Retrieving Augustine's Doctrine of Creation: Ancient Wisdom for Current Controversy

Written by Gavin Ortlund

Narrated by Kyle Tait

How might premodern exegesis of Genesis inform Christian debates about creation today?

Imagine a table with three people in dialogue: a young-earth creationist, an old-earth creationist, and an evolutionary creationist. Into the room walks Augustine of Hippo, one of the most significant theologians in the history of the church. In what ways will his reading of Scripture and his doctrine of creation inform, deepen, and shape the conversation?

Pastor and theologian Gavin Ortlund explores just such a scenario by retrieving Augustine's reading of Genesis 1-3 and considering how his premodern understanding of creation can help Christians today. Ortlund contends that while Augustine's hermeneutical approach and theological questions might differ from those of today, this church father's humility before Scripture and his theological conclusions can shed light on matters such as evolution, animal death, and the historical Adam and Eve. Have a seat. Join the conversation.

• Language: English
• Publisher: ChristianAudio.com
• Release date: Aug 31, 2021
• ISBN: 9781545918388

Gavin Ortlund

Gavin Ortlund (PhD, Fuller Theological Seminary) runs the popular YouTube channel Truth Unites and is the author of several books, including Humility; Finding the Right Hills to Die On; and Theological Retrieval for Evangelicals. Gavin and his wife, Esther, have five children. 

Reviews for Retrieving Augustine's Doctrine of Creation

[Kyle De Wolf · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

This is an interesting review of Augustine's views regarding creation and their relevance for modern debates. Augustine challenges all of us: young-earth creationists, old-earth creationists, and evolutionary creationists alike. He believed that God created the whole universe instantaneously and that the six days of creation are figurative.

He holds to a recent creation by default but warns believers not to rashly dispute with natural philosophers and scientists on the basis of scripture lest they expose the gospel to ridicule due to their ignorance.

He believes that Genesis 1-11 is broadly historical but contains many figurative details. His notion of the "literal" meaning of scripture encompasses metaphors and other figures of speech. It is the historical sense determined by ancient language and culture, not the "literalistic" sense determined by modern day readers filtering the text through their own language, culture, and expectations. He also believes that scripture may involve numerous layers of meaning due to the inspiration of the Holy Spirit.

I believe that the divine creative act is instantaneous in the sense that it is eternal -- outside of time as we know it -- and thus it is ongoing in every single moment of existence. Yet it does not follow that the universe itself must be eternal. The amount of time issuing forth from the divine creative act is still finite and had a beginning. I believe that this took place at the big bang 13.8 billion years ago.

St Augustine speaks of seminal reasons or rationes seminales (rational seeds, seeds of reason) that God implanted in creation which would later develop under his Providence. Many Catholic scholars have connected this with the theory of evolution to suggest that God planted the seeds of all future development at the moment of creation. Thus life unfolds in accordance with the seminal reasons planted by God.

I believe that God endowed matter with a secondary power of causation: "Let the earth bring forth," etc. This power is actualized in response to the divine command, or the power of God's Word, which was later incarnated in the person of Christ.

St Augustine offers a lot of speculation about the Garden of Eden and the historical existence of Adam and Eve. I believe that there is a spiritual plane and a physical plane. Scripture refers to many things on the spiritual plane using figures drawn from the physical plane. I may not know what every figure in the Bible means but I can still grasp the point of the story.

Perhaps the trees in Garden of Eden are real, biological trees endowed with supernatural powers. Or perhaps they are purely spiritual entities like the kabbalistic tree of life, which shows how divine light filters down to us through several of the divine attributes which are arranged hierarchically into a "tree." The light pours down from one branch to another until it finally reaches the bottom, the plane on which we live.

Either way, we can still grasp the point of the story: man is deprived of access to divine grace and the life of paradise that it gives him as a result of his own pride and fall, his own hubris. It doesn't necessarily matter whether that took place in 4004 BC or 4,000,004 BC, or on a spiritual plane altogether separate from the timespace continuum that we happen to know.

One interesting thing about this book is how even though St Augustine is technically a "recent" creationist he still debunks a lot of points made by modern day young earth creationists. For example he stresses that animal death is a normal part of nature and not a consequence of the Fall. He did not believe the animals were given immortality like man before the Fall.

Another interesting point is that cause and effect relationships don't necessarily have to be sequential on a linear time scale. So even if the Fall was the cause of animal death it doesn't necessarily have to precede animal death. This is roughly similar to how Christ atoned for all those who preceded him and gave power to their sacrifices through his blood on the cross. It is also roughly similar to how the cause and effect relationship between baptism and regeneration isn't necessarily linear.

Overall, I love this book and I feel that it adds a lot of much needed nuance to the creation/evolution debate.