King James Cosmology

4c
A Biological Question


An interesting parallel to the Bible's treatment (or lack thereof) of cosmology is its treatment of human "parenting" and biology. The Bible has quite a bit to say about "seeds," "sons," "heirs," and the like, and since biology and genetics are sciences as well as physics and cosmology, the extent of Scripture's treatment of one scientific "discipline" should hold pretty much true with the others.

Where Do They Come From?

It may come as a surprise to many but the most basic biological question, asked from as far back as history will take us, was not fully and scientifically answered until around 1900 AD! That question—"Where do babies come from"—perplexed man for millennia. Today many in the west assume it has long been common knowledge that the male has his part with his "sperm," the female has her part with her "egg," and when the two come together, a child sharing traits of both is conceived. Nine months later the child is born into the world. As matter-of-fact as this sounds today, this entire concept is only around 150 years old.

Consider a moment that for 5900 years of recorded history no one really knew the biology of how children were conceived. Yes, people came up with many sometimes crazy ideas, but no one could prove any of them. Aristotle, the (supposed) great philosopher didn't know; Leonardo DaVinci the genius didn't know; Isaac Newton, the great physicist didn't know; nor did even Charles Darwin the silly evolutionist know (he claimed to know where man came from...apes...but didn't have a clue how children are conceived). It was one of science's great mysteries.

The most common idea throughout the millennia was "the man supplied the seed and the woman the fertile ground." This contention was so prevalent that it still has adherents today. If one does a simple internet search he will find that practically all people in the Muslim nations of the Middle-East, and even some Americans in 2018 still insist the woman is merely the "field" or "soil" where the man plants his "seed." This belief makes the mother only a surrogate mother. She contributes no traits or nature of herself since she is not a true parent of the child. She is merely an incubator to grow the human seed of the father. As an ancient Greek said, four centuries before Christ (as found in The Seeds of Life by Edward Dolnick),

The woman you call the mother of the child
Is not the parent, just a nurse to the seed.
the new-sown seed that grow and swells inside her.
The man is the source of life—the one who mounts.
She, like a stranger for a stranger, keeps
the shoot alive unless god hurts the roots.

This view was still held twenty centuries later when King James of England's royal physician said in 1618,

'The woman hath a womb ordained by nature as a field or seed-plot to receive and cherish the seed."

Yes, this is the same King James who commissioned the "King James Bible" of 1611, thus we see the prevailing thought on "human reproduction" at the time the AV was translated. But this idea brought even more questions, "How does the man get the seed"? "Where does the seed come from"?

One suggestion that held sway for many years was every individual that will ever live was created when God created Adam. It held that man is too sinful to be the conduit of (pro)creation so God had to create all men at once. Thus, within the man's "issue" were tiny, immature humans bundled in a tiny seed pod waiting to be planted in the woman's "fertile soil" to grow and be born. To continue the perpetuity, each tiny human also had an even smaller tiny, immature human in him waiting for his day, and on and on into infinity. Humans were much like the nested gift boxes some get at Christmas: a box, in a box, in a box,.... The adherents of this view also had Bible to back them up. Look at Hebrews 7:9-10

"And as I may so say, Levi also, who receiveth tithes, payed tithes in Abraham. For he was yet in the loins of his father, when Melchisedec met him."

Levi is said to be in his distant ancestor's "loins" and actually performed actions while there! Furthermore, Heb 7:5 says all the Jews came out of the "loins of Abraham." This fits perfectly with the male seed propagation idea. The entire Jewish race was dwelling inside Abraham "loins" doing the things he did. What are loins you ask? They are the part of the anatomy primarily around the pelvic area. The term is actually a figure of speech for the reproductive organs since the loins only speak of a general region of the human body, like "belly" or "bowels." Loins are made of flesh. This is made clear in Acts 2:30 when speaking of David Peter said,

"...and knowing that God had sworn with an oath to him, that of the fruit of his loins, according to the flesh, he would raise up Christ to sit on his throne;"

So was Christ, at least His human body, inside David's body like Levi was in the loins of Abraham? Hum.... There is more to this than you first thought, isn't there?

"That's My Seed, Not Yours"

We have not even mentioned yet how the Scriptures use the term "seed." What a seed is, is common knowledge. Any grade school kid can tell you that a seed is the small part of something one plants to let it grow into maturity and then make more seeds. "Mighty oaks from little acorns grow." All the information needed for the seed to grow to maturity is already there; it is complete and whole. All it lacks is the "fertile ground" to supply the nutrients and allow it to germinate and mature. The first mention of seed in the Bible bears this out (Gen 1:11),

"And God said, Let the earth bring forth grass, the herb yielding seed, and the fruit tree yielding fruit after his kind, whose seed is in itself, upon the earth: and it was so."

Each tree yields seed after its own kind, which produces more trees. Here you may say, "Everyone knows this, what about people, do they have a seed?" Indeed they do. Not only people, though, even serpents have them. Look at Genesis 3:15,

"And I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between thy seed and her seed; it shall bruise thy head, and thou shalt bruise his heel."

Here both the woman, Eve, and the serpent, Satan, are said to have a seed. The woman's seed we later learn is ultimately the Lord Jesus Christ, and the serpent's seed is the "antichrist," "man of sin," or "beast." Nevertheless, it is said that a woman can have a seed, but...look at the next mention, Genesis 4:25,

"And Adam knew his wife again; and she bare a son, and called his name Seth: For God, said she, hath appointed me another seed instead of Abel, whom Cain slew."

