A Review of Mark Van Bebber’s and Paul S. Taylor’s A Report on the Progressive Creationist Book by Hugh Ross

Reviewed by Mark T. Clark, Ph.D. Associate Professor of Political Science Apologist, Reasons to Believe

There is really much less than meets the eye in this book. The title reads "Creation and Time," followed by the smaller subtitle, "A Report on the Progressive Creationist Book by Hugh Ross," so that, to the uninitiated, it appears to be the book it purports to critique, Creation and Time by Hugh Ross. Stylistically, the report seems designed to piggyback onto the success of Creation and Time.

On one level, the form of the report looks like an attempt to counter the arguments and evidence of Ross’ work. On another level, however, the substance reveals an ideological polemic against the substantial scientific and theological evidence for an old earth. In tone and substance, it is simply not good scholarship.

The report is relatively short (127 pages) and does not lend itself to easy reading. Compared to Creation and Time (187 pages), which has more than 300 endnotes from a wide variety of sources, this report only has about 80, 30 percent of which are taken from Ross’ works, both written and taped. The majority of the rest is from young-earth creationists. Ironically, the authors cite arguments from several well-known Christian scholars who have strongly endorsed Creation and Time as if to show opposition to Ross’ position. The reference material at the end, designed to demonstrate that many other scientists believe in a young universe, lists only sixteen books. Nearly half of these references are the products of two well-known young-earth creationists: Drs. Henry and John Morris of the Institute for Creation Research.

From the bio-sketch at the back of the book, little information is given about the authors. One has a master’s degree in divinity (Van Bebber) from a small seminary in Arizona, and the other (Taylor) has no apparent formal training in higher education. The only qualifications they seem to have is that they both have worked for years with pro-young earth organizations. No evidence is given to suggest that they have the technical training to perform linguistic, scientific, or theological criticism. Nonetheless, the authors took upon themselves the task of judging the scholarly quality of Ross’ work.

The report is organized in nine sections and provides counterpoints to some forty-seven "claims" made in Creation and Time. Although it seems fair to produce such a work, its form represents a logical fallacy and a debater’s tactic. The fallacy it contains is circular reasoning. Since, by the authors own definition, creation had to be recent, any and all evidence that contradicts that presumption has to be discarded, ignored, or trivialized. The authors ignore, downplay, or accuse of bias all evidence from a wide array of academic disciplines, including science, history, anthropology, and theology.

The debater’s tactic is the straw man. In the straw man argument, the technique is to characterize your opponent’s argument in the weakest possible manner, and then proceed to "knock him down"; that is, to show that his arguments do not follow logically or are not proven by the evidence. All forty-seven "claims" analyzed are taken out of context–both from the chapter in general and the section in particular–and reduced to weak or misrepresented assertions.

Much of the attack on science in general, and the evidences in Creation and Time in particular, stems from a confusion of what constitutes good science and scholarship. Though arguing that "not being astronomers or physicists, we do not deal with Ross’ astrophysical claims," the authors nonetheless repeatedly discredit both the methods and the results of science throughout the work. They do this primarily by asserting that science and scientists are under the curse of sin, and so too are their methods and judgments. Thus, all their findings are suspect (unless, of course, they agree with young-earth proponents). Yet, apparently those who would interpret the words of God are not under the same constraint, especially those who hold to the young-earth position. Ross is wrong, they assert and try to demonstrate, because he elevates science above Scripture, though this charge remains unproven. Unproven assertion is mere opinion, not evidence.

More generally, the authors misunderstand good scholarship. Reacting to the overwhelming support in academia for an old earth, they assert that "Majority opinion does not determine truth." While true, this statement misses the point. The reason for consensus judgments is because of the scholarly review process. In fact, because of the high premium placed on pursuing accurate judgments, theories, and reports, the peer review process was instituted to keep scholars honest, both with method and results. Even the Apostle Paul saw the wisdom of this (see Gal. 2:1-2). Before publication, Creation and Time was submitted to rigorous review by more than twenty scholars, including scientists, theologians, and other academics. The review process builds humility into scholarship. While scholars can be, and often are, wrong, this "self-arrest" mechanism keeps knowledge advancing rather than stagnating into ideology. One need only look at what scholarship was like in the former Soviet Union to understand this.

The primary tool of persuasion used in the book is emotion. For example, rather than describe how carnivores before the fall might have been capable of chewing plants with teeth made for flesh, the authors paint an emotionally charged picture. They talk about when animals "devour each other," and that there existed "evidence of death and frequent misery on a massive scale," where "bears kill baby sea lions." According to them, "Could even a sadist think of a more cruel and ugly way to produce the animals over which Adam was to rule?" In another instance, the authors charge that accepting a position on creation other than the young universe leads to a path of confusion, damage in the church, loss of faith, and increasing liberalism.

Last, the authors use secondary, not primary, source materials. Primary source materials are those written by authors themselves, in the original language. Secondary sources are those analyses or translations of what was written or done. While Creation and Time includes a variety of primary and secondary sources, the authors of the report only consult secondary ones, and only those that suit the young-earth position.

Perhaps it was to be expected, but it is certainly disappointing that the authors ignored Ross’ appeal in Creation and Time for a new "Jerusalem Council" to mend fences within the church over the age-date controversy. Rather than take the offer for what it is worth, the authors patronize Dr. Ross and his ministry. As they put it, they "pray for the day when Dr. Ross will improve his presentations toward better biblical and scientific accuracy. In that day, we trust the Lord will expand the fruitfulness of his ministry" (pp.119-120). Apparently, the success of Dr. Ross and the ministry of Reasons To Believe is not by God’s grace and hard work, but due to an "undeniable flair for marketing" (p.14). Ironically, the ministry employs no marketing specialists. Such paternalism is symptomatic of the intractability of many young-earth ideologues.

And this really is the deeper problem. While the community of "scholars" that adhere to the young-earth position remains insular, self-reinforcing, and out of touch with new tools for evangelizing an increasingly secular world, they only keep themselves from participating in the many new opportunities to share Christ in the world. But, when they go on the offensive and attack other Christians, they also hurt the unsuspecting. And this is the audience within which they have the most success: those who have no background in science or higher education, yet who do not want to lose faith. In the absence of more complete information, the young-earth position at least has the appeal of inspiring a zeal for God–often despite the quality of the work and the "evidence" presented.

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