Book Review: “A Worldview Approach to Science and Scripture” by Carol Hill

There are many textbooks out there purporting to put forward the best view of science from a Christian standpoint, but most come from a young earth creationist point of view. Carol Hill, with A Worldview Approach to Science and Scripture, provides an alternative that unites mainstream science with thoughtful reading of the biblical text. But the book is more than one might think if one gets the impression of a dry textbook from this description–it’s an introduction to how Christians can think about numerous science-faith topics, a survey of competing literature, and an analysis of various views of science and faith.

The book is divided into 10 chapters, beginning with a chapter that defines the notion of a “worldview approach” to science and Christianity. A worldview approach is a holistic look at how to approach the Bible, scripture, and more–allowing one to integrate insights from various positions into one coherent whole. Hill outlines the basic premise of the worldview approach as: “the Bible in its original context records historical events if considered from the worldview of the biblical authors who wrote it” (12-13). This is important: it allows Hill to affirm historicity of the biblical account while not settling for simplistic answers in interpretation.

The second through fourth chapter deal with the Six Days of Creation, the Garden of Eden, and the book of Numbers/Chronologies of Genesis respectively. The chapter on the Garden of Eden is of particular interest because Hill both makes a strong argument for a real, true to life location for the Garden of Eden while also noting that the Flood Geology that young earth creationists so often espouse cannot account for the actual location of the Garden. The ages of the patriarchs is also a notable section as Hill notes the numbers being used in specifically theological and analogical ways by the author.

Chapters 5-7 deal with Noah’s Flood from a number of points, and it is an extremely helpful section both for analyzing the young earth creationist/flood geology account and for noting the language of the Bible and the local nature of the Flood. Hill, once again, sides with seeing the Flood as historical (as she sees the Garden of Eden as a historical possibility) while also noting the real difficulties with a literalistic reading. A number of interesting points related to Mount Ararat and the attempts to locate the actual Ark are made here, as well. The analysis is keen, showing difficulties with various theories, while also showing the misguided nature of such attempts to find the Ark. Hill argues for a local flood, but does so both from the text and geology, offering a holistic approach to the question.

Chapter 8 considers evolution and genetics, noting the attempts by some to turn the word “kind” in the Bible into something that would allow for immense speciation after the Flood. Hill also notes some of the apparent problems with evolutionary theory, while also showing the evidence for evolution and how powerful that evidence is. Chapter 9 considers Adam and Eve. The question of people outside the Garden is not a problem for Hill’s “Worldview Approach” because she argues that the purpose of the authors was to write the story of God’s interaction with their ancestors and not to write the story of everybody everywhere at all times (151). Chapter 10 presents Hill’s view in short, “Putting it All Together” to present it to readers. Here, Hill outlines the entirety of her position, bringing together everything from the previous chapters.

I should note that the book is richly printed with color photography throughout. Like The Grand Canyon: Monument to an Ancient Earth, this book uses the illustrations both for beauty and for specific points. The beauty of the book should not be understated, and the color photography helps it function as intended: a text that can be used to explore Christianity and science.

A Worldview Approach to Science and Scripture is an invaluable text that presents, in readable form, a fairly comprehensive (though compact) view of Christianity related to some of the biggest questions that arise when considering science. Recommended.

Disclaimer: I was provided with a copy of the book for review by the publisher. I was not required to give any specific kind of feedback whatsoever.

Links

Be sure to check out the page for this site on Facebook and Twitter for discussion of posts, links to other pages of interest, random talk about theology/philosophy/apologetics/movies and more!

Book Reviews– There are plenty more book reviews to read! Read like crazy! (Scroll down for more, and click at bottom for even more!)

SDG.

——

The preceding post is the property of J.W. Wartick (apart from quotations, which are the property of their respective owners, and works of art as credited; images are often freely available to the public and J.W. Wartick makes no claims of owning rights to the images unless he makes that explicit) and should not be reproduced in part or in whole without the expressed consent of the author. All content on this site is the property of J.W. Wartick and is made available for individual and personal usage. If you cite from these documents, whether for personal or professional purposes, please give appropriate citation with both the name of the author (J.W. Wartick) and a link to the original URL. If you’d like to repost a post, you may do so, provided you show less than half of the original post on your own site and link to the original post for the rest. You must also appropriately cite the post as noted above. This blog is protected by Creative Commons licensing. By viewing any part of this site, you are agreeing to this usage policy.