ZYGO Zygon® 0591-2385 1467-9744 10.1111/j.1467-9744.1994.tb00661.x DOES NATURE NEED TO BE REDEEMED? Rolston Holmes 02 06 1994 29 2 10.1111/zygo.1994.29.issue-2 205 229

Abstract. In the light of evolutionary biology, the biblical idea that nature fell with the coming of human sin is incredible. Biblical writers, classical theologians, and contemporary biologists are ambivalent about nature, finding in natural history both a remarkable genesis of life and also much travail and suffering. Earth is a land of promise, and there is the conservation, or redemption, of life in the midst of its perpetual perishing. Life is perennially a struggling through to something higher. In that sense even natural history is cruciform, though human sinfulness introduces novel tragedy. Humans now threaten creation; nature is at more peril than ever before.

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