Passover’s Message of Hope in the Aftermath of Oct. 7
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Darwin was neither the darling of the atheist nor the villain of the theist.
In 1809, the year Charles Darwin was born, no one, with the exception of “religious fanatics,” believed in the common ancestry and evolution of human beings. Enlightenment scientists before Darwin dismissed the notion of a common ancestry for humans as a “backward” and “unscientific” theological doctrine from the Bible. And these scientists also steered clear of the word “evolution”—a religious term whose Latin roots referred to the unrolling of a scroll or the unfolding of a plan. In those days, the concept of “evolution,” first appearing in English in the 17th century, referred to an orderly sequence of events and was synonymous with a Divine plan.
In the century before Darwin, the great biologist and taxonomist Carl Linnaeus had scientifically shown that species are static and do not change types. At the time of Linnaeus’ pioneering work, the idea that species are “fixed” and stable units was a progressive scientific development, grounded in careful observation and meticulously gathered experimental evidence. Before this point, neither biologists nor theologians believed that species are stable or that “species had to remain exactly as they had been created.”
Other Enlightenment thinkers, such as David Hume, Thomas Jefferson, and Voltaire, believed that science had clearly demonstrated that the different types of human variety were stable and eternal too—a view known as polygenism. As Hume wrote in 1753: between the different “species of men…such a uniform and constant difference could not happen in so many countries and ages, if nature had not made an original distinction betwixt these breeds.” For sophisticated and enlightened men of science, like Hume, the monogenistic idea that “Eve was the mother of all living” and that “God hath made of one blood all nations of men, for to dwell on all the face of the earth” was utter nonsense.
The Enlightenment scientific framework of Hume and others argued that there had never been a time when the world was without humans, and it allowed for no conception of a world before humans or without humans. Enlightenment scientists before Darwin rejected the Bible’s historical and linear view of time and returned to Aristotle’s understanding of the planet Earth as eternal and cyclical in its processes. Thus, according to the renowned geologist James Hutton, “we find no vestige of a beginning, no prospect of an end.” For Hutton and those who followed his lead, Earth was a “dynamic but steady-state system…permanently habitable by humans, from and to eternity.”
Before Darwin’s time, the idea of an endless sequence of human lives on an eternal Earth was the scientific norm rather than the exception.
For scientific atheists, explains historian of science Martin Rudwick, an eternal Earth was “the best guarantee of the absence of a creative deity of any kind.” Scientific-minded skeptics “took the eternity of the cosmos to include the uncreated eternity of the human race,” with the various types of human diversity fixed in unchanging time. Before Darwin’s time, the idea of an endless sequence of human lives on an eternal Earth was the scientific norm rather than the exception. “Against this background,” says Rudwick, “the idea that the world has had a unique starting point and a linear and irreversibly directional history—an idea that first emerged in Judaism…stands out as a striking anomaly.”
In Darwin’s day, it was broadly understood that “modern science supported polygenesis” and that the various kinds of humans—which by that time had come to be referred to as “races”—had separate origins that never converged upon a common ancestor. Enlightenment scientists saw polygenism as a direct refutation of the monogenism of the Bible. These same scientists also used polygenism to justify racist attitudes and the institution of slavery.
When Darwin began his evolutionary quest in search of human origins, his starting point was the abolitionist belief in blood kinship, a “common descent” for all human beings.
In the early 1800s, monogenists were typically abolitionists and religiously devout Christians and Jews who upheld a single origin for all known races of humanity to “preserve the integrity of Scripture.” In the opinion of the scientific establishment of the day, monogenesis was “tainted” as antiquated religious dogma. However, this religious dogma was very near and dear to Darwin’s heart. Darwin was a convinced and convicted monogenist because his family, the Wedgewoods, were deeply devout Bible believers who supported and financed the movement to abolish slavery. Indeed, Darwin’s grandfather, Josiah Wedgwood, even designed the official seal of the abolitionist movement—an image depicting an African slave on one knee, shackled hand and foot, with eyes and hands pointing to God in heaven, pleading, “Am I not a Man and a Brother?” The central Biblically inspired conviction that Adam was the true father of humankind was the foundational theological premise of anti-slavery and was firmly anchored in the worldview of young Charles. Adamic unity and the “brotherhood of man” were axiomatic in the anti-slavery tracts that he and his family devoured and distributed. From his earliest days, Darwin was zealously driven by a moral fire to demonstrate that all the races of humanity were truly one family and that there was a single origin—a common ancestry—for black and white.
When Darwin began his evolutionary quest in search of human origins, his starting point was the abolitionist belief in blood kinship, a “common descent” for all human beings. He wanted to show through science that the Bible was right and that the African man was indeed the brother of the European. This deep conviction and faith in the unity of the human race, explain historians of science Adrian Desmond and James Moore, “was the unique feature of Darwin’s peculiar brand of evolution.” The Biblical notion of human “brotherhood” grounded Darwin’s evolutionary enterprise. From his recently published personal journals, we now know that it was there in his first musings on evolution in 1837, and it persisted through his book The Descent of Man in 1871.
The true Darwin was neither the atheist’s hero nor the fundamentalists’ parody. When Darwin enlisted his keen scientific mind to aid the monogenist cause, he was going deeply against the scientific tide of his day, inspired by a vision of faith. Because Darwin’s case for human unity flew in the face of the world’s scientific authorities, he waited to publish until he could make a scientifically convincing case. Evolution through common ancestry—as we call Darwin’s understanding today—was Darwin’s unique scientific way of undermining slavery and proving the Bible right.
