A Syncing of Science and Theology
A Review of
Jesus and the Genome: The Intersection of Christology and Biology
Michael Peterson, Timothy Pawl, Ben Brammell
Paperback: Cambridge University Press, 2024
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Reviewed by Leonard J. Vander Zee
I may not be the best person to review this book heavy with scientific data and philosophical inquiry. I somehow got through high school and my undergraduate studies with one ninth grade general science class and one college course in biology in which, as I recall, all my fruit flies died, and I had to make up the lab report.
Despite this rather dismal entree, my interest on the intersection of science and theology has grown through the years to the point that I now have several books on the subject on my shelves. This volume will now join the collection, gaining a prominent place.
The major focus of Jesus and the Genome centers around how the mystery of the incarnation of Jesus Christ fits with the modern evolutionary picture of human life and the human genome. It asks questions like: How do we understand Jesus as a human being with a full human genome when his mother was the Virgin Mary, and his father was, well, God? Along the way, it tackles other such dizzying questions as what genetic characteristics went into Jesus’s genome to be “son of David, and what about all the chance mutations characteristic of all human genetic life? These three authors are not afraid to face hard questions.
Yet, with Jesus Christ’s incarnation at the center, this book also asks much broader questions about the relationship of science and religion in general and Christianity in particular. In Chapter One the authors set out some parameters, explaining what they call a realist approach to Christianity, in relation to science. They distinguish their theological approach from scholars like Paul Tillich in the 20th century, who says that “objects in the theological realm are mental projections, created by language, products of culture, or the like.” By a realist approach in science they mean, “not only is there a real physical world, but its constituents and structures can be the object of true and false statements.”
In Chapter Two on “The Encounter Between Theology and Science,” the authors call for the integration of science and religion following “the classical ideal of seeking a comprehensive worldview based on the idea that a multifarious reality is still a unified whole, consistent among its parts which may nevertheless be known by different means.” This may come across as academic jargon but a few sentences later, they distill their ideas with simpler language. Essentially, they’re seeking a comprehensive wordview that can integrate science, orthodox Christianity, and all other important phenomena. That is a large task indeed, bravely assumed, and largely accomplished in this book.
In Chapter Three, “The Doctrine of the Incarnation,” the authors get down to describing the clear biblical and conciliar description of Jesus as the very Son of God but born of the Virgin Mary, fulfilling messianic prophecy and bringing salvation through the cross and resurrection. This also includes the scriptural insistence that Jesus Christ is the divine Son of God. The authors helpfully lay out the range of philosophical and theological discussions in the first three centuries as to the exact nature of Jesus’s theandric nature. And finally, they tackle the problem of Jesus’s sinlessness as a human being within the constraints of his truly human genome.
Chapter Four continues to discuss the general problems by facing Darwinian evolution and its adherents. Darwinian evolution poses some basic problems for a belief in Jesus Christ as the fully human Son of God. Following a sometimes rather scientifically dense trail for this science neophyte, the authors conclude that Christian orthodoxy has the categories to affirm evolution as a divinely created process in the living world, while acknowledging other “forms or divine action in the world such as ‘intervention miracles, the resurrection of Jesus, and the capacities of human beings with rational thought, moral judgement, and a spiritual relationship with God.’”
The next three chapters do the heavy lifting of addressing the difficult scientific problems surrounding these theological beliefs. These include an intensive description of the human genome and the philosophical and theological problems involved with integrating it into a cohesive worldview. Issues such as:
- The meaning of original sin in relation to the genome.
- The soul and evolutionary biology
- The Resurrection of Jesus Christ
- Morality, love, and truth in relation to evolutionary biology
- The deep problem of suffering in nature
The authors consistently insist that science, by its very nature as a methodology, tends to leave out theological or religious questions. But they insist that there is no scientific or rational reason to exclude divine intervention from within an evolutionary framework, despite the bold assertions of some militant atheists.
In the end, the authors turn the tables by asserting that Darwin is a gift to Christianity and Christian theology. As opposed deists like Paley who separate God from actual involvement with nature, Darwin “allows God back within nature.” They include a surprising quotation from theologian Aubrey Moore, some thirty years after Darwin’s On the Origin of Species, “At the moment at which it seemed He would thrust God out altogether, Darwinism appeared, and, under the guise of a foe, did the work of a friend. It has conferred upon philosophy and religion an inestimable benefit by showing us that we must choose between two alternatives. Either God is everywhere present in nature, or He is nowhere.”
This formidable volume goes a long way in providing a broadly orthodox Christian, non-fundamentalist way of viewing the Christian faith while also being willing and open to accepting evolutionary science without its accompanying scientism. It may at times present some difficulties to the scientifically uninformed folks like myself, but it will bring us up to speed with exciting insights that break down the wall that still exists today between evolution and Christianity, much to the deficit of both sides.
Leonard Vander Zee
Leonard Vander Zee is a retired pastor in the Christian Reformed Church, married to Jeanne Logan, and father of four and grandfather of 12. Besides serving as occasional Interim Pastor he loves playing tennis, pickleball, and golf, and reading the theology of the church fathers. He is author of Christ, Baptism, and the Lord's Supper (IVP, 2004).
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