The Historicity of

Adam
A CRITIQUE TO AN ATHEIST’S RANT CONCERNING
GENESIS ACCOUNT OF CREATION OF MAN
 • Critical scholars generally consider the first
chapters of Genesis to be myth, not history.
They point to the poetic nature of the text, the
parallel of the early chapters of Genesis to other
ancient myths, the alleged contradiction of the
text with evolution, and the late date for Adam
in the Bible (ca. 4000 BC) which is opposed to
Adam 101 scientific dating that places the first humans
much earlier. All of this they consider as
evidence that the story of Adam and Eve is
mythical. However, the Bible presents Adam
and Eve as literal people, who had real children
from whom the rest of the human race
descended (cf. Gen. 5:1f.).
Historical Adam and Eve
• There is good evidence to believe that Adam and Eve were historical persons.
• First, Genesis 1–2 presents them as actual persons and even narrates the important events in their lives.
• Second, they gave birth to literal children who did the same (Gen. 4–5).
• Third, the same phrase (“this is the history of”), used to record later history in Genesis (for example, 6:9; 10:1; 11:10, 27;
25:12, 19), is used of the creation account (2:4) and of Adam and Eve and their descendants.
• Fourth, later Old Testament chronologies place Adam at the top of the list (Gen. 5:1; 1 Chron. 1:1).
• Fifth, the New Testament places Adam at the beginning of Jesus’s literal ancestors (Luke 3:38).
• Sixth, Jesus referred to Adam and Eve as the first literal “male and female,” making their physical union the basis of
marriage (Matt. 19:4).
• Seventh, the book of Romans declares that literal death was brought into the world by a literal “one man”—Adam (Rom.
5:12, 14).
• Eighth, the comparison of Adam (the “first Adam”) with Christ (the “last Adam”) in 1 Corinthians 15:45 manifests that
Adam was understood as a literal, historical person.
• Ninth, Paul’s declaration that “Adam was first formed, then Eve” (1 Tim 2:13–14) reveals that he speaks of real persons.
• Tenth, logically, there had to be a first real set of human beings, male and female, or else the race would have had no way to
get going. The Bible calls this literal couple “Adam and Eve,” and there is no reason to doubt their real existence.
 • The Poetic Nature of Genesis 1.
• Despite the common assumption to the contrary and the beautiful
language of Genesis 1 and 2, the creation record is not poetry.
Although there is possible parallelism of ideas between the first
three and last three days, this is not in the typical form of Hebrew

Objection of poetry, which involves couplets in parallel form. A comparison

with the Psalms or Proverbs readily shows the difference.
Genesis 2 has no poetical parallelism at all. Rather, the creation
Historicity account is like any other historical narrative in the Old
Testament. The account is introduced like other historical
accounts in Genesis with the phrase, “This is the history of . . .”
(Gen. 2:4; 5:1). Jesus and New Testament writers refer to the
creation events as historical (cf. Matt. 19:4; Rom. 5:14; 1 Cor.
15:45; 1 Tim. 2:13–14). The Ebla tablets have added an early
nonbiblical witness of a monotheistic ex nihilo creation.
• The Late-Date Objection.
• The traditional biblical date for the creation of Adam
(ca. 4000 BC) is much too late to fit the fossil evidence
for early human beings, which ranges from tens of
thousands to hundreds of thousands of years. The early
date for humankind is based on scientific dating and
analysis of bone fragments. However, there are false or
challengeable assumptions in this objection. First, it is
assumed that one can simply add all the genealogical
records of Genesis 5 and 11 and arrive at an
approximate date of 4000 BC for Adam’s creation. But
this is based on the false assumption that there are no
gaps in these tables, which there are. This objection
also assumes that the dating method for early human-
like fossil finds is accurate. Yet these dating methods
are subject to many variables, including the change in
atmospheric conditions, contamination of the sample,
and changes of rates of decay.
• It assumes that early human-like fossil finds were really human beings created in the image of God.
But this is a questionable assumption. Many of these finds are so fragmentary that reconstruction is
highly speculative. The so-called “Nebraska Man” was actually an extinct pig’s tooth! Identification
had been based on a tooth. “Piltdown Man” was a fraud. Identifying a creature from bones, especially
bone fragments, is extremely speculative. There may have been human-like creatures that were
morphologically similar to human beings but were not created in the image of God. Bone structure
cannot prove there was an immortal soul made in God’s image inside the body. Evidence for simple
tool making proves nothing. Animals (apes, seals, and birds) are known to use simple tools.
• This objection also assumes that the “days”
of Genesis were twenty-four-hour solar days.
This is not certain, since day in Genesis is
used of all six days (cf. Gen. 2:4). And “day
seven,” on which God rested, is still going
on, thousands of years later (cf. Heb. 4:4–6).
