If we are to ask questions about humans, we have to know what we mean by the word. We cannot answer these most basic of questions without first establishing our definition of human.
DEFINITIONS OF HUMAN IN SCIENCE
There are many ways to define human in science. The particulars of each of these definitions are subject to substantial debate and revision. Nonetheless, we can identify several markers in history that may be important starting points from which to build more careful definitions (fig. 8.1):
1. Six thousand to twelve thousand years ago, when permanent settlements associated with agriculture arise across the globe,
2. About fifty thousand to one hundred thousand years ago, with the rise of behaviorally modern humans, a chronological subset of Homo sapiens as a whole,
3. About one hundred fifty thousand to three hundred thousand years ago, with the rise of anatomically modern humans, also known as Homo sapiens,
4. About five hundred thousand to seven hundred thousand years ago, with the common ancestor of Neanderthals, Homo sapiens, Denisovans, and other hominins no longer among us,
5. About 2 million years ago, with the rise of the Homo genus, including many hominins no longer found among us.
Figure 8.1. When do humans arise? This figure depicts the geographical spread of our ancestors over the last two million years, with several different species and remains labeled.a Three dividing lines are visible here: (5) Homo erectus; (4) common ancestors of Homo sapiens, Neanderthals, and Denisovans; and (3) Homo sapiens. Lines can be drawn in other places too, and the precise details are murky.
a Adapted from https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Homo_lineage_2017update.svg. Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International (CC BY-SA 4.0; https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/).
The dates here are very imprecise, subject to correction, debate, and revision. This list is not a definitive reference, but a general overview to guide further engagement with anthropology and archaeology. There are fossils, archaeological finds, genetic data to consider, and ongoing scientific debates about most of the details. Individual scientists can be very opinionated here, but there is often poor agreement on the details.
Most scientists, nonetheless, would say our ancestors become distinctly human in important ways about 2 million years ago, with the rise of the Homo genus. The notion that humans are Homo sapiens, in particular, is currently a minority view. Two major organizations (BioLogos and Reasons to Believe) often promote this view, and it is one valid definition.14 Most scientists, however, no longer see human origins this way.
AUTONOMY AND PRECISION IN THEOLOGY
Confident scientific claims about human origins require a precise definition of human. There is, however, no settled definition of human in science. Even if there were, there is ambiguity in scientific definitions of human, and this ambiguity undermines confident claims. What does this mean for the dialogue between science and theology? What does this mean for the genealogical hypothesis?
In conversation with theology, best practice is to state scientific claims without the term human. Scientific claims about humans are only as precise as the meaning of the term. Rather than stating, “It seems the human population was never just a single couple,” it is more precise to say, “It seems our ancestors never dip down to a single couple within the last five hundred thousand years.” Rather than, “Humans arise more than a hundred thousand years ago,” it is more precise to say, “Homo sapiens arise more than a hundred thousand years ago.”
The theological conversation requires precision. There is a great deal of information that science uncovers about our past, but it does not tell us how theologians should define human. This is a question that science cannot answer or adjudicate.
Theologians have autonomy to define the term human on its own terms. The definition in theology need not correspond with a scientific definition such as Homo sapiens or the Homo genus. Even if we use one of these definitions as a starting point, the boundaries are not sharply defined in science. Theology cannot dictate how scientists use the term human, but neither can science dictate how theologians use it.
A great deal of theology turns here, on the meaning of human. Could Adam and Eve be our progenitors? Depending on how we define human, we might arise from a single couple in the recent past. The definitions we choose here, however, raise several questions about the status of everyone outside Adam and Eve’s lineage. In what senses are they human or not? Is this a dangerous distinction to make or not? These are the questions we will enter into deeply in the coming chapters.
CHAPTER NINE
HUMANS IN THEOLOGY
THE DEFINITION OF human in science is disputed and unclear, especially in origins, as we look at the distant past. The situation in theology and philosophy is just as unsettled. There are large disagreements between several different camps, and it is impossible to catalogue all the views we find. Each scholar, nonetheless, has autonomy to define human with precision for themselves. The plurality of definitions shapes our understanding of scientific findings. Humans arise at different times and in different ways, depending on precisely what we mean by human. As we will soon see, by some definitions of human, we arise recently, by genealogical descent from a single couple. Adam and Eve could be our progenitors in this sense.
In the last couple of years, I have been meeting with scholars from across the spectrum, discussing this proposal in many places, including at the Dabar Conference of the Creation Project in 2018. The range of theological questions on which these discussions touched was astounding. I am continually surprised by the degree of disagreement and range of views. Theologians cannot agree on what is “human,” and even within each of the major camps, there are a wide range of views. Exegetes have greater consensus on what Genesis is saying, but they also disagree on important details of relevance now. Philosophers come with their own set of traditions and debates that have been raging for centuries. No one can produce a consensus understanding of what it means to be human in theology. Theologians, philosophers, and exegetes were just as divided on what it means to be human as the scientists.
