Freedom from the New Age
From pagan to ‘New Age’ missionary
by Philip Bell
Today, Paul James-Griffiths works with London City Mission as a missionary to the
New Age Movement, and as a chaplain to the West End Theatre staff. He has a B.A.
in Ancient History and Classical Studies and has lectured in Ancient History. He
has also written several books on the subject of the New Age. His fascinating testimony
has lessons for us all.
What follows is the remarkable story of one man’s spiritual journey from outright
paganism to a thoroughly biblical Christian faith and how he struggled with the
evolutionary ideas that he encountered in his quest for truth. Paul says:
‘My conversion to Jesus Christ happened in 1982 during a survival trip in
the rainforests of Australia. I had been a spiritualist and had practised witchcraft.
My intention had been to promote an interfaith movement for world peace.’
With this background, it is not surprising that Paul had all sorts of erroneous
beliefs that only served to bring confusion to his mind as a young Christian. This
was particularly the case when he began to read the first pages of the Bible.
‘As a new believer I struggled with Genesis. I mixed pagan ideas with my Christian
faith. As a pagan, I had believed in an eternal universe that continually underwent
a cycle of rebirth and death. Evolution and the vast age of the cosmos were all
part of my belief system and we always spoke of the human race evolving in consciousness
as the New Age was upon us. Morality was defined by the spirit of the age. I knew
from the Bible that God had created the universe, so I rejected pantheism,1
but I became a theistic evolutionist with stricter morals.’
 The James-Griffiths family—(from left to right) Samuel (nearly 14), Isolde (Paul’s wife), Julia (12), Paul and Miriam (15). |
Of course, this serves to highlight that our views of what is good or bad are ultimately
determined by whether or not we have a basis for moral absolutes. If the Bible really
is God’s revealed Word to humankind, we are accountable to the Creator for
how we live (Isaiah
33:22). If, on the other hand, we are part of an evolving world, there is
no reason why our ‘moral sense’ should not shift with the times, as
people’s opinions change—and this is exactly what we see in many Western
nations as moral standards are increasingly relaxed and biblically-based laws are
overturned. Like so many today, by retaining his prior religious beliefs
concerning evolution and ‘millions of years’, Paul had to resort to
a ‘God used evolution’ compromise. Sadly, as is commonly the case, he
was in danger at university of being aided and abetted in his error. Yet,
in a wonderful way, God used Paul’s history studies to open his eyes to the
ancient origins of this evolutionary worldview:
‘My professors trained me in the art of “hermeneutical phenomenology”?,2
which meant they taught me how to deconstruct a Judaeo-Christian worldview and replace
it with a pluralistic one. God used my study of ancient history at university to
shake me from an evolutionary position. To my amazement I discovered that evolution,
the big bang theory and the vast ages of the universe had existed as pagan theories
thousands of years before Darwin and Lyell. I learned that Epicurus (341–271
BC ) promoted a materialistic theory that had no place for God, and Pliny the Elder
wrote, “… Chance herself takes the place of God … .”?3
Anaximander reckoned that “humans originally resembled another type of animal,
namely fish.”?4 Aristotle developed the theory of spontaneous generation
in the fourth century BC, and Democritus (c. 460–370 BC ), who proposed an
atomic theory, also held to a sort of evolutionary view of human anthropology.5
The Babylonians gave dates for humankind upwards of 730,000 years,6 and
Buddha (c. 500 BC ) estimated that man had existed for at least 3 x 1027
years!7 Meanwhile the Hindus, among other pagans, held to a cosmic egg
expansion of the universe, as part of an evolutionary cycle every few billions of
years.’8,9
 Paul James-Griffiths with four books he has written. |
Paul had discovered that modern evolutionary ideas, far from being a direct consequence
of advances in operational science in the nineteenth century, had roots that went
much deeper in human history. Indeed, his biblical namesake, the Apostle Paul, encountered
disciples of the Greek evolutionary philosopher Epicurus when he spoke to the people
of Athens (Acts
17:18). Rather than simply preaching about Christ’s Resurrection and
the need for repentance, he tackled their wrong evolutionary ideas head-on by teaching
them the real history of the world from Genesis.
As Paul James-Griffiths studied further, he was in for a surprise:
‘When I looked into the roots of Darwinian evolution I received a big shock.
Wallace, widely recognised alongside Darwin as the co-founder of evolution, wrote
books defending spiritualism. Furthermore, he came to the same conclusion as Darwin
while studying spiritualism among the mediums in Malaysia!10
‘As a former spiritualist, my suspicions were aroused. I began a long and
intensive investigation of scientific evolution in physics, chemistry, biology,
geology and archaeology, only to find it was not scientific but mere pagan philosophy
decked out in fancy language! I therefore rejected macroevolution as science.’
