Barth on creatio ex nihilo

It is sometimes debated whether science and Genesis 1 is consistent with the Christian doctrine of creatio ex nihilo [creation out of nothing].

I found it interesting to see what Karl Barth says in the context of his exegesis of Genesis

It is clear enough that there is a chaos; that creation is "somehow" related to it; that it plays its part even in the later history which begins with creation; and that there too there are definite encounters between it and God. But there is no such thing as a "reality of chaos" independently confronting the Creator and His works, and able in its own power as matter or a hostile principle to oppose His operations. 

It may well be that the concept of a creatio ex nihilo, of which there is no actual hint in Gen. 1-2, is the construct of later attempts at more precise formulation. But its antithesis - the mythological acceptance of a primeval reality independent of God - is excluded in practice by the general tenor of the passage as well as its position within the biblical context.

Karl Barth, Church Dogmatics 3.1: The Doctrine of Creation, page 103.

Hence, Barth argues that creatio ex nihilo is not explicitly supported by Genesis. However, he stresses that Genesis stands in conflict with its antithesis.

What would John Wesley think?

Protestant church schools in Australia are a complex and "fascinating" phenomena. Many of the older ones are extremely wealthy, charge high fees (of the order of $20,000 per year for tuition), and have high-flying corporate figures on their boards.
What I did not know until recently was the extra-ordinary renumeration packages of some principals (heads of school).

There has been considerable media coverage about the recent sacking of the principal of Methodist Ladies College in Melbourne. This arose due to conflict over alleged discrepancies of payments of the renumeration. This past weekend School for Scandal was the cover story of the Weekend Australian Magazine which describes all the intrigue and conflict in more detail than you probably want to know.

I have no interest or comment on the justice of the dismissal.
The questions no-one is even asking is

Is it appropriate that the head of a church school should be paid more than half a million dollars per year? 

What does this say about the values of the head and the school board? 

According to the Weekend Australian article, "parents launched a Rosa Storelli Fairness page on Facebook, where an anonymous supporter of the board used the pseudonym "John Wesley" to counter their claims."

I find this ironic and tragic given the frugal and humble lifestyle of John Wesley.

Is scientific knowledge forbidden fruit?

An interesting and important question about Genesis and the "tree of the knowledge of good and evil" concerns what is the nature of this knowledge?

Here is Karl Barth's commentary:

What does "knowledge of good and evil" mean? The expression is obviously too concrete to allow us to accept the interpretation of Wellhausen (Prolegomena, p. 300 f., etc.) that its reference is to science and our general knowledge of things. Indeed, if this were so, it would be impossible to see why God should prohibit this to man and thus prohibit progress from childish ignorance to culture, or why the saga should regard this progress as deadly. For this reason other writers (e.g., Delitzsch) have thought in terms of the problem of progress from childish innocence to moral decision. Knowledge of good and evil characterises intellectual maturity and moral decision.

Church Dogmatics 3.1, The Doctrine of Creation, p. 285

I found Julius Wellhausen's perspective intriguing (and ultimately misplaced), particularly because he is best known as the first main proponent of the Documentary Hypothesis.
To me equating this "knowledge" with modern academic knowledge is just reading into the text modern (particular German modernist academic) preconceptions and concerns. Wellhausen's view reflects poorly on his scholarship.

So what does Barth himself think?
He first emphasises how ones view should be shaped by other Old Testament passages about "good and evil". After a survey he concludes

The question frequently raised whether we are to understand by "good and evil" what is morally right and wrong, or useful and useless, or pleasant and unpleasant, cannot be answered as though these were alternatives. The Old Testament concepts of tobh and ra' embrace all these things in the instances adduced. To know good and evil is to know right and wrong, salvation and perdition, life and death; and to know them is to have power over them and therefore over all things. The Genesis saga in its account of the fall, and in agreement with the rest of the Old Testament, undoubtedly tells us that man has seized this knowledge and power to his own undoing, and that he must now live in the possession of this knowledge and power.

Church Dogmatics 3.1, The Doctrine of Creation, p. 287

A distortion of vocational calling

My son and I are just finishing reading Just Do Something by Kevin DeYoung. I thought the following paragraph in was quite insightful about work and careers.

Unfortunately, we’ve turned the idea of calling or vocation on its head. The Reformers emphasized calling in order to break down the sacred-secular divide. They said, if you are working for the glory of God, you are doing the Lord’s work, no matter whether you’re a priest or a monk or a banker. But we’ve taken this notion of calling and turned it upside down, so instead of finding purpose in every kind of work, we are madly looking for the one job that will fulfill our purpose in life. 

(p. 103)

A vacuous legacy for theology

The notion of a vacuum (i.e. empty space) is an important concept in physics.

Today I learnt (from an article in the American Physical Society News) that the word vacuum first entered the English language in a theological treatise written by Thomas Cranmer in 1550.

Thus it is evident and plain, by the words of the Scripture, that after consecration remaineth bread and wine, and that the Papistical doctrine of Transubstantiation is directly contrary to God's word....
Natural reason abhorreth vacuum, that is to say, that there should be any empty place, wherein no substance should be. But if there remain no bread nor wine, the place where they were before, and where their accidents be, is filled with no substance, but remaineth vacuum, clean contrary to the order of nature.

"A Defence of the true and Catholick doctrine of the Sacrament of the body and blood of our Saviour Christ : with a confutation of Sundry errors concerning the same"

I think Cranmer's theology was correct. But, clearly his science was wrong. Physical vacuums can and do exist. Perhaps, another caution from history about the dangers of theologians and preachers pontificating about science (pun intended!).

Augustine on science

Given that he lived, more than a millenium before the rise of modern science I would have thought that Augustine would not have not had much to say about science or the relationship of science and Christianity.
However, I recently learnt this was not the case and that he had some important, perhaps timeless, insights. Even in his time there were some who conflated their theology with some scientific "theory".
Here is one quote, brought to my attention by Luke Glanville.

Whenever I hear a brother Christian talk in such a way as to show that he is ignorant of these scientific matters and confuses one thing with another, I listen with patience to his theories and think it no harm to him provided that he holds no beliefs unworthy of you, O Lord, who are the Creator of them all. The danger lies in thinking that such knowledge is part and parcel of what he must believe to save his soul and in presuming to make obstinate declarations about things of which he knows nothing. 

Augustine, Confessions, Book V, page 96.

The context is nicely discussed in a post on Eureka Street by Andrew Hamilton. Prior to becoming a Christian Augustine was engrossed in Manichaeism but became intellectually  dissatisfied with the elaborate and unjustified astrology associated with it. 

An annotated bibliography on natural science, evolution and creation

David Ussery is an Associate Professor of Systems Biology at the Danish Technical University. He is a Christian, with a fundamentalist church background, who eventually rejected the young earth creationism he was brought up with.

Between 1988 and 2001 he compiled an annotated bibliography of 386 books on Natural science, evolution, and creationism. By 2001 he had actually read 187 of the books, which is rather impressive.
He has written a fascinating journal describing his background, thoughts on reading some of the books, and debates with young earth creationists.

The books cover a wide range of topics, perspectives (Christian and non-Christian, liberal and conservative), publication dates, and theological and scientific sophistication.
The bibliography is worth at least scanning. Some of the terse comments are quite insightful. It makes one appreciate the incredibly diverse literature which is available and often overlooked.

Finally, on the Biologos Forum Ussery has a critical and helpful review of Michael Behe's book The Edge of Evolution.