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Creation 34(3):20–22, July 2012

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Roots and fruits

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One way of discovering the true nature of a theory is to study its ‘roots and fruits’— that is, its origins and consequences. We shall see in this article that evolution’s origins are anti-Christian and anti-biblical, and its consequences appear to be uniformly evil. There are several reasons why Christians should oppose the theory of evolution, and these are just two of them.

© iStockPhoto.com/NikolajSchouboe roots-fruits

Roots

The idea of evolution is actually very old. The pagan Greeks, for example, wrote about it some 2,700 years ago. But the modern theory, together with the present-day concept of vast periods of time, has its roots in the anti-Christian ‘Enlightenment’ of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. (The same is true of liberal theology.) Many of the pioneers of these ideas were deists. Deists do not believe in divine revelation; so they do not believe that the Bible is the Word of God. Their ‘god’ is very different from the God of the Bible. He/it is a remote being who started the universe, but left it to run itself, operating according to natural laws.1

Various theories were put forward, resulting eventually in the full-blown long ages, anti-Flood geology of Charles Lyell (1797–1875) and then the theory of evolution of Charles Darwin (1809–1882). Lyell was a deist who wanted to “free the science [geology] from Moses”.2 He was greatly influenced by another deist, James Hutton (1726–1797). Hutton proposed a radical uniformitarianism in which he insisted that only present-day processes at present-day frequencies and magnitudes should be used to interpret the rock record—and Lyell developed this idea further.3

Darwin studied theology for a time, but he turned against Christianity and became a deist or possibly an agnostic.4 He was much influenced by Charles Lyell, and by his own grandfather, Erasmus Darwin (1731–1802), who was an anti-Christian deist and evolutionist.

Charles Darwin’s theory did not arise primarily out of his scientific observations. He accepted the deistic, uniformitarian worldview of his friend and mentor, Charles Lyell, and then he interpreted the data in accordance with that worldview.5

Thus the roots of these ideas (of vast ages and evolution) are clearly anti-biblical and anti-Christian.

Fruits

What about the fruits of these ideas? The list of evil fruits seems almost endless. They catalogue untold misery and suffering. Whole nations and societies—countless millions of people—have been affected for evil. Science itself has been corrupted and its progress hindered.6

© iStockPhoto.com/lonescuBogdanCristian Rotten-apple

The theory of evolution (with the billions of years that it requires) is the foundational belief of secular humanism (atheism). It enables humanists to deny the existence of God and their accountability to Him. It means that they can create their own standard of morality and do “what is right in their own eyes” (cf. Judges 21:25).

Nations and societies which adopt this evolutionary philosophy see a breakdown of family life, broken homes, sexual immorality, lack of respect for the sanctity of human life (including that of the unborn child) and increasing crime. The theory of evolution is foundational to the doctrines of Marxism and Nazism, which produced the cold-blooded murder of millions. These murders include 77 million in Communist China, 62 million in the Soviet Gulag State, 2 million in the Khmer Rouge killing fields and 21 million non-battle killings by the Nazis.7

It is the basis of the most appalling practices of eugenics (the ‘science’ of ensuring superior human populations). This included Hitler’s killing of many disabled people, and the forced sterilization of hundreds of thousands, including many thousands in the USA.8

It has also fuelled racism of various kinds, involving the ruthless elimination of those regarded as inferior.9 Australian aboriginals, for example, were slaughtered because they were considered to be subhuman.10

The theory of evolution has also contributed to the loss of faith or lack of faith of millions. Witness the millions of atheists and agnostics in countries that used to be ‘Christian’, but have been or are dominated by communism or secular humanism. There are countless stories of individuals brought up in Christian homes who say they lost their faith through evolutionary teaching.

Another fruit of the ideas of vast ages and evolution is the tendency to slide into ‘liberal’ theology. This entails dismissing Genesis as history, which undermines the very notion of salvation in Jesus Christ, “the last Adam”.

Christian responses

Many Christians share my view that the theory of evolution, together with its billions of years, is actually a satanic deception. Jesus said,

“Beware of false prophets, who come to you in sheep’s clothing, but inwardly they are ravenous wolves. You will know them by their fruits. Do men gather grapes from thornbushes or figs from thistles? Even so, every good tree bears good fruit, but a bad tree bears bad fruit. A good tree cannot bear bad fruit, nor can a bad tree bear good fruit. Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. Therefore by their fruits you will know them.” (Matthew 7:15–20)

The fruits borne by the theory of evolution are uniformly bad, but the fruits borne by believing the biblical account, consistently applied, are uniformly good. Belief in the biblical account has effects which are the exact opposite of those caused by belief in evolution. For example, it discourages racism. According to the Bible, all human beings are closely related, being descended from Adam via Noah, who lived less than five thousand years ago.11 It also encourages the advance of science, because it accepts that the whole creation has been wonderfully designed by a rational God.12

But what about Christians who accept the theory of evolution and/or billions of years, and try to reconcile them with Scripture? One clergyman who is a theistic evolutionist said to me, “Darwin did not know that Hitler and Stalin would use the theory of evolution to justify their actions”. It is true that Lyell and Darwin did not foresee the full consequences of their theories, but they could have guessed. After all, the full title of Darwin’s book is On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection, Or the Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle for Life, and in The Descent of Man, he wrote:

