Creation is Evolution
Darren Meade
June 01, 2009
Paradoxically, both science and religion are equally based on faith, trust, and belief and are bulwarked by the authority of impressive literature and historical documentation. As seen from even brief analysis, each paradigm draws from a different realm of presumptive reality with no means of crossover.
There is actually no inherent conflict between religious or secular viewpoints until they are converts to ideological 'isms' and thus imply a claim to emotionalized exclusivity.
Conflict exists in the mind of the observer and not in that which is observed. The levels of consciousness of spiritual realities denote nonlinear dimensions, which are related primarily to context, essence, and a realm rather than provable, factual specifics of linear content. The Bible utilizes parables, myths, legends, allegories, and metaphors to illustrate principles rather than use of specifics so that the literal factuality of Biblical stories is operationally irrelevant. Meaning is an abstract category of nonlinear thought and reason and its symbolism is not compatible, concrete, literal terminology.
We see the same principles illustrated by the wisdoms that are revealed solely by humor. A joke is not a factual statement but instead utilizes paradox or hyperbole to clarify reality by the use of ambiguity. Like the fable, humor is a means of crossing over parameters of paradigm. The same principles are illustrated by fiction and fairy tales as well as poetry and all forms of art. The mechanism is often one of contrast or purposeful distortion in order to highlight significance, implication, and meaning. The author would also bring to light, that subatomic particles, physics and so forth had to be illustrated for understanding in which the 'Bible' was written.
It is a mistake to confuse the abstract and the literal. Thus, we could summarize the 'Scopes' conflict as being incompatibility of the literal versus the abstract levels of comprehension and presentation. Truth can be obscures or rejected but it cannot be disproved.
The term 'creation' is an abstraction that implies emergence, appearance, and progressive existence of increasing complexity and efficacy. Every field of human inquiry has been progressive; simultaneously, the universe has been expanding in infinite directions at the speed of light. With a little reflection, it would appear that there really is no conflict between Evolution and Creation for they are intrinsically one and the same (e.g., Creation is progressive, ongoing, continuous, unfolding, and emerging as Evolution).
According to Richard Elliot Friedman´s 'Commentary on the Torah with a New English Translation and the Hebrew Text' in reference to creation, Genesis 1:3 God said "Let there be light." God creates light simply by saying the words" Let there be" (The Hebrew jussive). Only light (matter) is expressly created from nothing (creation ex nihilo). All other elements of creation may possibly be formed out of preexisting matter, that is, from initially undifferentiated chaos.
It should be noted that the sun, moon and stars have not yet been created. Thus God later says, "Let there be a space," but the text adds, "And God made the space." And God says, "Let there be sources of light, " but the text add, "And God made the sources of light." So we cannot understand there things to be formed simply by the words "Let there be." Now we can appreciate the importance of understanding the Torah's first words correctly: The Torah does not claim to report everything that has occurred since the beginning of space and time. It does not say, "In the beginning, God created the skies and the earth." It rather says, "In the beginning of God's creating the skies and the earth, when the earth had been shapeless and formless..." That is, there is a preexisting matter which is in a state of watery chaos. Subsequent matter - dry land, heavenly bodies, plants, animals - may be formed out of this undifferentiated fluid. In Greece, the first philosopher, Thales, later proposed such a concept, that all things derive from water. Examples from other cultures could be cited as well. There appears to be an essential human feeling that everything derives from water, which is hardly surprising given that we - and all life on this planet - did in fact proceed from water. According to the literal Hebrew in the Torah Genesis 1:4 "God Separated" Initially there is only the watery chaos: shapeless and formless. Then creation is the making of distinctions: " And God separated between the light and the darkness," "And separated between the water and that was under the space and the water that was above the space." Then more distinctions: between the day and night, and so on. In each case, creation is the act of separating a thing from the rest of matter and then giving it a name. The first day also includes the creation of the ordering of time. Prior to the invention of day and night no less than space would be undifferentiated: "formless."