It is impossible to affirm that Genesis is not
historical. In fact, given the unproven
assumptions, the history of misinterpretation
of early fossils, and the mistaken assumption
that there are no gaps in the biblical
genealogies of Genesis 5 and 11, the
arguments against the historicity of Adam
and Eve fail.
 • Let us assume for a moment that the
Adam and Eve story is not to be understood
Is the Adam literally. What would be the result? Would
Christianity remain essentially the same with
and Eve a non-literal understanding of the story of
story to be Adam and Eve? No. In fact, it would have
serious implications for virtually every tenet
understood and doctrine of the Christian faith. If Adam
literally? was not a real man, then sin did not enter the
world through one man as Romans 5:12
states. How, then, did sin enter the world?
• Further, if the New Testament is wrong about
how sin entered the world, what else is it wrong
about? If Romans 5:12 is wrong, how do we
know that the entirety of Romans 5:8–15 is not
wrong? If the story of Adam and Eve is not to be
taken literally—if they did not really exist—then
there was no one to rebel, there was no
fall into sin. Satan, the great deceiver, would like
nothing better than for people to believe that the
Bible should not be taken literally and that the
story of the fall of man is a myth. Why? Because
once we start denying parts of the Bible, we lose
our trust in the Bible. Why should we believe
anything God’s Word says if we cannot trust
everything that it says?
• Jesus taught that God created one man and one woman (Mark 10:6) and mentions Abel, a
son of Adam and Eve in Luke 11:51. Was Jesus wrong in His beliefs? Or did Jesus know
there were no literal Adam and Eve and He was simply accommodating His teaching to
the beliefs of the people (i.e., lying)? If Jesus is wrong in His beliefs, He is not God. If
Jesus is intentionally deceiving people, He is sinning and therefore cannot be the Savior (
1 Peter 1:19).
• That is why this is such a serious issue. To
deny the literalness of Adam and Eve is to
place oneself in opposition to Jesus and the
apostle Paul. If one has the audacity to claim
he is right and Jesus and Paul are wrong,
then Jesus is a sinner, not God and not the
Savior; the apostle Paul is a false prophet;
and the Bible is not inspired, inerrant, or
trustworthy.
• The Bible clearly presents Adam and Eve as
literal people who existed in a literal Garden of
Eden. They literally rebelled against God, they
literally believed Satan’s lie, and they were
literally cast out of the Garden (Genesis 3:24).
They had literal children, all of whom inherited
the sin nature, and that nature was passed down
to succeeding generations to this very day.
Fortunately, God promised a literal Savior to
redeem us from that sin nature (Genesis 3:15).
That Savior is Jesus Christ, called the “last
Adam” (1 Corinthians 15:45), who died on a
literal cross and literally rose again. Those who
believe in Christ will have literal salvation and
spend eternity in a literal heaven.
• Christians who deny the story of Adam and Eve
essentially deny their own faith. Rejecting the
literal interpretation of the Bible’s historical
narratives is a slippery slope. If Adam and Eve did
not exist, then were Cain and Abel not real? Did
Seth exist, and did he father a godly line that led all
the way to Abraham and eventually to Jesus
Himself? Where in Luke’s genealogy (
Luke 3:23–38) do the names stop referring to literal
people and start referring to mythical characters?
To dismiss Adam and Eve as non-literal is to deny
the accuracy of Luke’s gospel, cast aspersions on
Moses’ record, and remove the foundation of the
rest of the Bible.
 • Passage:
• God created human beings in his
own image. In the image of God he
From Josh created them; male and female he
created them. Then God blessed
McDowell them and said, “Be fruitful and
and Sean multiply. Fill the earth and govern
it” (Genesis 1:27-28).
McDowell • Difficulty: Doesn’t the science of
genetics refute the concept that the
entire population of the world came
from just one couple?
• Explanation:
• Over the past couple of decades researchers have used “population genetics” to
estimate initial population size of the human species. By studying human genetic
diversity in the present day, they have tried to extrapolate back to determine the
minimum size of the original population of humans necessary to produce the
diversity we observe today. Some have argued that it is impossible for civilization
to have come from one human couple. Dr. Francis S. Collins is a physician and
geneticist who in 2007 formed the San Diego–based BioLogos Foundation. It is an
organization that promotes theistic evolution among evangelicals. Dennis R.
Venema, PhD, a BioLogos senior fellow for science and biology chairman at Trinity
Western University, is a writer for BioLogos. He too is a theistic evolutionist who is
trying to promote harmony of Darwinian science and faith within the evangelical
community.
• Dr. Venema claims that human
population “was definitely never as
small as two.” He contends that
“our species diverged as a
population. The data are absolutely
clear on that.” He asserts that to
reach the level of genetic diversity
we see today, the initial population
of humans would have had to be
several thousand individuals at
minimum—not one couple.