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Evolution is G-d's intelligent design
Dr. Moritz, please, quit whatever you are presently doing and get a full time job rewriting history.
Emma, his wife, a very devout Christian, writes nonstop about her fear of his soul due to his lack of faith. Charles wrote to many that his thoughts would remain thoughts until he could be assured that they would not hurt or violate his wife's world view. Only then would he publish them.
After 10 year old Anna's death did he believe, that in her grief, could she bear the burden of a "God" she depended upon taking her child. Although they had suffered the loss before, he believed this one was the one he could use to explain to her, his worldview.
Darwin made no bones about his anger and his conviction that the world order could be explained and defined without a divine presence.
Hi, Dr. Moritz asked me to post this on his behalf (1 of 2)
This essay is looking at Darwin's early work and the motivations behind it (the subject of the book, Darwin's Sacred Cause). Yes, Darwin's faith was deeply troubled by the death of his beloved daughter Annie (see the book Darwin, His Daughter, and Human Evolution for a detailed account). For his later life, take a look at the work of John van Wyhe, founder and Director of the award-winning Darwin Online project at the University of Cambridge. Van Wyhe makes the point that Darwin was never an atheist--even while he struggled to find faith in the personal God of the Anglican Church (see https:https://publicdomainreview.org/essay/was-charles-darwin-an-atheist/)
(2 of 4) No, Darwin was not afraid to publish because of religion or his wife (this is a myth).
Whether you are aware of it or not, you are citing the unsubstantiated thesis of psychologist Howard Gruber. Postponement because of fear became the central theme of the Darwin story in the work of the psychologist Howard Gruber. Gruber was influenced by the work of the French child psychologist Jean Piaget to understand the psychological processes of the growth of new ideas and their development over time. As Piaget wrote in his preface to the book: '[It is] one of the major themes of this book: Darwin's motives for his long delay in publication.
His fear of persecution and ridicule was based not only on the unpopularity of evolutionary theory, but on the fiercer retribution meted out against proponents of materialism.' Gruber put it similarly: 'we need some explanation for Darwin' s long delay in publishing his views, and we need some understanding of the way in which this delay affected his inner life'. Mental anguish was Gruber' s primary explanation for the delay, although other possible causes such as offending Emma Darwin were considered. Gruber did not assemble a case to show that Darwin had avoided publication; rather, assuming this to be the case, he argued that fear was the main reason. Gruber's rendition of Darwin was very influential and fear has remained the most popular explanation for Darwin's delay.'
By 1977 Darwin's delay had become a major episode in the Darwin story. Silvan Schweber accepted Gruber's interpretation and named anxiety of materialism, upsetting Emma, the reception of Vestiges, Darwin's 'inability to advance a satisfactory explanation for the observed variations' and the disapproval of colleagues as reasons for postponing. Steven Jay Gould also discussed 'Darwin's delay'. Gould was certain that Darwin had avoided publishing. 'So complex an issue as the motivation for Darwin's delay has no simple resolution, but I feel sure of one thing: the negative effect of fear must have played at least as great a role as the positive need for additional documentation.' In the same year Ralph Colp's important book on Darwin's illness appeared.
Here, too, Darwin seems to delay because of his fear of the 'vast opposition' of his colleagues. Colp also argued that Darwin' s ill health was related to the torment of concealing his evolutionary and materialist ideas. Also in 1977 Sandra Herbert argued that 'twenty years had been required for an audience to form' and that the absence of which explained why Darwin did not publish in 1839. This new delay trend in the literature found its way to the television screen in 1973 in Bronowski's The ascent of man, in which viewers were told that Darwin feared his book would be shocking to his wife and that Darwin would rather die because he 'did not want to face the public'.
Darwin's delay appeared again in 1978 in the BBC series The voyage of Charles Darwin. Contrary to this Van Wyhe shows that there is "no unambiguous evidence has been found that Darwin was particularly concerned about a hostile reception. In fact, all of the evidence that does exist points to other forms of expected objections, gaps in the theory or its evidence for example. None of Darwin's written considerations of difficulties suggests an unwillingness or even a reluctance to go public."
See Van Wyhe "Did Darwin Avoid Publishing His Theory for Many Years?" https://www.jstor.org/stable/20462619.
Wow, fascinating!
I borrowed his book many years ago. I got through the first half of the first chapter and shut my eyes and ears to the rest. What a lot of mumbo-jumbo.
If this version/allusion of a change in Darwins beliefs - actually occurred - why - are there still so many notable people & groups - still using him as a source - to justify their beliefs?
Because people either do not understand what Darwin actually said (or the basis of his research, as outlined in this article) or they want so desperately to uphold their own non-Biblical account of the origin of everything in the universe that they will subvert and distort any statement to make it seem supportive of their own ideas. Cannot allow cognitive dissonance to continue, can they? So they twist Darwin's words to say what they would rather he would have said.
I have also come to the conclusion that Darwin's research has been used in a way he never intended. Thank you for the refreshing article.
One important thing to note is that evolution is now the accepted basis of all biology, and that Darwinism is studied by historians, not by scientists. Darwin's opinions reflect his society. Although they are the basis of modern understanding of the history of life they have been supplanted by many new scientific understandings. For example, modern genetics, which was totally unknown to Darwin, supplants his speculations as to the mechanisms of evolution. Whether or not he was an atheist makes no difference in understanding modern concepts in evolution.