If the “days” of Creation in Genesis 1…

(a) are defined as an “evening” and a “morning,”

(b) are preceded by cardinal or ordinal numbers,

(c) are characterized by alternating periods of “day/light” and “night/darkness” (which facilitated photosynthesis, photoperiodism, and pollination),

(d) are mentioned alongside of “years” (and thus one can understand the difference),

(e) require symbiotic relationships among species created on separate “days,”

(f) entailed the creation of man and woman “from the beginning of the creation” who then witnessed the things God created “since the creation of the world,”

(g) and are identified by God/Moses as “six days” followed by the “seventh day” as the day of Sabbath rest,

Then the “days” of Creation in Genesis 1 were literal, 24-hour days.

Premise 2:

The “days” of Creation in Genesis 1…

(a) are defined as an “evening” and a “morning” (Genesis 1:5,8,13,19,23,31),

(b) are preceded by cardinal/ordinal numbers (1:5,8,13,19,23,31),

(c) are characterized by alternating periods of “day/light” and “night/darkness” (1:3-5),

(d) are mentioned alongside of “years” (1:14),

(e) require symbiotic relationships among species created on separate “days” (e.g., yucca plant/yucca moth; Emerald Wasp/cockroach; Leafcutter ant and fungus; etc.),

(f) entailed the creation of man and woman “from the beginning of the creation” (Mark 10:6) who then witnessed the things God created “since the creation of the world” (Romans 1:20),

(g) are identified by God/Moses as “six days” followed by the “seventh day” as the day of Sabbath rest (Exodus 20:11).

Conclusion:

Therefore, the “days” of Creation in Genesis 1 were literal, 24-hour days.

The post A Logical Argument for Literal Days of Creation appeared first on Apologetics Press.

[Editor’s Note: The following article was written by A.P. auxiliary staff writer, Kevin Cain, who holds degrees from Freed-Hardeman University (B.S., M.Min.) and the Doctor of Jurisprudence from South Texas College of Law. A former Briefing Attorney of The First Court of Appeals, his current practice focuses on litigation at the trial and appellate levels in both State and Federal Courts.]

We took her to Bible class. We took her to worship services regularly. We took her to countless youth events, trips, and activities. She was baptized at camp when she was 14. I thought we did everything right before she left for college. We did what the preachers and elders said we should do when it comes to raising our sweet daughter. And yet, when she left home for higher education, she left the church about the same time. She does not attend worship services or Bible class. She is not involved with any other Christians or on-campus Christian organizations. She is not in contact with any of her old church friends. She’s gone, and it breaks my heart every day. Where did we go wrong?

Too many parents have lived a similar experience. If it only happened once, it would be a tragedy. But when we see it happen time and time again, it is an epidemic. The obvious question is “why?” Why are so many of our young people leaving for college and leaving the church at the same time? What are we missing? What did we fail to teach them? What went wrong?

There are countless theories as to why this epidemic continues. People speculate they are leaving because the church is too conservative; the music is boring; the preacher uses too much Scripture; the church is outdated on its views of marriage and women’s roles; the parents were too strict; the church building is outdated; or the youth minister didn’t connect with my child on a personal level. Theories and opinions abound, but what is missing are facts and objective answers. Parents and elders are looking for answers—why are they leaving and what can be done?

First, are the statistics as bad as we have heard? The short answer is “yes.” Campus Renewal out of Austin, Texas estimates that between 60% to 80% of Christian denominational students leaving for college also leave their faith behind as well.¹ Another study by respected pollster George Barna involved interviews with 22,000 adults and over 2,000 teenagers in 25 separate surveys (hereinafter the “Barna Study”). The purpose of this survey was not only to determine how many young people were leaving religion, but also to find out why. This survey among “conservative” evangelicals concluded that two-thirds of young people give up on religion when they head for college.² While these are general studies outside the churches of Christ, these numbers are nevertheless alarming. While the numbers at the congregation you attend may be better, any statistic above 0% is worrisome.

So, who do we blame? When things go this wrong on this scale, we like to blame the elders, the youth minister, the preacher, the church (as a whole), global warming, or pretty much anyone but ourselves. If we can point the finger at someone else before they point the finger at us, we don’t have to feel too bad about these alarming numbers. Right?

Interestingly, the Barna Study delves deep (and I mean deep) into analyzing why these young people are leaving religion behind. For example, the Barna Study determined that of all the 20-something evangelicals who attended church regularly but no longer do so now:

• 95% attended church regularly during elementary and middle school.
• 55% attended church regularly during high school
• 11% were still going to church during college³

From those stats, we see that only 11% of those who have left the church did so during college years. Almost 90% of them were lost already in middle school and high school—before going to college. About 40% are leaving the church during elementary and middle school. This shocked me when I first read it. We are not losing most of our young people when they leave for college and have to face the world alone for the first time. Most of them are checking out (mentally if not physically as well) in junior high and high school. We are losing them earlier than we might have thought.

The Barna Study goes on to make an interesting comparison between those who regularly attended Bible class and those who did not regularly attend Bible class. Compared to those who grew up not attending Bible class, students who regularly attend Bible class are:

• more likely NOT to believe all accounts/stories in the Bible are true or accurate;
• more likely to doubt the Bible because it is written by men and has errors in the translating;
• more likely to accept that gay marriage and abortion should be legal;
• much more likely to believe that God used evolution to change one kind of animal into another;
• more likely NOT to believe the earth is less than 10,000 years old;
• more likely to believe dinosaurs died before people were on the planet; and
• more likely to believe that good people don’t need to go to church.⁴

These statistics appear to be upside down. How could it be that a person who grew up attending Bible school is less likely to believe in basic Bible principles as compared to a person who did not regularly go to Bible class? That simply doesn’t make sense. I’ll admit; I had to read these results several times before I finally concluded that I was not misreading or misunderstanding all this. Are we doing something wrong or missing something in our traditional Bible class curricula?

What we begin to see from these important findings in the Barna Study is a significant correlation between believing in the creation account and whether they will remain faithful to God or whether they will come back to the church. There is a direct tie between what they believe about Genesis and their attitude toward Christianity.

The conclusion here is painfully obvious: If the authority of God’s Word is undermined in Genesis, this leads to a slippery slope of unbelief about the whole of the Bible. If we as teachers, parents, preachers, and elders have been chipping away at the accuracy and reliability of the events in the first eleven chapters in Genesis (or we ignore cultural attacks on Genesis 1-11), if we really cannot rely on these events as being historically accurate, why should we believe in the accuracy of the details of the life of Joseph in Genesis 37-50? Why should we believe the accuracy of Moses delivering Israel from slavery in the book of Exodus? Why believe the account of David and Goliath? How could we believe in the miracles of Elijah and Elisha? Why should we even believe the prophecies of Jesus? Ultimately, why believe the Gospel accounts of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John if we cannot rely on the accuracy of Genesis 1-11? Our kids are smart enough to know that when we compromise in one area of the Bible (like Genesis 1-11), we can hypocritically compromise wherever we want. The damage has been done, and for most of our young people, it depends on how they view the foundation and the very beginning of the Bible and the Creation account.

The Barna Study also looked into the beliefs of young adults who said they plan to return some day (like when they have kids of their own) versus those who never plan to return.⁵

Those who have left and never plan to return have serious doubts about the accuracy of the Bible, especially when it comes to Creation. In those early formative years, they were clearly left with questions and reservations about the reliability of God’s word and the Creation account in particular. And now, after years of doubting the first chapters of Genesis and years after a constant bombardment of evolution in school (and pretty much everywhere) and increasing compromises by religious institutions regarding Creation, they find themselves gone with no thought of ever returning.

In 1859, Darwin published On the Origin of Species and 12 years later The Descent of Man.⁶ In these two volumes, he made popular the idea that single-celled organisms changed through the process of evolution into ape-like creatures and eventually into humans.⁷ In response, many of the religious institutions in England, and eventually across the United Kingdom and Europe, began to adopt Darwin’s ideas.⁸ They reinterpreted the Genesis account of Creation and proposed views such as “theistic evolution.”⁹ They compromised what they had always taught (God created the world in one literal week) and tried to engender scientific credibility by claiming that God worked through evolution to create the world. To see the long-term effect of this compromise, just look at the superficial state of religion in Europe today. It can be summed up by looking at the beautiful cathedrals and places of worship throughout that continent—amazing museums filled with architectural works, but lacking in the work of the Lord.

The damage was done, and the slope was more than just a little slippery. This thinking and rationale of making compromises in the Creation account sent a very clear message to everyone, especially to the upcoming younger generations. It was now acceptable to use man’s ideas to re-interpret the Bible, rather than to use the Bible to judge man’s ideas. God set up a system where He laid out His divine perspective on how man should view the world (Psalm 32:8). God made man (Genesis 1:27). Therefore, man should listen to God, the Creator (Deuteronomy 28:1-2). When man started listening to sources outside of God, a spiritual perspective would encourage man to judge those worldly ideas by God’s standard to see if they are sound and righteous (Acts 17:11; 1 John 4:1). But now, young people see organized religion doing something altogether different. Now they see church leaders conforming and changing God’s Word to fit alleged scientific theories and notions, rather than an accurate view of the physical world that corresponds perfectly with the Bible—a divine source these young people once believed was the “truth.”

Here is the rational next step that signals the beginning of the end for so many young people. “If I can’t trust the Bible in the earthly things, why should I trust it in the spiritual things?” That is a fair question. If you answer that you cannot trust the Bible in either arena, then what good is God’s Word? And that is the conclusion that many young people are reaching. In contrast, if you are struggling and want to compromise and believe the Bible may not be scientifically accurate but it is still relevant for spiritual matters, then think about what message that sends. Under this perspective, if a young person has questions about how to feel about God or think about his fellow man, then you go to the church for answers. If you have questions about facts and reality, you go to school and ask your science teacher. This practice of trying to harmonize Creation with evolution (often called “theistic evolution”) has created an environment where the church has basically disconnected the Bible from the “real world.”

The first chip to fall—and where the slippery slope begins—is the belief that the Earth is billions of years old. The battleground is not necessarily evolution, as there are many evolutionists who still believe in God, and there are many who do not believe in God and also do not subscribe to the theory of evolution. The major attack on biblical authority today starts with the attack on the first verse in the Bible, “In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth” (Genesis 1:1).

Notice the growing level of disbelief in the statistics below as they bottom out on the subject of the age of the Earth.

• 77% believe in Noah’s ark and the global flood
• 75% believe in Adam and Eve in the garden
• 62% believe Abraham fathered Isaac when he was 100 years old
• 60% believe in the Tower of Babel
• ONLY 20% believe the earth is less than 10,000 years old¹⁰

The number one area of disbelief among young people who are leaving religion and their faith behind is the age of the Earth. This is where we are losing them. This is where the line in the sand has been drawn.

For those surveyed who did not believe in the accuracy of the Bible, the Barna Study asked the reasons why they did not believe the Bible events are accurate:

• 24% said they were written by men.
• 18% said the Bible was not translated correctly.
• 15% said the Bible contradicts itself.
• 14% said science shows the world is old.
• 11% said the Bible contains errors.
• 7% said there’s so much suffering in the world.
• 4% said Christians do not live by the Bible
• 4% said evolution proves the Bible is wrong.¹¹

Interestingly, 82% of those who said they did not believe all the accounts in the Bible are true and accurate did so because of doubts about the authority of the Bible. This is the problem and a significant reason why they are leaving.

This should come as no surprise to the Bible student who knows through inspiration what people will be like in times like this.

Knowing this first of all, that scoffers will come in the last days with scoffing, following their own sinful desires. They will say, “Where is the promise of his coming? For ever since the fathers fell asleep, all things are continuing as they were from the beginning of creation.” For they deliberately overlook this fact, that the heavens existed long ago, and the earth was formed out of water and through water by the word of God (2 Peter 3:3-5).

In this period of time where scoffers and critics will ridicule faithful Christians for anticipating the return of Christ, notice that these same people will deny the Creation account. And from a sinful, strategic perspective, it makes sense. If you can get them to doubt the first historical act of God in the Bible (God made the world in six days), getting them to doubt the rest of the Bible will be easy work.

