I’ll be a speaker this weekend at the Genesis Seminar in Bridgeville, Pa (near Pittsburgh). The keynote speaker is Dr. Andrew Steinmann of Concordia University, Chicago. The title of my presentation is History and Philosophy of the Science of Origins, in which I will try to organize a diversity of material in history, philosophy, science, and biblical studies.
I see a dialogue/dialectic between two opposites/extremes, represented by these two lists:
(a) Genealogy, generations, chronicle, narrative, diachrony, history, process, society, time
(b) Logic, principles, philosophy, theory, exact science, synchrony, structure, universe, space
Where does theology fit in this? Exegetical and historical theology fit with (a) and systematic theology fits with (b).
Where does biology fit in this? Platonic, Scholastic, scala naturae, fixed-species biology fits with (a) and Aristotle (not Aristotelian), developmental, adaptive, evolutionary biology with (b).
There is also a both-and (c) to go with this either-or of extremes:
(c) mean, moderate, combination, synthesis, duality, complementarity, space-time
In science (c) is the convergence of increasing precision, the duality of particle and wave, the synthesis of space and time.
Theologically (c) is the Old and New Testaments, Law and Gospel, direct and indirect creation, Word and Spirit, and the Trinity as a unity-of-duality.
Biologically (c) is a combination of process and structure, variation and permanence, bottom-up and top-down classifications.
The Bible is remarkably balanced version of (c).