It is well known that Alfred Russel Wallace was a devotee of spiritualism (also
called spiritism), and it is certainly intriguing that the relatively modern resurgence
of New Age philosophies (including pantheism, paganism and occult ideas and practices)
coincided with the arrival and rapid acceptance of Charles Darwin’s evolutionary
ideas.11
Paul had come a long way in his pursuit of truth but there was one last hurdle.
Though he had rejected molecules-to-man evolution, his earlier millions-of-years
beliefs remained.
‘Next was my investigation of the long ages of evolution. This was much harder.
It has taken me nearly 20 years to come to the conclusion, from the evidence, that
the earth is less than 10,000 years old. I recall going to a creation science talk
at Leicester University in 1984 and joining forces with liberal “churchians”?
and atheists against the speaker, Professor Verna Wright.12 I hammered
him about the Global Flood because my professors of archaeology had taught me that
the Bible referred to a localised event in Sumeria. I left feeling puffed up with
pride. Today I repent. Verna Wright was right; I was wrong.’
 One of the New Age type expos/festivals at which Paul has booths presenting the gospel. |
So many Christians—who have, like Paul, seen the light when it comes to the
falsity of the evolutionary big picture—still tenaciously hang on to their
belief in ‘millions-of-years’. Yet, as numerous articles in Creation
magazine have shown, not only does old-earth belief ignore much scientific evidence
for a young earth, such a compromise undermines the foundations of true biblical
Christianity and effectively destroys the basis of the gospel message. Paul now
realizes this and chooses to let the Bible speak, rather than reinterpret it to
conform with people’s ultimately fallible opinions. Now, when he encounters
people and shares his own faith, he is able to draw on the experiences of his spiritual
journey, his historical research and, most importantly, God’s Word.
‘I work with London City Mission as a missionary to people involved in the
New Age Movement and as a chaplain to the West End Theatres. We go into “mind,
body, spirit”? events and have a stand where we share the gospel with thousands
of New Agers. In talking to pagans, whether actors, film directors or anything else,
I show them evidence from the Bible and science to point them to a Creator God and
then, eventually, to the only Saviour, our Lord Jesus Christ.’
References and notes
- This is the false belief that God is equal to the universe (from Greek pan
= all, theos = God).
- A hermeneutic is a method of interpreting the Bible. Paul James-Griffiths was being
trained to take ideas outside of the Bible and read them into Scripture
(eisegesis). Sound biblical hermeneutics requires the Christian to start with God’s
infallible Word and read out from the text (exegesis). See: Ham, K., Eisegesis: A Genesis virus, Creation 24(3):16–19,
2002.
- Pliny the Elder, Natural History, Healy, J.F. (translator), Penguin Classics,
London, England, p. 13, 1991.
- Barnes, J., Early Greek Philosophy, Penguin Classics, London, England;
Hippolytus, Refutation of all heresies, p. 72, 1987.
- Cartledge, P., Democritus, Phoenix, London, England, p. 21, 1998.
- Ref. 3, p. 105.
- Buddhist Scriptures, selected and translated by Conze, E., Penguin Classics,
London, England; Outline of a Bodhisattva’s progress, p. 31, 1959.
- Mundaka Unpanishad 1, translations and explanations by Swami Nikhilananda, Ramakrishna–Vivekananda
Center, New York, from Understanding Hinduism, Creation, pp. 6–9, <www.hinduism.org.za/creation.htm>,
9 June 2003.
- Wiseman, P.J., Clues to Creation in Genesis, Wiseman, D.J. (Ed.), Marshall’s
Paperbacks, England, p. 226, 1977.
- Morris, H., Who Started the Evolutionary World View? Sword and Trowel
1:2–7, 1996.
- For a helpful discussion of spiritism, pantheism and the New Age, see chapters 3
and 4 of: Morris, H.,
The Long War Against God: The history and impact of the creation/evolution conflict,
Master Books, Arkansas, USA, pp. 93–195, 2000. Chapter 4 is entitled ‘The
dark nursery of Darwinism’.
- Verna Wright (1928–1998), an eminent rheumatologist, was a committed Christian
and keen biblical creationist. He was a key figure in such British organisations
as United Beach Missions, Young Life, Lord’s Day Observance Society, Christian
Medical Fellowship and Creation Science Movement.
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