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First, I need to make clear that, with the occurrence of Big Bang II, we find ourselves in a whole new ball game. For the past 10-plus billion years, The Creator had maintained a hands-off policy as he allowed the creation to unfold according to his plan. With the imposition of his image on humanity, however, he now had an element of that creation with which he could establish and maintain a relationship. That relationship, has been, from its inception, a hands-on affair. ..... We also need to recognize that, if the unique human capacity to think in abstractions, to communicate in metaphors and to appreciate aesthetics is intimately associated with the possession of the Image of God, then these qualities are, by definition, metaphysical in nature and beyond description in physical terms. That is, many, if not most, functions of what we call the human mind are not really biological in nature, even though they are necessarily expressed through a biological organ--the brain. These functions exist in modern humans because we, among all of creation, have been touched by the finger of God--set apart and uniquely equipped to have dominion over it. In practical terms, what this means is that the mechanisms that give expression to this unique capacity will forever remain beyond the grasp of those investigators who are seeking to understand them. And at this point in time, this prediction remains unchallenged, in spite of all the technological resources modern neuroscientists have at their disposal. This fact has been adeptly documented by author John Horgan (1999). The subtitle of his book summarizes its thesis: "How the Human Brain Defies Replication, Medication and Explanation." ..... I believe that it is perfectly reasonable to assume that there are aspects of human existence that are metaphysical in origin and beyond physical explanation. And, as I emphasized earlier, acknowledgement of this fact in no way compromises my objectivity as a scientist. If future experiments provide credible evidence that this prediction is in error, then I will happily revise it. Yet, when and if such an explanation is ever offered, it must be able to demonstrate in physical terms how a developmental process that had been in infinitesimally slow progress for billions of years suddenly--in a single tick of the evolutionary clock--endowed one of its products with the capacity to paint the Mona Lisa, to design a moon rocket...and to perceive God. ..... Indeed, if the present-day human capacity for cognition--and all of its accompanying attributes--were first invested in the race at that instant 50 thousand years ago, then whoever became the initial recipient of that capacity was as potentially capable of designing a moon rocket as modern-day astroscientists. The only things needed were education and experience. Considering the level of hominid cognitive capacity at that instant (the most advanced technology was the production of crude stone blades), 50 millennia does not seem an unreasonable amount of time for that education and experience to be acquired. ..... Rapid advances in paleolithic technology and the first evidence of art expression and other symbolic behaviors became apparent in the fossil record soon after "Big Bang II." Ritualistic burials, never before clearly evident from the fossil record, became commonplace, indicating a perception of--and a relationship to--a deity. This was an entirely different kind of individual than the one that had existed before being touched by the finger of God. ..... Up to this point, I have identified this new bearer of God's image using the Genesis term adam (man) as a generic designation. But the Genesis account identifies Adam as a specific individual. So, we now face the daunting task of trying to integrate the story of Adam and Eve in Genesis with the account of human origins extracted from the fossil record. A number of troublesome issues will emerge from this endeavor. However, as troublesome as these issues may be, no good purpose will be served by trying to avoid them. ..... It remains my firm conviction that creation itself is as reliable a source of divine revelation as the revelations of scripture; and that these two sources cannot be found in conflict with one another. God has revealed to us one truth, and 50 thousand years ago (if I have it right), he invested us with the cognitive equipment to determine what that truth is. Why now? Because this is when nature has finally revealed to us enough of its mysteries that we can begin to understand what it has been trying to tell us since long before Paul declared, "...what may be known about God is plain to them...being understood from all that has been made..." So, let's have at it. ..... First, we need to confront the problems involved in dating the appearance of the first human in the image of God. Seventeenth century Irish bishop and scholar, James Usher, calculated from biblical genealogies that humanity (and the earth) began its existence in 4004 BC. Whether or not you agree with Bishop Usher's contention that the creation of the universe occurred at that time, his calculation of the cumulative ages of Jesus' earthly ancestors from biblical accounts appears to be reasonably accurate. That is, The Bible tells us that the total time required for all the generations from Adam to Jesus