50 categorizing) the animals according to their unique and fixed attributes that he used to separate them according to their “kinds.” This intelligent act clearly presupposed Adam’s fundamental awareness of the rational and uniform order of creation. He intuitively understood he was a creature distinct from all the rest and that none of the others were suitable companions for him — save for Eve: “This at last is bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh” (Gen. 2:23). Marriage and the social hierarchy that it entails were not acquired habits of human evolution; rather, God created man and woman to complement and serve each other. This truth was not accidently discovered by the first human couple; it was innate to them. So, as we can see from Scripture, mankind did not start off intellectually brutish nor did the Fall reduce them to primitive cavemen; quite the contrary, Adam’s progeny very quickly established urban civilization, being skillful in farming (Cain), animal husbandry (Abel and Seth), music and metal-forming (Lamech and Tubal-cain). None of these rational activities would have been attempted apart from the crucial assumption that nature exhibits reliably consistent patterns, for why else would Cain have undertaken farming unless he knew prior to this experience that planted seeds of a certain kind will always yield produce of the same kind in due season? How could Abel have surmised from experience alone that animals always beget their kind and that selective breeding will produce a more desirable flock? How would Tubal-cain have known that metal ores from the earth would be useful, and that they could be forged into bronze and iron instruments? None of these men were forced to endure a long process of trial and error in order to learn that nature is orderly and therefore amenable to planned cultivation of her resources. Rather, the intellectual foundation for all these talents could only have come from God who first made the universe in wisdom (Prov. 3:19–20) — and then equipped man with the cognitive ability and desire to understand this rational creation so as to labor and manage it intelligently according to the Creator’s original command. Based on this biblical evidence, then, the Fall did not deprive man of his ability to reason, but it did pervert his right use of it. Man has replaced God’s authority by substituting his own, thereby making himself the ultimate judge of truth. The unbeliever will not subordinate his intellect to the authority of God’s revelation; this then forces man to be what he is not: autonomous and independent of God. Because of this, there is a logical impasse within the natural man’s worldview. On the one hand, he believes that physical nature is all there is — just matter moving
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