PRESENTATION OUTLINE
Evolution is the Theory that explains certain observable phenomena by suggesting that gene differentiation happens naturally over time.
evidence for evolution
- Fossils - Many animals that have existed, no longer exist.
- Homologous Structures - Forearms, flippers & wings have the same skeletal sturcutes.
- Biogeography - Marsupials are grouped in Australia.
- Direct Observation - Mosquitos became resistant to DDT.
In the mid-19th century, Charles Darwin formulated the scientific theory of evolution by natural selection, published in his book "On the Origin of Species" (1859).
Design
- בְּרֵאשִׁית, בָּרָא אֱלֹהִים, אֵת הַשָּׁמַיִם, וְאֵת הָאָרֶץ.
- וַיֹּאמֶר אֱלֹהִים--יִשְׁרְצוּ הַמַּיִם, שֶׁרֶץ נֶפֶשׁ חַיָּה; וְעוֹף יְעוֹפֵף עַל-הָאָרֶץ, עַל-פְּנֵי רְקִיעַ הַשָּׁמָיִם. כא וַיִּבְרָא אֱלֹהִים, אֶת-הַתַּנִּינִם הַגְּדֹלִים; וְאֵת כָּל-נֶפֶשׁ הַחַיָּה הָרֹמֶשֶׂת אֲשֶׁר שָׁרְצוּ הַמַּיִם לְמִינֵהֶם, וְאֵת כָּל-עוֹף כָּנָף לְמִינֵהוּ, וַיַּרְא אֱלֹהִים, כִּי-טוֹב. כב וַיְבָרֶךְ אֹתָם אֱלֹהִים, לֵאמֹר: פְּרוּ וּרְבוּ, וּמִלְאוּ אֶת-הַמַּיִם בַּיַּמִּים, וְהָעוֹף, יִרֶב בָּאָרֶץ. כג וַיְהִי-עֶרֶב וַיְהִי-בֹקֶר, יוֹם חֲמִישִׁי.
Purpose of Man
- וַיֹּאמֶר אֱלֹהִים, נַעֲשֶׂה אָדָם בְּצַלְמֵנוּ כִּדְמוּתֵנוּ; וְיִרְדּוּ בִדְגַת הַיָּם וּבְעוֹף הַשָּׁמַיִם, וּבַבְּהֵמָה וּבְכָל-הָאָרֶץ, וּבְכָל-הָרֶמֶשׂ, הָרֹמֵשׂ עַל-הָאָרֶץ. כז וַיִּבְרָא אֱלֹהִים אֶת-הָאָדָם בְּצַלְמוֹ, בְּצֶלֶם אֱלֹהִים בָּרָא אֹתוֹ: זָכָר וּנְקֵבָה, בָּרָא אֹתָם.
Age of the Universe
- כִּי שֵׁשֶׁת-יָמִים עָשָׂה ה׳ אֶת-הַשָּׁמַיִם וְאֶת-הָאָרֶץ, אֶת-הַיָּם וְאֶת-כָּל-אֲשֶׁר-בָּם, וַיָּנַח, בַּיּוֹם הַשְּׁבִיעִי;
THE REAL PROBLEM
The Atheism Agenda
Rabbi Avigdor Miller
- Scientists project an “effort to ignore the Creator.”
- Scientists “disbelieve in Free Will and the concomitant concept of right and wrong.”
- "Evolution has become a religion” refusing “...to acknowledge the open evidence that the Creator made the Universe.”
- Science is in constant flux.
The lubavitcher rebbe
- In 1961: “If you are still troubled by the theory of evolution, I can tell you without fear of contradiction that it has not a shred of evidence to support it.”
- “G-d created ready fossils […] without any evolutionary process.”
- “Science cannot operate except by accepting certain working theories or hypotheses, even if they cannot be verified.”
