Much to his credit, Ellott shunned the wordplay tactics of many of his academic colleagues and didn’t couch heterodoxy in orthodox language. Though he eventually resigned under pressure from Midwestern, it was not for heresy, but because he refused to stop a new edition of his book from being published and proudly stood by it.

One of the catalysts of the Conservative Resurgence — the Elliott controversy — was examined by three Southern Baptist historians in a panel discussion Sept. 10 at Midwestern Baptist Theological Seminary.

The controversy erupted at Midwestern in 1961 when Ralph Elliott, the chair of the Old Testament department, authored a book published by Broadman Press titled “The Message of Genesis.”

Elliott used a historical-critical method of interpretation to examine the first book of the Bible, arguing that it was not literal history, but that it could be religious truth nonetheless. Elliott assumed multiple authors for Genesis and concluded it was full of “symbolic stories” not to be taken as “literally true,” such as: Adam and Eve were not actual historical figures, the flood was local, and Abraham did not actually hear the voice of God commanding him to sacrifice Isaac.

Featured in the panel discussion were Greg Wills, dean of Southern Baptist Theological Seminary’s school of theology; John Mark Yeats, pastor of Normandale Baptist Church in Fort Worth and a former church history faculty member at Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary; and Michael McMullen, professor of church history at MBTS. Jason Allen, Midwestern’s president, was the moderator.

Yeats described Elliott’s book as “a classic, liberal approach” which held that “the Scriptures themselves contain good, moral truth.”

What I think is more shocking,” Yeats said, “is that Elliott writes later that this was consistent amongst all our seminaries. This is what all departments were teaching and how pastors were being trained; you teach your people simple moral truths. Whether it’s historical, real or not, that doesn’t matter.”

The outcry in Baptist life was swift and widespread, exemplified by Texas pastor K. Owen White’s widely read essay, “Death in the Pot.”

“The book in question is ‘poison,'” White wrote. “This sort of rationalistic criticism can lead only to further confusion, unbelief, deterioration, and ultimate disintegration as a great New Testament denomination. It has happened to other denominations; it can happen to us! Modernism is insidious, dangerous, and destructive.”

Leading up to the SBC annual meeting in 1962, The Message of Genesis controversy led conservatives who agreed with White to attempt to codify traditional Baptist doctrine in what would become the Baptist Faith and Message (BF&M) of 1963. The new confession was intended to reflect the beliefs of churches in the convention and to tighten the accountability standards regarding the inerrancy of Scripture at the seminaries and SBC institutions.

[Editor’s note: This article is incomplete. The source for this document was originally published on Baptist Press—however, the link (URL) to the original article is unavailable and has been removed.]