established by the generative force that makes existence possible (logos, ruach, wisdom). The Horite priests were the known earliest astronomers and it is likely that horo is a reference to their celestial archetypes surrounding Horus, the son of Ra, born to Hathor-Meri. Hathor-Meri's animal totem was a cow. She is shown at the Dendura Temple holding her newborn son in a manger or stable.

The Horites were devotees of HR (Hor, Hur, Har or Horus) whose mother Hathor-Meri conceived miraculously by the overshadowing of the Sun (the Creator's emblem). Horus is the archetype by which Abraham's descendants would recognize Jesus as the promised Seed of the Woman (Gen. 3:15). His authentication was His rising from the dead on the third day, in accordance with Horite expectation. As St. Augustine noted, the Egyptians took great care in the burial of their dead and never practiced cremation, as in the religions that seek to escape physical existence. Abraham's ancestors believed in the resurrection of the body and awaited a deified king who would rise from the grave and deliver his people from death.

Horus controlled the wind (ruach). The Harmattan trade wind which blows from the northeast and east across the western Sahara was named for Horus. The Nilotic peoples were probably the first in invent the sail because the prevailing wind blows south while the Nile (Hapi) flows north. Horus was invoked to send favorable wind. The four winds sometimes appeared as birds at the four quarters of the heavens announcing the accession of Horus' deified ruler on earth. On the walls of Amenemhat's burial chamber at Hawara Horus is depicted at the cardinal points and associated with the resurrection of the ruler.

Canopic jars showing the
4 forms of Horus

At the north he is Horus the dog-headed (a warrior); at the east he is Horus the jackal-headed (a judge); at the south he is Horus the Man (God's message in the flesh) and at the west he is Horus the falcon-headed. In the Pyramid Texts these four are called the "Four Spirits." These coincide with Sirius (dog) and the Pole Star (jackel). The Pole Star represents "the power of stability fixed at the center of the universe." This is why Horus as jackel is seen at the center of the Dendura planisphere. Horus the Man is the "dark Sun" or Mercury. He is nearest the Sun, but visible only at night. Horus the falcon is he who perches "upon the ramparts of the house of him of the hidden name." He flies with the Sun to west, as is evident in this stone relief from Angkor Wat showing Horus as a falcon perches upon the mast of Ra's solar boat:

Angkor is derived from Ankh Hor, meaning Life to Horus!

Consider how Horus, the archetype of Christ, describes himself in the Coffin texts (passage 148):

"I am Horus, the great Falcon upon the ramparts of the house of him of the hidden name. My flight has reached the horizon. I have passed by the gods of Nut. I have gone further than the gods of old. Even the most ancient bird could not equal my very first flight. I have removed my place beyond the powers of Set, the foe of my father Osiris. No other god could do what I have done. I have brought the ways of eternity to the twilight of the morning. I am unique in my flight. My wrath will be turned against the enemy of my father Osiris and I will put him beneath my feet in my name of 'Red Cloak'." (Myth and Symbol in Ancient Egypt by R.T. Rundle Clark, p. 216)

Here we find the words of Psalm 110:1, a messianic reference: The Lord says to my Lord: "Sit at My right hand until I make Your enemies a footstool for Your feet."

Horus and the Winds

In the ancient world, the earth below was perceived as a mirror of the celestial order above. The cosmological significance ot the four quarters of the winds - north, east, south and west - are apparent in Homer's writings. The quarters were divided again to configure an 8-point order for the winds know to the Greeks after Homer. By the time of Eratosthenes (c. 276 – 195 BC) a 12-point wind configuration had emerged, but the 8-point configuration was used again in the time of Andronicus of Kyrrhos in the first century BC. Around the top of the Tower of Winds that he designed 8 winds are named: Boreas (N), Kaikias (NE), Eurus (E), Apeliotes (SE), Notus (S), Livas (SW), Zephyrus (W), and Skiron (NW). The North, Northeast, Northwest and East are associated with men (masculine principle) and the Southwest, West, South and Southeast are associated with women (the feminine principle). This suggests the binary influence of the earlier Afro-Asiatics.

The Horologion

Andronicus' tower is called the "Horologion." Here again we see the root horo. Abraham's Nilotic Proto-Saharan ancestors were the first that we know of to associate the wind with the divine generative force. Ruach eloyim means spirit, breath, wind, movement of God. The association of wind with Horus is seen also in the word harmattan, referring to the dry wind that seasonally blows across the Sahara.