• Not all biologists, however, agree with
Dr. Venema. Dr. Ann Gauger is senior
research scientist at the Biologic
Institute, a pro–intelligent design
research lab based near Seattle,
Washington. She earned a PhD in
biology from the University of
Washington, and later did postdoctoral
work at Harvard. In the chapter “The
Science of Adam and Eve” in the 2012
book Science and Human Origins,
Gauger finds that Venema’s arguments
were based upon a now outdated study
of genes involved in the human immune
system that was published by the
geneticist Francisco Ayala in 1995.
• According to Gauger, these population genetics studies
make many assumptions—including a constant
background mutation rate, lack of natural selection, lack
of migration, and a constant population size. If any of
those assumptions are wrong then the conclusions
could be meaningless. Gauger reanalyzed Ayala’s data
and found that he failed to control two of the
assumptions, and analyzed a portion of the gene known
to experience an unusually high mutation rate, causing
him to dramatically overestimate the required initial
population sizes.
• When the analysis is done properly,
Gauger found that “a first couple
could have carried sufficient genetic
diversity to account for” the genetic
diversity we observe today in
humans for this gene.4 Gauger
further found that more recent
research reveals this gene shows
conflicting phylogenetic patterns,
which “cannot be explained by
common ancestry” of humans and
apes.
• Likewise, Dr. C. John Collins, professor
of Old Testament at Covenant
Theological Seminary, questions
these population genomics figures.
He cites 2006 research from Canada,
France, and Japan that “indicates
ambiguity about the rate of changes
in genetic diversity that have been
used thus far to calculate primordial
population sizes.” Theorizing about
how many people it would initially
take in the deep past to generate
observed human genetic diversity
today, according to Collins and
Gauger, is far from an exact science.
• Another factor that geneticists usually fail to consider is the original genome of
the first man and woman, Adam and Eve. From a creationist’s point of view, the
optimal DNA and genetic diversity of the first couple formed by the hand of God
is impossible to quantify because it has been lost to time, and potentially
radically changed since the Fall. But it does seem plausible that Adam and Eve
had a physiology and genotype different from our own today. After all, Adam lived
to be 930 years old—so clearly his biology was different from ours. So their
biological makeup may have been such that their genetic diversity was not
comparable to humans today. If that is the case there might be no genetic reason
why an initial pair of two humans couldn’t have led to present-day human genetic
diversity in a short period of time.
 • Did Adam and Eve really exist? Did all
humanity originate from a single pair?
These questions are not peripheral topics
for an academic debate; they are central to
The Scientific the Christian faith.

Case for Adam • Toward this end, recent advances in

molecular genetics are quite provocative.
and Eve (By As Hugh Ross and I discuss in
Who Was Adam?, numerous studies
Fazale Rana) indicate that humanity originated: (1)
recently (around 100,000 years ago, plus or
minus 20,000 years or so); (2) at a single
location (East Africa)—close to where
some Bible scholars think the Garden of
Eden was located; and (3) from a small
population
of individuals.
• Moreover, analysis of mitochondrial DNA (which provides insight into the
origin of the maternal lineage) indicates that humanity traces back to a
single ancestral sequence that could be interpreted as a single woman.
Likewise, characterization of Y-chromosomal DNA (which provides insight
into the origin of the
paternal lineage) indicates that all men trace their origin back to a single
ancestral sequence that could be interpreted as a single man.
• These astounding results harmonize with a traditional reading of the
biblical account of human origins, and suggest that Adam and Eve likely
existed as real persons who gave rise to all of humanity.
• But Did Adam and Eve Exist? Population Size
• Others have challenged this interpretation, arguing
that the genetic data shows that humanity arose from
thousands of individuals, not two.1 The chief basis
for this claim comes from estimates of the ancestral
population size of humans based on genetic
diversity.
• It is possible to estimate the effective population size
of any ancestral group from genetic diversity of
present-day populations if the mutation rate is
known. As discussed in Who Was Adam?, a number
of these types of studies do indeed indicate that
humans stem from a small population, on the
order of a few hundred to a few thousand.2
• Skeptics of the traditional reading of the biblical
account of human origins uncritically accept
these results. They argue that the data indicate
humanity experienced a genetic bottleneck, with
the population collapsing to a relatively small
number of individuals. Consequently humanity
arose from the thousands of survivors, not a
primeval pair.
• Critics also point to other methods to model the
size of the ancestral population that do not
depend on mutations, but on other types of
processes to generate genetic diversity.3 Studies
employing these techniques also seem to
indicate that humanity arose from population
sizes on the order of a few thousand individuals.
• What Was the Population Size, Really?