was about 4000 years. So, our first troublesome question is, how does this calculation square with what we now know about early humans from the prehistoric record? For those of us who seek to confirm the truth of scripture, this is a particularly difficult issue because these genealogies are presented as historical fact in both the Old Testament and the New Testament. ..... In addition, The Bible tells us that Adam and Eve lived in an era when agriculture was already well developed. Their sons, Cain and Abel, "worked the soil" and "kept flocks." Yet, the paleoanthropological record indicates that modern humans remained hunter/gatherers until after the last ice age, which ended some 10 or 12 thousand years ago. So, the first humans to be created in God's image did not till the soil and herd sheep. They chased after reindeer and wooly mammoth with crude, flint-pointed spears. In the years that followed, the technology of their weaponry may have advanced at breakneck speed--as compared to progress over the preceding two million years--but they did not become farmers and herdsmen until relatively recent times. This is not really a contradiction of the biblical record. After all, it is only in the past century or so that the existence of prehistoric humans has been known and appreciated. The writer of Genesis (generally held to be Moses) was inspired to tell the story of creation using the concepts of reality that prevailed at that time (the 15th century BC). Divine inspiration gave the author the big picture. He described that picture in metaphors and parables to which he and his listeners could relate. It is the big picture that we are interested in pursuing in the biblical record. Nowadays, creation itself is the best resource for providing the details. ..... According to prehistory scholars, the period including times around 4000 BC is called the Chalcholithic Age or Copper Age. At that time, civilization was rapidly developing, technology had advanced to include the smelting of copper and cities were beginning to emerge. Thus, all the best evidence indicates that modern humans were not only present, but abundant and significantly civilized, at the time biblical genealogies suggest that the first human appeared. These genealogies may indeed describe an accurate picture of Jesus' ancestry, but the first individual identified in that bloodline was clearly not the first human on earth. So, where does this put us in our effort to reach the truth about our beginnings? ..... Personally, I do not feel compelled to view the biblical story of human origins any differently than the metaphor of the six-day creation. The specific time that the first recorded human ancestor of Jesus came on the scene is irrelevant to the fundamental purposes for which biblical truth was revealed to us. In fact, I choose to view the metaphor of Adam and Eve simply as a parable to introduce us to one of those purposes; to show humanity its sin. We will consider in some detail in the next chapter what insight creation has to offer in regard to this revelation. Meanwhile, let's return to the fossil record and see what other troublesome issues we have to confront. ..... Whether the first human in the image of God appeared six thousand years ago or 50 thousand years ago, the acquisition of that image was not coincident with the acquisition of those biological attributes that identify the species. That is, the Image of God is a distinctly separate identity from that which we find coded in our DNA. We are human because of our biological heritage. We are the Image of God because, when the time was right, he chose to superimpose some of his own nature on a descendant of that heritage. These realities compel us on a mission to discover when, how and on whom this image was initially invested--and how it is perpetuated from generation to generation. ..... The best evidence from the fossil record suggests that anatomically modern humans (Homo sapiens) came into being around 100 thousand years ago. So, by the time 50 thousand years ago when I propose that the human race first became the Image of God, the earth was already populated with a relative abundance of the species. The obvious question this raises is, if the finger of God, at that instant in time, invested the human race with a soul, who were the original recipients of this investment? Was it a single couple, as a literal interpretation of Genesis Chapter 1 would indicate? Or was it perhaps a blanket invocation directed at all individuals in existence at that time that had achieved sufficient biological advancement to be able to integrate this capacity into their being? As there is no current evidence in the fossil record to indicate specifically which, if either, of these alternatives is the more likely, we have an opportunity to speculate, bearing in mind that the guiding principles of such speculations continue to demand that whatever is proposed must be simple, logical...and nifty. ..... Personally, I find the idea of a blanket, species wide, acquisition of the Image of God very unappealing. First of all, it is unnecessary to account for what we find in the fossil record. Most of all, it is just not very nifty. My perception of a creator worthy of highest praise demands a mechanism that is more in keeping with the awesome process by which he produced nature from nothing. ..... So, let's take a