Ancient towers and temples reflect the cosmology of their builders. The differing geometric shapes of the temples of the Horite Sabians (Afro-Arabian Dedanites) associated the hexagon with Saturn, the triangle with Jupiter, the rectangle with Mars, the square with the Sun, the octagon with the Moon, and a triangle within a quadrangle with Venus.


Fixed Boundaries in Genetics

The word horotely is used to describe the boundaries of evolutionary change for a given group of plants or animals. The term is rarely used today since is implies fixed boundaries between "kinds" (to use the Biblical term). This is not a popular idea among those who believe that chimps and humans have a common ancestor because they have similar anatomical and genetic structure, or that nurse sharks and camels have a common ancestor because they have a similar antigen receptor protein structure.

The Darwinian theory of common ancestry of all living organisms still requires fixed boundaries. Human only reproduce humans and have done so from at least 3.6 million years ago. There are fixed boundaries within the DNA code. While the similarity of humans to primates may suggest a common origin, this common ancestor isn't known to have actually existed. It is the creation of artists who draw images for biology books.

There are now enough fossils recovered in Hadar, Ethiopia and in Cameroon to recontruct a picture of Lucy and her people. They were clearly human and not apes although the artists drawings persist in showing them as hairy and apelike. For example, complete fourth metatarsal of A. afarensis was discovered at Hadar that shows the deep, flat base and tarsal facets that "imply that its midfoot had no ape-like midtarsal break. These features show that the A. afarensis foot was functionally like that of modern humans." 

When Jeremy DeSilva studied the anatomy of chimps and compared his findings with the anatomical structure of the ankle joint, the tibia and the talus of fossil "hominins" between 4.12 million to 1.53 million years, he discovered that all of the hominin ankle joints resembled those of modern humans rather than those of apes. Chimpanzees flex their ankles 45 degrees from normal resting position. This makes it possible for apes to climb trees with great ease. While walking, humans flex their ankles a maximum of 20 degrees. The human ankle bones are quite distinct from those of apes, and apparently have been from the beginning. In other words, though there are anatomical and genetic similarities upon which to group humans and chimps in the same genus, the two have distinctly different essences. In the essentialist view, similarities cannot be regarded as proof of common ancestors. Common ancestors can only be possible where a creature reproduces it own kind.


Related reading:  Theories of Change and Constancy; Resurrection as Mirrored Reality; The Horite Ancestry of Jesus Christ; Who Were the Horites?; Genesis and Genetics

Rowan Williams' Confusion

Rowan Williams on the Christian Duty to the Environment

It is a rather different reading of the biblical tradition to that often (lazily) assumed to be the orthodoxy of Judeo-Christian belief. We hear regularly that this tradition authorises the exploitation of the earth through the language in Genesis about "having dominion" over the non-human creation. As has been argued elsewhere, this is a very clumsy reading of what Genesis actually says; but set alongside the Levitical code and (as Ellen Davis argues) many other aspects of the theology of Jewish Scripture, the malign interpretation that has latterly been taken for granted by critics of Judaism and Christianity appears profoundly mistaken. But what remains to be teased out is more about the nature of the human calling to further the "redemption" of persons and world. If liberating action is allowing things and persons to stand before God free from claims to possession, is the responsibility of human agents only to stand back and let natural processes unfold?

In Genesis, humanity is given the task of "cultivating" the garden of Eden: we are not left simply to observe or stand back, but are endowed with the responsibility to preserve and direct the powers of nature. In this process, we become more fully and joyfully who and what we are – as St Augustine memorably says, commenting on this passage: there is a joy, he says, in the "experiencing of the powers of nature". Our own fulfilment is bound up with the work of conserving and focusing those powers, and the exercise of this work is meant to be one of the things that holds us in Paradise and makes it possible to resist temptation. The implication is that an attitude to work which regards the powers of nature as simply a threat to be overcome is best seen as an effect of the Fall, a sign of alienation. And, as the monastic scholar Aelred Squire, points out (Asking the Fathers, p.92), this insight of Augustine, quoted by Thomas Aquinas, is echoed by Aquinas himself in another passage where he describes humanity as having a share in the working of divine Providence because it has the task of using its reasoning powers to provide for self and others (aliis, which can mean both persons and things). In other words, the human task is to draw out potential treasures in the powers of nature and so to realise the convergent process of humanity and nature discovering in collaboration what they can become. The "redemption" of people and material life in general is not a matter of resigning from the business of labour and of transformation – as if we could – but the search for a form of action that will preserve and nourish an interconnected development of humanity and its environment. In some contexts, this will be the deliberate protection of the environment from harm: in a world where exploitative and aggressive behaviour is commonplace, one of the "providential" tasks of human beings must be to limit damage and to secure space for the natural order to exist unharmed. In others, the question is rather how to use the natural order for the sake of human nourishment and security without pillaging its resources and so damaging its inner mechanisms for self-healing or self-correction. In both, the fundamental requirement is to discern enough of what the processes of nature truly are to be able to engage intelligently with them.

