“Because that when they knew God, they glorified him not as God, neither were thankful, but became vain in their imaginations.” (Romans 1 : 21 ) .
Here Paul, reflects hack in time to when ALL men first knew the one true God — back in the days of the tower of Babel. At that time there was no confusion of thought about idols, all men “knew God” although they did not worship him.
When men were confounded in the confusion of languages “the Lord scattered them abroad from thence upon the face of all the earth.” (Gen. 11: 8). It is clear then, that man began, in the various races spread throughout the world, with the certain knowledge that there was one all-powerful God. Moreover that this was a God who dwelt in heaven, which at one time they had had in mind to reach by means of a colossal tower.
It is not surprising then, to discover widespread evidence that all primitive races still in existence today have a basic concept of a “sky-god”. The theories of evolutionists about the origin of religion are quite interesting. The fact that races evolved from worshipping one god to many, or as Paul puts it, they “changed the glory of the uncorruptible God into an image made like to a corruptible man, and to birds, and fourfooted beasts, and creeping things”, is a fact some tried hard to suppress earlier this century.
H. Fraser brings out these facts and many others in a fascinating opening essay in the 5th volume in the series “SYMPOSIUM ON CREATION”. He quotes from a full-scale article which G. Foucart wrote in the ‘ENCYCLOPAEDIA OF RELIGION AND ETHICS’.
Foucart says the high-god
“occupies the same place in the semi-civilised religions of Pre-Columbian America as we find in all groups of so-called non-civilized religions without exception. We may safely presume that the concept of a sky-god belongs to the most ancient period in the history of religious feeling…. The nature, role and characteristics of this universal sky-god may be concealed under the most diverse forms, but he is always more or less recognisable to the historian of religions and always identical in essential definition. America shows him in the mythology of the Toltecs, the Mayas and the Incas as well as in Brazil, in the Andes, among the Caribs, in Tierra del Fuego, and at the extreme north among the Eskimos. The sky-god has reigned everywhere: his kingdom still covers the whole uncivilised world.”
Those committed to the evolutionary point of view tried to ignore this evidence, Fraser comments — “When the controversy was at its height, the evolutionists did everything possible to eradicate the idea. They ignored the subject in their writings and especially in textbooks — scarcely a college or high-school text refers to the concept: and they insisted that, whenever a high level of religion appears in a pagan tribe, it is a product of missionary influence.”
A German writer Dr Wihelm Schmidt, in a six-volume classic study on this and related subjects virtually accuses the anthropologists of suppressing the facts and Fraser quotes at length from his writings.
Another aspect of this subject developed by Fraser is the matter of language similarities. In a detailed and analytical study of ancient languages he demonstrates an astonishing series of parallel words throughout the world to describe the sky-god. For example when scholars came to translate the Bible into the multitude of African languages “almost without exception a satisfactory name was found for the Most High as Almighty, Creator and Sustainer.” Fraser studied over 120 Scripture translations in arriving at this conclusion. Only in one case had the translators thought it desirable to transliterate God’s Name into the native language, a fact which explodes any theory that the missionaries introduced the concept of one Almighty Creator to the natives.
We have considered briefly only 1 of the 8 absorbing essays in this volume. Other subjects covered are “The testimony of Radio- carbon to the Genesis Flood,” “Evolution: The Ocean says No!”, “Tracing the Past: Is Uniformity Meaningful?”, “The Case for Global Catastrophism” and “Genetics and Jacob’s Flock.”
There are two other articles dealing with important historical characters, namely “Galielo and the Church” and “Gregor Mendel.”
In these days when we meet so many who are sceptical of religion on scientific grounds it is more than useful to have such authoritative works on hand. It enables us to sometimes challenge people on their own concepts, and, by the grace of God, may lead one here and there to see life in a new light to take off the blinkers of biased human thinking.
Review of “The Early Earth” by John Whitcomb (1972)