Racism—Getting to the Heart of the Matter

Inevitably, many hold to the idea that certain groups are just inherently flawed and irredeemable—immutably racist to the core. And that’s really not that surprising when cultures reject the Bible as their authority. You see the whole idea of races isn’t biblical, it’s an evolutionary concept.

The whole idea of races isn’t biblical, it’s an evolutionary concept.

Many even in the evangelical church would balk at that conclusion, but that is because many in the church have abandoned belief in Genesis 1–11 (which is the seedbed of all Christian doctrines) as plainly written as true history. And as easily as that is for me to see now, it wasn’t always that way. So let me tell you my personal story and perhaps you’ll see how I’ve come to realize the root cause of racism.

A World-Wide Issue

Growing up my family travelled all over the world because of my Dad’s work. We lived in Panama, West Africa, Cyprus, and crisscrossed Canada several times over, finally settling in Nova Scotia where I met my wife.

I remember observing racist attitudes in various forms everywhere we went, and even people from the same people group would discriminate against each other when they reached a higher socio-economic level than they had previously been (which is “classist,” not racist, but has the same root—the concept of personal superiority over others). Surprisingly, Halifax/Dartmouth saw many race-relation challenges, as segregation was part of the historical make-up of the area.

An Evolutionary Lens

As a young person from a non-Christian home trying to make sense of the world around me, my only worldview framework I had was from an evolutionary point of view. By age 10, I had fully embraced the concept that mankind had evolved from ape-like ancestors over millions of years and that, ultimately, man was just a sophisticated “hairless ape.” Why wouldn’t I? It was taught everywhere I looked on TV, in schools, and in the books I read.

I remember looking at diagrams such as these (Image 1) from Time-Life Books that taught that the different “races” of people (Australoid, Mongoloid, Caucasoid, and Negroid) had evolved and branched off from a common ancestor millions of years earlier, while the classic “ape-to-man” diagram I often saw (Image 2) indicated something quite profound—that dark-skinned apes had apparently “evolved” into Caucasians.

So, it seemed clear that what they were teaching me is that the lighter the skin color you had, the more evolved that you were. Conversely, the less “white” you were, the less evolved you must be. It seemed so obvious then that some “races” may have evolved to different levels of intellect or abilities than others, which would mean some races are superior, and some inferior.2

Now even though some people haven’t thought that through as clearly as I just expressed, that is the mental sub-routine that is likely playing in the back of many people’s minds whether they know it or not. And I understand that modern evolutionary ideas try to distance themselves from these concepts regarding human evolution, but for many in my age category this is the paradigm that was etched into our consciousness because of our education.

Racism in Real Life

For those that think this is too simplistic, look at how racism commonly plays out in real life. Have you ever watched a European soccer game where when one of the dark-skinned players runs out on the field, and a camera pans the crowd and reveals a group of light-skinned people with their hands bunched up under their armpits screeching monkey noises at them?3 Racist, isn’t it? But why is it racist? What’s the real message they are conveying to the darker-skinned person? The underlying idea is—“You are closer to the apes; you are less evolved than we are. Therefore, we are superior to you and can mock you.”

Think of the popular movie Remember the Titans where the “black” coach played by actor Denzel Washington is tossed a banana by the racist “white” coach? Racist, wasn’t it? But why is tossing a banana to someone with dark skin racist? Because monkeys like bananas, so what you are expressing is that they are more like a monkey than you are. The entire concept of evolution is a racist idea, and the father of modern evolution clearly expressed those views in his books from the beginning.

Darwin the Racist

Conceptually, Charles Darwin’s Origin of Species barely touched the surface regarding human evolution, although he hinted at it when he said:

In the distant future . . . Light will be thrown on the origin of man and his history.

He made what he believed much clearer in his expose of human origins titled The Descent of Man where he proposed that:

At the same time the anthropomorphous apes [i.e. the apes that look like people—author]. . . will no doubt be exterminated. The break between man and his nearest allies will then be wider . . . even than the Caucasian, and some ape as low as a baboon, instead of as now between the negro or Australian [aborigine] and the gorilla.