From here.


What I find interesting is this sentence:

in a world where exploitative and aggressive behaviour is commonplace, one of the "providential" tasks of human beings must be to limit damage and to secure space for the natural order to exist unharmed.

If we apply this to the divinely established order of male-female relations, we are faced with the providential task of defending marriage between a man and a woman and opposing homosex as against the natural order. Had Rowan Williams taken this step the Anglican Communion would have been spared a great deal of pain and suffering during his beleaguered term. However, the Archbishop fails to make this logical connection because of his consent to convergent evolution. He appears to be influenced more by Richard Dawkins (as in his The Blind Watchmaker) than by the book of Genesis. Either the Bible is right in asserting a fixed order with fixed genetic boundaries, or it is wrong.  Apparently, Rowan believes it is wrong because he makes this contrary statement:

the human task is to draw out potential treasures in the powers of nature and so to realise the convergent process of humanity and nature discovering in collaboration what they can become.

Clearly the Archbishop is spinning a "Christian" viewpoint on creation that is not a Biblical viewpoint.  He is committed to green action, but not to the divinely-established order of creation.




What does the Bible teach?


The Bible teaches a fixed binary order in creation, not a convergent process of becoming. Obviously, Rowan Williams cannot have both a fixed order and a convergent process of becoming, so which is it, Sir?

Homosex was in the same category as onanism. Both were regarded as grievous violations of the fixed boundaries in the order of creation. The seed that should fall to the earth is the seed of plants, which spring forth from the earth. The seed of man should fall on his own type (the womb), from which man comes forth.

In our pleasure-consumed society, sex has become a comodity. The more orgiastic and pornographic, the better the comodity. Sex as comodity misses the mark of God's righteousness by so far that it isn't even proper to discuss the two together.

There is much we do not understand about sexual attraction. There is also much false information about homosexuality, much of it built upon the discredited Kinsey Report. The issue is not homosexuality or even heterosexuality, but the use of the body, which is to be the temple of the Holy Spirit. Sex within marriage is the only approved sex in the Bible and in Holy Tradition, and both understand marriage as between a man and a woman.

Related reading:  Levi-Strauss and Jacques Derrida on Binary Oppositions; Binary Distinctions and Kenosis; How to Invite Ridicule; Biblical Anthropologists Discuss Darwin; More Questions on Sex; Ideologies Opposed to Holy Tradition

Questions Asked by Primitive Man

Alice C. Linsley

Readers of Just Genesis will find this conversation about Archaic Man interesting. You will note the faulty assumptions made as to what anthropology has demonstrated to be factual.

"To the primitive men all experiences were supernatural. It appeared in different forms and manifestations in accordance with the different civilizations of the clime and climate of the respective country.
 
According to the scientific research and the knowledge of anthropology the conversion of animals to human beings took about 30 hundred thousands years through evolutionary process ; there are two important  periods in the primitive history of mankind.  The first period is called Stone Age, when man used tools made of stone to get his food and other necessities of life to sustain his existence. It was the period when man began to conceive and feel the environment, and the conversion from animal to man had been complete.  Initiation  of awareness of the surroundings began to grow.  With the introduction of the use of Iron, man became more sophisticated and he started to think about the manifestations of nature in different forms.  He could not understand the nature and function of the objects of nature, and therefore surrendered to them . Questions in his mind were :

[a] What is the character and general structure of the universe in which we live?

[b] Is there permanent element in the constitution of the universe? 

[c] How are we related to it?

[d] What place do we occupy in it. 

[e] What is the kind of conduct that befits the place we occupy?