RABBI SAMSON RAFAEL HIRSCH
"Our rabbis, the Sages of Judaism, discuss (Bereshit Rabbah 9:2, Hagigah 16a) the possibility that earlier worlds were brought into existence and subsequently destroyed by the Creator before He made our own earth in its present form and order."
Even if the latest scientific notion that the genesis of all the multitude of organic forms on earth can be traced back to one single, most primitive, primeval form of life, . . . were ever to gain complete acceptance by the scientific world . . . Judaism in that case would call upon its adherents to give even greater reverence than ever before to the one, sole God, who, in his boundless creative wisdom and eternal omnipotence, needed to bring into existence no more than one single, amorphous nucleus and one single law of adaptation and heredity in order to bring forth from what seemed chaos but was in fact a very definite order. . . .
DR. GERALD SCHROEDER
We look back in time, and say the universe is 15 billion years old. But as every scientist knows, when we say the universe is 15 billion years old, there's another half of the sentence that we rarely bother to say. The other half of the sentence is: The universe is 15 billion years old as seen from the time-space coordinates of the earth.
...Darwin himself, at seven locations in The Origin of Species, urged the reader to ignore the fossil record if he or she wanted to believe his theory. Abrupt morphological changes are contrary to Darwin's oft repeated statement that nature does not make jumps. Darwin based his theory on animal husbandry rather than fossils. If in a few generations of selective breeding a farmer could produce a robust sheep from a skinny one, then, Darwin reasoned, in a few million or billion generations a sponge might evolve into an ape. The fossil record did not then nor does it now support this theory. That life developed from the simple to the complex is, in my opinion true. What drove that development is the debate: random mutations or teleology?
The British Natural History Museum in London had an entire wing devoted to the evolution of species. And what evolution do they demonstrate? Pink daisies evolving into blue daisies; small dogs evolving into big dogs; a few species of cichlid fish evolving in a mere few thousand years into a dozen species of cichlid fish. Very impressive. Until you realize that the daisies remained daisies, the dogs remained dogs and the cichlid fish remained cichlid. It is called micro-evolution. This magnificent museum, with all its resources, could not produce a single example of one phylum evolving into another. It is the mechanisms of macro-evolution, the change of one phylum or class of animal into another that has been called into question by these data.
RABBI YOSEF DOV SOLOVEITCHIK
“I have never been seriously troubled by the problem of the Biblical doctrine of creation vis-à-vis the scientific story of evolution at both the cosmic and organic levels, nor have I been perturbed by the confrontation of the mechanistic interpretation of the human mind with the Biblical spiritual concept of man. [...] However, while theoretical oppositions and dichotomies have never tormented my thoughts, I could not shake off the disquieting feeling that the practical role of the man of faith within modern society is a very difficult […] one.”
RAV AVRAHAM YITZCHAK KOOK
"The concept of evolution, which has gained popularity in all fields due to the new understanding of nature, has made a conceptual revolution. Not in the minds of those special few masters of knowledge and thought [i.e. the kabbalists] who have always seen the order of gradual emanation even in the spiritual realm from a hidden perspective. For it is not unusual for them to understand by analogy that this is the way of physical development in the tangible world. It should be so, for [the physical world] should be in harmony with the spiritual emanation of existence, which does not miss or skip a level."
The masses were not capable of understanding evolution as a complete and inclusive idea and could not [therefore] relate it to their spiritual world. The problematic aspect, which weighs so heavily on the masses, isn’t the incompatibility of the biblical verses or of traditional texts with the idea of evolution. This type of work [of explaining the verses of Genesis or Rabbinic texts on creation] is quite easy. [After all] everyone knows that metaphors and riddles dominate these areas which are cosmic secrets. . . . But [the problem is] how to relate to the idea of evolution all of the wealth of spiritual ideas developed by the masses which are based on the idea of [creation] ex nihilo and which [was taught since it] saves the mind from floating into areas too removed from understanding. . . . This needs a great deal of the light [of pedagogical explanations].