This is not to say that there are not other factors at work and relevant causes of this dilemma. However, it seems clear that basic beliefs about the first few chapters of Genesis are a significant part of the problem as to why so many young people leave the church.

The Solution

The problem is devastating, the numbers are heartbreaking, and the cause of all this is discouraging. So, what can be done? Is the point of all this just to scare us and make us feel bad, or is there something we can do? The good news is there are answers and solutions, but it will take hard work to right this ship.

Rewrite Our Curriculum

This is not to say that we have not been doing a good job of teaching our children about the Old Testament, Christ, the Church, and salvation. However, we may be under-emphasizing or overlooking a critical component in a balanced spiritual course of study—APOLOGETICS. We need more classes on apologetics, especially on fundamental questions on the existence of God and the first eleven chapters of Genesis, especially the historical reality of the Creation account. Please do not be prideful and say, “We’ve been doing this for years” or “I’ve spent years developing these lessons.” That work should not be overlooked and is genuinely appreciated. However, it is time to take a fresh perspective on what we are teaching in light of these alarming statistics. Greater emphasis on apologetics and the historical reality of the Creation account is needed in our classes.

Start Younger

We need to be teaching apologetics at younger ages. And yes, this obviously includes our high school and junior high students, but also our elementary and even pre-school children. “Train up a child in the way he should go, and when he is old, he will not depart from it” (Proverbs 22:6).

Apologetics Press offers a variety of resources to help you instruct and instill within our young people a belief and love for God, His word, and His creation. There is the “Learn to Read” series that uses the theme of “God created everything” to help children begin to read. My personal favorite is Dogs, Frogs, and Hogs. These books contain simple phrases like “God made dogs.” Like the early readers we were introduced to in public school, these books take simple phrases and concepts, mingle them with God’s creative power, and engrain them into precious minds who need to know God.

There is also an “Early Reader” series that uses more words and somewhat more sophisticated topics to impress on slightly older children the complexity and beauty of God’s creation. The little boys I read to love God Made Insects. The girls tend to like God Made Puppies. There is something for everyone here. The level of information increases when you move to the “Advanced Reader” series. These include titles like Copies of God’s Design, Human Body, and Migrating Animals. As your children grow in their reading skills and in their ability to process information, these readers follow them all along the way emphasizing over and over again the reality that God made it all.

As your kids get even older, there are books that mature with them while tackling more difficult concepts. Dinosaurs Unleashed is one of the best sellers at Apologetics Press, and the kids love it. The art-work is amazing, but the message is invaluable—God made everything, and that includes dinosaurs. There are other books for this stage in life, like How Do You Know God is Real? and Wonders of God’s Creation. One of my personal, creative favorites is the Dinosaur Field Journal. This is a great resource for the adventurer inside our sweet children.

As they reach their teenage years, there are other excellent books that challenge our young people to question what they are hearing in the world and to be secure in their faith. These include The Dinosaur Delusion, Truth Be Told: Exposing the Myth of Evolution, Always Be Ready, Out With Doubt, A Matter of Fact, and Reasons to Believe.

Finally, every student leaving for college should be equipped with the Defending the Faith Study Bible from Apologetics Press. This Bible is filled with resources designed to arm our teens and college aged youth (and older people like me) with information to combat the atheistic assumptions and difficult questions that so many young people face in school and among their friends.  This Bible has helps and resources throughout that include:

• Scores of special sections that cover topics such as God’s existence, science and the Bible, God’s justice and hell, defending the Bible’s position on prayer, theistic evolution, and the Bible and slavery.
• Comments written and produced by faithful members of the Lord’s Church.
• Thorough and complete refutations of alleged Bible contradictions and discrepancies.
• A litany of positive evidences for the inspiration of the Bible, such as documented archaeological discoveries, comparisons of modern scientific findings with the biblical text, and historical evidence that validates the predictive prophecies of the Bible.
• Biblical answers to some of life’s most profound questions such as: Why did God create people? Why do good people suffer? How will it all end?

And the good news is that while there are many books and resources highlighted in this article, this is just the tip of the iceberg. Apologetics Press has countless volumes of books, readers, magazines, and other sources to help fortify your children’s faith and assist moms and dads in reaching one of the greatest goals in their lives—see their children remain faithful to God. Please take advantage of these resources.

More Teachers Willing To Step Up

If we are going to have more classes on apologetics, we will obviously need more teachers willing to tackle these classes. We not only need teachers to step up in Bible class, but also parents to get more involved in teaching and reinforcing apologetics at home. Unfortunately, we tend to think of apologetics as somewhat of a specialized discipline where only experts (like the staff at AP) can effectively teach this material. I’ll be the first to admit that the folks at Apologetics Press are outstanding teachers and preachers, especially in the area of apologetics. They have unique knowledge and talents that make them exceptionally qualified and true blessings in the church. I get it.

However, you probably don’t know much about how to treat Type 2 Diabetes or Reye’s Syndrome. Nevertheless, I am confident that if your child was diagnosed with one of these conditions, it would not take you long to become an expert in this arena. Your child’s physical condition would require you to learn a considerable amount of complicated medical information, but you would master it, because your child’s life is worth it.

We need to get just as serious and motivated when it comes to the spiritual welfare of our children. Yes, I know, apologetics can seem a little complex and will require some study and effort on our part, but it is worth it. Our children are leaving the church in alarming numbers, and a significant reason why is because of how they view the first few chapters of the Bible. The world is constantly attacking the Bible, and especially the Creation account. We need to get prepared, and we need to prepare our children. They are worth it.

History, Not Stories

I know this will sound like nitpicky semantics, but please stop calling historical events in the Bible “stories.” It is not that this is in any way inaccurate. But when our children hear the word “stories,” they think of everything from Winnie the Pooh to Harry Potter. The term “stories” can imply that the information to be revealed may not be entirely accurate. When we talk in class about the “story of Creation,” our children may be equating this in their minds with the fiction in story books we read to them about talking bears and flying superheroes. Let’s start talking about the Creation “account” rather than a story. Let’s refer to the Flood as an “event” or a “historical reality” rather than a story. We can do better to impress on our children that what happened in the Bible (especially in the first 11 chapters) is just as real as when men landed on the moon, when George Washington was our first president, and when Shakespeare wrote Hamlet. Let’s get real with our teaching.

What Is Not the Solution

To the surprise of many, one interesting thing gleaned from the Barna Study is that young people largely are not leaving religion because the worship and singing is not cool enough. To look at some churches who subscribe to the “Sister Act” theory of church retention, one could easily conclude that young people are leaving the church because worship services just aren’t exciting enough. Some have the mindset that if we just make our worship and singing culturally relevant, the young people will flood back into the pews and stay with us. The statistics simply do not support this assumption.

Becoming “culturally cool” may have an immediate short-term impact on enthusiasm and attendance, but it is just a Band-Aid for a much deeper disease. While contemporary music and a concert environment is popular these days in many worship services, it is not the problem. The Barna Study made clear that the primary problem driving young people away is not “cool” worship services, but their rejection of belief in basic Bible teachings. We don’t need gimmicks, entertaining concerts, and light shows in worship. We simply need the preaching of God’s Word.

Are there other things that can be done to help address this problem of young people leaving the Church? Absolutely. Pray for them every day that God would bless and protect them as they increase in wisdom and stature and in favor with man, and especially in favor with God. Remove hypocrisy from the lives of elders and parents who interact with these young people. Be consistent with your kids in terms of emphasizing the importance of spiritual matters over everything (including sports and academics). Keep your kids involved in church and spiritual activities, and surrounded by godly influences. These are all helpful and worth consideration. But at the core of this problem is whether our kids believe the first few chapters of Genesis. No more excuses. No more compromises. It is time to take a stand and proclaim: “In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth,” and after six days, God saw that it was very good.

ENDNOTES

The post Why Are We Losing Them When They Leave For College? appeared first on Apologetics Press.

[EDITOR’S NOTE: A.P. auxiliary writer Dr. Rogers serves as an Associate Professor of Bible at Freed-Hardeman University. He holds an M.A. in New Testament from Freed-Hardeman University as well as an M.Phil. and Ph.D. in Hebraic, Judaic, and Cognate Studies from Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion.]

At the center of scientific inquiry is a desire to express free thought. “Go wherever your mind leads you” is the academic cry that hearkens back at least to the Enlightenment. For Bible believers, however, this mantra has its limits. If one’s pursuit of so-called “knowledge” leads him to deny the divinity of Christ or the existence of God, then he has become a victim of intellectual deceit. The philosophical constructs causing him to reach these conclusions must be reexamined if not rejected. Such is the case with many modern theories of universal origins. By eliminating God as the primal Cause, these theories operate under false pretenses, and thus can never reach the truth.

Many Christians working in the field of scientific cosmology seek to poach godless theories from modern science and work them into a model of biblical faith. We should applaud their efforts so long as they do not “go beyond what is written” (1 Corinthians 4:6). Unfortunately, some do go too far. In their desire to harmonize the biblical account with the scientific “necessity” of old-Earth creationism, they seek to read into the Bible concepts not clearly present. Rather than using divine inspiration to inform science, they prefer to impose modern scientific insight onto the Bible—an insight, it should be observed, the original readers of the Bible would not have understood.

WHAT IS GAP THEORY?

One example of the harmonistic approach between modern “science” and biblical faith is the so-called “Gap Theory.” Although there are numerous iterations of this idea, each of them suggests Genesis 1 contains a gap or multiple gaps in which can be squeezed the amount of time necessary to accommodate an Earth billions of years old. Although the biblical text does not require or even intimate such gaps, proponents of Gap Theory insist that the science requires it. In other words, they allow the tail to wag the dog, allowing “science” to trump plain biblical teaching.

Of course, for theists who claim to accept the biblical account of Creation, much is at stake. If Gap Theory is correct, then the Bible must be made to accommodate it. Since anyone with common sense and an English Bible would find it difficult to accept Gap Theory from the Genesis account alone, Gap theorists often transfer the debate to the mysterious world of Hebrew linguistics. Playing on the ignorance of the general Bible reader (and often revealing their own), Gap theorists insist the Hebrew terminology makes Gap Theory possible.

I must admit: when I first encountered the arguments from biblical Hebrew to defend Gap Theory, I was confused. Even liberal Bible scholars do not use linguistic arguments to deny the literal understanding of Genesis 1. James Barr, a world-renowned Old Testament scholar, writes,

So far as I know there is no professor of Hebrew or Old Testament at any world-class university who does not believe that the writer(s) [sic] of Genesis 1–11 intended to convey to their readers the ideas that (a) creation took place in a series of six days which were the same as the days of 24 hours we now experience; (b) the figures contained in the Genesis genealogies provide by simple addition a chronology from the beginning of the world up to the later stages of the Biblical story, and (c) Noah’s flood was understood to be worldwide, and to have extinguished all human and land animal life except for those in the ark (as quoted in Platinga, 2001, p. 217).

These reasons explain why critical biblical scholarship tends to discuss the genre of Genesis 1-11, that is, whether it is intended to be history or mythology, whether it is literal or symbolic, whether it contains any truth or some truth. The meaning of the words themselves, however, is under no major dispute. But Gap theorists maintain the Creation account is both historical and (apparently) incomprehensible (at least, without the “expert” guidance of the Gap theorist). They insist the key to unlocking Genesis 1 is not what it does say, but what it doesn’t say. What a strange method of interpretation.

WHAT GAP THEORISTS ALLEGE

There are two major linguistic arguments cited in favor of Gap Theory. First, Gap theorists begin by understanding the term bārā’ in Genesis 1 to mean “create” (from nothing), and ‘āsāh to mean “restore” (at a later time). The bārā’ creation marks the initial stage of Creation in which God set the world into motion by fiat. One of the earliest Gap theorists, George H. Pember, wrote over 100 years ago: “For we are told that in the beginning God created the heaven and the earth; but the Scriptures never affirm that He did this in the six days. The work of those days was…quite a different thing from the original creation: they were times of restoration, and the word asah [sic] is used in connection with them” (1907, pp. 22-23).