These questions occurred in the mind of the primitive man. When he could not find any satisfactory answers, he created gods, and goddesses to satisfy his passion of curiosity.  It is very interesting that in Neolithic Period of his evolution he had  more interest with Mother Earth because it provided him the necessities of life."  [Extract from Tasavaray Khudha, translated by Muhammad Asghar Butt]


Some responses:

"Anthropology has not demonstrated that humans emerged from lower animals. In fact, no physical evidence has been recovered that supports this assertion."--Alice C. Linsley

"The foundations for many sciences - astronomy, medicine, animal husbandry, metallurgy, etc. - are found among some biblical populations. Why did they pursue knowledge in these areas? What were their aims? Maybe to satisfy curiosity? To seek truth? To feel closer to the Creator? To better understand their place in the cosmos?" - Alice C. Linsley

 

"Scientific outlook gives the objective outlook which totally discard bias and prejudice. On the other hand, religious activities are concerned with the idiosyncrasies, whims  and caprices of the mind.  Moreover, it is directly related to human emotions, passions, sentiments. A religious spirit does not inculcate the scientific bent of mind. It is based upon the personal whims of the believer. Thus, if we take these two spirits apparently, there are poles asunder. 

The essentials of religion are blind faith and supernaturalism for its support to live in a illiterate society."-- Muhammad Asghar Butt

"The fundamental questions that Primitive Man asked are asked by scientists, theologians, and ethicists today. Primitive Man's conclusions constituted the beginnings of science.  For example, the ancient Afro-Asiatics noted a fixed order in creation.  The Sun appears to rise in the East and set in the West. We are able to greet it only as we face East.  The Sun's light is greater than moonlight as the Moon merely reflects the Sun's light. Humans are either Male or Female, and the male is larger and stronger than the female. Primitive Man grasped the binary nature of this fixed order and recognized that one entity in the binary set is greater.  This guided the decision making process of archaic man. The binary pattern observed in Nature led ancient Nilotic peoples to hypothesize about binary stars such as Siruis A and B long before Sirius B was discovered using high-power telescopes.

The binary worldview of the Horim who originated in ancient Kush was diffused by their kingdom-building rulers across a vast expanse from the Nile to Nepal.  There is substantial linguistic, archaeological, and anthropological evidence to demonstrate that this is so. These rulers were the patrons of the earliest stone and metal working technologies."-- Alice C. Linsley

"How did God come about? Imagine yourself with no ceiling, no walls, and no shelter. No beds, no pillows, and no quilts. No clothes, no shoes, no caps—not even a shawl. No factories, no industries, and not even Gandhi’s spinning wheel. No electricity, no air conditioners, and no heaters. Fire has not been discovered yet. No farms, no agriculture, no grocery stores; no food except from the trees and plants and from the animals weaker than you, whom you can kill. No doctors, no surgeons, no quacks, no hospitals, no clinics, no pharmacies—and not even turmeric.

No transportation of any sort, not even a bike or a cart. The wheel, the mother of all transportation, has not yet been invented. No telephones, no faxes, and no computers. No technology of any type — period. You have no idea about the world or its vastness; forget about its flatness or roundness. And you have zero understanding of the natural phenomenas. You have wild and gentle animals, birds, and insects as your neighbors.

Furthermore, it is extremely cold and raining with thunderstorms and lightning. Or it’s hot and humid. Your whole being is enveloped in fear and fear of the unknown.

This then is the most fertile time of your life. You are in the ovulation period. Then comes     pregnancy — not of a child, but a concept. And so during the labor pains and the fear, you give birth. What to? The God Almighty, of course, the Supreme Being.

He is not the Father God. You are the mother of God. You gave birth to God. She, he, I, they, we all are mothers of God. We gave, and give, birth to God in time of our needs." --B. R. Gowani (brgowani-at-hotmail-dotcom)

Another way to look at this topic of primitive and archaic inquiry is to consider the relationship between religion and early science. The Sun was the emblem of the High God. Their ceremonies were patterned on astronomical observations that revealed cycles. The most fundamental cycle was sunrise-sunset, but their ceremonies were patterned also on the seasons, the equinoxes and solstices, eclipses, and the rising of Sirius. As in the heavens, so on earth... celestial archetypes become the pattern for earthly rituals/ceremonies (Mircea Eliade). Such ceremonial repetition grounds us in spiritual reality which is outside time. Profane time is suspended as the participants enter sacred time." -- Alice C. Linsley

 

"And like all other religious people from all other religions, you are making an attempt to mix science with the imaginations of men who existed hundreds and thousands of years ago and created religions." --Shazia Nawaz MD (shazianawazsays-at-gmail-dotcom)

"These questions did indeed occupy the mind of primitive Man. However the archaeological, linguistic and anthropological evidence doesn't support the conclusions that Man created gods and goddesses, or that Neolithic Man was more concerned with Mother Earth than with the Creator and his heavenly domain. Within the Afro-Asiatic Dominion there was a remarkable uniformity of religious doctrine concerning a Supreme Creator whose lesser assisting spirits (henotheism) were associated with natural elements such as rivers, trees, and mountains. Archaic man is often portrayed as an ignorant idol worshiper, but as an acute observer of the fixed patterns in nature, he knew the material world had a Fixer who alone was worthy of adoration.

