Question:

I was reading that you believe that God used evolution to create modern man.  However, to refute this point, I’ve heard Christians point out that evolution is a process that is achieved through death.  However, death did not exist until Adam (a fully developed human) brought sin into the world.  Now, this is a genuine question – I’m not simply trying to be a pest – but how could modern man have come from evolution if the very process of evolution (death) didn’t exist until after fully developed man already existed?

Answer:

The doctrine that death did not exist before Adam comes from Calvinism.  This assumes a false doctrine of the "fall" of man.  This is the same doctrine that gives us the false doctrine of original sin–the very unfortunate doctrine that we inherit the sins committed by another person (which is proved wrong by Ezekiel 18:19-20 and hundreds of other passages).  One passage used to attempt to prove that physical death began with Adam is Romans 5:12-19.   It says that death came into the world through the sin of Adam.  I believe this is talking about spiritual death.  Romans 5:18-19 implies that the consequences were spiritual, not physical.  We know for many reasons that death existed before the sin of Adam.  Surely there were bacteria dying before Adam sinned.  Surely there were predators killing prey, fish eating other fish and so forth before the sin of Adam and Eve.   From fossil evidence, we know that death happened for hundreds of millions of years before humans came on the stage.  More than 99% of the entire fossil record was laid down before humans appear in the fossil record.

So, it is an incorrect interpretation of the Bible to say that physical death was initiated with the sin of Adam.  Romans 5 is talking about spiritual death/separation from God coming through the sin of Adam.  Add to this the evidence and common sense both tell us that death was in the world long before Adam sinned.

I have not committed to the conclusion that humans evolved.  I believe that God could have, and probably did create Adam and Eve by special creation.  However, the evidence for evolution of other species happening is overwhelming, and besides, there is no biblical statement which says otherwise, so I conclude that the evidence is not lying to us.

John Oakes