What About Neanderthals?

SPQR

Darwin's Dachshund
SPQR
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I was watching a show on the Discovery Science Channel entitled The Rise of Man a few nights ago and this question hit me.

What does Chrisitianity say about neanderthals? They were a seperate species of human that lived along side homo sapiens about ten thousand years ago(feel free to correct me on the time frame).

If they were a different species of human, did they have a "soul"? If not, why?

Or do fundies simple disregard the fossil evidence of neanderthals like they do with most everything else? Just curious.

I'm not sure if this should be in the Science sub-forum or the Religion one.
 
The notion about the existence of Neanderthals is clearly a trick of Satan.

It sure must be easy having a catch-all solution to any inquires caused by all that annoying evidence. :)
 
They were just stubby peoples! Evidence that says they were another species is just scientists being stupid*!

*Stupid=contradicting the HOLY BIBLE, have they no SHAME?

But seriously, that is about what the average Christian does. Sure the evidence all points to it, but all a Christian needs is a vague understanding (generally, that they are a supposed missing link rather than a seperate evolutionary branch, and also that they look different, but no details on HOW different), and they come to the conclusion that they were just the occasional genetically different human, thinking "hey, humans have had genetic disorders before". It is the very nature of a closed mind. Either ignore what someone said, or use only the basic essence of what they said, come up with some way to rationalize it away, and don't bother doing any further research.
 
The Fundy's believe that the Earth was created 6,000 years ago. Anything that was supposed to exist prior to that time is a lie. Carbon dating does not work; unless of course the method correctly dated(in accordance with the church) some Christian artifact or relic.

The Neanderthals went extinct about 25,000 years ago.
 
Most Christians believe that they were Neanderthals.

Some creationists believe that they were sickly humans, usually somehow connected to the great flood. Some believe they were giants that went extinct during the flood.
 
If the flood clouds were around long enough for the neanderthals to develop rickets, wouldn't everyone around at the time have developed rickets? And since rickets isn't a hereditary condition, that would mean that all the neanderthals ever found were alive at the same time. None before, and none after. Quite remarkable, when you think about it...:D
 
Intriguing question.

I don't recall hearing any theologians discussing Neanderthals.

Doesn't look like anyone else has either.
 
I suspect if pushed, most moderate/liberal non-literalist Christians would say they would consider Neanderthals simply another 'sort' of human, and so would be just the same as any other human who lived prior to all the stuff in the Bible. Maybe it could spawn a debate about when you stop being actualy 'human', and start being a different animal entirely, but they'd probably just go along with whatever scientists say (like the whole Homo sapiens neanderthalensis debate, etc.).

But with YECs, early hominids are an entirely different problem (given that they lived before the world was created, and are entirely understandable in terms of evolution), and so lead to the dumbness mentioned above. I've seen YEC sites which "prove" (or more usually "proove") that the first Neanderthals discovered were Russian cossacks suffering from malnutrition and horseriding-related deformities; ad hoc explanations are proffered for subsequent examples.

For good discussions about how appallingly wrong and dishonest such YEC arguments are, see lengthy rebuttals at www.talkorigins.org
 
Asking this question sort of assumes that the Christian you're talking to accepts evolution, so in that case, I wonder what is their view of exactly when hominids acquired a soul. I think they preach that other animals don't have souls, right? So what about australopithecenes? Homo erectus? Homo ergaster? Did they have souls? Was it sudden, or did it form gradually over the last 500,000 years?

I would think that this line of questioning would stump a Christian pretty quickly.
 
Would this be the same Christians that until recently (relatively speaking) didn't think that darker skinned individuals or those from the far east or any other different culture for that matter were not human and didn't have souls.
 
I always heard it as they were the Nephilim--you know, the offspring of angels and mortal women. "There were giants in the earth in those days, men of old, men of reknown."
 
OK, then, Objective Ministries is satirical. Take a look at Kidz crafts page. Doesn't the Mr. Gruff action figure look familiar?
 
Many Christians, too, will use the argument usually reserved for problems like the native who dies on a remote island, having never had an opportunity to accept Christ. One view is that he is condemned; the other relies on a statement by the Apostle Paul vis-a-vis (to paraphrase) "for as much light as a man is given, for so much is he accountable."

A Christian like this might argue that whether Neanderthals, Cro-Magnons, etc., had souls or not is irrelevant, since neither Christ nor the covenant with Abraham (nee Abram) had been established. If they use this argument (barring the obvious objections a skeptic might have about the existence of God, etc.), then the question of a neolithic soul really doesn't have much punch to it.

Keep in mind, please, that I'm only playing Devil's Advocate here.
 
what about neanderthals?

The neanderthals I used to work with didn't seem to have souls.

glenn
 
UrsulaV said:
I always heard it as they were the Nephilim--you know, the offspring of angels and mortal women. "There were giants in the earth in those days, men of old, men of reknown."
Click to expand...

Uhm, I guess not.

If I remember correctly (no, no, I'm not THAT old, I'm talking about something I read - or I think I read) the Average Neanderthal Joe was acually shorter than the Average Sapiens Joe. More muscular, but shorter.

Some creationists (had to correct a Freudian lapse - wrote cretinists) claimed meganthropus were the nephilin (those from the Bible, not the Shivan ones).
 
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