Further, there is not a single ancient text that speaks of 'Mother Earth.' In ancient Egypt we find exactly the opposite.  The fluid canopy of sky was associated with the feminine principle of Nut. Likewise, firmness such as displayed by stone pillars, was associated with the masculine principle.

The goddess figurines of antiquity were fertility fetishes similar to the fertility paddles worn by young Ashante women today. These are not worshiped by the Ashante. And the earlier Asherahs and Madonnas all seem to be patterned on the mythic Hathor."-- Alice C. Linsley 

Related reading: Theories of Change and Constancy; Theories of Primal Substance and Cause; Ethical Concerns of Archaic Communities; Getting the Facts about Human Origins; Binary Sets in the Ancient World; Solar Imagery of the Proto-Gospel; The Sun and the Moon in Genesis

How to Invite Ridicule

Alice C. Linsley


To understand the biblical worldview we must grasp the supplementary nature of the binary opposites. This involves understanding of what is meant by binary opposites and supplementary.

Supplementary is about meaning.  It is not an egalitarian principle. That is to say that meaning is derived from the relationship of the binary opposites. I experience hateful acts as evil because I have experience of loving acts and know them to be good. The reverse is also true. The male-female relationship has meaning because of the supplementary nature of male-female.

Supplementary doesn’t mean equal, since one of the opposites is perceived as greater in some way. This is how the biblical worldview avoids dualism.

Supplementary is what makes a relationship meaningful. In fact, meaning is derived from the supplementary nature of two things.

Consider Law and Grace. St. Paul presents these as binary oppositions, and their meaning is found in the supplementary relationship of the oppositions. One is greater, stronger, brighter, etc. than the other in its attributes. Grace is superior to the Law, but makes no sense without the Law. For as St. Paul says, the Law was our "school teacher" until grace should be revealed in the Incarnate Son.

The Sun is brighter than the Moon and the Moon's light is a reflection of the Sun's light. The western Afro-Asiatics thought the Chaldeans and Babylonians were confused because they venerated the Moon. Since the Moon merely reflects the Sun's light, it is a lesser entity. Why would anyone want to venerate a lesser entity? Abraham's father was accused of being an idol worshiper (Joshua 24:2) because he lived in the region of Ur and Haran where people worshipped the moon god.

Binary distinctions are not figments of the ancient imagination. They are observed in the order of creation. Men are physically larger and stronger than women.

Among Abraham's people it was taboo to allow distinct entities to become confused. This is why both men and women were circumcised, a custom that continues in many parts of Africa. Male circumcision is seen as an enhancement of maleness and the complement to the circumcised male could only be a circumcised female.  Circumcision in its original context derives meaning only when considered in this supplementary way.

Many examples of supplementary binary distinctions are found in Scripture. Consider the distinction between heat and cool. Abraham was visited “in the heat of the day” by God in 3 Persons (Gen. 18:1). Compare this to the binary opposite of “in the cool of the day”, the time of God’s visitation to Adam and Eve in Paradise (Gen. 3:8). Why are the two accounts posed as hot and cool encounters with God? Because in the first God has come to punish the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah, and in the second God has come to enjoy fellowship with the Man and the Woman.

Bible verses which forbid sowing two types of seed in the same field, weaving two types of fabric in the same garment, and boiling a baby goat in its mother's milk - are about NOT blurring the distinctions God has created in nature. The last is especially troublesome because the offspring meets death in the life-giving mother's milk.

The prohibition against mixing types, be they fibers, seeds or blood, is like the prohibition against confusing the holy with the unholy, or blurring the distinction between life and death, such as happens when a baby goat is boiled in its mother's milk (forbidden 3 places in Scripture). That is why each seed is to go to its own kind. As plants are born from the earth, so the seeds of plants return to the earth. As the man is born from the woman, so the seed/semen of man is to return to woman. The spilling of seed called 'onanism' was regarded as an evil deed, a violation of the order of creation and therefore an affront to the Creator. So obviously was homosex.

