Clough Evolution Lesson 17

Conclusion: Religious nature of attack against the Bible waged by evolutionists

Now we come to the conclusion of this series of tapes and in the conclusion I wish to show the religious nature of the whole attack against the Bible waged by the evolutionists. I feel, along with Rushdoony, who is a very perceptive thinker of out time, I read his book and I feel he hit the nail very perceptively on the head, and that is that evolution is a cultural myth. He writes on page 8 of his paperback book, The Mythology of Science, available through the Bible Science Association, “A myth is a traditional explanation of life and its origins which so expresses or coincides with the contemporary spirit that its often radical contradictions and absurdities are never apparent, in that they express the basic presuppositions, however untenable, of every day life and thought. No age has been free from its myths. While we are quick to see the absurdities of the outworn myths of other ages, the present age cannot see the contradictions in its own. The myth is a cultural expression embodying the basic motives of the people.”

I think this is a very perceptive point, namely that what we are dealing with in this whole evolutionary dogma and everything else is a myth; it’s a myth like all myths that is acceptable to the great base of society at any given point in time. And since from 1850 on through the present time the evolutionary myth has attained ascendancy its presuppositions are never questioned, except by Christians who are willing to live rationally and logically consistently with Scripture. Aside from these few people, no other people wish to question the presuppositions of this mess. And my personal view of evolution is that it is a cultural myth.

I have some other quotes but I would first like to point out one quote that Rushdoony got and I checked it out and it’s a legitimate quote; it’s on page 169 of Russell Mixter’s Evolution and Christian Thought Today, Erdman’s Publishing Company, 1959. On page 169 of that volume James Boswell III, former anthropologist at Wheaton College made this amazing statement and I think this illustrates Rushdoony’s point that evolution is a myth that is accepted on emotional, psychological and religious grounds and not upon scientific grounds. Listen to how Boswell slaps back at the critics of evolution. (Quote) “One of the chief drawbacks to the anti-evolutionist from Darwin’s early critics to the present day is that their activities and literature have been almost completely wrapped up in arguments over petty fragments of the record. Assuming that to attack evolution as a total philosophy one must show the data upon which the assumptions are based to be untrue.” Now isn’t that an amazing statement? That is an amazing statement. Boswell is saying that we who attack evolution are making a mistake; he says we are under the delusion that to attack a theory, it is a delusion to think that to attack a theory you have to attack the data upon which it is based. Now pray-tell, how else are you going to tell a theory is wrong than attack the base of the data upon which it is based? Now isn’t that an amazing statement and it clearly shows, it seems to me, the mythological, religious, emotional commitment that a person who’s favorable to evolution is making.

There are some other quotations that I have which I’ve gotten from a book, Why Scientists Accept Evolution, by Bales and Clark, a paperback also available through the Bible Science Association. On page 89 they quote a scientist by the name of [can’t understand word, sounds like: Fan ah] and listen to this; this is a quotation in the book: (quote) “Let us admit without further preamble the success attained by the theory of evolution is not due primarily to its self-evident character, for even the most generally admitted facts cannot always be reconciled with it, but rather to the sympathy of the scientific world for the dogma of continuity of natural phenomena,” (end quote). I think that’s very important that “the success attained by the theory of evolution is not due primarily to its self-evident character, for even the most generally admitted facts cannot always be reconciled with it, but rather to the sympathy of the scientific world for the dogma of continuity of natural phenomena.”

In Bales and Clark’s book on page 93 a German scientist by the name of Dubois Raymond is quoted, (quote): “The possibility, ever so distant, of banishing from nature its seeming purpose and putting a blind necessity everywhere in the place of final causes appears, therefore, as one of the greatest advances in the world of thought to have somewhat eased the torture of the intellect which ponders over the world problem will, as long as philosophical naturalists exist, be Charles Darwin’s greatest title to glory.”

Another quote, page 106 of the same book, by Professor Dwight, a Catholic anatomist at Harvard, “The tyranny of the [can’t understand word]” or the world view, “in the matter of evolution is overwhelming, to a degree of which outsiders have no idea. Not only does it influence our manners of thinking but there is oppression as in the days of the terror. How very few of the leaders of science dare tell the truth concerning their own state of mind. How many feel themselves forced in public to do a lip service to a cult they do not believe in.”

Professor Shorey of the University of Chicago quoted also on page 106 of Bales and Clark, (quote) “an ambitious young professor may safely assail Christianity or the Constitution of the United States or George Washington or female chastity or marriage or private property but he does not apologize for Brian, it is not done,” (end quote).