look at the possibility that the human race as we know it today began with just two individuals, as told in the Genesis story, only transposed back in time by 40 or 50 millennia. Certainly, no more than a single pair of humans was needed to produce the current world population in 50 thousand years. That feat could be achieved with as slow a population growth rate as one doubling every 15 hundred years. And these two individuals, being far superior cognitively, would very quickly (in evolutionary terms) repopulate the earth with their descendants, and drive their less cognitive forebears into extinction. In fact, we know that the Neanderthals, which were relatively abundant at the time of Big Bang II--and, from the fossil record, similar in cognitive capacity at that time to their Homo sapiens neighbors--only survived another 20 thousand years or so. Thus, it is reasonable to assume that those other Homo sapiens that existed at the time the image was first conferred suffered a similar fate. The exact timing of their extinction would be impossible to tell from the fossil record, because the new image-bearers would not have been distinguishable physically from their immediate forbears. ..... However, irrespective of how many individuals may have been the initial recipients of God's image, they all would have been subject to one very critical requirement. They had to be able to pass on that attribute to their offspring. Bear in mind that this creative event, at least as I propose it, was not a biological phenomenon. It was the divine imposition of metaphysical attributes that simply took advantage of anatomical and physiological characteristics the species already possessed. Thus, it is only reasonable to assume that these metaphysical attributes are passed on to our descendants by a mechanism that is fundamentally different from that used to perpetuate our biological identities. And, it is also reasonable to assume that, if we can develop a supportable theory on how the Image of God continues to be acquired by each new member of the species, then we may be able to arrive at a judgment concerning how that image came to be invested in our original ancestor(s). ..... First, it should be clear that we are not going to find the answer we are looking for by searching the biblical record. The Bible gives us no clue as to when the Image of God becomes an attribute of a new individual. Those who adamantly contend that life begins at fertilization, for example, do not do so on any authority to be found in scripture. They may believe that their point of view reflects the will of God, but in fact, his Word is silent on the issue. He does give us some significant clues, however, in "what has been made." Thus, if we want to discover the event that heralds the beginning of each new human life in the image of God, we are going to have to ask creation itself to tell us. ..... The process leading to the development of a new human life begins when an egg, released from the ovary of the female, is encountered and fertilized by a male sperm. This encounter--and the initial cell divisions in the resulting embryo--occurs in the Fallopian tubes (oviducts) of the female. As the initial stages of development begin, the embryo travels down the oviduct to the uterus, a trip that requires about a week. By the time it reaches the uterus, the embryo, now called a blastocyst, has become essentially a mass of undifferentiated cells. If development is to continue, the blastocyst must at that time implant into the wall of the uterus. If implantation does not occur, development will not continue and the embryo will be discarded. If implantation does occur, normal gestation will typically follow. ..... In the past, various points during gestation have been proposed as the time when life begins. In the 19th century, "quickening," the first occurrence of detectable movement by the fetus, was used as one such indicator. More recently, "viability" has become popular. Viability is defined as that point when the fetus has a reasonable probability of survival if it is prematurely removed from the womb. Some people continue to use live birth as the time when life should be considered to begin. But, the fact is, birth itself is nothing more than a trivial change in life support for the developing individual. Development proceeds as a totally predictable, continuous process from implantation into adulthood. ..... Yet, no matter what point in the developmental process you might select as the time when life begins, each is just a biological event. We're looking for something more. We're looking for an indication that one particular event can be logically associated with the acquisition of the attributes that identify the Image of God. So, let's revisit the process and see what it can tell us about what we're looking for. ..... Fertilization is the event most often identified as the "beginning of life" by individuals who view life issues as critically important. There are, however, very compelling reasons to conclude that the union of the sperm and the egg cannot be the event we are looking for. The first of these is that it just doesn't make good sense. Certainly, conception marks the beginning of development. But, what can there possibly be about this event that could qualify it as the time when God uniquely invests his image in the resulting entity? Before