Bloods were never permitted to mix or even to be present in the same space. For example, men were not permitted in the birthing hut. Women (and many men also) were not permitted where animals were sacrificed. This is why women were never priests and why in church tradition they waited 40 days to return to church, following the ancient custom requiring purification after shedding blood.

Ancient peoples recognized a fixed order in creation. The male is larger and generally stronger than the female. The male is equipped for war and hunting while the female is equipped for cultivation and childbirth. This leads us to the distinction between the blood shed by men and the blood shed by women. Male "blood work" was expressed in hunting, war, execution of lawbreakers, and in animal sacrifice by the rulers, priests or prophets.

The blood work of women is supplementary to the blood work of men. Women sacrifice blood in first marital intercourse. They bleed in their monthly cycle and in childbirth. The blood shed of women represents life and is distinct yet supplementary to the blood shed by men in hunting, war and animal sacrifice.

I’ve found that speaking about the binary distinctions draws fire. Suggesting that they are important invites ridicule. Yet this is how the ancient Afro-Asiatics made sense of the world and their thinking informs us today through the Bible, Law and Ethics. Abraham's ancestors were not spinning an illusion that we moderns in our superior knowledge may set aside, they were describing a cross-shaped reality.


Related reading:  Levi-Strauss and Jacques Derrida on Binary Oppositions; The Origins of Circumcision; Circumcision and Binary Distinctions; Genesis and Genetics; Biblical Anthropologists Discuss Darwin; More Questions About Sex

St. Anthony the Great on Creation

"God, by His Logos, created the different kinds of animals to meet the variety of our needs: some for our food, others for our service. And He created man to apprehend them and their actions and to appraise them gratefully. Man should therefore strive not to die, like the non-rational animals, without having attained some apprehension of God and His works.”

“Providence is manifested in events which occur in accordance with divine necessity – such as the daily rising and setting of the sun, and the yielding of fruits of the earth. Law, similarly, is manifested in events which occur in accordance with human necessity. Everything has been created for man’s sake. Since God is good, whatever He does, He does for man’s sake.”

“God’s providence controls the universe. It is present everywhere. Providence is the sovereign Logos of God, imprinting form on the unformed materiality of the world, making and fashioning all things. Matter could not have acquired an articulated structure were it not for the directing power of the Logos, who is the Image, Intellect, Wisdom and Providence of God.”

Genesis and Genetics

Alice C. Linsley


Can the essence of entities change?

You have heard it said, "There is nothing new under the Sun." In this view no changes in the essence of entities occurs. The essence of humans is the same as it was at the dawn of human existence. The essence of trees is the same today as at the time of the appearance of the first tree. Plato believed that the eternal soul re-cognizes objects because they reflect the properties of the one eternal Form of which the soul has innate knowledge. We re-cognize the elm and the pine as trees because they reflect the one eternal form Tree. They embody "treeness" though these trees are quite different. Likewise, each human embodies the essence of humanness though there is a wide range of human features.

Plato's theory of Forms is an early brand of essentialism. Essentialism is the view that a specific entity (group of people, living creatures, or objects such as rocks) has a set of attributes or traits all of which are essential to its identity and function. Other essentialists include Aristotle, and Saul Kripke. Jacques Derrida expresses an essentialist view in his ontotheology. These would argue that the essence of an entity may fluctuate but does not change.

The essentialist makes a distinction between change and flux. For example, the essence of water is H2O. The form of water can change (flux) between a solid (ice), liquid, and vapor, but the essence remains H2O.

Non-Essentialism is the view that a specific entity does not have a set of attributes which are essential to its identity and function. Some non-essentialists include Heraclitus and Ludwig Wittgenstein.

Clearly, great thinkers do not agree on the question of change. We often assign different meaning to the word "change." When we say the weather is changing are we speaking of a shift in the wind direction or in the transition from one season to another? When we say that modern humans represent a change from archaic humans are we speaking of essential change or anatomical change?


Archaic views of change

In the ancient world the order of creation was viewed as hierarchical and fixed. This was based on the observation of patterns in nature. In the time of Abraham's ancestors, the observation of the fixed movement of the heavenly bodies was done by priests. Plato, who studied in Egypt, stated that the Nilotic priests had been observing the stars and constellations for 10,000 years. They noted the constellations have a clocklike movement, the seasons are linked to the 12 lunar cycles, and the Sun directly overhead marks mid-day.

They perceived boundaries in the nature order. The boundaries were fixed between "kinds" arranged hierarchically. The Biblical "kind" is not synonymous with "species." Because of mutation and adaptation there are many more creatures than there are kinds. Kinds refers to the original pattern of a created entity. Creationists believe the original pattern never disappears. The Biblical "kind" represents an essentialist worldview.

