Is "Creatio Ex Nihilo" A Post-Biblical Invention? An Examination Of Gerhard May’s Proposal -- By: Paul Copan

Journal: Trinity Journal
Volume: TRINJ 17:1 (Spring 1996)
Article: Is "Creatio Ex Nihilo" A Post-Biblical Invention? An Examination Of Gerhard May’s Proposal
Author: Paul Copan


Is Creatio Ex Nihilo A Post-Biblical Invention?
An Examination Of Gerhard May’s Proposal

Paul Copan*

“Let this, then, be maintained in the first place, that the world is not eternal, but was created by God.”

—John Calvin, Genesis

I. Introduction

The noted philosopher of science Ian Barbour has boldly declared, “Creation ‘out of nothing’ is not a biblical concept.”1 Rather, so he claims, the doctrine was merely a post-biblical development to defend God’s goodness and absolute sovereignty over the world against “Gnostic ideas regarding matter as evil or as the product of an inferior deity.”2 Furthermore, in Barbour’s view, the Bible is not simply ambiguous about the nature of God’s relationship to creation but actually asserts that God created from pre-existent materials:

Genesis portrays the creation of order from chaos, and … the ex nihilo doctrine was formulated later by the church fathers to defend theism against an ultimate dualism or a monistic pantheism. We

* Paul Copan is a Ph.D. student at Marquette University in Milwaukee, Wisconsin.

still need to defend theism against alternative philosophies, but we can do so without reference to an absolute beginning.3

Now if it can continue to be shown that the Big Bang is the most convincing scientific theory, Barbour states, “the theist can indeed see it as an instant of divine origination.” However, the doctrine of creatio ex nihilo is not theologically necessary: “this is not the main concern expressed in the religious notion of creation.”4

Along similar lines, Arthur Peacocke in his 1978 Bampton Lectures asserted that “the Judeo-Christian doctrine of creation” only implies that the world owes its existence to God, which would not contradict science were it to discover that the cosmos is eternal.5 So the doctrine of creatio ex nihilo is of marginal theological significance for Peacocke as well. Instead, both he and Barbour emphasize preservation in God’s creation of the universe rather than its temporal beginning.

Langdon Gilkey, whose Maker of Heaven and Earth has significantly influenced Barbour and Peacocke, loosely outlines what he believes the Christian doctrine of creation of out nothing is: (1) God is the source of all that there is; (2) creatures are dependent, yet r...

You must have a subscription and be logged in to read the entire article.
Click here to subscribe
visitor : : uid: ()