AIG - What’s wrong with the word “races”?
Q: What’s wrong with the word “races”?
A: At the time of Thomas Jefferson, 200 years ago, when people used the term “races,” they’d think of the Irish race or English race and so on. But Charles Darwin changed all that when he published his book The Origin of the Species. The title actually included the words “the Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle for Life.”
Darwin was a racist. He believed that different groups of people evolved at different times, and so some societies were more like apes than others. Sadly, this fueled racist attitudes toward different people groups. Because of this, the word “races” today still conjures up evolutionary ideas. Many people think of Darwinian evolution when they hear that word.
Based on the Bible, and understanding the split-up of people due to the Tower of Babel event, we should use the term “people groups” instead. After all, there is only one race of people, all descendants of one man—Adam.
Labels: theology
2 Comments:
Many don't realize that God confounded the languages so the people would disperse, but not because they might try to build another tower.
He wamted them to disperse because he knows that big Cities begat big sin, and rural gatherings are generally more moral.
That's from FAR 1:1 :)
Make sense?
FAR
FAR,
Yes, it makes sense. And to take it a step further, we can even view the dispersion at Babel as an act of God's grace. At first glance we may think this is merely a vengeful God exercising His divine justice (and maybe there's an element of this). But God is a God of Holy Love -- fundamental to His nature -- and even His acts of vengeance flow from and highlight His nature. The confusion of languages was a divine measure to prevent "big sin" as you called it. And while the confusion due to foreign tongues is frustrating, we see God's redemptive solution on the day of Pentecost -- the work of the Spirit which transcends language barriers. In other words, the circumcised heart that can love God and man perfectly is able to speak the universal human language. Pentecost was not a day when the apostles spoke gibberish that only interpreters understood. It was a day when God declared by His Spirit through His people that He speaks your language.
Good comment.
Check out Babel from Answers in Genesis.
Post a Comment
Links to this post:
Create a Link
Back to Blog