If the biblical worldview is true, no discrepancy should exist between genetics and the biblical assertion that the order of creation is fixed with genetic boundaries between "kinds." Those who believe that the Bible presents a true view of reality must understand what is meant by "fixed order of creation" and "kinds."  Because of a fixed order or pattern in nature we can count on the laws of physics and we are able to identify anomalies. Kind refers to a given living organism that reproduces itself.

What is often termed evolutionary "change" is really flux, a distinction many fail to make. Flux is expected within kinds and is certainly evident in biology. The theory of common ancestry for chimps and humans assumes the possibility of emergence of two kinds from a common kind. Humans reproduce only humans. Chimps reproduce only chimps. Humans and chimps cannot therefore represent flux within a fixed order. They represent different kinds, different, but similar essences.


Evolutionary Claims

The claim of universality of the DNA code as a prediction of common descent doesn't align with known variations that violate this prediction. At the same time there appear to be specific fixed boundaries within the DNA code. This explains why humans reproduce humans and not some other animal.  Further, while the similarity of humans to primates may suggest a common origin, this common ancestor isn't known to have actually existed.  It is the creation of artists who draw images for Biology books.

There are now enough fossils recovered in Hadar, Ethiopia and in Cameroon to reconstruct a picture of Lucy and her people. They were clearly human and not apes although the artists drawings persist in showing them as hairy and apelike. For example, complete fourth metatarsal of A. afarensis was discovered at Hadar that shows the deep, flat base and tarsal facets that "imply that its midfoot had no ape-like midtarsal break. These features show that the A. afarensis foot was functionally like that of modern humans."

It is ludicrous to assume that because nurse sharks and camels share an antigen receptor protein they are descended from a common ancestor. The DNA sequences that code for the proteins are different between sharks and camels.

This suggests that what are held to be examples of evolutionary changes are not really changes. The horse was once smaller and is now large. Yet the horse's essence has not changed. The earliest human fossils show a range of anatomical features yet all these features are found among humans today. The nearly complete skulls of people who lived 160,000 years ago are, in the words of paleontologist Tim White, "like modern-day humans in almost every feature."[1]

When Jeremy DeSilva, a British anthropologist, compared the ankle joint, the tibia and the talus of fossil "hominins" between 4.12 million to 1.53 million years old, he discovered that all of the hominin ankle joints resembled those of modern humans rather than those of apes. [2]

Some of the australopithecine fossils dating between 700,000 and 2.4 million years are recognized as "early human fossils."  Although classified as "ape of the South", some are recognized as having had human dentition, bipedalism and stone tools.[3]

With DNA samples from 2400 individuals from more than 100 modern African populations, researchers have identified a panel of 1327 sites of genetic variation across the entire genome. Analysis of the data suggests that modern Africans are descended from 14 ancestral populations, which correlate with known linguistic groups. Comparative linguistics and genetics are moving to similar conclusions when it comes to the question of "change" among humans. The evidence in both fields indicates a limited amount of flux, but no essential change.[4]

In other words, there is no evidence of essential change within "kinds", and no support for the macro-evolutionary worldview of change from one kind into another kind. Roux and others say, "Evolutionary convergence at the molecular level is presumed to be widespread, but is poorly documented."[5] Convergent evolution is an interpretation, not an unbiased presentation of data.

Consider the work of Richard Lenski at Michigan State University. He has grown E. coli in the test-tube for more than 40,000 generations. The first generations showed little mutation. Then a “mutator” strain arose, after which new genetic varieties were present in all cells, resulting in more than 250 varieties. The total number of single changes is more than a thousand, yet Lenski has produced nothing fundamentally new.

It appears that God established an order in which there is flux within fixed boundaries, but no essential change from species to species. As Professor Scott Rae has written, "Scripture affirms that there is a fixed order that governs the natural physical world."[6]

The Bible teaches that God created in an orderly fashion from the least complex creatures to humans, the most complex creatures. It teaches that each "kind" reproduces according to its own kind, and the mixing of kinds (even different fibers) is discouraged or forbidden.

The Bible teaches that violations of the order of creation represent sinful rebellion against the Creator. Eve's sin, as St. John Chrysostom points out, is a sin against the order of creation because she exchanged her glory as one made in the image of God for subservience to the serpent, a creature low in the order of creation. Onanism is a violation of the order of creation because, just as the seed of plants should fall to the earth to bring forth plants from the earth, so the seed of man should fall on his own kind (the womb), from which man comes forth.