Within churches of Christ, John Clayton has been an active proponent of the insights of Gap Theory, although his actual position defies precise categorization. Thompson refers to it as the “modified Gap Theory,” although Clayton himself is rather coy about labeling his position (2000, pp. 281-296). Like others, Clayton also appeals to the Hebrew language to defend his version of the theory. Unfortunately, like the Gap theorists, he too states bārā’ is a miraculous creation from nothing, even going so far as to suggest Genesis 1:1 implies the “Big Bang” (Clayton, 2015, p. 90). Like the Gap theorists, Clayton also parrots the view that ‘āsāh means “reworking existing material” (2011, p. 207). If Clayton were to read the rest of the Hebrew Bible, or even the rest of Genesis, he would learn that his definitions are impossible to maintain (as we shall demonstrate).

By interpreting the Hebrew in this fashion, Gap theorists believe they can accommodate an Earth billions of years old without compromising the essential integrity of the Genesis account. The bārā’ stage of Creation occurs first (Genesis 1:1), and, after centuries or even billions of years, the ‘āsāh stage of Creation occurs (the “six days,” Genesis 1:2ff.). Unfortunately, Gap theorists focus their attention, so far as the Hebrew is concerned, principally on Genesis 1 and Exodus 20:11 (taken as proof of the ‘āsāh stage of Creation). Again, if they were to read the entire Hebrew Bible, however, they would learn their position to be linguistically untenable, as we shall demonstrate.

Second, Gap theorists allege the grammar of Genesis 1:2 implies a gap. Basically, three arguments are made from the Hebrew: (1) The Hebrew waw is disjunctive, and thus implies an interruption in the narration from what is reported in Genesis 1:1. This interruption signals a chronological “gap”; (2) The verb form “was” (hāy^etāh) should be translated “became,” signaling a new beginning beyond the bārā’ creation of Genesis 1:1; and (3) The nouns traditionally translated “without form and void” (tōhū vā-vōhū) imply a degeneration of the original Creation, and thus what follows is a re-creation.

We shall proceed to discuss and evaluate these Hebrew linguistic arguments, beginning first with the question of bārā’ and ‘āsāh, and then turning to the grammar of Genesis 1:2 specifically. In the course of our analysis, the linguistic evidence for the Gap Theory will be shown to be lacking.

THE VOCABULARY OF CREATION

The Genesis account uses no less than four terms to describe Creation. The terms best known are bārā’ (“create”) and ‘āsāh (“make”), although yātsar (“form”) and bānāh (“build”) are also found. Man is “formed” (yātsar) from the dirt (Genesis 2:7-8), and woman is “built” (bānāh) from man (Genesis 2:22). The bulk of attention, however, has centered around bārā’ and ‘āsāh, the most frequent of these four words in the Creation account. Gap theorists allege these terms refer to very different stages of Creation, billions of years apart. We shall see that, while this theory is attractive at the macro-level, the Hebrew terminology simply will not bear the burden of proof Gap theorists load upon it.

bārā’ and ‘āsāh

We should begin by noting that the Bible uses multiple terms to describe God’s creative activity. Across the Old Testament, in Hebrew and Aramaic, one can locate no less than 13 different terms for Creation! So Israelite Creation theology is not as simple as making a facile distinction between bārā’ and ‘āsāh. In fact, these terms are used interchangeably of God’s creative activity.

Even in the Genesis account itself, bārā’ and ‘āsāh are used together to summarize God’s creative work: “These are the generations of the heavens and the earth when they were created” (bārā’), that is, at the time when (literally, “in the day that”) Yahweh God made (‘āsāh)earth and heaven” (Genesis 2:4; translation mine). The careful reader will notice that the second half of this verse explains and completes the first. We have here what literary scholars call a chiasm, in which the sentence can be broken into two or more parts, and the various components of the sentence parallel one another in introverted fashion (for more on chiasm, see Dorsey, 1999). Allow me to illustrate:

These are the generations of…

a—the heavens and the earth
b—when they were created
b’—at the time when Yahweh God made
a’—the earth and the heavens

Notice that the first and final components (a and a’) are flipped, signaling the inverted nature of the verse, and they also highlight the verse’s synonymous parallelism (both halves convey exactly the same idea). Also note the parallelism of b and b’. The whole of the Creation narrative could be described by both Hebrew terms. So the forced distinction made by Gap theorists between bārā’ and ‘āsāh is already shown to be artificial in the Genesis account itself. But we can go further.

The terms bārā’ and ‘āsāh are routinely used in parallel with one another, both in Genesis and elsewhere in the Hebrew Bible.

• God both “created” (bārā’) and “made” (‘āsāh) Adam (Genesis 5:1).
• God will destroy man whom He has “created” (bārā’), along with every living thing, for He was sorry that He had “made” (‘āsāh) them (Genesis 6:7).
• The hand of God “has done” (‘āsāh) it, and God Himself “created” (bārā’) it (Isaiah 41:20).
• God has “created” (bārā’) and “made” (‘āsāh) for His glory (Isaiah 43:7).
• God has “made” (‘āsāh) Earth and “created” (bārā’) man on it (Isaiah 45:12).
• God “made” (‘āsāh) and “created” (bārā’) the Earth (Isaiah 45:18).
• God “creates” (bārā’) wind and “makes” (‘āsāh) darkness (Amos 4:13). 

As any careful reader of the Bible will observe, the Hebrew language does not make a sharp distinction between bārā’ and ‘āsāh in accounts depicting the Creation. On the contrary, the terms are used interchangeably for Creation throughout the Old Testament, and can often be found in parallel expressions.

Now, this does not mean that bārā’ and ‘āsāh are always synonymous terms. The word bārā’ occurs 53 times in the Bible, and generally has to do with an initial act, or a new beginning. For example, God “creates something new” at the punishment of Korah and his company (Numbers 16:30). He “makes a new beginning” of Israel after the Babylonian Exile (Isaiah 41:20). The term represents a change—a new beginning—in the natural order as well (Isaiah 65:15; Jeremiah 31:22).

So, in addition to creation, which is always an “initial act” on God’s part, subsequent divine intervention after creation can also be depicted by the word bārā’. This explains why the term can be used of the creation of man. He was a new creature, a new beginning, in the process. If Gap theorists were correct, any usage of bārā’ after the initialGenesis Creation would be inappropriate. This clearly is not the case.

The term ‘āsāh, by comparison,has a much broader semantic range. This term occurs 2,627 times, making it one of the most common verbs in the Bible. In addition to meaning “make,” ‘āsāh is the standard verb for “do, act, or perform” in Hebrew. It often means to “keep” the Law (Deuteronomy 5:32), to manufacture a product (1 Samuel 8:12), to “carve” (Ezekiel 41:18), to “work” miracles (Deuteronomy 34:11), to “make” money in the colloquial English sense (Deuteronomy 8:17), to “make” a name for oneself (Genesis 11:4), to “make” dinner or a meal (Judges 6:19), to “make” peace (Isaiah 27:5), to “work” a job (Ruth 2:19), and many other possible nuances. In short, many of the same meanings we can assign to the English verbs “make,” “do,” “work,” “perform,” “act,” and the like can also be ascribed to the Hebrew ‘āsāh.

The word ‘āsāh basically has to do with producing something through work, and it may or may not imply pre-existing material. Passages echoing Genesis 1:1 routinely use ‘āsāh instead of bārā’ (e.g., 1 Chronicles 16:26; Nehemiah 9:6; Psalm 33:6; Isaiah 45:12). This fact implies that, while these two terms can be used interchangeably of Creation, one emphasizes the production of a new thing (whether at Creation or afterward), and the other refers to the work involved in producing a thing (whether at Creation or afterward).

The Vocabulary of Creation in the Hebrew Bible

The Creation is one of the most commonly discussed biblical accounts in later biblical literature. The poetry of the Old Testament, particularly in the Psalms and Isaiah 40-55, is rich in Creation terminology. God has a claim on the lives of his people (and on the world!) becauseHe is the Creator of everything. It thus makes sense that the Hebrew language would feature many terms to express one of its most basic theological principles.

The biblical terms for Creation are represented in the chart above. As one can observe, the terminology of Creation in the Bible is rich and varied. Many of these terms are used in parallel to one another, indicating their synonymous nature insofar as Creation is concerned. These terms also illustrate that the Israelites viewed God’s Creation holistically. God “brought creation into initial existence.” God “formed creation.” God “begat” Creation (in a figurative sense). God “established,” “founded,” “acquired,” “spread out,” and “made” every created thing. The full lexicon of Hebrew manufacturing is applied to Creation to illustrate that, in a single period of time, God set the world into existence, just as in a single moment He will destroy it (2 Peter 3:10).

THE GRAMMAR OF GENESIS 1:2

We previously mentioned that Gap theorists cite three grammatical Hebrew features in favor of their position. They claim: (1) the Hebrew waw implies a gap in the narrative; (2) the verb form “was” (hāy^etāh)signals a new beginning; and (3) the nouns tōhū vā-vōhū imply a re-creation from a degraded, earlier Creation. We shall treat each of these arguments in order.

The Hebrew Particle waw

First, the Hebrew letter waw, represented by the incessant “and” in the King James Version and often left untranslated in more recent versions, is always prefixed to Hebrew words. When it is attached to a shortened “imperfect” verb form in biblical narrative, it normally functions as a preterite (from Latin praeter, “before”). The purpose is to relate action, typically in the past, and the waw functions to connect those past actions to one another.

When the waw is attached to a noun, as it is in Genesis 1:2, it is disjunctive, and thus signals a shift in the narrative. This shift does not necessarily imply a different series of events, much less events separated by billions of years in time. An abrupt shift is found in Genesis 3:1—“Now, as for the serpent, he was more crafty.” Although no serpent has been discussed, and the context determines a complete break in the narrative, there is nothing stated about the amount of time that elapsed from the creation of woman and the appearance of the serpent.

Sometimes, however, the disjunctive waw can simply provide background information for the story being related (e.g., Genesis 13:13), or explain what is happening simultaneous with the narrative, but elsewhere in location (e.g., Genesis 37:36, translated well as “meanwhile” in the ESV). In these cases, the waw sets up a parenthetical remark which functions to explain the preceding information. This is, I believe, what we have in Genesis 1:2.

Remember that Genesis 1:1 is a declarative statement: “In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth.” Since the narrative will not focus on the creation of the heavens, but on the Earth, the next verse opens with the final word from the previous one (v^ehā’ārets). By utilizing the disjunctive waw along with the noun “Earth,” the Hebrew serves to focus attention on the creation of the Earth: “Now, as for the earth, it was formless and void.” This statement is clearly based on the final word of the previous verse as the narrative unpacks exactly how the creation of the Earth took place.

The Hebrew Word “was” (hāy^etāh)

The second linguistic argument from Genesis 1:2 deals with the term hāy^etāh, traditionally translated “was.” Gap theorists insist the term means “became” or “had become.” They assert the bārā’ stage of Creation “became” or “had become” a desolate waste, and thus a re-creation (the ‘āsāh stage) was necessary. In the assessment of Fields, “It is the mistranslation of this word which has, perhaps, added more to the ranks of gap theorists than any one factor” (1976, p. 88).

First of all, let us acknowledge that Gap theorists are correct about the Hebrew verb hāyāh. It can mean “became” or “had become.” But the meaning of any word must be determined by its context, and not by the translator’s arbitrary choosing of a meaning from a lexical list. In Genesis 1:2, the copular usage of the verb hāyāh in biblical Hebrew must be understood. The community of Hebrew grammarians is uniform in recognizing that the term hāy^etāh (a feminine form of hāyāh) in Genesis 1:2 functions as a copula (see, e.g., Joüon and Muraoka, 2006, §154m), and thus simply links the subject with the object without implying any true verbal quality. Let us explain.

Hebrew has no proper equivalent to the English verb “to be.” Therefore, several syntactical approximations, called copulas, communicate the essence of the English “to be.” For example, the pronouns hū’ (literally “he” or “it” for masculine objects) andhî’ (literally “she” or “it” for feminine objects) can serve this purpose (often translated “is”). The same is true of the verb “he became” (hāyāh). The copula hāy^etāh is not, therefore, functioning in Genesis 1:2 in its true verbal sense as “became,” but in the copular sense as “was.”

