“And hath made of one blood all nations of men for to dwell on all the face of the earth, and hath determined the times before appointed, and the bounds of their habitation” (Acts 17:26).
This important truth was preached by Paul to the Greek intellectuals in Athens, reminding them (and us) that all nations are alike before God. Note that God has ordained distinct nations, not “races.” Neither the word nor the concept of “race” ever appears in Scripture. All nations are of “one blood” and have all descended from Noah. “These are the three sons of Noah: and of them was the whole earth overspread” (Genesis 9:19).
Thus there is no Biblical basis for racism, or any notion that one race is intrinsically superior to any other. Racism has its basis in evolutionism—the idea that the so-called “races” have been evolving independently for 50,000 years or more. Racism has its roots in pre-Darwinian systems of evolutionary pantheism, but Darwin and most other evolutionists of the 19th century both in Europe and America were strong racists and gave it a pseudo-scientific sanction with their notions of struggle for existence and natural selection of the fittest.
Racist thought continued to dominate anthropology until the ardent evolutionist, Adolf Hitler, gave it a bad name with his Aryan racism in World War II. Modern evolutionists have now largely abandoned the racist ideas of Darwin, Huxley, Haeckel, et al., but evolutionary theory still naturally lends itself to such applications.
In any case, no Christian should harbor any concept of racial superiority, for we have been “renewed in knowledge after the image of Him that created [us]: Where there is neither Greek nor Jew . . . Barbarian, Scythian, bond nor free: but Christ is all and in all” (Colossians 3:10,1 1). HMM
