Abstract

Table of Contents

Part I

Part II

Part III

Part IV

Part V
   

Volume 4: The Doorway Papers Series

EVOLUTION OR CREATION?

Abstract:

     This Volume of Doorway Papers is on the subject of Origins, particularly the origin of the earth, of monotheism, and of man himself.
     In dealing with the question of the age of the earth and how it came into being, four alternative views are presented with one being discussed in depth ("The Preparation of the Earth Before Man"). Two Papers show that the evidence does not support the evolutionary view in the matter of the origin of religion ("Primitive Monotheism and the Origin of Polytheism") and in the origin of Man ("Convergence and the Origin of Man"). One Paper ("The Survival of the UN-fit") demonstrates the irrationality of the evolutionary faith in the 'survival of the fittest'.
     The final Paper, "Is Man an Animal?" is important because it shows that man is not merely quantitatively different from all other creatures, but qualitatively different � these differences are discusssed in 6 chapters. The conclusion in the last chapter is that man was created a unique creature because he was to become a "house" for God Himself to be manifested in the flesh, and that this Incarnation really demands a uniqueness in the constitution of man which puts him in a category by himself completely separate from all other animal forms.

     Questions about the earth's past geological history have sparked conflicting answers. How old is this earth? Did it evolve by chance � or was it created by God? Is our planet billions of years old � or was it an instantaneous creation of only a few thousand years ago?
     There are four basic alternatives � the purely non-theistic evolutionary view, the theistic evolutionary view, the creationist view (young earth or flood geology), and the view explored in this Paper which argues for that particular form of catastrophism that sees a discontinity between our present world and "the world that then was" (2 Peter 3:6), which was disastrously overwhelmed and left a desolation as described in Genesis 1:2 and then reconstituted in Genesis 1:3-31.  

     From Anthropology comes evidence which clearly indicates that man's religious history has not been marked by a gradual purification of his faith from animism to polydemonism to polytheism and finally to a pure monotheism (as held by evolutionists), but by a trend in the opposite direction, representing rather degeneration than upward evolution. The second chapter is more philosophical in an attempt to discover why this is so: it is an exploration of ideas rather than facts, of implications of events rather than the events themselves.  

     It is assumed (by evolutionists) that similarity of structure is evidence of ancestry � this is Divergence. Yet the fact is that animals which are not related DO develop precisely similar structures. For similar needs and similar environmental pressures act upon living organisms so that they tend to converge in structural form. This is Convergence. This Paper presents a summary of the evidence from the fossil record and the living world, and then discusses the implications of this established fact upon the close interaction between form and function, and thus upon genetic relationships and therefore on man's origin.

     This Paper provides information on observations in Nature where co-operation and even self-sacrifice are by no means uncommon among animals in the wild, both between members of a single species and between members of different species. Thus it is found that the un-fit, by Darwin's definition, do indeed very often survive. His view of Nature as a ruthless battleground is quite unrealistic.

     While it seems obvious that man is essentially an animal, the differences are assumed to be accidental and quantitative only. But in truth the differences lie rather in the ralm of quality than quantity, and taken together they constitute an absolute difference. Man differs from animals in so many subtle ways � anatomically, physiologically, psychologically, mentally, spiritually � that it no longer is really justified to classify him in the animal kingdom at all.
     He is a creature unlike any other, not so much because he has certain facultires that are superior to theirs, but because he is capable of sin and of being redeemed; which no other animal is. His destiny is different: and his origin is different. Man is more than an animal by reason of his creation, yet less than an animal by reason of his Fall. He is, in fact, unique to which the term 'animal' is not really applicable at all.
     This Paper is a study of man's assessment of himself apart from revelation, and the final chapter is a study from revelation of what God intended, of true Man as seen in the Person of Jesus Christ.

Introduction

Chapter 1. The Uniqueness of Man

Chapter 2. The Human Brain: Its Size and Its Complexity

Chapter 3. The Erectness of Man

Chapter 4. The Ubiquity of Man

Chapter 5. Man the Culture Maker

Chapter 6. The Expression of Humanness in Man

Chapter 7. The True Nature of Man in Jesus Christ

1976 published by Zondervan Publishing Co.
1997 published online
2001 2nd Online Edition – corrected, edited and re-formatted