It is recognized universally that “the Hebrew verb translated was refers to the time when God began his work of creation. Was does not mean that the earth remained in this shapeless state for a long time; nor does it mean that it became such after being something else earlier” (Reyburn and Fry, 1997, p. 30). This point is recognized in virtually every decent translation of the Hebrew text since the Septuagint (cf. the Latin Vulgate and the mountain of English translations). Gap theorists must find a different justification for their theory.

The Words tōhū vā-vōhū

The two Hebrew nouns tōhū and bōhū are so closely linked that Hebraists universally regard them as a hendiadys (even the Masoretic accentuation suggests this). Some English translations follow this understanding, using an adjective-noun construction (e.g., the NAB: “formless wasteland”). Traditionally, however, two adjectives are used to translate tōhū vā-vōhū. The Septuagint has “invisible and unconstructed” (aoratos kai akataskeuastos). The Vulgate understands the terms by the synonyms, “empty and void” (inanis et vacua). English translations have generally opted for “formless and void.” All of these are legitimate potential translations of a difficult Hebrew expression.

By contrast, Gap theorists assert these terms imply a depreciation of the original Creation (e.g., Isaiah 34:11; Jeremiah 4:23). Since prophetic passages convey a change from order to disorder when the terms are used, Gap theorists believe the same meaning must hold in Genesis 1:2. [NOTE: Their interpretation here is contingent upon this erroneous understanding of hāy^etāh.] However, the prophetic pronouncement is intended to be shocking. God plans to punish his people by dramatically reducing the land to a state of non-existence. It is not merely that He wishes to degrade their existence; He wishes to nullify it!

The term bōhū occurs only three times in the Bible, all in conjunction with tōhū (Genesis 1:2; Isaiah 34:11; Jeremiah 4:23). There can be no doubt, then, that tōhū is the clearer term, occurring about 20 times. It can be used in a physical sense in reference to a desert (Deuteronomy 32:10) or an abandoned city (Isaiah 24:10), or it can be used in a moral sense to refer to vanities (1 Samuel 12:21; Isaiah 40:17). It can refer to a “wasteland,” but does not refer to a “wasted land.”

One verse helps us to establish the appropriate meaning of tōhū in a Creation context: “For thus says Yahweh, who created [bārā’] the heavens—he is God—who formed [yātsar] the earth, and he made it [‘āsāh], he established [kūn] it not to be empty [tōhū]. He created it [bārā’] to be inhabited. I am Yahweh, and there is no other” (Isaiah 45:18). This verse not only utilizes the term tōhū in reference to what the Earth was not intended to be, but also associates the bārā’ Creation with the inhabiting of the Earth.

While the Gap theorists are correct to understand tōhū vā-vōhū to mean a state of creation God did not regard as ideal, nothing in the Hebrew words themselves implies a depreciation of Creation. Rather, the expression conveys the amorphous nature of the Earth before God provided His creative structure to it. Such is the way the terms have been understood throughout the history of Bible translation.

CONCLUSION

There is nothing in the Hebrew text of Genesis 1 to demand a gap of time. The Hebrews in fact had a variety of ways to express chronological gaps, whether general or specific. For general amounts of time they could and often did say, “after this” (ach^arēy-kēn) or “after these things” (ach^arēy-hadd^evarîm hā-’ēleh). To express a greater extent of time, they could have said “many days” (yāmîm rābbîm) or something similar. Although common in the Bible, none of these phrases occurs in Genesis 1. So we are left to trust the Gap theorists that they are qualified to speak where the Bible is silent, and to understand in the Hebrew what no Hebrew scholars actually affirm, and what no qualified translators have ever put forth. So is Gap Theory linguistically viable? No.

REFERENCES

Clayton, John N. (2011), The Source: Eternal Design or Infinite Accident? (Niles, MI: Clayton).

Clayton, John N. (2015), The Rational God: Does God Make Sense? (Niles, MI: Clayton).

Dorsey, David A. (1999), The Literary Structure of the Old Testament: A Commentary on Genesis–Malachi (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker).

Fields, Weston W. (1976 reprint), Unformed and Unfilled: A Critique of the Gap Theory (Green Forrest, AR: Master Books).

Joüon, Paul and Takamitsu Muraoka (2006), A Grammar of Biblical Hebrew (Roma: Pontifical Biblical Institute).

Pember, Georg H. (1907), Earth’s Earliest Ages (London: Hodder and Stoughton), reprint.

Platinga, Alvin (2001), “Evolution, Neutrality, and Antecedent Probability: A Reply to McMullin and Van Till,” in Intelligent Design Creationism and Its Critics: Philosophical, Theological and Scientific Perspectives, ed. Robert T. Pennock (Cambridge: MIT Press).

Reyburn, William D. and Euan McG. Fry (1997), A Handbook on Genesis (New York: United Bible Society).

Thompson, Bert (2000), Creation Compromises (Montgomery, AL: Apologetics Press, second edition).

The post Is the Gap Theory Linguistically Viable? appeared first on Apologetics Press.

[EDITOR’S NOTE: A.P. auxiliary writer Dr. Rogers serves as an Associate Professor of Bible at Freed-Hardeman University. He holds an M.A. in New Testament from Freed-Hardeman University as well as an M.Phil. and Ph.D. in Hebraic, Judaic, and Cognate Studies from Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion.]

How old is the Earth? It has become standard for many scientists to believe the Universe is over 10 billion years old, and the Earth over six billion years old. Public school textbooks implicitly teach our children the biblical account of Creation is at best incomplete, and at worst erroneous. It is no wonder that many Bible-believers have sought to harmonize the “facile” narrative of biblical Creation with the complex and engaging portrait of universal origins in modern “science.”

The Bible never dates the creation of the world explicitly. But the Bible does provide a straightforward account of the first week of universal history. There is no obvious implication that the days are really billions of years, or that the first week is a quasi-mythological construct. Yet old-Earth creationists who wish to utilize the Bible need something in Genesis 1 to divinely approve their position. In this quest for evidence, many have fixated on the Hebrew term for “day” (yōm).

Understanding each day to be an “epoch” of time, the word yōm has been required to carry the weight of old-Earth creationism and evolution—a weight it is incapable of bearing. With little attention to context, to other markers of time in Genesis 1, and to common linguistic sense, many have blindly accepted that the Bible endorses old-Earth creationism. It is not the place here to discuss the larger question of the age of the Earth. However, I hope to establish in this article that the Hebrew word yōm cannot be used as ammunition for old-Earth creationism.

The Non-Literal Use of Yōm

Many researchers have noted that the term yōm is not always literal in the Hebrew Bible. This is true. The term can be used both in the singular and in the plural simply to mean “time” in a generic sense. In the King James and New King James versions of Genesis 39:11, the Hebrew is translated, “It came to pass about this time.” The other major versions, however, more literally render the Hebrew word yōm, “Now it happened one day” (e.g., NASB). Is the KJV wrong? No. It simply rendered the term “day” as “time,” which, although not the most literal translation, is certainly acceptable in the context.

The same can be observed for the plural form “days” (yāmîm) in the Bible. Scripture informs us, “And Isaac dug again the wells of water which they had dug in the days [yāmîm] of Abraham his father” (Genesis 26:18). The passage is obviously not referring to the specific number of 24-hour periods of time that Abraham lived. We might differently translate “in the time of Abraham” to capture the essential meaning. The book of Joshua is summarized similarly: “Israel served the Lord all the days of Joshua, and all the days of the elders who outlived Joshua” (Joshua 24:31). No literal number of days is intended, although a limited “period” of time is implied.

We should note here that the non-literal use of the word “day” has a perfect parallel in English. We often speak of “days gone by,” meaning not, of course, the consecutive 24-hour periods of time that have elapsed, but “times gone by.” Likewise, one might look forward to “better days,” again referring to a nonliteral period of time in the future. The generic use of the word “day” in English and Hebrew has led some to believe that the same term in Genesis 1 is also generic, and thus need not be taken as a literal, 24-hour period of time. The generic meaning of the word “day,” however, is entirely irrelevant for Genesis 1 for reasons we will consider below. But at this juncture let us emphasize that the Creation account does use the term yōm in a non-literal fashion.

The work of the first week is summarized as follows: “This isthe history of the heavens and the earth when they were created, in the day [yōm] that the Lord God made the earth and the heaven” (Genesis 2:4, NKJV). If one forces this passage into literalism, then God did not create the world in six days, but in one day! Some ancient readers of Genesis did, in fact, derive from this verse that the Creation took place in one day, and Genesis 1 therefore must be a non-literal account (e.g., Philo of Alexandria). Knowing little to no Hebrew, and not recognizing the non-literal use of the word “day,” these thinkers drew the wrong conclusions.

The term yōm in Genesis 2:4 is not to be taken in the sense of a literal, 24-hour period of time. The same can be said of God’s warning about the tree in Genesis 2:17: “for in the day [yōm] that you eat of it you shall surely die.” The term is again referring generically to a “time” of indeterminable length and not to a specific 24-hour “day.” Now the big question: Is this non-literal usage relevant for Genesis 1?

The Term Yōm in Genesis 1

Words mean nothing outside of contexts. In other words, reading a sentence is similar to piecing together a puzzle. The picture of the whole emerges only after the individual pieces are put in their place. Such is the case with the term yōm. It can be literal or non-literal, depending on the context. But a distinctive syntactical feature of Genesis 1 ought to be observed. An adjective accompanies every occurrence of yōm in Genesis 1, a fact that fundamentally limits its meaning.

Virtually every language uses adjectives to modify a noun’s scope of reference. I may declare, “Women are wise!” Is this a general truth or an absolute truth? The hearer doesn’t know. It is a generic and ambiguous statement. But if I add the adjective, “All women are wise!” it is an absolute truth applicable to all women. If I say, “Some women are wise!” then the truth of the first statement is limited. In the Hebrew language, as in English, numbers are adjectives. Since every time the word “day” occurs in Genesis 1, a numerical adjective accompanies it, the generic application of the term “day” that we have observed does not apply at all. The scope of reference is limited.

Allow me to illustrate. If I say, “These days have gone so quickly,” you do not know how much time has elapsed. All you know is that more than one day has gone by. But if I declare, “These five days have gone so quickly,” you know exactly how many days have passed. The latter example is a much better illustration of the term “day” in Genesis 1. When the Bible declares “one day,” “a second day,” “a third day,” and so on (Genesis 1:5,8,13), the numerical adjective naturally limits the scope of reference so that the Hebrew word “day” cannot be taken in the generic sense of “one block of time,” “a second block of time,” and so on. The term must be used in accord with the numerical adjective that accompanies it. Its scope of reference is limited.

Moses expected the original audience of the Pentateuch to understand his intention of a literal, 24-hour day in the Creation account. In commanding the observance of the Sabbath day he wrote, “For in six days the Lord made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them, and rested the seventh day. Therefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and hallowed it” (Exodus 20:11). Israel was to imitate God’s example of working for six literal days, and resting on the seventh. If Moses’ audience had understood the days of Genesis 1 as hundreds, thousands, or billions of years, as many modern interpreters wish to do, they could have lived their entire lives without ever observing a single Sabbath! This would not be the intention of biblical law. Violating just one Sabbath required execution (Numbers 15:32-36). Clearly the readers of Genesis were to understand a literal Creation week.

Other References to Time in Genesis 1

It is conveniently selective for those who wish to age the Earth from Genesis 1 to focus exclusively on the Hebrew word for “day.” There are, in fact, other references to time in the same paragraphs in which the term “day” occurs. These terms help further to limit and define the specific meaning of the word yōm in the context.

After each day’s creative activities, the Bible utilizes the same formula: “And there was evening and there was morning” (Genesis 1:5,8,13,19,23,31). While it is true that the Hebrew term “day” can be used in a nonliteral sense in other contexts, the terms “evening” (‘erev) and “morning” (bōqer) are always used in a literal sense. The former occurs 134 times in the Old Testament and the latter around 200 times. So our representative sampling is high enough to draw absolute conclusions about what these words mean.