I did notice one common understanding, though it is not unanimous. Many seem to equate “human” in theology with the image of God. This is certainly a valid position, but we are not limited to this understanding; I will present an alternative in coming chapters. Understanding human in theology as the people bearing the image of God, nonetheless, is where we will start. This still leaves us with a knotty problem, shifting one question to another. What is the image of God? There is no consensus definition, but this disputed phrase is among the most common definitions of human I found among the theologians, philosophers, and exegetes. In this chapter, I will make four main points.
1. There is a range of ways the image of God is understood, giving us a window into the difficulty of defining human in theology.
2. There are, nonetheless, two major approaches to defining humans using image of God: “structuralist” and the “vocationalist.”
3. Affirming monogenesis, there are definitions of human in theology where all people in history arise from genealogical descent from Adam and Eve within a larger population.
4. Supporting this definition of monogenesis, speculation about interbreeding between Adam and Eve’s lineage and others is common among creationists.
This argument will demonstrate that there are theological definitions of human that enable us to affirm monogenesis, even if Adam and Eve are within a larger population. This will take us into a conversation with historical theology, to understand more about the tradition out of which the doctrine of monogenesis is clarified. This will bring us to societal questions. First, what is the image of God?
HUMANS IN THE IMAGE OF GOD
Some are convinced that to be human is to be in the image of God. Therefore, by defining the image of God, we are defining what it means to be human. I am not sure this is ultimately the best strategy. Nonetheless, it is useful for t
he moment to show the range of positions held on this phrase. What exactly is the image of God? Throughout Church history, it is often said that there are three main ways to understand the image of God.
1. In the substance understanding, the image of God is understood as the set of attributes we have in common with God. Different theologians will emphasize different attributes, such as human uniqueness (or exceptionality),1 rational souls, language,2 and universal rights3 and dignity.4 The substance view is sometimes understood synonymously with structuralism, which I will describe in a moment, and may be most common among philosophers.
2. In the vocational or functional or regency understanding, the image of God is understood as a God-given calling or role, perhaps to represent him in this world.5 This understanding sometimes connected to the function of government, and it is the dominant understanding among exegetes.
3. In the relational understanding, the image of God is understood as a certain sort of relationship we have with God, or perhaps with each other in community. This understanding is, perhaps, least common now, but it is put forward by Karl Barth, Martin Luther, and John Calvin.
Many philosophers tend to emphasize substance understanding, but most modern exegetes emphasize the vocational understanding.6 C. John Collins refers to these three understandings, respectively, as resemblance, representative, and relational. Each understanding locates the essential features of being human in different realms: the attributes of individuals, our actions according to a calling, or our relationships with each other and with God.
To these basic understandings, there are several additional approaches to the image of God that cropped up over the centuries.
A structural understanding, a variant of the substance understanding, arose in philosophy and theology. This understanding tightly binds up the image of God with everything we associate with “human,” as an all-or-none package. In the strictest forms, our capacities, worth, and physical form are linked such that one cannot be found without the other. Human uniqueness is particularly important in this understanding for many. In Catholic thought it has been linked to the concept of a rational soul.7 The all-or-none packaging is the distinctive feature of structuralists. There is, nonetheless, disagreement about what specific attributes are linked all-or-none to each other.
In a universal worth and dignity understanding, our moral and ethical worth is bestowed by the image of God. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s rhetoric looms large here, leaving many in the public with the strong impression this is the primary meaning.8 In one understanding of this view, those with the image of God are granted human rights, and the rest, if any such were identified, might have no rights. There are, however, are better ways to understand the connection between rights, dignity, and the image of God.9
In a Christological understanding, we might associate the image of God exclusively with Jesus, emphasizing that Genesis teaches we are merely like the image of God, whereas Jesus is the exact representation of God’s being (Heb 1:3).10
In an exiled heavenly being understanding, Adam and Eve in the Garden were immortal heavenly beings, more like angels than humans. In this view, uncommon now, Adam and Eve lost the image of God when they fell and were exiled from the Garden.11
Some simultaneously mix multiple understandings together, while others might strongly emphasize one understanding over the others. The key point, however, is that scholars cannot agree on what precisely is the image of God. If this is what it means to be human, theologians are no closer to consensus than the scientists.
THE STRUCTURALISTS AND THE VOCATIONALISTS
Ask ten scholars to explain the image of God, and more than fifteen different answers might be found. This is a wide range of views. In my conversations with scholars, nonetheless, I observed a recurring pattern. Most scholars feed into one of two camps: philosopher structuralists and exegete vocationalists.