By faith, there could be believed to be literally historical facts even though they appear to be fallacious to logic and reason. Actually the realization of Divinity as the Source of Creation does not depend on literal belief in associated folklore that is primarily allegorical, just as the truth of Buddhism does not rest upon believing whether Buddha actually sat under a bodhi tree.
Scientific validity was not yet born at the time of the assemblage of ancient scriptures. To a sophisticated mind, whether the Red Sea actually parted or Jonah lived for three days in the stomach of a whale is irrelevant to the basic truths presented. Their appeal is to the mind's attraction to the presumably miraculous nature of the described ancient events. The naive mind is attracted to the mystification and the seemingly magic and sensationalism of the miraculous, which are perceived as a major physical demonstration and validation of the power and presence of unseen Divinity. The average person is impressed by (or alternatively, dubious of) descriptions of the miraculous because the phenomena are rarely recognized as such. Because the great majority of miraculous events fall outside the range of ordinary perceptual experience, they are generally unrecognized and even when perceived, they are dismissed as merely being 'lucky', fortuitous, or accidental. In contract, truly scientific verified miracles occurred as documented thorough investigations of the many miracles of Lourdes and other faith-based miraculous phenomena, such as religious stigmata or the long-term incorruptibility of the bodies of dead saints. Although ordinary people make experience the miraculous on occasion, they have no adequate context within to comprehend the reality of the event. As a possible rational explanation, the famous psychiatrist Dr. Carl Jung had proposed the concept of 'synchronicity.
In closing, 'creationism' versus 'intelligent design' is only different points of observation which thereby do not create seperate conflicting 'realities' but merely represent different perspectives from within the all-inclusive, infinite field of consciousness itself. As an example, instead of creating a fractious dichotomy between 'evolution' and 'creation', how simple is it to see from a higher, inclusive paradigm that evolution is creation. It becomes obvious that evolution is simply what ongoing creation look like, and that they are actually one and the same thing. The seemingly conflictual 'faith versus science' conundrum is also simplified by the realization that a permanent, ever- present 'source' is different from a transitory, ostensibly single event, such as a 'cause'. The term 'cause' is a limitation of the restrictive Newtonian paradigm of reality, now outmoded be even science itself, which has gone to nonlinear dynamics, probability theory, intermingling theory, emergence-and-complexity theory, and more.
There is actually no inherent conflict between religious or secular viewpoints until they are converts to ideological 'isms' and thus imply a claim to emotionalized exclusivity.
Conflict exists in the mind of the observer and not in that which is observed. The levels of consciousness of spiritual realities denote nonlinear dimensions, which are related primarily to context, essence, and a realm rather than provable, factual specifics of linear content. The Bible utilizes parables, myths, legends, allegories, and metaphors to illustrate principles rather than use of specifics so that the literal factuality of Biblical stories is operationally irrelevant. Meaning is an abstract category of nonlinear thought and reason and its symbolism is not compatible, concrete, literal terminology.
We see the same principles illustrated by the wisdoms that are revealed solely by humor. A joke is not a factual statement but instead utilizes paradox or hyperbole to clarify reality by the use of ambiguity. Like the fable, humor is a means of crossing over parameters of paradigm. The same principles are illustrated by fiction and fairy tales as well as poetry and all forms of art. The mechanism is often one of contrast or purposeful distortion in order to highlight significance, implication, and meaning. The author would also bring to light, that subatomic particles, physics and so forth had to be illustrated for understanding in which the 'Bible' was written.
It is a mistake to confuse the abstract and the literal. Thus, we could summarize the 'Scopes' conflict as being incompatibility of the literal versus the abstract levels of comprehension and presentation. Truth can be obscures or rejected but it cannot be disproved.
The term 'creation' is an abstraction that implies emergence, appearance, and progressive existence of increasing complexity and efficacy. Every field of human inquiry has been progressive; simultaneously, the universe has been expanding in infinite directions at the speed of light. With a little reflection, it would appear that there really is no conflict between Evolution and Creation for they are intrinsically one and the same (e.g., Creation is progressive, ongoing, continuous, unfolding, and emerging as Evolution).