The words ‘erev and bōqer are used to specify holidays on the Israelite calendar (Exodus 12:18), to mark the exact span of one’s ceremonial uncleanness (Leviticus 11:31), to regulate the timing of the required sacrifices (Numbers 28:23), and to mark the exact time of historical events (Nehemiah 8:3). Therefore, the Bible counts on the literal understanding of the terms “evening” and “morning,” for the Israelites’ very religious and secular calendar depends on it. There is to my knowledge no place in the Bible in which the terms “evening and morning” refer to a broad scope of time. They are always literal, both when they occur separate from one another, and when they occur together; both when they are singular and when they are plural. When these terms occur with the word yōm, the obvious conclusion is that a regular, 24-hour day is in view (Leviticus 6:13; Numbers 19:19; Deuteronomy 16:14).

Even if one insists on explaining the term yōm in a non-literal fashion, this explanation does not permit him to force non-literal applications of other time references in the same context. How long was the morning of day 1 anyway? The linguistic acrobatics applied to Genesis 1 are never applied consistently to other contexts of the Old Testament. Why force words to fit a preconceived theory of truth? Why not allow them to speak clearly from their contexts?

Conclusion

In language, words are bound to their contexts. The meaning of biblical words is determined by their use in the sentence, paragraph, chapter, and book in which they occur. The term yōm occurs in many contexts, both in the singular and in the plural, in a non-literal fashion. In the context of Genesis 1, however, there can be little doubt that the Hebrew noun yōm, accompanied by numerical adjectives and limited by further references to time, should be understood literally. So those who wish to defend old-Earth creationism must look elsewhere to support their doctrine.

The post Does the Hebrew Word Yōm Endorse an Old Earth? appeared first on Apologetics Press.

Every Christian readily admits that God is not bound by time. He is the infinite, eternal, all-powerful, all-knowing Creator. He is “from everlasting to everlasting” (Psalm 90:2). The point, however, is not whether God is outside of time; the crux of the matter is: what has the all-authoritative, eternal Creator revealed to us about His Creation in His all-authoritative Word? God could have created the Universe in any way He so desired, in whatever order He wanted, and in whatever time frame He chose. He could have created the world and everything in it in six hours, six seconds, or in one millisecond—He is, after all, God Almighty (Genesis 17:1). But the pertinent question is not what God could have done; it is what He said He did. And He said that He created everything in six days (Genesis 1). Furthermore, when God gave the Israelites the Ten Commandments, He stated:

Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. Six days you shall labor and do all your work, but the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord your God. In it you shall do no work: you, nor your son, nor your daughter, nor your male servant, nor your female servant, nor your cattle, nor your stranger who is within your gates. For in six days the Lord made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them, and rested the seventh day. Therefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and hallowed it (Exodus 20:8-11, emp. added).

This Sabbath command can be understood properly only when the days of the week are interpreted as normal days.

The Creation of Man and the Age of the Earth

According to the theory of evolution, man is a newcomer to planet Earth, far removed from the origin of the Universe. If the Universe was born 14 billion years ago, as many evolutionists, theistic evolutionists, and progressive creationists believe, man did not “come along” until about 13.996 billion years later. If such time were represented by one 24-hour day, and the alleged Big Bang occurred at 12:00 a.m., then man did not arrive on the scene until 23:59:58 p.m. Man’s allotted time during one 24-hour day would represent a measly two seconds.

If the Bible taught, either explicitly or implicitly, that man was so far removed from the origin of the Universe, Bible-believing Christians would have no reservations accepting the above-mentioned timeline. Just as a Christian believes that God parted the Red Sea (Exodus 14), made an iron ax head float on water (2 Kings 6:5), and raised Jesus from the dead (Matthew 28:1-8), he would accept that humans appeared on Earth billions of years after the beginning of Creation—if that was what the Bible taught. The problem for theistic evolutionists and progressive creationists is that God’s Word never hints at such a timeline. In fact, it does the very opposite.

The Bible makes a clear distinction between things that took place before “the foundation of the world” and events that occurred after the “foundation of the world.” Jesus prayed to the Father on the night of His arrest and betrayal, saying: “You loved Me before the foundation of the world” (John 17:24, emp. added). Peter revealed in his first epistle how Jesus “was foreknown before the foundation of the world, but was manifest in these last times for you” (1 Peter 1:20, emp. added). Paul informed the Christians in Ephesus how God “chose us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without blame before Him in love” (Ephesians 1:4, emp. added). Before “God created the heavens and the earth” (Genesis 1:1), He was alive and well.

If theistic evolutionists and progressive creationists are correct, then man arrived on the scene, not before the foundation of the world (obviously), nor soon after the foundation of the world, but eons later—13.996 billion years later to be “precise.” This theory, however, blatantly contradicts Scripture.

Jesus taught that “the blood of all the prophets…was shed from (“since”—NASB) the foundation of the world…, from the blood of Abel to the blood of Zechariah who perished between the altar and the temple” (Luke 11:50-51, emp. added; cf. Luke 1:70). Not only did Jesus’ first-century enemies murder the prophets, but their forefathers had slain them as well, ever since the days of Abel. Observe that Jesus connected the time of one of the sons of Adam and Eve to the “foundation of the world.” This time is contrasted with the time of a prophet named Zechariah, whom, Jesus told His enemies, “you murdered between the temple and the altar” (Matthew 23:35). Zechariah was separated from the days of Abel by thousands of years. His blood was not shed near the foundation of the world; Abel’s was. Certain early martyrs, including Abel, lived close enough to Creation for Jesus to say that their blood had been shed “from the foundation of the world.” If man arrived on the scene billions of years after the Earth was formed, and hundreds of millions of years after various living organisms such as fish, amphibians, and reptiles came into existence (as the evolutionary timeline affirms), how could Jesus’ statement make sense? Truly, man was not created eons after the beginning of the world. Rather, he has been here “from the foundation” of it.

On another occasion when Jesus’ antagonists approached Him, they questioned Him about the lawfulness of divorce. Jesus responded by saying, “But from the beginning of the creation, God made them male and female” (Mark 10:6, emp. added). According to Genesis 1 and 2, God made Adam and Eve on the sixth day of Creation (1:26-31; 2:7,21-25). Jesus referred to this very occasion and indicated that God made them “from the beginning of the creation.” Similar to the association of Abel’s day with “the foundation of the world,” the forming of Adam and Eve on day six of the Creation can be considered “from the beginning of the creation.”

[NOTE: Jesus is not suggesting that Adam and Eve were created at the beginning of day one of the creation week. The word “creation” (ktiseos) in Mark 10:6 is not used in the specific sense of the week of creation. (If that were the case, then Jesus would have said that the original couple were made “at the end of the creation” week.) Respected Greek lexicographers Danker, Arndt, and Gingrich noted that Jesus is referring to “the sum total of everything created;” the “world” (2000, p. 573). In other words, Adam and Eve were so far removed from the first century A.D. and the time that Jesus made this statement, that one could truly say that the first human beings were made “from the beginning of the creation/world/universe” (cf. 2 Peter 3:4).]

If the 14-billion-year timeline of evolution were true, Jesus’ statement in Mark 10:6 would be erroneous; Adam and Eve would have been nowhere close to the beginning of the Universe, but would have arrived “at the end”—13.996 billion years after it began. Simply put, the theory of evolution and Jesus’ statement in Mark 10:6 cannot both be true.

In the epistle to the Christians in Rome, the apostle Paul also alluded to how long man has been on the Earth. He wrote: “For since the creation of the world His invisible attributes are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even His eternal power and Godhead…” (Romans 1:20, emp. added). Who on Earth can recognize the eternal power and divine nature of God? Man. [NOTE: Although some might suggest that angels can understand God’s invisible attributes, the context of Romans 1:18-32 clearly refers to humans, not angels.] How long has man been aware of God and His invisible attributes? “Since the creation of the world.” How, then, could man logically have been “perceiving” or “understanding” God “since the creation of the world,” if he is separated from the creation of “the heavens and the earth, the sea,” and so many of the animals (like trilobites, dinosaurs, and “early mammals”) by millions or billions of years? Such a scenario completely contradicts Scripture. Yet, as David Riegle once observed, people (even “Christians”) will “accept long, complicated, imaginative theories and reject the truth given to Moses by the Creator Himself” (1962, p. 24).

The simple fact is, one cannot logically believe in both evolution and the Bible. A choice must be made between the two. One can choose the ever-changing, man-made, unscientific theory of evolution (cf. Miller, 2013), or he can decide to believe the “the word of the Lord” that neither withers nor falls away, but “endures forever” (1 Peter 1:24-25).

God’s Chronology of Creation vs. Evolutionary Theory

In addition to the theory of evolution contradicting the timeline of Creation, it further contradicts the precise chronology of Creation as revealed in Genesis 1. The omnipotent Creator could have created everything at the same moment. He could have created everything in the precise order that evolutionists theorize the Universe developed—over 14 billion years of time. There are an infinite number of ways that God could have brought everything into existence. However, there is only one way that God’s authoritative Word said He brought the Universe into existence, and that one way contradicts evolutionary theory. Consider some of the discrepancies between the chronology of evolution and Genesis 1.

Which Came First—the Earth or Sun?

Evolution alleges that the Sun and other heavenly bodies evolved millions of years before the Earth. However, according to Genesis 1, God created the water-covered Earth on day one (Genesis 1:1-5), while He brought the Sun, Moon, and stars into existence on day four (Genesis 1:14-19). So which is it? Was the Earth created three days before the Sun, or did it evolve millions of years after the Sun? One cannot logically embrace both accounts.

[NOTE: Some Christians contend that God must have created the Sun, Moon, and stars in Genesis 1:1 and then “set” them (Genesis 1:16; Hebrew nathan) in their precise locations in the heavens on the fourth day of Creation (see Thurman, 2006, p. 3). However, it was on day four of Creation that God not only “set” the heavenly bodies in place, but He literally “made” (Hebrew asah) them (1:16). Similar to how God initially made the land and seas void of animal life (which later was created on days five and six of Creation), the “heavens” were made “in the beginning,” but the hosts of heaven (which now inhabit them) were created “in the firmament of the heavens” on day four. What’s more, similar to how God spoke light into existence on day one of Creation, saying, “Let there be light” (1:3), on the fourth day God declared, “Let there be lights in the firmament of the heavens…and it was so” (1:14-15). As Gary Workman noted:

“Let there be lights” (v. 14) is identical in grammatical construction with other statements of “let there be…” in the chapter. Therefore the command can only mean that God spoke the luminaries into existence on the fourth day just as he had created the initial light on day one and the firmament on day two” (1989, p. 3).

Keep in mind that “the Father of lights” (James 1:17), Who is “light” (1 John 1:5), could create light easily without first having to create the Sun, Moon, and stars. Just as God could produce a fruit-bearing tree on day three without a seed, He could produce light supernaturally on day one without the “usual” light bearers, which subsequently were created on day four (see Miller, 2014 for more information on this subject).]

Early Earth—Dry or Water-Covered?

Evolution alleges that billions of years following the Big Bang, Earth evolved out of a massive cloud of dust that was billions of miles wide. What’s more, there was no water on the surface of the early Earth, as bodies of water did not form (allegedly) for millions of years.

Does this scenario sound anything like the Creation account? Certainly not. God spoke a water-covered Earth into existence on the first day of Creation (Genesis 1:1-5). On day two He divided the waters (1:6-8). It was not until the third day that God made the dry land to appear (1:9-13). Once again, God’s chronology of Creation and evolutionary theory stand at odds with one another.

Fruit-Bearing Trees—Before or After Fish and Fleas?

Consider another frequently disregarded discrepancy between evolutionary theory and the Bible. Allegedly, “[p]lants first colonised land in the Ordovician period, around 465 million years ago” (O’Donoghue, 2007, 196[2631]:38). “It wasn’t until the evolution of trees 80 million years later that vegetation could spread around the globe” (p. 40, emp. added). What’s more, trees with roots, seeds, and leaves supposedly evolved nearly 100 million years after the first land plants (p. 40). There were fish in the seas (see Evolution…, 1994, p. 30) and “tiny creatures such as insects” on land (O’Donoghue, p. 38), but according to evolution, seed-producing, fruit-bearing trees bloomed millions of years later.

