Evolution, the Enlightenment, and Worldviews

Today’s entry is part of our Video Blog series. For similar resources, visit our audio/video section, or our full "Conversations" collection. Please note the views expressed in the video are those of the author, not necessarily of The BioLogos Foundation. You can read more about what we believe here.

Today's video features N.T. Wright. N.T. Wright is a leading biblical scholar, former Bishop of Durham in the Church of England, and current Research Professor of New Testament and Early Christianity, University of St Andrews. He studied for the ministry at Wycliffe Hall, Oxford, and was ordained at Merton College, Oxford. Wright holds a Doctor of Divinity from Oxford University in addition to several honorary doctorates. Wright has also written over fifty books, including the multi-volume work Christian Origins and the Question of God and his two most recent books Simply Jesus: A New Vision of Who He Was, What He Did, and Why He Matters and How God Became King.

In the video above, N.T. Wright discusses how the Enlightenment worldview -- which clearly separates God from the world -- has impacted our view of Scripture, and why cleaning the "spectacles" through which we view the world can help us see both Scripture and the world more clearly. In contrast to the Englightenment, most other worldviews present a more fluid and messy interrelationship between God and the world. According to Wright, we need to learn how to navigate this fluid, messy relationship in order to learn how to read the Bible.

Wright makes an especially interesting point between 1:40 and 2:20. As a challenge for this weekend, let’s see if we can get to the heart of what he is saying. Regardless of whether you agree with him, see if you can summarize Wright's ideas for us. If we get what we think is a really good summary, then we’ll likely put it up as a main post sometime soon and give everyone a chance to respond to it. Your task for now though, is to summarize it in 1,250 characters.

Blessings, Darrel.

Commentary written by the BioLogos editorial team.