According to Richard Elliot Friedman´s 'Commentary on the Torah with a New English Translation and the Hebrew Text' in reference to creation, Genesis 1:3 God said "Let there be light." God creates light simply by saying the words" Let there be" (The Hebrew jussive). Only light (matter) is expressly created from nothing (creation ex nihilo). All other elements of creation may possibly be formed out of preexisting matter, that is, from initially undifferentiated chaos.
It should be noted that the sun, moon and stars have not yet been created. Thus God later says, "Let there be a space," but the text adds, "And God made the space." And God says, "Let there be sources of light, " but the text add, "And God made the sources of light." So we cannot understand there things to be formed simply by the words "Let there be." Now we can appreciate the importance of understanding the Torah's first words correctly: The Torah does not claim to report everything that has occurred since the beginning of space and time. It does not say, "In the beginning, God created the skies and the earth." It rather says, "In the beginning of God's creating the skies and the earth, when the earth had been shapeless and formless..." That is, there is a preexisting matter which is in a state of watery chaos. Subsequent matter - dry land, heavenly bodies, plants, animals - may be formed out of this undifferentiated fluid. In Greece, the first philosopher, Thales, later proposed such a concept, that all things derive from water. Examples from other cultures could be cited as well. There appears to be an essential human feeling that everything derives from water, which is hardly surprising given that we - and all life on this planet - did in fact proceed from water. According to the literal Hebrew in the Torah Genesis 1:4 "God Separated" Initially there is only the watery chaos: shapeless and formless. Then creation is the making of distinctions: " And God separated between the light and the darkness," "And separated between the water and that was under the space and the water that was above the space." Then more distinctions: between the day and night, and so on. In each case, creation is the act of separating a thing from the rest of matter and then giving it a name. The first day also includes the creation of the ordering of time. Prior to the invention of day and night no less than space would be undifferentiated: "formless."
By faith, there could be believed to be literally historical facts even though they appear to be fallacious to logic and reason. Actually the realization of Divinity as the Source of Creation does not depend on literal belief in associated folklore that is primarily allegorical, just as the truth of Buddhism does not rest upon believing whether Buddha actually sat under a bodhi tree.
Scientific validity was not yet born at the time of the assemblage of ancient scriptures. To a sophisticated mind, whether the Red Sea actually parted or Jonah lived for three days in the stomach of a whale is irrelevant to the basic truths presented. Their appeal is to the mind's attraction to the presumably miraculous nature of the described ancient events. The naive mind is attracted to the mystification and the seemingly magic and sensationalism of the miraculous, which are perceived as a major physical demonstration and validation of the power and presence of unseen Divinity. The average person is impressed by (or alternatively, dubious of) descriptions of the miraculous because the phenomena are rarely recognized as such. Because the great majority of miraculous events fall outside the range of ordinary perceptual experience, they are generally unrecognized and even when perceived, they are dismissed as merely being 'lucky', fortuitous, or accidental. In contract, truly scientific verified miracles occurred as documented thorough investigations of the many miracles of Lourdes and other faith-based miraculous phenomena, such as religious stigmata or the long-term incorruptibility of the bodies of dead saints. Although ordinary people make experience the miraculous on occasion, they have no adequate context within to comprehend the reality of the event. As a possible rational explanation, the famous psychiatrist Dr. Carl Jung had proposed the concept of 'synchronicity.
In closing, 'creationism' versus 'intelligent design' is only different points of observation which thereby do not create seperate conflicting 'realities' but merely represent different perspectives from within the all-inclusive, infinite field of consciousness itself. As an example, instead of creating a fractious dichotomy between 'evolution' and 'creation', how simple is it to see from a higher, inclusive paradigm that evolution is creation. It becomes obvious that evolution is simply what ongoing creation look like, and that they are actually one and the same thing. The seemingly conflictual 'faith versus science' conundrum is also simplified by the realization that a permanent, ever- present 'source' is different from a transitory, ostensibly single event, such as a 'cause'. The term 'cause' is a limitation of the restrictive Newtonian paradigm of reality, now outmoded be even science itself, which has gone to nonlinear dynamics, probability theory, intermingling theory, emergence-and-complexity theory, and more.
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