According to Scripture, the omnipotent God Who created everything with “the breath of His mouth” (Psalm 33:6), said: “Let the earth bring forth grass, the herb that yields seed, and the fruit tree that yields fruit according to its kind, whose seed is in itself, on the earth” (Genesis 1:11). The Bible then reveals, “and it was so. And the earth brought forth grass, the herb that yields seed according to its kind, and the tree that yields fruit, whose seed is in itself according to its kind. And God saw that it was good. So the evening and the morning were the third day” (Genesis 1:11-13).

It is really very simple. God made grass, herb, and tree, seed, spore, and fruit on the same day of Creation. There were no epoch-long, time-laden processes that turned plants into shrubs and shrubs into trees over many millions of years. God said He did it in one day, “and it was so.” Furthermore, He did it prior to His creation of any animal life. Although evolution says that fish and insects were around before fruit bearing trees, the Bible teaches otherwise (Genesis 1:20-25).

In truth, the chronology of Creation as revealed in Genesis 1 completely contradicts evolutionary theory. A true Bible believer cannot reasonably hold to a theory that claims certain animals were around millions of years before trees, or that the early Earth had no water on its surface. The sooner evolutionary-sympathizing Christians acknowledge the clear contradictions between evolution and God’s Creation account, the better. If evolutionary theory is true, the Bible is wrong. If the Bible is true, evolutionary theory is a lie. “How long will you falter between two opinions?” (1 Kings 18:21).

The Day-Age Theory

Christians who embrace the long ages of evolutionary geology must find some way to fit billions of years into the biblical record. One of the most popular theories concocted to add eons of time to the age of the Earth is known as the Day-Age Theory. This theory suggests that the days of Genesis 1 were not literal, 24-hour days, but lengthy periods of time (millions or billions of years). Is such a theory to be welcomed with open arms, or is there good reason to reject it? In truth, the available evidence reveals several reasons why we can know that the days mentioned in Genesis 1 were the same kind of days we experience in the present age, and were not eons of time.

Interpreting the Word “Day” is Not Rocket Science

The singular and plural forms of the Hebrew word for day (yom and yamim) appear in the Old Testament over 2,300 times, making it the fifth most common noun in the Old Testament (Saebo, 1990, 6:13-14). The term is used in three basic ways. The first two ways are defined and limited: “Day” (yom) can refer to a 24-hour period (e.g., Genesis 50:3), and it can refer to the part of the 24-hour period that is “light” (in contrast to the darkness/night; Genesis 1:3-5). Day is also used in an extended way to refer to longer, less-defined periods of time in the past, present, or future (e.g., “the day of the Lord,” Zechariah 14:1).

Even today, we use the term “day” in different ways, but rarely do people have a difficult time understanding each other’s use of the term, since the context and the way in which the word is used virtually always defines the word rather easily. Think about it: How often do you have to interrupt and question someone because you misunderstand how they are using the word “day”? Such questions are seldom, if ever, asked. Consider the following paragraph:

In Abraham’s day, God made a covenant with the righteous patriarch and his descendants, saying, “Every male child among you shall be circumcised…. He who is eight days old among you shall be circumcised” (Genesis 17:10,12). As long as it was day eight, it may not have mattered if Abraham and his descendants circumcised their young males during the day or night. In Moses’ day, even if day eight fell on the seventh day (the Sabbath day), the Israelites were expected to circumcise their male children on this day, “so that the law of Moses should not be broken” (John 7:23).

How is the word “day” used in the above paragraph? It is used twice in reference to the two different general periods of time in which Abraham and Moses lived. It is used once to refer to the opposite of night. It is used six times to refer to literal, 24-hour days.

Most Bible readers can easily and quickly understand how the inspired writers used yom (day) throughout the Bible. Most people clearly comprehend if the word “day” is used in a defined manner (as a part of or an entire 24 hours) or in an undefined manner (e.g., “in the day of the Lord”). After the Flood, the Lord said, “While the earth remains…, winter and summer, day and night shall not cease” (Genesis 8:22). “Day” is obviously used here in reference to a defined time period—the part of a 24-hour period that is light (cf. Genesis 7:4; 29:7; Exodus 24:18). During the Flood, “the waters prevailed on the earth one hundred and fifty days” (Genesis 7:24). Once again, “days” (yamim) is used in a defined sense, though instead of referring to the light period of the day(s), the emphasis is on the total 24-hour period(s)—specifically, 150 24-hour periods. In Deuteronomy 31:17, the Lord foretold how the Israelites would break His covenant, and “in that day” many troubles would come upon them. The emphasis here is on a less defined period of time—in the future, when the Israelites would begin worshiping the idols of the pagan nations around them.

Days and Numbers

One of the easiest ways (though not the only way) to detect when the Bible is using the term “day” in a literal, 24-hour sense is if the term is modified by a number. Obviously, day eight (in the aforementioned sample paragraph) refers to the eighth literal day (not week, month, year, decade, etc.) of a child’s life. Day seven refers to the seventh literal day of the week—the Sabbath day. Who would mistake these “days” for anything other than regular days? Interestingly, as Henry Morris once noted, “[W]henever a limiting numeral or ordinal is attached to ‘day’ in the Old Testament (and there are over 200 such instances), the meaning is always that of a literal day” (1974, p. 224, emp. added, parenthetical item in orig.). Indeed, just as Jonah was in the belly of the great fish for three days (and not 3,000 years), and just as the Israelites marched around Jericho once a day for six days (and not six long, vast periods of time), we can know that God created everything in “six days” (Exodus 20:11; 31:17), not six billion years. About each day of Creation, Moses wrote: “So the evening and the morning were the first day…second day…third day…fourth day…fifth day…sixth day” (Genesis 1:5,8,13,19,23,31).

Days with Evenings and Mornings

Another indicator throughout the literal, non-prophetic language of Scripture that yom refers to a limited, defined time of 24 hours or less [i.e., whether it is used to refer to (a) daylight hours of a 24-hour period or (b) the 24-hour period itself], is if the words “morning” and/or “evening” are used to describe the particular day. The words “morning” (boqer) and “evening” (‘erev) appear 348 times in the Old Testament. (Boqer appears 214 times and ‘erev 134 times; Konkel, 1997, 1:711,716.) Again and again throughout the Old Testament these words are used in reference to specific, defined portions of regular 24-hour days.

• Noah “waited yet another seven days, and again he sent the dove out from the ark. Then the dove came to him in the evening” (Genesis 8:10-11).
• Moses judged Israel “on the next day…and the people stood before Moses from morning until evening” (Exodus 18:13).
• The Lord instructed Aaron and his sons in the book of Leviticus about the various offerings, including the laws concerning peace offerings. According to Leviticus 7:15, “The flesh of the sacrifice of his peace offering for thanksgiving shall be eaten the same day it is offered. He shall not leave any of it until morning.”
• During the Israelites’ wandering in the wilderness, God caused a cloud to remain over the tabernacle “from evening until morning: when the cloud was taken up in the morning, then they would journey; whether by day or by night” (Numbers 9:21).

The only instances where evening and morning may not refer to defined portions of a 24-hour day are the relatively few times they are used in prophetic or figurative language (e.g., Genesis 49:27; Habakkuk 1:8). Otherwise, the evidence is overwhelming: when “morning” and/or “evening” are used in reference to a period of time (in literal, non-prophetic language) they always refer to regular, 24-hour days (or parts thereof). [NOTE: For a clear distinction between the literal, narrative, non-prophetic language of Scripture and the figurative, prophetic language of the Bible, compare the narrative of Joseph in Genesis 37-48 with what Jacob prophesies will happen to Joseph, his brothers, and their descendants in Genesis 49:1-27. For more information on the literal, historical nature of Genesis 1-2, see Thompson, 2000, pp. 133-161 and DeYoung, 2005, pp. 157-170.]

So what does this have to do with Creation? Only that each day of the Creation was said to have one evening and one morning.

“So the evening and the morning were the first day” (Genesis 1:5).

“So the evening and the morning were the second day” (Genesis 1:8).

“So the evening and the morning were the third day” (Genesis 1:13).

“So the evening and the morning were the fourth day” (Genesis 1:19).

“So the evening and the morning were the fifth day” (Genesis 1:23).

“So the evening and the morning were the sixth day” (Genesis 1:31).

Just as God spoke of limited, defined periods of days using the terms “evening” and “morning” hundreds of times throughout the Old Testament, He did so six times in the Creation account. If everywhere else in the literal, non-prophetic language of the Old Testament these words are used to refer to regular 24-hour days, why is it that some contend the days of the literal, non-prophetic Genesis account of Creation were undefined, vast periods of evolutionary time? It would seem because their loyalty to the assumption-based, unproven theory of evolution means more to them than a serious, consistent, logical interpretation of the Bible.

Other Questions Day-Agers Should Consider

In addition to the powerful testimony against the Day-Age Theory provided by the Bible writers’ use of yom in conjunction with numerical adjectives and the words “evening” and “morning,” other appropriate questions linger for Day-Age theorists.

• If the “days” of Genesis 1:14, were “eons of time,” then what were the “years” mentioned? The word “years” can be understood correctly in this context only if the word “days” refers to normal days.
• If the “days” of Genesis were not days at all, but long evolutionary periods of time, then a problem arises in the field of botany. Vegetation came into existence on the third day (Genesis 1:9-13). If each day of Genesis 1 was a long geological age composed of one period of daylight and one period of darkness (Genesis 1:4-5), how did plant life survive millions of years of total darkness?
• How would the plants that depend on insects for pollination have survived the supposed millions or billions of years between “day” three and “days” five and six (when insects were created)?
• If the Holy Spirit can easily communicate the difference between a regular day and a much longer period of time (e.g., “a thousand years,” 2 Peter 3:8), what logical, biblically sound reason can one give for assuming that the days of Genesis must have b een thousands, millions, or billions of years?

The fact is, the Day-Age Theory collapses under a reasonable reading of Genesis 1 and the rest of the Scriptures.

Conclusion

Those who propose that billions of years of evolutionary time preceded the creation of Adam and Eve need to give serious thought to the many Bible passages that teach otherwise. The Bible is not silent regarding our origins. God Almighty created the Universe (and everything in it) simply by speaking it into existence.

By the word of the Lord the heavens were made, and all the host of them by the breath of His mouth… Let all the earth fear the Lord; let all the inhabitants of the world stand in awe of Him. For He spoke, and it was done; He commanded, and it stood fast (Psalm 33:6,8-9).

The same God Who turned water into a tasty drink (oinos) in a moment of time (without dependence on time-laden naturalistic processes like photosynthesis; John 2:1-11), “the God Who does wonders” (Psalm 77:14), spoke the Universe into existence in six days.

Had God chosen to do so, He could have spent six billion years, six million years, or six thousand years creating the world. Had He given any indication in His Word that He used lengthy amounts of time in order for naturalistic processes to take over during Creation, we could understand why Christians would embrace such a belief. However, God has done the very opposite. First, He revealed that the heavens and the Earth are the effects of supernatural causes (thus contradicting the General Theory of Evolution). Second, He gave us the sequence of events that took place, which contradicts evolutionary theory. What’s more, He told us exactly how long He spent creating. The first chapter of Genesis reveals that from the creation of the heavens and the Earth to the creation of man, He spent six days. On two occasions in the very next book of the Bible, He reminds us that the Creation took place not over six eons of time, but over six days (Exodus 20:11; 31:17). He then further impressed on Bible readers that man is not 14 billion years younger than the origin of the Universe by referring to him as being on the Earth (1) “from the beginning of the creation” (Mark 10:6), (2) “since the creation of the world” (Romans 1:20), and (3) “from the foundation of the world” (Luke 11:50).

If God did create everything in six literal days, and expected us to believe such, what else would He have needed to say than what He said? How much clearer would He have needed to make it? And, if it does not matter what we think about the subject, why did He reveal to us the sequence of events to begin with?

Truly, just as God has spoken clearly on a number of subjects that various “believers” have distorted (e.g., the worldwide Noahic Flood, the necessity of immersion in water for the remission of sins, the return of Christ, etc.), the Bible plainly teaches that God, by the word of His mouth, spoke the Universe and everything in it into existence in six days. No “rightly divided” Bible passage will lead a person to any other conclusion (2 Timothy 2:15).

REFERENCES

Danker, Frederick William, William Arndt, and F.W. Gingrich, (2000), Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament (Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press).

DeYoung, Donald (2005), Thousands…Not Billions (Green Forest, AR: Master Books).

