Drawing on inspiration from an old Hindu parable, John Godfrey Saxe gave us the wonderful poem, The Blind Men and the Elephant:
that each by observation, might satisfy his mind.
The first approached the elephant, and, happening to fall,
against his broad and sturdy side, at once began to bawl:
"God bless me! but the elephant, is nothing but a wall!"
The second feeling of the tusk, cried: "Ho! what have we here,
so very round and smooth and sharp? To me tis mighty clear,
this wonder of an elephant, is very like a spear!"
The third approached the animal, and, happening to take,
the squirming trunk within his hands, "I see," quoth he,
the elephant is very like a snake!"
The fourth reached out his eager hand, and felt about the knee:
"What most this wondrous beast is like, is mighty plain," quoth he;
"Tis clear enough the elephant is very like a tree."
The fifth, who chanced to touch the ear, Said; "E'en the blindest man
can tell what this resembles most; Deny the fact who can,
This marvel of an elephant, is very like a fan!"
The sixth no sooner had begun, about the beast to grope,
than, seizing on the swinging tail, that fell within his scope,
"I see," quothe he, "the elephant is very like a rope!"
And so these men of Indostan, disputed loud and long,
each in his own opinion, exceeding stiff and strong,
Though each was partly in the right, and all were in the wrong!
So, oft in theologic wars, the disputants, I ween,
tread on in utter ignorance, of what each other mean,
and prate about the elephant, not one of them has seen!
Saxe, of course, used the poem to illustrate the tensions between believers of different faiths. However, I believe the poem better illustrates the attitudes of unbelievers. It’s funny how people with such limited knowledge and understanding can still have such confidence in their opinions. Let’s face it, even the most zealot followers of scientism would have to admit there is far more we don’t know than we do know. What’s more, the things we don’t know often have a bearing on things we think we know.
To demonstrate how things we don’t know can affect things we think we know, I have sometimes done this exercise: In a room of people, I will hold up two fingers and ask how many fingers I’m holding up. Every time I’ve done this, everyone has always answered, “two.” What they don’t know is that, either under the table or at my side, I’m also holding up two fingers on my other hand. So, I was truly holding up four fingers but they only ever saw two of them.
Think about some of the claims of science that no one has ever seen: the universe came from nothing, stars formed from collapsing hydrogen clouds, life rose from non-living matter, and so forth and so forth. Scientists see birds eating one shade of moth and extrapolate that same process could turn a bacterium into a bird. They see a similarity between a human hand and a whale’s fin and surmise it means they have a common ancestor. It’s all nonsense.
Seeing an event like natural selection or noticing some similarity between different animals is merely a tiny piece of knowledge in a history that wasn’t seen. It’s like the blind men who experienced only one part of the elephant but were wrong about the whole thing. Science is only done in the present. The past is beyond scientific inquiry. In a real sense, we are blind to the things of antiquity. The only thing we can hope to know with any certainty is what was written down by those who lived in the past.
Concerning the origin of the world and of man, Christian have the written revelation of the only One who was a witness to the events. We have the word of the One who made the universe.
I admit that I don't know everything. I also admit there's far more that I don't know than I do know. However, God is the One who does know everything and I will trust what He has said about the past. Everyone else is welcome to grope about for the truth!
