It kind of bothers me when people talk about an absolute prohibition against considering polygenism, because I think it’s an exaggeration of the Church’s position. Speaking of it as such is probably fine in most contexts, because Pope Pious XII strongly discounted this possibility in an encyclical and the current explanations in the Catechism align with this, but in the hierarchy of truth in the Catholic Church, it’s possibility hasn’t been banned entirely without question. Thus to speak of it as such opens the door to possible later misunderstanding and crises of faith like finding out that the Earth isn’t the center of the universe.
To build on that example as an imperfect analogy, geocentrism was strongly supported for a long time, and anything else was very cautiously to be engaged, and then only to faithful scholars; the common laity were certainly not encouraged in a non-geocentric notion of cosmology, for it was seen to undermine the common ways of thinking about the special place earth and humanity have in God’s sight. Only when scientists and theologians had carefully considered the revelation of God through Scripture alongside His revelation through His own Creation (as is always still being discovered) was the Church more comfortable in supporting heliocentrism as a position that could be held by the faithful.
In fact, the language Pope Pius XII used in
Humani Generis is not itself absolute:
When, however, there is question of another conjectural opinion, namely polygenism, the children of the Church by no means enjoy such liberty. For the faithful cannot embrace that opinion which maintains that either after Adam there existed on this earth true men who did not take their origin through natural generation from him as from the first parent of all, or that Adam represents a certain number of first parents. Now it is no way apparent how such an opinion can be reconciled with that which the sources of revealed truth and the documents of the Teaching Authority of the Church propose with regard to original sin, which proceeds from a sin actually committed by an individual Adam and which through generation is passed on to all and is in everyone as his own.
The bolded words show the current state of things, but leave the possibility that it could become apparent to the Church. I noticed that the first time I read it. Jimmy Akin (of Catholic Answers) also seems to have noticed it:
Hypothetically (and I am not advocating this), an interpreter might conclude that Adam and Eve represent the early human community as a whole. Pius XII strongly discouraged this interpretation in his enecyclical Humani Generis, but did not altogether preclude the possibility that the Magisterium might be open to it in the future, and some members of the Magisterium (such as the German bishops’ conference) have been explicitly open to it in recent years.
jimmyakin.com/2005/08/tough_bible_que.html
Jimmy recognizes that many interpreters, even older Jewish sources, recognize by the very words “Adam” and “Eve” that Genesis is quite possibly identifying a group or people by an appellation.
However, the first two sentences of Pope Pius XII are binding to the general faithful, that we are not at liberty to hold polygenism over monogenism, to teach it as fact. It would require a shift from the emphasis on the personal sin of Adam and Eve to a more corporate sin (which is another common theme of the Bible, but not emphasized in the the context of Adam and Eve by the Church), a concurrent sequence of personal sins throughout the community, or an infectious sin (or effects thereof, like a “Pandora’s Box”). While the Church teaches these elsewhere, it has refrained so far from doing so in the case of Adam and Eve, and therefore until or unless the Magisterium determines otherwise, we must be careful to give the assent of faith only to the monogenism and connected personal original sin of Adam and Eve.
Just some things that have been on my mind
You don’t, by the way, need to reject the observed data of human prehistory or even most current scientific opinions and interpretations of those data to hold to monogenism. There are many possibilities that allow for it. It is true that polygenism would fit more cleanly into current scientific models, but it is certainly not a case of “accept all of science or reject it all in favor of Genesis as a scientific account.”
There may even be ways to reconcile a Mesopotamian Adam and Eve (recall the mention of the Tigris and Euphrates in Genesis, or at least as is most commonly interpreted) with scientific accounts, even in the approximate time frames we get from the genealogies. I’m not sure many people would like them, but I think they are possible
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