From: scharle@lukasiewicz.cc.nd.edu (scharle)
Subject: Re: Re: The Creationist Controversy...PBS a
Date: 9 Jun 1995 20:26:14 GMT

[materials deleted by Bob Grumbine 4 February 1996 not related to this quote]

    Maybe it's time to bring up the quotaton from Augustine.
The Literal Meaning of Genesis (De Genesi ad litteram libri duodecim) 
(translated by J. H. Taylor, Ancient Christian Writers, Newman Press, 
1982, volume 41) Book 1 Chapter 19 Paragraph 39
 
    Usually, even a non-Christian knows something about the earth,
the heavens, and the other elements of this world, about the
motion and orbit of the stars and even their size and relative
positions, about the predictable eclipses of the sun and moon, the
cycles of the years and the seasons, about the kinds of animals,
shrubs, stones, and so forth, and this knowledge he hold to as
being certain from reason and experience.  Now, it is a
disgraceful and dangerous thing for an infidel to hear a
Christian, presumably giving the meaning of Holy Scripture,
talking nonsense on these topics; and we should take all means to
prevent such an embarrassing situation, in which people show up
vast ignorance in a Christian and laugh it to scorn.  The shame is
not so much that an ignorant individual is derided, but that
people outside the household of faith think our sacred writers
held such opinions, and, to the great loss of those for whose
salvation we toil, the writers of our Scripture are criticized and
rejected as unlearned men.  If they find a Christian mistaken in a
field which they themselves know well and hear him maintaining his
foolish opinions about our books, how are they going to believe
those books in matters concerning the resurrection of the dead,
the hope of eternal life, and the kingdom of heaven, when they
think their pages are full of falsehoods and on facts which they
themselves have learnt from experience and the light of reason?
Reckless and incompetent expounders of Holy Scripture bring untold
trouble and sorrow on their wiser brethren when they are caught in
one of their mischievous false opinions and are taken to task by
those who are not bound by the authority of our sacred books.  For
then, to defend their utterly foolish and obviously untrue
statements, they will try to call upon Holy Scripture for proof
and even recite from memory many passages which they think support
their position, although _they understand neither what they say
nor the things about which they make assertion_. [1 Timothy 1.7]

-- 
Tom Scharle  
Room G003 Computing Center |scharle@lukasiewicz.cc.nd.edu
University of Notre Dame  Notre Dame, IN 46556-0539 USA