Creation Science News
Bible books ‘Not fiction’: Archaeologist
Claims that the first 10 books of the Bible are fiction are ‘totally unwarranted’, a former director of the Australian Institute of Archaeology has said.
Dr Clifford Wilson was commenting on claims by Professor Thomas Thompson of Milwaukee. Professor Thompson has said in a new book that no archaeological evidence was available to confirm some events and people in the Bible, so he didn’t believe that Solomon, David, Abraham and Moses ever existed.
Dr Wilson said Professor Thompson’s claims have been made by others in the past, but that the Bible has an uncanny habit of ‘proving to be right after all’.
‘Archaeology has in fact consistently come down on the side of the Bible, even from the early chapters of Genesis’, Dr Wilson said.
He said the Sumerian King List and other records show there were long-living men, as Genesis records; the Battle of Four Kings Against Five (Genesis 14) has endorsement from the nationalities there listed; and archaeology has helped establish dates for such events as the fall of Jericho. And there was much more evidence supporting the Bible.
‘For the unbiased research student the evidence is compelling’, Dr Wilson said. ‘The evidence has led me increasingly to accept the literal nature of the Bible record as authentic history.’
New Life, 8 April 1993 (p.4).
‘Red devil’ pickets Christian school
A man dressed in a red devil suit says he has set aside the next 10 years to picket a Christian school in California because it teaches creation science.
Retired jetliner captain Mike Bihn, 60, has donned his red devil suit since December 1990 to picket Monte Vista Christian School in Watsonville, California. He says this is all he has on his agenda for the next decade.
Bihn says he has been a member of the American Civil Liberties Union for 19 years, and he objects to creation-based teachings.
The principal at Monte Vista, Neil Peek, says he has told students the best thing to do is ignore the ‘red devil’.
Santa Cruz Sentinel, 22 January 1993 (p.1).
Teachers skittish about evolution
Many teachers are ‘very skittish’ about teaching evolution in American schools, an anti-creationist group has admitted.
Eugenie Scott, director of the National Center for Science Education in Berkeley, California, said that many academics were unaware of the revival of creationism. She said that in the past year or two, the religious right had won political victories which gave creationists a new base of power.
Evolution was being attacked in ‘sophisticated’ new books such as law professor Phillip Johnson’s book, Darwin on Trial.
Biology professor William Thwaites said that creationist attacks had generated ‘a tremendous amount of support among school-teachers that evolution is on shaky grounds.’
Laboratory News, March 1993 (p.5).
Albanians question evolution
After generations of indoctrination in atheism and evolution, many people in Albania wonder whether evolution is true, a missionary to Albania said in Brisbane, Australia, in March.
Missionary David McGrail said he was surprised that students he spoke to in Albanian schools and universities constantly asked him if evolution was true.
‘It’s strange, but there’s a natural sort of question-mark in their minds about evolution’, he said.
In 1967 Albania outlawed all religion. Since the collapse of communism in 1990 the country has again opened up to religion.
Mr McGrail said the most common questions he received in the schools and colleges had to deal with evolution.
‘They ask about fossils, dating the age of the earth, and ape-men’, he said. The first question in each place was often ‘is evolution true?’
He said he tried to get the students to think about the errors of evolution logically, ‘because they are great thinkers’. He is now using Creation Science Foundation materials to help him with his missionary work in Albania.
Fonda slams Jewish—Christian ideas
Hollywood actress and political activist, Jane Fonda, 55, has been quoted as saying that Judeo-Christian ideas have largely been responsible for hindering evolution.
Fonda had been invited to Harvard in October 1992 to address the Institute of Politics at the John F. Kennedy School of Government. She spoke on ‘Environmental Opportunities for the Activist and Entrepreneur’.
She was reported as saying, ‘History is littered with the ruins of peoples and civilizations that just never made it to the next stage of evolution.’ She claimed religious myths were responsible, ‘primarily the Judeo-Christian ideas’.
Bible-Science News, Vol. 30:9 (p.13).
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