In Genesis,
the
Torah (the five books of the Bible) describes a gradual process
of creation from simple to more complex organisms: first a mass
of swirling gasses, then water, then the emergence of dry land,
followed by plants, fish, birds, animals, and finally, human
beings. This, of course, is the same evolutionary process proposed
by science.
But didn't the evolutionary process take much longer than
the six days of creation?
In reading the story, you might observe that the Torah describes
a "day" before the creation of the sun and moon
to demarcate a 24-hour period. So what kind of "day"
is it? Rabbi S.Hirsch explains that each Biblical "day"
represents a mingling of raw materials (erev), followed by
bursts of dramatic new development (boker).
The six days are simply six epochs, stages of the process.
This has been the Jewish view for centuries.
The Torah's position has not changed; rather science has come
to match it. Arnold Penzias, who was awarded the Nobel Prize
for his research on the Big Bang, once remarked: "What
we see marking the flight of galaxies with our telescopes,
Maimonides saw from his metaphysical view." There is
one key point where Torah and evolutionists diverge: the question
of "accident versus design."
Evolutionists say that life happened by accident; Judaism
says that God made it happen.
What is the possibility that life and all the wonders of nature
accidentally occurred?
According to Yale Physicist Harold Morowitz, the accidental
formation of life necessitates precise bio-molecular activity
at every step - small organic compounds must accumulate, biological
polymers must form, proto-cells must arise, and a genetic
and protein-synthesizing system must evolve.
Dr. I. Prigogine, recipient of two Nobel prizes in chemistry,
spells out the bottom line:
"The statistical probability that organic structures
and the most precisely harmonized reactions that typify living
organisms would be generated by accident is zero."
Sir Fred Hoyle, the distinguished astronomer, writes:
"The trouble is there are about 2000 enzymes, and the
chance of obtaining them all in a random trial is only one
part in 10 to the 40,000 power (10 with 40,000 zeros after
it), an outrageously small probability that could not be faced
even if the whole universe consisted of organic soup."
Hoyle concludes: "No matter how large the environment
one considers, life cannot have had a random beginning. Troops
of monkeys thundering away at random on typewriters could
not produce the works of Shakespeare - for the practical reason
that the whole observable universe is not large enough to
contain the necessary monkey hordes, the necessary typewriters,
and certainly the waste paper baskets for the deposition of
wrong attempts.
"The same is true for living material"
Believers in the theory of evolution must accept the idea
that in thousands of examples throughout nature, two independent
lines of mutations occurred in the same random way at each
of 500 steps of development. With one million potential choices
at each step (and even if only 100 of the 500 choices needed
to be the same), the odds against success would be one in
10 to the 600th power.
And this is only for one simple transition!
For a complicated organ such as a wing or a kidney or an eye,
the probability against such an accident would increase by
the billions.
Darwin himself wrote in The Origin of Species:
"…If it could be demonstrated that any complex
organ existed which could not possibly have been formed by
numerous, successive, slight modifications - my theory would
absolutely break down…"
Consider the Bombardier Beetle, a little bug equipped with
a chamber of hydroginine and a second chamber of hydrogen
peroxide. When combined, these two chemicals are explosive
- but a mechanism inside the beetle keeps them separate. However,
when provoked by an enemy, the beetle heats the chemicals
to the boiling point and squeezes them into a reaction chamber
to undergo a combustion process like igniting a rocket engine.
From here the explosive material streams out of the beetle
at a rate of 1,000 pulses per second. (Pulses, rather than
a continuous stream, give the beetle a chance to cool itself.)
The poisonous fuel is expelled through a nozzle which, much
like the turret of a tank, can rotate in any direction, under
the legs or over the back. The enemy is poisoned, the beetle
is saved!
So the questions immediately spring to mind:
1) Which came first: the hydroginine or the hydrogen peroxide?
- One without the other is useless.
2) Which came first: the chemicals, or the independent chambers
separating them?
- One without the other is useless.
3) Which came first: the chemicals, or the shooting mechanism?
- One without the other is useless.
The human eye is another example of coordinated evolution.
If the cornea is fuzzy, or the pupil fails to dilate, or the
lens becomes opaque, or the focusing goes wrong - then a recognizable
image is not formed. The eye either functions as a whole,
or not at all.
Could this all possibly have evolved by slow, steady, infinitesimally
small Darwinian mutations?
In a private letter, Darwin expressed anxiety over what he
called "organs of extreme perfection," and admitted
that "the eye, to this day, gives me a cold shudder."
(Life and Letters of Charles Darwin, London, 1888, Vol. 2,
p. 273)
So what difference does it make how this all came about anyhow?
The difference is simple yet profound: If world is accident,
then I am too. And if I'm an accident, what would be the difference
between a sick fly and me, in addition there will be no purpose
to my creation. Life is random, not meaningful.
If I am just a random collection of molecules, should I have
any more respect for a human being than I do for a dog? Should
I save my drowning dog or the drowning stranger? Is it then
acceptable to label a race of people sub-human and to enslave
or kill them all?
The Torah says that God blew into Adam a spiritual soul (Genesis
2:7). Man is not just a smart monkey. Man is a qualitatively
different creation. This "spiritual consciousness"
separates man from all other creatures, enabling us to sanctify
life and get close to God