Evolution: Change Over Time (1994), (Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall).

Konkel, A.H. (1997), boqer, New International Dictionary of Old Testament Theology & Exegesis, ed. Willem A. VanGemeren (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan).

Miller, Jeff (2013), Science vs. Evolution (Montgomery, AL: Apologetics Press).

Miller, Jeff (2014), “How Could There Be Light Before the Sun?” Reason &Revelation, 34[7]:94-95, June.

Morris, Henry M. (1974), Scientific Creationism (San Diego, CA: Creation-Life Publishers).

O’Donoghue, James (2007), “A Forest is Born,” New Scientist, 196[2631]:38-41, November 24.

Riegle, David (1962), Creation or Evolution? (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan).

Saebo, M. (1990), yom, Theological Dictionary of the Old Testament, ed. G. Johannes Botterweck and Helmer Ringgren (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans).

Thompson, Bert (2000), Creation Compromises (Montgomery, AL: Apologetics Press).

Thurman, Clem (2006), “How Was Light Before the Sun?” Gospel Minutes, September 8:3.

Workman, Gary (1989), “Questions from Genesis One,” The Restorer, May/June, pp. 3-5.

The post Creation and the Age of the Earth appeared first on Apologetics Press.

Just as most people who speak English can—rather effortlessly—understand how the English word “day” is used in a variety of contexts, most Bible readers can easily and quickly understand how the inspired writers used yom (day) throughout the Bible. Most people clearly comprehend if the word “day” is used in a defined manner (as a part of or an entire 24 hours) or in an undefined manner (e.g., “in the day of the Lord”). After the Flood, the Lord said, “While the earth remains…, winter and summer, day and night shall not cease” (Genesis 8:22). “Day” is obviously used here in reference to a defined time period—the part of a 24-hour period that is light (cf. Genesis 7:4; 29:7; Exodus 24:18). During the Flood, “the waters prevailed on the earth one hundred and fifty days” (Genesis 7:24). Once again, “days” (yamim) is used in a defined sense, though instead of referring to the light period of the day(s), the emphasis is on the total 24-hour period(s)—specifically, 150 24-hour periods. In Deuteronomy 31:17, the Lord foretold how the Israelites would break His covenant, and “in that day” many troubles would come upon them. The emphasis here is on a less defined period of time—in the future, when the Israelites would begin worshiping the idols of the pagan nations around them.

As with most terms, the word “day” cannot be defined accurately without considering the context in which it is found. However, inspired penmen nearly always provided various indicators within a given passage of Scripture so that readers can understand the text rather easily—including accurately interpreting how the word “day” is used hundreds of times in a limited, defined sense.

One of the indicators throughout the literal, non-prophetic language of Scripture that yom refers either to a limited, defined time of 24 hours or less [i.e., whether it is used to refer to (a) daylight hours of a 24-hour period or (b) the 24-hour period itself], is if the words “morning” and/or “evening” are used to describe the particular day. The words “morning” (boqer) and “evening” (‘erev) appear 348 times in the Old Testament. (Boqer appears 214 times and ‘erev 134 times; Konkel, 1997, 1:711,716.) Again and again throughout the Old Testament these words are used in reference to specific, defined portions of regular 24-hour days.

• Noah “waited yet another seven days, and again he sent the dove out from the ark. Then the dove came to him in the evening” (Genesis 8:10-11).
• Moses judged Israel “on the next day…and the people stood before Moses from morning until evening” (Exodus 18:13).
• The Lord instructed Aaron and his sons in the book of Leviticus about the various offerings, including the laws concerning peace offerings. According to Leviticus 7:15, “The flesh of the sacrifice of his peace offering for thanksgiving shall be eaten the same day it is offered. He shall not leave any of it until morning.”
• During the Israelites’ wandering in the wilderness, God caused a cloud to remain over the tabernacle “from evening until morning: when the cloud was taken up in the morning, then they would journey; whether by day or by night” (Number 9:21).

The only instances where evening and morning may not refer to defined portions of a 24-hour day are the relatively few times they are used in prophetic or figurative language (e.g., Genesis 49:27; Habakkuk 1:8). Otherwise, the evidence is overwhelming: when “morning” and/or “evening” are used in reference to a period of time (in literal, non-prophetic language) they always refer to regular, 24-hour days (or parts thereof). [NOTE: For a clear distinction between the literal, narrative, non-prophetic language of Scripture and the figurative, prophetic language of the Bible, compare the narrative of Joseph in Genesis 37-48 with what Jacob prophesies will happen to Joseph, his brothers, and their descendents in Genesis 49:1-27. For more information on the literal, historical nature of Genesis 1-2, see Thompson, 2000, pp. 133-161 and DeYoung, 2005, pp. 157-170.]

So what does this have to do with Creation? Many evolutionary sympathizers contend that the days of Creation were (or at least could have been) long periods of evolutionary geologic time (where each “day” was millions or billions of years long). One of the main problems (among others; see Lyons, 2012) with this bizarre interpretation, however, is that each day of the Creation was said to have one evening and one morning.

“So the evening and the morning were the first day” (Genesis 1:5).

“So the evening and the morning were the second day” (Genesis 1:8).

“So the evening and the morning were the third day” (Genesis 1:13).

“So the evening and the morning were the fourth day” (Genesis 1:19).

“So the evening and the morning were the fifth day” (Genesis 1:23).

“So the evening and the morning were the sixth day” (Genesis 1:31).

Just as God spoke of limited, defined periods of days using the terms “evening” and “morning” hundreds of times throughout the Old Testament, He did so six times in the Creation account. If everywhere else in the literal, non-prophetic language of the Old Testament these words are used to refer to regular 24-hour days, why is it that some contend the days of the literal, non-prophetic Genesis account of Creation were undefined, vast periods of evolutionary time? Because their loyalty to the assumption-based, unproven theory of evolution means more to them than a serious, consistent, logical interpretation of the Bible.

“Be diligent to present yourself approved to God, a worker who does not need to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth” (2 Timothy 2:15).

REFERENCES

DeYoung, Donald (2005), Thousands…Not Billions (Green Forest, AR: Master Books).

Konkel, A.H. (1997), boqer, New International Dictionary of Old Testament Theology & Exegesis, ed. Willem A. VanGemeren (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan).

Lyons, Eric (2012), “Numbers…and the Use of the Word ‘Day,’” Apologetics Press, http://apologeticspress.org/APContent.aspx?category=9&article=3526&topic=327.

Saebo, M. (1990), yom, Theological Dictionary of the Old Testament, ed. G. Johannes Botterweck and Helmer Ringgren (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans).

Thompson, Bert (2000), Creation Compromises (Montgomery, AL: Apologetics Press).

The post Evening, Morning, and the Days of Creation appeared first on Apologetics Press.

The pollsters highlighted a sobering connection between how religious a person is and their likelihood of being a creationist versus an evolutionist. According to the poll, “the most religious Americans are most likely to be [young earth—JM] creationists” (2012, emp. added). Of those who attend worship each week, 25% believe in theistic evolution and 67% believe in the creation of the Universe within the last 10,000 years. For those who attend almost every week or month, 31% believe in theistic evolution and 55% believe in creationism. Of those who attend seldom or never, 38% believe in theistic evolution and only 25% believe in creationism (2012). The implication is that the less religious a person becomes, moving away from a consistent contemplation of spiritual matters (i.e., the worship of God and a study of His Word), the more he will capitulate to the prevailing secular viewpoint instead of the biblical viewpoint.

One unfortunate finding from the Gallup poll was that the percentage of those who believe in theistic evolution, in one form or another, appears to have gradually declined over the years (from 38% to 32%), while the percentage of those who believe in secular evolution has increased by the same amount (from 9% to 15%) (2012). That’s 19,000,000 Americans! This finding supports the contention that theistic evolution is a gateway doctrine that leads many to atheism—which is a major reason why Apologetics Press has long sought to fight the spread of this debilitating doctrine. Darwinian evolution is not a belief which comes from a straightforward reading of the Bible. It is a theory that is championed by the secular world and that many religious people have felt pressure to accept. Many feel the need to attempt to squeeze  Darwinian evolution into the text of Genesis chapter one, in spite of its clear teaching that the Universe was spoken into existence in six, approximately 24-hour days.

Theistic Evolution—A Devastating Doctrine

This practice can be devastating in the long run, destroying one’s faith in the Bible and Christianity and giving ammunition to the Bible’s skeptics. How so? The theistic evolutionist often tries to get around the clarity of the Genesis account of Creation by contending that it is not a literal, historical account, but rather is figurative and symbolic. In other words, Genesis chapter one does not actually mean what it says. The Bible certainly uses figurative language at times (e.g., in the Psalms, Revelation, Daniel, etc.). However, the fact that we can know that such language is being used, proves that there are textual indicators that distinguish historical from figurative and symbolic genres of writing in the Bible.

For example, when Genesis 25 describes Esau’s appearance as being “like a hairy garment all over,” we understand that his skin was not literally a hairy garment. Rather, it was similar to the appearance and feel of a hairy garment. When the 23^rd Psalm says that the Lord “makes me to lie down in green pastures” and “leads me beside the still waters,” we understand that the text is not speaking literally, but figuratively. In Daniel chapter 2, Daniel interpreted King Nebuchadnezzar’s dream, which depicted a “great image” with a head of gold, chest and arms of silver, belly and thighs of bronze, legs of iron, and its feet composed of iron and clay. Daniel said to Nebuchadnezzar, “You are the head of gold” (vs. 38). We, of course, understand that Daniel was not speaking literally. He was explaining that the gold head of the image was symbolic and represented the greatness of Nebuchadnezzar’s Babylonian empire in comparison to the lesser kingdoms that would follow his. We can know that Revelation is a book that is to be taken figuratively and symbolically, because John tells us so right at the beginning of the book (i.e., Revelation 1:1—“And He sent and signified it….” Revelation is a book filled with signs, not to be taken literally).

Similarly, one can easily distinguish the difference between a heavily symbolic account of Creation, like that given in Psalm 104, and the account given in Genesis one—which is given in straightforward, narrative terminology. Genesis one gives every indication of being a historical account of Creation. [NOTE: Biblical Hebrew scholar, Steven Boyd, in the book Thousands…Not Billions,engaged in a fascinating study, where he showed, using a statistical analysis of verb uses in 97 poetic and narrative biblical texts, that Genesis 1:1-2:3 unquestionably belongs in the category of narrative texts (DeYoung, 2005, pp. 157-170).]

That said, if a text like Genesis one, that has no indication that it is anything other than a historical narrative, is taken to be figurative, as the theistic evolutionary proposition requires, then what would keep a person from doing the same thing anywhere else in the Bible? How can we know for certain that Jesus was really born of a virgin, was crucified, and was resurrected? What would prohibit such accounts from being interpreted as figurative and symbolic as well? Some have gone so far! When the Bible tells us things that we should or should not do to be pleasing to God, what would keep us from interpreting those areas of Scripture as figurative as well? Interpreting Genesis one as figurative has far reaching implications.

In truth, one can come to know what in the Bible is figurative and what is not. When the evidence from the biblical text is weighed (cf. Thompson, 2000), it is clear that Genesis one relates a literal account of Creation in six, approximately 24-hour days, within the last 10,000 years. The scientific evidence supports this contention, as we point out on a regular basis at Apologetics Press. However, such issues highlight how critical the question of origins is, as it is fundamental to our interpretation of Scripture. Reading things into the biblical text that are not warranted can be a very slippery slope. Such practices are just as forbidden as adding man-made doctrines and practices into the church of the Bible (cf. Matthew 15:8-9; Colossians 3:17; 1 Corinthians 4:6; John 4:24; Revelation 22:18-19; Galatians 1:8-9).