Can you see what he said? There seems to be an implied hierarchy of “sophistication,” shall we call it, from the baboon or gorilla to Australian aborigine and negros to the Caucasian! Dark-skinned, hairy apes have turned into white people over millions of years, which means he believed Caucasians were supposedly the most highly evolved “race” on the planet. How might those who bought into these evolutionary ideas have been influenced against others different from them?

Lest you think this is just the random opinion of a Bible-thumping creationist, understand that even giants in the evolutionary community like the late Stephen Jay Gould have admitted it did.

Biological arguments for racism may have been common before 1859, but they increased by orders of magnitude following the acceptance of evolutionary theory.4

Origin of Species was published in 1859, Descent of Man graced (or more properly, disgraced) bookstore shelves in 1871. Ideas have consequences, which is why no sooner had these ideas been published, atheistic, evolutionary adherents like Thomas Huxley (nicknamed Darwin’s bulldog and one of his closest friends) was spewing racist filth like the following;

No rational man, cognizant of the facts, believes that the average negro is the equal, still less the superior, of the white man.5

Living Out What They Have Been Taught

How can you possibly argue that everyone is equally “evolved” if there are different races of people?

So, notice that many times when people exhibit racist attitudes, it’s actually a logical outcome of what the state-run school systems have been teaching as “fact” and “science” for several generations now. And I know that many evolutionists will cry foul when reading this because they will adamantly declare they are not racist—which I accept on the face of it. But that is actually inconsistent with what the so-called “theory of evolution” is based upon: How could one possibly argue that everyone is equally “evolved” if there are different races of people on the planet that have evolved at different rates? The concept of human evolution provided people with a (supposedly) scientific basis for believing they are superior to others, which is the entire basis for racism.

rac·ism
Prejudice, discrimination, or antagonism directed against someone of a different race based on the belief that one's own race is superior.
—Oxford Dictionary

A Renewed Mind

When I became a Christian, I began reading the Bible with a rather straightforward approach. I reasoned that if this were the word of God, then what it said as plainly written must be true. This gave me a brand-new way of understanding the world, and far from some evolutionary origin, “the Bible . . . reveals that all humans descended from one set of parents and that the people groups of the world can be explained through the events in Genesis 11 [at the Tower of Babel]. . . . Scripture doesn’t begin with people evolving from apelike creatures.”6

“Genesis records that Adam and Eve were made specially and intimately made by a supernatural act—the first humans, both male and female, created in God’s image on the sixth day of creation week. If Adam and Eve were the first humans, then all their descendants have also been fully human. . . . The Bible never uses the word race [in a biological sense], but it does mention that we are ‘one blood’ (Acts 17:26).”7 So biblically there’s only one race, the human race. Biblical creationists can’t be logically consistent and be racist. Who would we be racist to?

The Heart of the Matter

By rejecting the true history of the human race and replacing it with the story of evolution, our culture is lost in a sea of violent confusion and bitterness that is unresolvable within their own paradigm. And I am not downplaying specific events or minimalizing the hurt that many have experienced, however, the Bible reveals the root cause of racism—sin. You see, sadly, “humans identify with Adam not only in his humanity but also in his sin nature.”8 Romans 5:12 makes it clear:

. . . sin came into the world through one man, and death through sin, and so death spread to all men because all sinned.

And scripture also reminds us that the outward appearance is not what matters:

Do not look at his appearance . . . man looks at the outward appearance, but the Lord looks at the heart. (1 Samuel 16:7)

The heart of the matter, ultimately, is that we are all sinful creatures in need of a Savior.

The heart of the matter, ultimately, is that we are all sinful creatures in need of a Savior. The good news is that “Jesus Christ became a descendant of Adam to die for the descendants of Adam (Romans 5:17). Because of Christ’s sinless life, death, burial, and resurrection, we are able to put our trust in him for eternal life.”9 The redeemed that will worship the Lord in this new heaven and new earth will display a beautiful variety of physical features that the Lord imbued in his original creation and will be from every tribe, tongue, and nation.

Without the true history revealed in the word of God, the people on our planet will continue to tear each other down. That is why it’s so important for believers to stand on the authority of the word of God from the very first verse and love others enough to share the truth of where we all came from, and where we are all going, apart from our Savior.