fertilization occurs, the egg is just a cell. Similarly, the sperm is only a cell--a specialized, but unremarkable cell, like all of those from other tissues in the body. ..... The sperm and the egg, when they are released from the tissues that produce them, have no special status to set them apart as the antecessors of the Image of God. The vast majority of those that are produced simply die and are discarded. So, if fertilization is the event God uses to invest the new being with his image, then it would have to be associated with the act of fertilization itself and not with any special properties of the cells involved. If this were the case, however, then God would have to intervene personally each time a new individual was conceived. This I reject totally. God is not a tinkerer. Certainly, he intervenes in human lives--most often mysteriously--but he doesn't tinker. Tinkering is not nifty. Just as he created the universe by being nifty, we should expect him to accomplish this task the same way. ..... There is yet another reason that I reject fertilization as the beginning of human life in God's image. This reason has to do with the poor efficiency with which new embryos implant. As it turns out, implantation is a very chancy process. Viable blastocysts fail to implant almost half the time. Thus, if these embryos were already in the image of God (having been assumed as such since their conception), then half of God's tinkering would always be for naught. That is really not nifty. ..... Human embryonic development is consistently predictable and continuous only after implantation. So we need to take a close look at the moment of implantation and consider the possibility that this is the time the new human individual becomes the Image of God. How might that be accomplished without requiring the Creator to tinker? That's easy. Just consider what it is--in addition to the ability to reason and to admire the setting sun--that God wants us to be equipped for when he grants us the gift of his image. It is relationship. The quality that makes us human, equally as much as anything else, is the desire and the ability for relationship--with God and with one another. So, when is the first time the human embryo has an opportunity for relationship? At implantation. And with whom is that relationship established? With that current bearer of His Image whom God has given responsibility for nurturing it...the mother. At the instant of implantation, a bond--physical, emotional...and spiritual--is formed between the embryo and the mother, a bond that clearly transcends all other kinds of human relationships. No better time--and no better surrogate--could be found for investing the new life with the Image of God...and, to accomplish it without tinkering. So, just as God waited until the first humans were capable of relationship before he invested them with his image, so he also waits till the embryo is assured of the capability for relationship--at implantation--before he permits it to begin to bear his image. Now, that's nifty. ..... In a later chapter, we will consider some of the practical and ethical issues that this conclusion stirs up. Now, we need to continue our mission to determine how our first human ancestor(s) became the Image of God. As we trace our way back in time the 50 thousand years to when it happened, however, we need to stop and look at an event that occurred about two thousand years ago. ..... I don't pretend to understand what happened when the angel Gabriel visited Mary, the mother of Jesus, and announced that she would become pregnant without being inseminated, and bear the incarnate Son of God. As the angel said, "Nothing is impossible with God." But I do think it should at least be pointed out that this is an instance, recorded in scripture, in which a female (without any significant male participation) became the conduit for passing unique spiritual attributes into a subsequent generation. ..... So, how do we use all of this information to make some judgements about the first human to be invested with the Image of God 50 thousand years ago? Clearly, it suggests that the human race as we know it today could have begun with a single female, touched by The Creator to bear his image, and to perpetuate that image into future generations. There may have been more than one. We'll never know for sure. But, no one else was needed. She had to be inseminated by a male, of course, but that male was simply a source of sperm--the same role that males of the species continue to play today. Her offspring would be the Image of God because she was the Image of God, nurturing them as embryos in an intimate gestational relationship and passing on the image in the process. ..... Of course, all of this is pure speculation, and it certainly plays havoc with what a literal interpretation of the biblical account tells us about how the human race came into being. Yet, what nature tells us about itself cannot be simply ignored, so I find myself compelled to speculate in the hope that my speculations will continue to provide new and better ways to give greater glory to The Creator. Meanwhile, I cannot ignore what has been revealed to us in the scriptures. It remains a delicate balance. Nowhere is that balance more delicate than in the story of what transpired in the Garden of Eden.
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