• In the face of this challenge, it is important to recognize that population sizes generated by these
methods are merely estimates, not hard and fast values. The reason: the mathematical models are
highly idealized, generating differing estimates based on a number of factors. As a case in point
consider two studies discussed in Who Was Adam? One, reported in 2003 by a Russian and U.S.
research team, examined DNA sequence elements called short tandem repeats at 377 locations in the
human genome for 1,056 individuals that represented 52 population groups. On the basis of this
analysis, they concluded that humanity originated from a single point of origin (apparently Africa),
from a small population (~2,000 or less) between 71,000 and 142,000 years ago. 4 Although this
conclusion was consistent with that of an earlier study of short tandem repeats, the population size
estimate from the earlier study was around 500 individuals. 5 The reason for the difference (of about
1,500) was due to a varying sample size and number of locations in the human genome that were
studied.
• Did humanity originate from a single pair?
Even though population estimates reveal
that humanity originated from several
hundred to several thousand individuals
based on mathematical models, it could
well be the case that these models
overestimate the original numbers for the
first humans.
• And it is important to note that an origin of humanity from a small population is consistent with the
existence of a historical Adam and Eve who gave rise to all of humanity. After their creation the
biblical text teaches that they procreated––having many sons and daughters (Genesis 5:4). Given the
limitations of the methods, could it be that the population estimates are reporting on the population
structure of humans some time after their creation, when the population would have been small, on the
order of a few thousand? Additionally, skeptics who claim that humanity came from thousands of
individuals and not two assume that Adam and Eve were genetically identical. Yet, there is no hint of
that idea in Scripture. When Eve is created, God takes material from Adam’s side and rebuilds
(bānâ in the original Hebrew) it. Part of this process could have involved the introduction of genetic
differences into Eve’s genome that made Adam and Eve genetically heterogeneous.
• As with the mouflon sheep, if natural selection drove an
increase in genetic diversity in humans, then the estimates
of the original population sizes of humanity would be
artificially high.
• We All Like Sheep?
• In 2007 a research team reported on the
genetic diversity of wild mouflon sheep on
one of the islands that are part of the
Kerguelen sub-Antarctic archipelago.6 This
group of sheep provided researchers with an
unprecedented opportunity to study the
effects of population dynamics on genetic
diversity in small populations.
• In 1957 a male and female yearling were placed onto Haute Island (an island
in the Kerguelen Archipelago). These two sheep were taken from a captive
population in France. By the beginning of the 1970s, the number had grown
to 100 individuals and peaked at 700 sheep in 1977. Since that time the
population has fluctuated in a cyclical manner between 250 and 700
members. Given that the population began with only two individuals (the
founder effect), has experienced cyclical changes in the population size, and
was isolated on an island, the researchers expected very low genetic
diversity (measured as heterozygosity).
• Using mathematical models, the
heterozygosity of a population can be
computed at any point in time from the
heterozygosity of the ancestral population
(which was known for the original mouflon
pair) and the original population size. What
the researchers discovered, however, when
they measured this quantity directly for the
sheep on Haute Island was that it exceeded
the predictions made by the models by up to
a factor of 4. In other words, the models
underestimated the genetic diversity of the
actual population.

The researchers explained this
discrepancy by speculating that
natural selection drives the increase
in genetic diversity, since an increase
in genetic variability increases the
survivability of the population.
Consequently, if these same models
were used to estimate the effective
sizes of the ancestral population
from the measured genetic diversity
at any point in time, they would
have overestimated the original
population size as much larger than
two individuals.
• Lastly, the primary reason to think that
humanity arose from a single pair does not
rest on population estimates, but the fact that
the Y-chromosomal and mitochondrial DNA
sequences sampled from humans alive today
trace back to single ancestral sequences.
Again, these can be understood as reflecting
an origin from a single man and single
woman.
• One Lucky Mother, One Lucky Father?
• Even though the genetic data traces humanity’s origin back
to a single woman and man, evolutionary biologists are
quick to assert that mitochondrial Eve and Y-chromosomal
Adam were not the first humans. Rather, according to them,
many “Eves” and “Adams” existed.7 Accordingly,
mitochondrial Eve and Y-chromosomal Adam were the
lucky ones whose genetic material just happened to survive.
The genetic lines of the other first humans were lost over
time.
• While this explanation is not out of the realm
of possibility, it is highly contrived. It would
work if only a few of the first humans
reproduced, or were allowed to reproduce. If
the data is simply taken at face value, the
biblical model is the more parsimonious
explanation.
• Even though evolutionary biologists offer
ways to explain away the implications of the
human population genetic data, these
explanations—entrenched in naturalism—are
not necessarily superior to an interpretation
that fully squares with the biblical account.
The scientific case for the biblical Adam and
Eve stands firm.