The structuralist philosophers want to define humans according to their attributes. Though structuralists often disagree among themselves about which attributes are important, they are all taking a common approach. They are often focused on Scholastic philosophy, which emphasizes metaphysics. They are often systematic theologians. Catholics also tend to be structuralists, often drawing on Thomas Aquinas’s metaphysics. Hugh Ross and Fazale Rana of Reasons to Believe propound a structuralist understanding, often connecting human uniqueness to the image of God. William Lane Craig takes a structuralist understanding of the image of God too.
The vocationalist exegetes understand the image of God as our role in creation—for example, as stewards of what God made, or designated representatives of him in creation. They are often focused on understanding what the text of Genesis says on its own terms, within its original cultural context. They are usually biblical theologians, following the narrative of Genesis. Rather than building up a total and internally consistent metaphysical definition of human, they are more focused on what the text said. In response to their objections, structuralists would often insist that they too see a vocational component to the image of God. This is true. This question clarifies: Can one have the biological structure of a human without the vocation of a human? A vocationalist says yes, but a structuralist says no.
Structuralists and vocationalists fall on opposite poles of a continuum. Individual scholars tended to gravitate to one camp, but often borrowed ideas from the other. Still, each camp approaches questions very differently. The divide here is between metaphysics on one hand, and narrative on the other—systematic theology on one hand, and biblical theology on the other. Between philosophers and exegetes. Some groups find themselves in the middle, or in a hybrid position. It seems the debates here have been going on for a very long time.
Alongside these two major camps, a minority take a relational understanding of the image of God. Noreen Herzfeld, for example, considers the possibility of artificial intelligence in the relational image of God. Her articulation of the relational understanding of the image is salient for the question of Adam and Eve too.12 I encountered theologians in this camp at Concordia Seminary in St. Louis. Missouri Synod Lutherans are known for being very conservative in their theology, and sometimes perceived to be opposed to science. At the same time, I found value in their approach. They center on Jesus, embrace the tensions of paradox, and incline to a relational understanding of the image of God. For these reasons, they were comfortable with speculation about different ways of understanding human, even when different definitions were in tension with one another. My conversations with them were formative.13
The differences here raise to the surface several long-standing disagreements in theology. The intensity of disagreement between vocationalists and structuralists is striking. As questions arise, theologians cannot agree with one another on the answers. I wonder if there is a paradox underlying the divide between structuralists and vocationalists, the understanding of which might enable a rapprochement.14 Still, I observe several differences.
Everyone outside the Garden was biologically human, with the same biological structure of Adam and Eve. Were the biological humans outside the Garden the humans of theology too? The structuralists tend to say yes, but the vocationalists are uncertain.
There is evidence that uniquely (or nearly uniquely) human traits, such as burial of the dead, clothing, and complex tools, arose in the distant past. Are these people in the past human? Must they descend from Adam too? The structuralists tend to say yes, but the vocationalists say no, because people like us in the past may not have our vocation.
The agricultural revolution, and cities supported by agriculture, is in very recent history, less than twelve thousand years ago. Does this indicate Adam should be more recent in history? The structuralists say no, hoping for sharp lines to demarcate the metaphysical category of human, with all its entailments. The vocationalists say yes, because they are often exegetes who want to preserve the narrative elements of Genesis, including cities, agriculture, metal-working, and more recent technology.
Were there different “types” of humans in the distant past? Is a shift in the meaning of human in different eras acceptable? The structuralists usually say no, because they want to define the essential qualities of what it means to be human as stable through time. The vocationalists are often open to a shifting meaning of what it means to be human, because origin narratives are about how things come to be, presuming they were different the past.
This last point is particularly important in origins, where we seek to explain how things became the way we find them now. Temporal distinctions, nearly by definition, seem important in origins, where the progression of narratives tells us about how things come to be the way we find them. Metaphysics is often concerned with defining a stable and internally consistent ontology, a classification of the essential nature of everything we find in reality. Narratives, however, are often concerned with the change of our categories over time, their ontogeny. These are two very different ways of understanding the world: ontology versus ontogeny, metaphysics versus narrative, stable essentials versus the progress of a story. With this in mind, we should expect the structuralists to struggle with origins more than vocationalists. We often mistake the way things are for the way things have always been. Origins is important because it unsettles this conflation, forcing us to tease out how things became the way we now find them. Similar difficulty is encountered in their understanding of severe mental disability, which challenges the all-or-none approach they emphasize. A pre-determined all-or-none package of human attributes can resist contemplation of how the world came to be as we find it.
The Genealogical Adam and Eve Page 11
