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Immaculate Conception Major Seminary

Graduate School of Theology
Aidref R. Ronquillo Creation and Sin
Theology I Fr. Kent Andrew E. Apeña, MA

Chapter II: The Story of Creation

(Light which Dims the Stars: A Christian Theology of Creation | Colm McKeating)

Summary

The Importance of Story

Stories indeed play a vital role in the course of human life. It allows widening our
horizon through a deepened imagination and taking grasp of the reality. As we grow up and
being introduced to different stories, we are also being faced to an exploration of the drama of
human life that is why it has become a familiar attraction in us to be interested in knowing things
through its story. By it we are brought to further knowledge and understanding of reality as we
sift through to its roots, meaning and context.
Science, on the other hand, brings us closer to being rational in explaining things but the
Greek saw the wisdom of having more than the rational by having a concrete vision and
imagination that will give substance and value to our lives. The logos (reason) has to be
complemented by mythos (story) as we can see in the Ancient History, while having
Philosophers like Plato and Aristotle also comes the stories of Hesiod and Homer. Stories lead us
to mystery, a fact that it is appealing to us.
Myth as a part of the Ancient world has become a means of handing down wisdom from
generation to the next. In itself, it helped in preserving the essential truths of human existence.
More than entertainment and leisure for readers, it holds the purpose in disclosing the roots and
origins of peoples. Through it, the cultural identities of communities are being preserved.
Seeing from this perspective, as “myths” are being used today as false and delusory. This
kind of treatment of myth is coming from the modern world’s cultural climate in which the
empirical and the factual- products of the logos- seem to be all that counts. But they have
forgotten the central role, which it plays in better understanding reality. Hence, Mary Midgley
saying, “Myths are not lies. Nor they are detached stories. They are imaginative patterns,
networks of powerful symbols that suggest particular ways of interpreting the world.”
Having the fact that myth is not a history in the strict sense however leads us to that fact
that myths and history directs us to the same goal, that is, to tell us the truth about things. Thus
Thomas Mann pointing out those myths is a story, which tells us about “things that never were
but always are.” Hence we call Genesis 1-11 as primeval history and not simply mythology. It
points us to intense and real truth at the origin of existence. The story of creation and the
primeval beginnings as told in Genesis are in the form of religious myths.
In the book of Genesis, as an introduction, the book presents us stories from the
beginning of things leading to Joseph saga and the migration to Egypt in order t o provide and
prepare us for the inauguration of God’s chosen people. The book hence gives us the foundation
event of Israel in the Mosaic covenant. Thus, we are given the religious understanding of the
God of the Covenant and the being’s place in the world.
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Seeing the place of creation in the faith of Israel has brought some thinkers in division
taking into consideration that disparity between nature and history. Distinctions came from the
effects of the Enlightenment in bringing it into separate categories used in biblical interpretation.
But the question primarily accounts whether Israel’s belief in creation was dependent or
independent of the historical experience of the Covenant.
But in all these speculation, one suspects that the case for history as a model of revelation
is being somewhat overstated at the expense of God’s revelation through the book of nature. As a
balance to this emphasis on history, it is important to note that the Old Testament belief in
creation should not be regarded merely as background, a stage or a platform on which the dram
of salvation takes place.

The Creation Stories in Genesis

Taking from this queue, reading the Bible should not be taken like any other literary
books available everywhere. It must be understood that is comprised of traditions that also must
be read in the light of faith and not literally. Thus, the origin of Israel’s belief whether dependent
or independent on the historical event of liberation from Egypt, it then must be understood that
creation is inevitably sealed and marked by the Covenant of God. The stories of Genesis thus
give us the logical place to begin the story of God’s relation with the world though it was not the
historical or real starting point of Israel’s faith. In interpreting Genesis 1-11, an analysis of the
materials is to be sought. In the form of narrative and genealogies, it can be better seen the link
between the stories that marks out the pattern given by various stories.
In the Yahwist account of creation (Gn 2:4b-25), the authors points us that it is fitting to
remind Israel of its inherent weakness and sinfulness, to offer the proverbial message that pride
comes before a fall. The story being filled with realism makes aware of the potential of human
weakness to reject the Creator. The accounts give also the history and covenant experience of
Israel. While in Priestly tradition, the creation story is set during shortly after the Babylonian
exile. This creation story is certainly not a “creation myth” but rather a form of instruction given
by the priestly class on the basic creeds of belief.
Meanwhile, there has been an attempt to harmonize the Genesis account with that of
Science, however it was misguided. Matching the two is impossible for the authors of the books
knows no about science, they had no idea of how the world began other than to say that it was
created by God-hardly what one could call a scientific statement.

