In the latter half of the nineteenth century, the historic rivalry between science and religion flared anew with the publication of Charles Darwin’s On The Origin of Species. With evolution and natural selection as its explanatory instruments, Darwin’s work was seen as a shot across the pulpit by conservative theologians who thought his theory had crowded out the Creator. Princeton Theological Seminary Principal Charles Hodge was one such theologian, and in 1874, Hodge pulled no punches in his trenchant rebuttal What is Darwinism?, writing, “The conclusion of the whole matter is that the denial of design in nature is virtually the denial of God… What is Darwinism? It is atheism.” For Hodge, there were multiple issues at play: the contradictions between evolution and Scripture, the distance and virtual “non-existence” of Darwinism’s deity, and Darwin’s denial of “final causes” which together convinced Hodge that Darwinism and Christian Theism were mutually exclusive and impelled him to call the former to account. Twelve years later, his son, Archibald Alexander Hodge, took a narrower view, penning an introduction to Theism and Evolution wherein he argued that as long as evolution stayed in its lane and left talk of “origins, causes, and final ends” to theologians, the two could coexist without issue. However, like his father, A.A. Hodge maintained that should evolution the theory ever become evolution the philosophy, it would be rightly called atheistic. Thus, ultimately, both Hodges were united in their rejection of Darwinism, seeing it as an overreaching worldview which contradicted both reason and revelation. 

In this paper, I will focus mainly on evaluating and analyzing Charles Hodge’s three main critiques of Darwinism and argue that while he was ultimately right to categorize Darwinism as atheism, his rejection of evolution was a reactionary over-correction. In this respect, I will favor his son’s more measured response to science and scientific discovery. However, I will conclude with a critique of A.A. Hodge’s failure to apprehend and address the moral threat posed by a Darwinian worldview, something which, I believe, has done significant and lasting damage to society. 

In What is Darwinism?, Charles Hodge identifies what he calls the “three distinct elements” of Darwinism: evolution, natural selection, and the denial of “final causes.” In Hodge’s view, they are ordered from least to most objectionable with Darwin’s rejection of teleology being absolutely and unequivocally untenable in his eyes. For the sake of this paper’s flow, I will evaluate his objections in reverse, beginning with his resolute insistence on “final causes” and concluding with his allegiance to Scriptural authority. 

Darwinism’s denial of design is far and away the greatest sticking point for Charles Hodge due to the fact that it directly undermines any need for a Creator. However, despite being the most problematic of Darwinism’s tenants, it is also the one that Hodge most readily dispatches through an appeal to man’s reason, writing, “That design implies an intelligent designer is a self-evident truth. Every man believes it; and no man can practically disbelieve it.” While this is a highly logical argument, it relies on people being both rational and consistent, which, even in that day an age, was hardly guaranteed. However, of the rebuttals Hodge offers, this is easily the strongest.

His intermediary critique of Darwinism has to do with the idea of natural selection. This element of Darwinism, while not necessarily atheistic, was deeply contrary to the Christian conception of God as an involved and active deity because it held that rather than changes in species being a manifestation of God’s guidance and will, they were merely physical processes brought on by the survival of the fittest. In essence, natural selection held that while God might have created life, He was no longer actively involved. This was the view held by Darwin himself, but according to Hodge, “An absent God who does nothing is, to us, no God.” Thus, this critique of Darwinism is more a Christian critique than a theistic one. 

Finally, I want to evaluate Hodge’s response to Darwin’s doctrine of evolution. This is easily his weakest argument, something that, to Hodge’s credit, he acknowledges, writing, “It is conceded that a man may be an evolutionist and yet not be an atheist and may admit of design in nature. But we cannot see how the theory of evolution can be reconciled with the declarations of the Scriptures.” Now, while we now know that evolution cannot account for all of life’s complexity (see God’s Undertaker: Has Science Buried God? and The Devil’s Delusion), at the time of his writing, Hodge’s reluctance to accept evolution was based on little more than feeling which is somewhat ironic given his earlier appeal to man’s rationality. Beyond this, treating the Bible as a scientific textbook when it is rife with poetic and symbolic language seems like a poor application of hermeneutics, and it lends credence to the idea that the Bible must be taken literally in order for it to be taken seriously. Furthermore, in implicitly advancing the idea that science could somehow subsume God, Hodge gives the impression that the God of the Bible is really a God of the gaps that will eventually be explained away by scientific progress. For all of these reasons, I much prefer A.A. Hodge’s attitude towards science and scientific progress, and I will now entertain a brief discussion of the strength of his argument in Theism and Evolution.

In the introduction of Theism and Evolution, A.A. Hodge is careful to delineate between evolution confined within science and evolution loosed as a philosophy, writing, “Now when strictly confined to the legitimate limits of pure science, that is, to the scientific account of phenomena and their laws of co-existence and of succession, this doctrine of evolution is not antagonistic to our faith as neither theists or christians. It is only when this theory assumes to be philosophy, or becomes associated with a philosophy supplying the ideas, the causes, and the final ends which give a rational account of the facts collected, that it can challenge our interest as christians, or threaten our faith.” With the former, he takes no issue. With the latter, he echoes his father’s assessment that evolution very quickly lends itself to atheism. However, unlike his father, A.A. Hodge goes on to write that Christians need not fear scientific progress. In fact, they should welcome it, writing, “True science leads only to the truth, and all truth is congruous with true religion. We should hearty bid science Godspeed. Since our religion is true, matured science can only confirm and illume it.

Now, I much prefer A.A. Hodge’s attitude to his father’s. I think setting up Christianity and science as combatants rather than complements is wrongheaded. If Christianity is true, we have nothing to fear from what science might reveal. In fact, being fearful of scientific discovery simply smacks of unbelief. However, where Charles Hodge was too timorious with respect to evolution, I think A.A. Hodge was a bit too effusive in his endorsement of scientific advancement. 

While I fully agree that Christians have nothing to fear from what science can reveal, I think we have much to fear from what science can accomplish when partnered with a materialistic worldview. Even Richard Dawkins, who claims On the Origin of Species as his own personal Bible, acknowledges the dangers of living out Darwinism, saying in 2005 that “No self respecting person would want to live in a society that operates according to Darwinian laws. I am a passionate Darwinist, when it involves explaining the development of life. However, I am a passionate anti-Darwinist when it involves the kind of society in which we want to live. A Darwinian State would be a Fascist state.” More broadly, unmoored from objective morality, the capacity we have to seriously, even fatally, injure ourselves, one another, and our environment thanks to scientific advancement is both staggering and frightening. As Aldous Huxley wrote in Ends and Means, “We are living now, not in the delicious intoxication induced by the early successes of modern science, but rather in the grisly morning after where it has become apparent that what triumph science has done hitherto is improved the means for achieving unimproved and actually deteriorated ends.” 

Now, I fully realize that A.A. Hodge could not possibly comprehend what something like the atomic bomb or eugenics would mean for humanity, but I still feel that he should have perhaps paid a bit more attention to addressing what the practical consequences of evolution as a philosophy would mean for society.

Religion in America. Fall 2019. Grade Earned: A