So therefore I would say that since evolution is a religious issue and since it is based on a philosophy and since it is based on an emotional appeal, our comeback must ultimately be that of 1 John 4:1, “Test the spirits” of this age, test the spirits! Remember the spirit of the world is different in each age. Our parents faced a different world than we do; our children will face a different world than we do; it’s still the world but it’s in a different form and each generation must make its own test. John counsels us in 1 John 4:1, test the spirits of this world and see if they be of the Lord. You will find you are surrounded on every side with a monolithic cultural myth, total conformity…total conformity; not a consensus, might you understand, not a consensus built upon individual personal analysis but a blind conformity to the dogma of naturalism and evolution.

My second part of the conclusion deals with the horrible results that come from evolution in society. This is what I would call the moral argument against evolution. If the evolution theory is really true I do not see any base, any platform for right and wrong; I do not see how you can defend right and wrong once you accept evolution. And it’s interesting that evolutionists had a tremendous role to play in Nazism and communism. In R. E. D. Clark’s book, Dawn Before and After, there is accounted the role Darwinism had on Hitler’s mind. On page 191 of Wilder-Smith’s book Man’s Origin, Man’s Destiny, he says: “The state has the responsibility,” and by the way, this is Hitler speaking, “The state has the responsibility of declaring as unfit for reproductive purposes anyone who is obviously ill or genetically unsound and must carry through this responsibility ruthlessly, without respect to understanding or lack of understanding on the part of anyone. Hitler argued for German soldiers to have any Nordic girl and the state would take care of the offsprings. Jews and Negroes were declared to be the missing links.”

And of course this is a legitimate thing; I don’t see how you can criticize Adolph Hitler for using evolution in this way. Evolutionists like to say this is a misapplication of evolution, people have misused Christianity, so Hitler misused evolution. But I don’t think that’s valid. The people who have misused Christianity can be shown to be at logical odds with Christianity, they have not been logically consistent with Christianity. But I do not see how you can make the same criticism against Hitler’s use of evolution; Hitler certainly was logically consistent with evolution, for after all, if natural selection works why not manipulate it ourselves and with not a thought for the suffering it was going to cause someone, the suffering is incidental, suffering is a necessary ingredient in the ongoing process of evolution so therefore it shouldn’t bother us to consider how we might manipulate the process of natural selection.

It’s also to interesting to note that Marx wrote Engels in December 19, 1860, after reading Charles Darwin, (quote): “Although it is developed in the crude English style, this is the work which contains the basis of natural history for our views.” Later, the next month, January 16, 1861, Marx wrote Engels again and said, “Darwin’s book is very important and serves me as a basis in natural selection for the class struggle in history,” (end quote). In fact, it turns out that Karl Marx wanted to dedicate Das Kapital to Darwin, but Darwin refused the honor.

It’s also interesting to notice that [can’t understand words; sounds like: Yarif Laske], in his authorized biography of Stalin, published during Stalin’s own lifetime, had this following incident related to the life of Joseph Stalin. He’s speaking of an incident involving a boyhood friend of Stalin and Stalin, the conversation this friend and Joe had when they were both young men. “I began to speak of God, and Joseph heard me out and after a moment of silence said, ‘you know, they’re fooling us, there is no God.’ I was astonished at these words, I had never heard anything like it before. ‘How can you say such things So-so’ which is the nickname for Stalin, I explained. ‘I’ll lend you a book to read, it’ll show you that the world and all living things are quite different from what you imagine and all this talk about God is sheer nonsense,’ Joseph said. ‘What book is that,’ I inquired. ‘Darwin, you must read it,’ Joseph impressed upon me.”

Thus the moral argument of evolution, I think, can be very easily seen, namely that if a person would like to believe in evolution, my first point in discussing with a person is fine, would you like to live with the moral implications of evolution; let’s all live like apes, let’s live without any moral absolutes, I mean really live without any moral absolutes and let’s stop pretending, let’s stop playing games. And few people are really willing to go this route, mainly because they have the good sense to realize that it’s impossible to live this way. There’s just something inherently unreal about evolution, it doesn’t fit with man’s spirit, and therefore it has, I feel, a very strong flaw, a very, very deep flaw at this point.

Now this concludes our series on evolution and with this we conclude the entire series; we hope that this has been helpful, I realize that much of this material has been thrown together, I realize that a lot of it will be hard to understand on the part of a person not trained in science, but nevertheless I try to push as far as I can because I know there will be people listening who will appreciate the bibliography, who will want to check much of this material out themselves. I know by my own personal experience that for years and years and years I wished that I had come across a tape like this so it would save me hours and hours and hours of working around a library trying to find the material. And again may I caution you, however, that this tape is only true up to July 1, 1969. It doesn’t contain much material up to that time and doesn’t contain any material after that time. So therefore I would refer you to the Creation Research Society for additional material since July 1, 1969 and I would also refer you to the book list of the Bible Science Association for additional material.

In conclusion I would like to say that the most profound thing that the Christian has to say against the evolutionist today is Genesis 1:1, “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.” And I believe on this and this alone can we build the gospel of our so great salvation and on this and this alone can we build a viable philosophy of life that will really work in all of life’s situations.