It says Eve was "appointed" a seed. To "appoint" is "to place" or "bring" so the verse can easily be saying Eve's seed was not originally hers but was given to her by God through Adam. The same could be said of other places where women are said to have a "seed" (Gen 16:10, etc.) This also explains how men "begat" their children (Gen 5:4, etc.). They generate or sire the seed to the woman which she later bares (Gen 4:1). Women are NEVER said to "begat" a child, they are said to only "bare" it.

Considering the above, it is clear that the Bible indicates a "patriarchal" view towards human reproduction and family relations. Genesis 3:16 also speaks of this with, "and thy desire shall be to thy husband, and he shall rule over thee." This is actually part of the curse. Furthermore, the Lord said of Abraham, "For I know him, that he will command his children and his household after him..." indicating he is the head of the household—the patriarch.

Doth Not Nature Teach You?

Obviously, every human has a "human nature." It is actually what makes one human, even the Lord Jesus Christ has one. Sadly, though, except for Christ, everyone's nature is a sinful, fallen nature; it fell when Adam fell because in a sense, we were all in him when he sinned (Rom 5:21) and his guilt is imputed to us. This makes us "by nature the children of wrath..." (Eph 2:3). Christ, however, though fully human, does not have a fallen, sinful nature even though He also is a descendant of Adam and was born into this same evil world. What is the difference? Why do we have a fallen nature and Christ doesn't? The reason subscribed to by most Bible Believers is it is because Christ did not have a human father. He was virgin born.

The virgin birth of Christ served two key purposes. One was to enable the second person of the Godhead, the Word, to be born into the world as a man. The second was to bypass the sin and fallen nature of Adam since the Scriptures indicate they are passed by the male; the father. Since Jesus had no human father, this sin, guilt, and fallen nature did not pass to him. He inherited a full human nature from his mother, Mary, but she, being female, did not pass along Adam's guilt or a tainted nature. The passing of Adam's nature to one's "seed" could be called "male guilt propagation."

The implications are obvious. If a believer believes Jesus did not inherit or have imputed to Him Adam's guilt and nature because He had no human father and by this claims Adam's guilt and nature only passes through the male, then the argument for male seed propagation is made even stronger. If Adam's guilt only passes through the male, then the contention the whole person, or at least the key elements of a person, does as well gains clear support.

What's the Point?

At this point you may be thinking, "What does all this have to do with geocentrism?" Simple. Biology is a science as physics and cosmology are sciences. If geocentrists are going to insist one take "sunrise" and "sunset" literally, then they must also insist Levi was actually in Abraham's loins and only the human male begats the seed: the whole person. This is the "historical" view held by man for millennia. To not contend this shows them as scripturally inconsistent. They can't consistently say the Bible is scientific in one science and not in another. They can't claim "sunset" and "not be moved" should be understood as absolute and literal while "seed," "begat," and a person being "yet in the loins of his father" should not and expect people to take them seriously.

However...if the Bible reader takes these passages the way they are meant to be taken, both the geocentric and biological, and does not force wooden, hyper-literalism on them, he realizes some great truths. Levi did not absolutely and literally pay tithes in Abraham, how could he, he did not yet exist! Levi was only in his ancestor's loins in a seminal manner: that is, because he subsequently became a seed or descendant. If Levi had never been born, it could never be said a nonexistent person was ever in someone's loins.

As for "male seed propagation" claim, the Scriptures do allow this view, but more importantly they do not disallow other views. (Allowing or accommodating a view is not the same as verifying or confirming it as absolute fact.) As we said in the first chapter dealing with creation, the Bible is often ambiguous, and it is ambiguous in the area of human biology as well as cosmology. The Bible does not specifically state HOW children are conceived, it does not state dogmatically women are not considered an actual parent, nor does it absolutely say only the father provides the entire "person" of a child.

Note: Concerning the human nature of Jesus Christ, Mary does provide her own nature toward His conception (Rom 1:3, etc.), however, her case deals with the "mystery of godliness" and cannot be proof for the rest of humanity. Nevertheless, one dilemma the male seed propagation proponents could never adequately answer was, "Why do daughters often look like their mothers?"

The simple fact is the Bible is not speaking about absolute biology in these "seed" matters any more than it is speaking about absolute cosmology when it says the sun sets or the earth doesn't move. However, if the Hyper-Literal geocentrists were consistent they would claim something like,

"Since the Bible says throughout only a man can provide the "seed" and "beget" a child or heir, and the woman, which is called a "helpmeet" only helps by "bearing" it; and apart from the miracle of the virgin birth of Christ no woman is ever said to have a seed until after the man supplies it to her; and since male seed propagation was the prevailing biological view on human reproduction for thousands of years and it correlates perfectly with the guilt of Adam passing only through the male, we challenge the current claim that the female contributes in the conception of a child and contend that our view is just as valid as the modern "scientific" view.

"All the "scientific proofs" made by biologists and doctors claiming a woman has an "egg" which carries 23 chromosomes of DNA molecules and the male "sperm" carries the same amount, and that when the two are joined they produce a new child with the full human compliment of 46 chromosomes, thus sharing traits of both parents, are completely unscriptural and unproven. We will not concede to this "mutual conception" conspiracy; we choose to believe the Bible."

As ludicrous as they are, these statements would not be any more outrageous than their fanciful claims for geocentrism.