Creation and Intelligent Design

One of the notorious attempts in harmonizing Genesis with modern science is the
doctrine of Creationism. It was a thinking trying to disguise as science something, which is really
a religious belief, believing that God created the world in six days as the Bible says. The other
movement was that of the Intelligent design that has been described by M. Ruthven as “a thinly
disguised version of creationism that appears to be more scientific.
Addressing the science-religion dialogue, the late Pope John Paul II proposes this fitting
conclusion: “Science can purify religion from error and superstitions; religion can purify science
from idolatry and false belief- absolutes. Each can draw the other into a wider world, a world in
which both can flourish.”
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The Universe Story

In the work of B. Swimme and T. Berry, The Story of the Universe, allows us through the
stories to unfold the cosmos. The dialogue between science and religion has come to have its
place by having the importance of interrelating the two. By telling a story, we got to understand
appropriately the dialogue between the two. It answers then the human identity in forms of the
narratives. As for Paul Ricoeur and others, it is only with the unfolding of time that we learn
about who we are. The history recounts our identity through the mediation of the stories. The
universe and ours so to speak finds its understanding on how it has evolved.
Therefore it would seem that the scientific story offers the ample of reference in
understanding our world. Through this it gives a sense of belongingness to the cosmos as a
dynamic world in the making and not just a product of static creature. The ongoing process gives
as a share of being part of creation. Thus, the new scientific narrative rather than the traditional
Genesis story is thought to be a more adequate outline for understanding creation.
By an article Matthew Ashley, he comprehensively assessed The Universe Story. He
accounts it to give a good image of the origins and evolutions of the cosmos. Transcending all
cultural and religious differences, the story has the authority above all other. Individual or
particular religious stories f creation should then be read and interpreted in the light scientific
Universe Story.
He also gives to us the danger of any model that presents itself as giving the whole
picture. By the effect of postmodernism, where we are made skeptical of all forms of the grand
narrative allows us hence to have its positive contribution in this stance. This then allows us to be
more cautious at all times in taking different worldviews. He further explains the idealism of the
Universe Story particularly by taking the Neolithic village as the idealized stage in which all
created things were at home with one another. He then asserts that Berry has an over-optimistic
view of modern science in believing that, now that it has got beyond a mechanistic view of
nature, it bears the great promise of being able to incorporate the mystical with the physical
world, a vision he inherited from Teilhard de Chardin.
In the latter of his assessment, he saw two major lacking of the story that are the
addressing the question of suffering in the world and the need to have some form of self-
correcting mechanism in each narrative.

The Creation Theology of Genesis 1-11

The intention of the stories found in the book of Genesis direct us to achieve a number of
vital functions. It places the human origin and meaning within a cosmic order. The said stories
are meant to answer existential questions about the human circumstance rather than elaborated
and idealistic view of the world’s beginnings. It gives a secured explanation amidst the
threatened world.
More so, the stories give us a pattern on better understanding the human behavior and
their relationship and means of extending oneself towards another, offers us structures of
integration and creativity. Tracing back to the ancient time, it was the same mode that was used
in telling the basic truths of existence and of celebrating one’s identity.
And to give a summary on the idea of creation involves the words of Ian Barbour,
profound human experiences such as (a) “a sense of dependence, finitude and contingency; (b) a
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response of wonder, trust, and gratitude for life and affirmation f the world; and (c) the
recognition of interdependence among all living things, a sense of order and of beauty in the
world.”

Reflection

God cannot be outdone with His goodness. In the language of his love for humanity, he
cannot be exhausted of all the means to make Himself known to us at the expense of His own
initiative. His revelation of self is done in the name of true humility and acceptance of our finite
capacity. This reality absorbs the inevitable reality of our eternal debt for God’s never-ending
goodness and greatness for humanity amidst our inconsistencies and ingratitude.
The story of creation in the Book of Genesis allows me to captivate the magnificence of
God’s power in my own capacity of reception. The veracity of stories presented in the book is no
longer a big deal in sifting through the meaning and purpose of its writing, what it gives me now
is the undefiled reality of his will to reach out to us. He uses all means to make himself available
in our finiteness. All these were because of love. It is and will always be love as the generator of
all the possibilities that will make Himself reach our wretched humanity. No brilliant mind could
ever define and transcend the explicit causes and reason of human existence, by God’s grace
everything stands possible.