Ongoing discussions concerning Adam and Eve have intensified among Evangelicals over the past decade, with many scholars either abandoning historical claims or proposing novel but unusual solutions to maintain historicity in some form. Here we explore six forms of cultural artifacts from the paleoanthropological record that we believe are evidence of advanced cognition and indicative of true humanity: the controlled use of fire, the manufacture of advanced tools, the crafting of objects reflecting artistic creativity, care for the wounded or elderly, intentional burial of the dead, and complex behaviors associated with dispersal or exploration. Our evaluation assigns human status to Denisovans, Neandertals, H. erectus, H. heidelbergensis, H. floresiensis, H. naledi, probable human status to H. antecessor, H. luzonensis, and H. longi, provisional human status to “Early Homo” (H. habilis and H. rudolfensis), and uncertain status to Au. sediba. These assignments are in broad agreement with the work of other young-age creationists, particularly in the affirmation of human status among the “Lubenow core humans” (H. sapiens, Neandertals, and H. erectus). The historical setting of these remains is post-Flood on the basis of geological indicators, evidence of in situ habitation, and the provenance of source rocks employed as tools. Furthermore, given the universal perspective presented in Genesis 11, the dispersal of humans most likely occurs post-Babel. When considering the genetic distinctiveness of Neandertals and Denisovans, coupled with the geographic and stratigraphic occurrences of the taxa which show evidence of advanced cognition (and thus reflective of the Image of God), we expect that the earliest post-Flood migrants would display a high degree of morphological variability. The H. erectus site at Dmanisi, Republic of Georgia, may present a snapshot of just such a group of early post-Flood humans. ABSTRACT I. INTRODUCTION In 2010, a quartet of papers published in Perspectives on Science and the Christian Faith launched an ongoing debate among evangelical Christians, namely to what extent should we or can we modify or abandon the traditional belief in a real, personal, historical Adam? Where C. John Collins (2010) argued in favor of retaining some form of historical Adam, Dennis Venema (2010), Daniel Harlow (2010), and John Schneider (2010) argued against it or explored theological ways of leaving Adam behind. Bolstered by a resurgence of theistic evolution thanks in part to Francis Collins’s The Language of God (2006), these papers sparked a debate that continues to this day (e.g., Barrett and Caneday 2013, Mortenson 2016, Howe 2022, Luskin 2023), most of which is conducted with the implicit assumption that the details of the straightforward story of Genesis 2-4 cannot be taken seriously, and so Adam—if he actually existed—must be reimagined in significant ways. Long gone was the innocence of Adam and Eve naked in the garden. In its place came talk of tribal leaders called by God (e.g., Collins 2010), human and human-like beings living beyond Eden (e.g., Walton 2015), and peculiarities of genetics that allow more recent genealogical ancestors to exist undetected within a much older genomic family tree (Loke 2022; Swamidass 2019). Some have stipulated that Adam might live in a much deeper past and among a species different from Homo sapiens (Craig, 2021; Stone 2014). Others simply assert that Adam as the first human never really existed at all (Lamoureaux 2008, 2013). Implicit (and sometimes explicit) to all of these conversations is the conviction that whatever the answer was, it could not possibly be young age creationism. In the judgment of Peter Enns, One cannot read Genesis literally—meaning as a literally accurate description of physical, historical reality—in view of the state of scientific knowledge today and our knowledge of ancient Near Eastern stories of origins. Those who read Genesis literally must either ignore evidence completely or present alternate “theories” in order to maintain spiritual stability (Enns 2012, p. 137). The justification for this attitude is complex, as Enns notes, involving judgments about the origin of the biblical text, the proper issues of theological importance, as well as discoveries in the archaeology and history of the ancient Near East, all of which would take a library of books to fully address. Here, we want to examine just one aspect of this question: What is young age creationism’s “alternate ‘theory’” of human origins, and is it any good? Despite Enns’s apparent dismissal, constant evaluation of competing theories is the lifeblood of science, and many such theories, especially in the field of paleoanthropology, are constructed on the unstable Marcus R. Ross, Cornerstone Educational Supply, 515 Alleghany Ave., Lynchburg, VA 24501, m.ross@cornerstone-edsupply.com PS Brummel, and Todd Charles Wood, Core Academy of Science, P.O. Box 1076 Dayton, TN 37321 USA, peter_brummel@ yahoo.com, toddcharleswood@gmail.com © Cedarville University International Conference on Creationism. The views expressed in this publication are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily represent those of Cedarville University. 9th 2023 Ross, M. R., P.S. Brummel, and T.C. Wood. 2023. Human history from Adam to Abraham: Integrating paleoanthropology with a young-age creation perspective In J.H. Whitmore (editor), Proceedings of the Ninth International Conference on Creationism, pp. 66-87. Cedarville, Ohio: Cedarville University International Conference on Creationism. HUMAN HISTORY FROM ADAM TO ABRAHAM: INTEGRATING PALEOANTHROPOLOGY WITH A YOUNG-AGE CREATION PERSPECTIVE KEYWORDS paleoanthropology, hominin fossils, young age creationism, historical Adam, Tower of Babel
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