“At some future period … the civilized races of man will almost certainly exterminate and replace throughout the world the savage races. At the same time the anthropomorphous [having or suggesting human form and appearance] apes … will no doubt be exterminated. The break will then be rendered wider, for it will intervene between man in a more civilized state, as we may hope than the Caucasian, and some ape as low as a baboon, instead of as at present between the negro or Australian and the gorilla.”13,14

The important thing to understand is that Lyell and Darwin were deliberately seeking to exclude God from science, and they knew very well that their theories would destroy belief in the Bible, the God of the Bible and the morality rooted in the Bible.15

© iStockPhoto.com/MarekMnich Red-apples

Some Christians say that Darwin’s theory cannot be hostile to Christianity, because he mentioned the Creator in his book. However, this concept is totally foreign to the entire ethos of the Origin, so the mentions would appear to have been “a sop to mollify the Christian community”.16 E.g. Darwin added his famous words ‘by the Creator’ (in the last sentence of the book) to the 2nd (1860) and later editions of Origin. But privately, in a letter to Joseph Hooker, dated March 1863, he wrote, “ … I have long regretted that I truckled to public opinion & used the Pentateuchal term of creation, by which I really meant ‘appeared’ by some wholly unknown process.”17 As mentioned, Darwin himself was anti-Christian, and to the extent that his thinking may have included a deistic ‘God’, it was not the God of Christianity.

Another very common response is to say that evolution is simply a biological process, and the Nazis, Marxists and others misused the theory to justify their actions. There is nothing wrong, such Christians say, with the process itself. But this argument is illogical and unbiblical. The theory’s evil fruits are bound up in its very nature. If God created by means of evolution, it means that He used a process of millions of years of death, disease, violence, suffering and waste. And it involves the ruthless elimination of the weak by the strong. If God used such methods, why shouldn’t we? In fact, Nazis and Marxists thought that they were just emulating nature in their ruthlessness. Adolf Eichmann, the Nazi war criminal who masterminded the deaths of millions, was saturated in evolutionary thinking, and believed that his actions were not merely defensible—they were commendable. He was cooperating with nature, improving the human race.18

Actually, the scientific evidence against microbes-to-man evolution is so powerful that the theory of evolution has no right to be called a ‘theory’. Scientists normally use this word to mean a well-substantiated explanation of the data. An example is Einstein’s Theory of Relativity. The theory of evolution is really just a hypothesis based on a naturalistic worldview and a naturalistic definition of science—the arbitrary assumption that everything can and must be explained without reference to God and the supernatural.

The ‘roots and fruits’ of the theory of evolution indicate very clearly that it is a satanic deception. The Bible’s teaching supports this conclusion, as do the real facts of science. A further indication is the fact that ‘the world’ seems to have a special hatred for biblical creation. It does everything in its power to exclude and suppress it, and to impose the evolutionary worldview. Some Christians may believe in evolution and/or millions of years, but that does not change the unpleasant facts described in this article, nor the implications of those facts.

Posted on homepage: 12 October 2013

References and notes

  1. Mortenson, T., The Great Turning Point, Master Books, Green Forest, 2004, pp. 24–25. Return to text.
  2. Catchpoole, D. and Walker, T., Charles Lyell’s hidden agenda—to free science “from Moses”; creation.com/lyell; August 2009. Return to text.
  3. Mortenson, T., Ref. 1, pp. 25–33. Return to text.
  4. Brentnall, J. and Grigg, R., Darwin’s slippery slide into unbelief, Creation 18(1):34–37, 1995; creation.com/darwinslide. Return to text.
  5. Statham, D., Darwin, Lyell and the Origin of Species, J. Creation 24(1):65–71, 2010. Return to text.
  6. Bergman, J., Textbook tyranny, Creation 24(2):56, 2002; creation.com/textbook-tyranny. Return to text.
  7. Rummel, R.J., Death by Government, New Brunswick, N.J.: Transaction Publishers, 1994, Hall, R., Darwin’s impact—the bloodstained legacy of evolution, Creation 27(2):46–47, 2005; creation.com/darwinimpact. Return to text.
  8. Grigg, R., Eugenics … death of the defenceless, Creation 28(1):18–22, 2005; creation.com/eugenics. Return to text.
  9. Racism Q&A; creation.com/racism-questions-and-answers. Return to text.
  10. Wieland, C., Darwin’s bodysnatchers: new horrors, Creation 14(2):16–18, 1992; creation.com/bodysnatch. Return to text.
  11. Batten, D., et al., Creation Answers Book, Chapter 18: How did all the different races arise (from Noah s family)? creation.com/cab18. Return to text.
  12. Sarfati, J., The biblical roots of modern science; creation.com/roots. Return to text.
  13. Darwin, C., Descent of Man, 1871, Vol. 1, p. 201, Darwinonline.org.uk. Return to text.
  14. See also Bergman, J., The Dark Side of Charles Darwin, Master Books, Green Forest, 2011, pp. 211–232. Return to text.
  15. Grigg, R., Darwin’s mystery illness, Creation 17(4):28–30, 1995; creation.com/illness. Return to text.
  16. Taylor, I., In the Minds of Men, TFE Publishing, Toronto, 1984, p. 463, n.9. See Footnote 11 in Grigg, R., Charles Darwin’s mystery illness (Footnote 15 above). Return to text.
  17. Bergman, ref. 14, pp. 67–68. Also see creation.com/darwin-divine-design. Return to text.
  18. Grigg, R., The trial and death of Adolf Eichmann; creation.com/eichmann. Return to text.

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