In Jeremiah 33:25 we read: "Yahweh says this, 'If I have not created day and night and fixed the laws governing heaven and earth, why, then I shall reject the descendants of Jacob and of David my servant and cease to choose rulers from his descendants for the heirs of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob!'"

Jeremiah 31:35-36 says, "Yahweh who provides the sun to shine by day, who regulates moon and stars to shine by night, who stirs the sea, making its waves roar, he whose name is Yahweh Sabaoth, says this: 'Were this established order ever to pass away before me, Yahweh declares, then the race of Israel would also cease being a nation for ever before me!"

"The Lord spoke further to Jeremiah, 'I, Lord, make the following promise: I have made a covenant with the day and with the night that they will always come at their proper times. Only if you people could break that covenant could my covenant with my servant David and my covenant with the Levites ever be broken. So David will by all means always have a descendant to occupy his throne as king and the Levites will by all means always have priests who will minister before me. I will make the children who follow one another in the line of my servant David very numerous. I will also make the Levites who minister before me very numerous. I will make them all as numerous as the stars in the sky and as the sands which are on the seashore.'" (Jeremiah 33:19-22)

We note in these passages that the fixed order of creation is linked to God's plan to choose rulers from among Abraham's people. Genesis reveals that the fixed nature of God's plan is expressed in the unchanging kinship pattern of Abraham's people. The kinship pattern of these people remains consistent from before the time of Abraham to the birth of Jesus Christ. This so that the Christ should appear according to God's ordained plan.

The constellations, the stars and planets move according to a fixed plan. That's why scientists can predict where to look and when to look there. That's how they can identify apparent singularities such as the Star of Bethlehem.

Progress in the sciences depends on the fixed order of creation. It assumes the consistency of the laws of nature. Geneticists recognize certain genetic patterns which form the basis for their research. Physicists' exploration of the material world is based on physical laws that do not change. Anthropologists find that humans are essentially the same regardless of their environments. The oldest known human skeletons show the same range of flux, the same essential nature as human skeletal structures today. Even technological "change" has been possible because of the fixed nature of mathematical and physical laws.

All this is to say that the hypothesis of randomness that is touted by the media is not supported by empirical evidence. Natural selection, with its appearance of randomness, may be about orderly transition or flux within kinds. If the order of creation is fixed, we may expect to reap what we sow. If I plant corn, I harvest corn, not apricots. If I sow wheat, I harvest wheat, not frogs. All languages can be classified because there is order in human language. All born of women are human because there is order in the human genome. Events in the heavens are predictable because the stars, planets and constellations move according to a fixed pattern. This is how astronomers know where and when to focus their telescopes on a specific region of space. Singularities or anomalies are evident because they stand in contrast to the patterns observed in the fixed order of creation.


The Clash of Worldviews

The Essentialist worldview and the non-Essentialist worldview are at odds. Genesis 1 presents an Essentialist view which is consistent with the thinking of people in the ancient world. Creationists have written volumes in defense of their interpretation of Genesis 1, but the text has a context, and a better understanding of that context is needed.

NOTES
1. Read the report on the 160,000-year-old Ethiopian fossils here.

2. Chimpanzees flex their ankles 45 degrees from normal resting position. This makes it possible for apes to climb trees with great ease. While walking, humans flex their ankles a maximum of 20 degrees. The human ankle quite distinct from that of apes. Read more here.

3. Working from their convergent evolution framework, Richard, Mary and Louis Leakey named some fossils "Zinjanthropus" (now called Australopithecus boisei), others "Homo habilis", and Lucy and her community "Australopithecus". These are presented as divergence strains of hominids, including the extinct and extant humans and mammals. This classification has been revised several times because the criterion of classification of human and ape has not been consistently applied.

4. To read about the "out of Africa" gene study go here.

5. Roux et al. 1998 The identification of an unusual antigen receptor protein structure found in camels and nurse sharks is used to argue that these have a common ancestor. Kenneth Roux appears convinced, yet he admits that there is not enough written support for the convergence model.  It is conversationally agreed upon among convergence ideologues, but not as well documented as Roux would hope.

6. Read excerpts from Scott B. Rae's book Moral Choices here.



Related reading: The Themes of Genesis 1-3; First People at Genetic Center; Biblical Anthropologists Discuss Darwin; The Science Guy Reveals His Ignorance