This is the issue with concordism (hard or soft) that Walton argues against.
Concordists of all stripes assume that The Bible wasn’t inspired simply to record salvation history, teach us how to live a godly life, and the nature of God, but they believe that, in addition to these purposes, God inspired The Bible to give us scientific truths as well. Namely that they don’t interpret The Bible’s passages about nature in their cultural, historical context. John Walton doesn’t make a distinction between hard and soft concordism because, frankly, there is a hermenuetical issue with all branches of concordism. However, soft concordists would say, for example, that if the scientific evidence establishes that the universe began to exist 14 billion years ago in an explosive like expansion event, then that beginning must be the same beginning mentioned in passages such as Genesis 1:1, John 1:3, and Colossians 1. Ross and many other concordist Christians would agree that The Bible and Science do not overlap in many different areas, such as germ theory, atomic theory, whether black holes exist, etc. While soft concordists read The Bible and try to find scientific correspondence to biblical passages in only some places. Hard Concordism tries to find a biblical passage that corresponds to all of what modern science says about the origins of the universe, earth, life, and how the solar system functions, et. I agree that there is a difference between soft concordism and hard concordism. Furthermore, by reading less into the text, believers lose out on truth that they can apply for Christian living and for Christian witness.” Either way, the Bible’s truth claims are damaged. Secularists often interpret such responses as believers conceding that Scripture cannot withstand objective testing. On the other hand, to read less into the biblical text than what the text teaches can also be a problem. Scientific and/or historical research could prove our overreaching interpretation incorrect. When we overreach, we set ourselves up for possible embarrassment and the church at large for possible ridicule. It also agrees with Walton that we must always guard ourselves from reading more into the biblical text than what the text actually warrants. RTB’s soft concordism agrees with Walton that a literalistic hermeneutic does not apply to all Bible passages. Soft concordists seek agreement between properly interpreted Scripture passages that describe some aspect of the natural realm and indisputably and well-established data in science.
Ross said “Hard concordists look to make most, but not all, discoveries, new and old, in science agree with some passage of Scripture. Ross takes Walton to task by saying that no biblical scholar, including those at Reasons To Believe, holds to concordism as defined by Walton. On page 19 of The Lost World Of Genesis 1, John Walton says this about concordism: “Concordists believe the Bible must agree–be in concord with–all the findings of contemporary science”
He goes on to say, accurately, that John Walton opposes a concordist approach to Genesis. Ross begins his article by articulating accurately (for the most part at least) the view that John Walton argues for in The Lost World Of Genesis 1. Because Hugh Ross’ article is so lengthy, I will not address every point in the article, but I will address what objections I think really need to be dealt with.ġ: Walton Doesn’t Distinguish Between Hard and Soft Concordism Let’s look at Ross’ objections to Walton’s book. I find John Walton’s The Lost World Of Genesis One to be more accurate than Hugh Ross’ Navigating Genesis. That said, I disagree with his approach to Genesis. I learned a lot about Big Bang cosmology and the cosmic and local fine-tuning come from books such as The Creator and The Cosmos, Why The Universe Is The Way It Is, and Improbable Planet. I have a deep respect for Hugh Ross and have benefitted greatly from his writings and the work he’s done at RTB. In this blog post, I will be addressing some objections to this view from an article written by Dr. Recently, I wrote a blog post defending an interpretation of Genesis 1 called “The Cosmic Temple Inauguration View” which you can read about by clicking here.