Peril in Paradise

Every month we receive information and advertisements for many more books in the broad field of apologetics than we can possibly review. We try to find books to review that offer unique understandings or approaches to our readers, and this book is truly unique. This is a book on creationism, but not on science or scientific evidence. This is surprising since the author has a Ph.D. in aerospace engineering and works for NASA.

What Dr. Whorton has done is to study young earth creationism from a biblical standpoint. He does this by taking creationist views on Scripture, showing what the implications of those statements are, and asking whether their interpretations are valid. The meaning of very good for example, is used by creationists to suggest that there was no death until Adam and Eve sinned. The idea is that nothing died and animal death began at man's transgression. This type of physical understanding underlies many of the arguments in denominational creationism.

Whorton does a wonderful job of explaining creationism. He apparently has millennial understandings himself, but he properly directs the discussion away from the physical and focuses on God's ultimate purpose in the creation. The importance of understanding the spiritual implications of sin and man's redemption can not be over emphasized, and one of creationism's main problems is attaching so much emphasis on the physical that the spiritual message is missed.

This is the first book we have seen that goes into the biblical arguments of young earth creationism in depth. We recommend it to people on both sides of the issue. It is not abusive or heavy handed and presents good biblical challenges to young earth creationists.

Note:  Books reviewed on this page are not available through our Web Site.  They should be available through a local bookstore or some of the online bookstores.

Back to Contents Does God Exist?, SepOct06.