Consider further, if theistic evolution is true, then Moses was in error in his writings and was, therefore, not inspired by God. Moses clearly stated in Exodus 20:11 that everything—“the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them”—was made in six days. When the plural form of the Hebrew word for “day” (yamim) is used in Old Testament non-prophetic literature, like Exodus 20:11, it always refers to literal 24-hour periods of time. The same can be said when this Hebrew word is preceded by a numeral, as in Exodus 20:11 (cf. Thompson, pp. 188-201). Why? Because it would make no sense to speak of six “long periods of time.” So, according to Moses, the entire Universe, with everything in it, was created in six, literal, 24-hour periods of time. If theistic evolution were true, then Moses’ writings—a significant section of our Bibles—would be in error, and the skeptic would be accurate in concluding that Moses was not inspired by God. And further, any other biblical characters who quoted from Moses’ writings as though he was an inspired author (including Jesus, Himself—Matthew 4:4,7,10), would also be in error.

If theistic evolution were true, Paul also would be in error. Speaking of mankind, Paul said in Romans 1:20 that certain attributes of God have been “clearly perceived” by mankind “ever since the creation of the world” (ESV). If theistic evolution is true, mankind would not have been around to “clearly perceive” or see the world until billions of years after “the creation of the world.” So, either theistic evolution is false, or Paul was in error and was not inspired by God—a contention which would eliminate much of the New Testament.

And further, Jesus, Himself, said in Mark 10:6 concerning Adam and Eve, “But from the beginning of the creation, God ‘made them male and female’” (cf. Matthew 19:4; Genesis 1:27). Again, if theistic evolution were true, man was certainly not around “from the beginning of creation.” Evolutionary theory supposes that mankind was not around for the vast majority of the Universe’s history. If theistic evolution is true, Jesus, Himself—the Son of Almighty God—is in error and not worthy of our worship. Indeed, theistic evolutionary positions strike at the very heart of the Christian faith—the integrity and inspiration of the Bible, the inspiration of Moses and Paul, and the deity of Christ Himself.

Several have said to Apologetics Press personel over the years, “Does it matter? What’s the big deal if someone believes in theistic evolution?” This latest poll, and the implications of belief in this devastating doctrine with regard to the biblical text, make it clear that this matter is no “little thing.” It is critical that the Christian prepares himself for the defense of the truth on any topic (1 Peter 3:15). We are commanded to “prove” or “test all things; hold fast what is good” (1 Thessalonians 5:21). The proper interpretation of the first chapter of the Bible is no exception to this command. The Christian should be ready to cast “down arguments and every high thing that exalts itself against the knowledge of God, bringing every thought into captivity to the obedience of Christ” (2 Corinthians 10:5).

REFERENCES

DeYoung, Don (2005), Thousands…Not Billions (Green Forest, AR: Master Books).

Newport, Frank (2012), “In U.S., 46% Hold Creationist View of Human Origins,” GALLUP Politics, June 1, http://www.gallup.com/poll/155003/Hold-Creationist-View-Human-Origins.aspx.

Thompson, Bert (2000), Creation Compromises (Montgomery, AL: Apologetics Press), http://apologeticspress.org/pdfs/e-books_pdf/cre_comp.pdf.

The post Literal Creationists Holding Their Ground in the Polls appeared first on Apologetics Press.

Consider the following paragraph and the different ways in which the term “day” is used and easily distinguished.

In Abraham’s day, God made a covenant with the righteous patriarch and his descendants, saying, “Every male child among you shall be circumcised…. He who is eight days old among you shall be circumcised” (Genesis 17:10,12). As long as it was day eight, it may not have mattered if Abraham and his descendants circumcised their young males during the day or night. In Moses’ day, even if day eight fell on the seventh day (the Sabbath day), the Israelites were expected to circumcise their male children on this day, “so that the law of Moses should not be broken” (John 7:23).

How is the word “day” used in the above paragraph? It is used twice in reference to the two different general periods of time in which Abraham and Moses lived. It is used once to refer to the opposite of night. It is used six times to refer to literal, 24-hour days.

One of the easiest ways (though not the only way) to detect when the Bible is using the term “day” in a literal, 24-hour sense is to see if the term is modified by a number. Obviously, day eight refers to the eighth literal day (not week, month, year, decade, etc.) of a child’s life. Day seven refers to the seventh literal day of the week—the Sabbath day. Who would mistake these “days” for anything other than regular days? Interestingly, as Henry Morris once noted, “[W]henever a limiting numeral or ordinal is attached to ‘day’ in the Old Testament (and there are over 200 such instances), the meaning is always that of a literal day” (1974, p. 224, emp. added, parenthetical item in orig.).

The popular belief among some that “we have no idea how long the days of Creation were in Genesis 1” is, with all due respect, an illogical, unbiblical notion. Do people have any trouble understanding each other’s use of this term in modern times? Do we have any difficulty understanding the hundreds of times the word day is used outside of Genesis 1? If not, why is Genesis 1 so difficult to understand for some individuals? Why will some not accept the fact that the six times the word “day” (yom) is coupled with a number in Genesis 1, regular 24-hour days are under discussion? The fact is, it is not difficult to understand or accept the Creation account as literal truth, and to interpret the days of Creation for what they obviously were—unless one is sympathetic to the long, theoretical ages postulated by evolutionary theory and is attempting to find a way to fit vast periods of evolutionary time into the Bible.

REFERENCES

Lyons, Eric (2004), “Did Jesus Rise ‘On’ or ‘After’ the Third Day?” Apologetics Press, http://apologeticspress.org/AllegedDiscrepancies.aspx?article=756.

Morris, Henry M. (1974), Scientific Creationism (San Diego, CA: Creation-Life Publishers).

The post Numbers…and the Use of the Word “Day” appeared first on Apologetics Press.

The Age of the Earth and the Universe

One of the core teachings of atheistic evolution is that the Universe is billions of years old. All of those involved in the discussion recognize that without such vast eons of time, the supposed naturalistic processes at play in the evolutionary scheme would not have time to accomplish their work (even though, we would contend, all the time one could imagine would be insufficient to accomplish the impossibilities associated with atheistic evolution). Atheist David Mills wrote:

Despite widely divergent viewpoints, creationists and evolutionary biologists agree on a crucial fact: Six-thousand years is insufficient time for evolution to have produced the complex lifeforms we observe on Earth today. Homo sapiens could evolve only if given hundreds of millions of years to accumulate selective advantages. A 6000-year-old Earth means therefore that Genesis and the Theory of Evolution are forever irreconcilable (2006, p. 137).

Mills suggests that those who adopt the Day-Age Theory do so only in order to avoid being labeled as atheists, what he calls the “dreaded ‘A’ label.” While his equivocation of the concept of an old Earth with atheism is unfounded, he goes on to state that those who wish to force the Genesis text to accommodate an ancient Earth are involved in “a pompous intellectual charade” designed simply so they can “‘have it both ways’—imagining themselves to be both religious and scientific at the same time” (p. 151).

Countless other atheistic and/or evolutionary scientists have written concerning the opposition between modern “science” and biblical teaching. [NOTE: The word “science” is in quotations, because what is often called “science” in the modern sense is actually evolutionary, assumption-based science that is not founded on fact, and what is routinely discounted as being unscientific is often much more rigorously verifiable than the modern idea of “science.” Thus, when most atheists/evolutionists speak of “science,” the meaning of “evolutionary or materialistic false science” should be understood.] Co-discoverer of the DNA double helix structure, Francis Crick, wrote:

I realized early on that it is detailed scientific knowledge which makes certain religious beliefs untenable. A knowledge of the true age of the earth and of the fossil record makes it impossible for any balanced intellect to believe in the literal truth of every part of the Bible in the way that fundamentalists do. And if some of the Bible is manifestly wrong, why should any of the rest of it be accepted automatically? (1988, p. 11).

In truth, Crick’s and Mills’ assessment that much of modern atheistic/evolutionary-based “science” is directly opposed to a straightforward reading of the biblical text is correct. That being the case, what would we expect to see if certain scholars wanted to “have it both ways” and appear both religious and scientific? We would expect to see a massive reinterpretation of key aspects of the biblical text, especially as it relates to God’s creative activities. In addition, we would not be surprised if multiple ways of cramming billions of years into the text of Genesis were explored by different authors.

In truth, numerous ways have been invented in an attempt to fit millions of years into the biblical text including the Gap Theory, Progressive Creationism, Modified Progressive Creationism, the Modified Gap Theory, the Non-world view, the Multiple Gap Theory, and the Framework Hypothesis (see Thompson, 2000, pp. 275-306). The fact that multiple ways are attempted to accommodate the billions of years advocated by modern “science” is a tell-tale sign that the deep-time scenario did not derive from the Bible, and is only being forced into the text in an attempt to syncretize the Bible with modern “science.” In order to see this trend of syncretism, consider the writing of David Snoke, an advocate of the Day-Age Theory.

David Snoke and the Day-Age Theory

David Snoke’s book, A Biblical Case for an Old Earth, published by Baker Books in 2006, provides an excellent example of an attempt to syncretize the biblical account of Creation with the evolutionary-based scenario of an Earth measured in millions or billions of years. Snoke explains in his preface: “This book presents the case of a ‘day-age’ view that takes Genesis 1 as giving a real chronological sequence, but not necessarily of twenty-four-hour days” (p. 9). Snoke’s primary contention is that the biblical account of Creation can legitimately be interpreted to allow for billions of years of Earth history. He believes that certain scientific evidences call for a reinterpretation of the days of Creation to allow the days to be unidentified ages of extended time.

The primary scientific evidences that he believes point toward the conclusion that the Earth is old are presented in chapter two of his book and include such concepts as distant starlight, geological layers, and tree-ring dating methods (pp. 24-46). He contends that these scientific evidences for an old Earth have no other possible answer than “God made them look old.” And while he believes that God could do that, he does not believe that is what God did, and thus he maintains that we must interpret the biblical text to accommodate the billions of years that modern science supposes.

While Snoke is aware of the many highly qualified scientists who advocate a young Earth, and who believe the scientific evidence points to a young Earth, he believes these scientists are in error. He believes that since, by and large, these scientists have not been successful at being accepted in peer-reviewed (read that as evolutionary-based) journals, and have attempted nonetheless to present their views to the general public, they have bypassed the rules of modern science. He stated:

Young-earth creationists engage in scientific practices widely considered unethical by mainstream scientists. This sounds like quite an accusation, but I see it as intrinsic to the young-earth science movement. Young-earth creation scientists say that an enormous amount of modern science is wrong, either through a conspiracy or through shared beliefs that lead scientists to unconsciously suppress or alter data. Therefore, young-earth creation scientists must bypass the modern science establishment…. Most scientists feel that bypassing other scientists to market your scientific claims directly to the public is highly unethical, since the public is not qualified to evaluate scientific claims (pp. 187-188).

Snoke manifests his true feelings and his mode of operation in the above quote. He cannot bring himself to say that an “enormous amount of modern science is wrong.” One wonders why it would be difficult to say that. If the Bible is correct that Satan is the “god of this world” (2 Corinthians 4:4), and he is the father of lies (John 8:44), and he has blinded those who do not believe, what better way to “blind” people to the truth than by using the respected “scientific” avenues to propagate misinformation? In reality, many of those who suggest that the available scientific evidence points to a young Earth have not bypassed the scientific process. On the contrary, they have been excluded from the process by those who refuse to accept anything that allows for a straightforward reading of the Bible to be correct (see Butt, 2008). Credentialed scientists such as Henry Morris have critically assessed the scientific evidence and have demonstrated that it favors a young Earth (Whitcomb and Morris, 1961). Others such as John D. Morris and Don DeYoung have done the same (Morris, 1994; DeYoung, 2005). In fact, John Ashton edited the book, In Six Days, in which 50 credentialed scientists give their reasons for believing in a Creation that happened in six, literal days (Ashton, 2000). Additionally, Kurt P. Wise, who earned an M.A. and Ph.D. in paleontology from Harvard University while studying under Stephen Jay Gould, maintains that the scientific and biblical evidence converge to show that the Earth’s age is measured in thousands of years, not billions (2002).

The scientific case for an old Earth is not nearly as convincing as Snoke suggests. It is fraught with error. But it is the prevailing idea maintained by the majority of scientists. That is why, it seems, that Snoke and other old-Earth advocates feel the burden to conform to it. In his attempt to justify the avenue he has taken, Snoke appeals to the concept of contextualization (though he does not call it that). He states:

As hard as it may be, we must work to convince the scientific world, not bypass it. This means we must take the time to learn the basic rules of the secular scientific world, even while we question the unproven assumptions we hear. Many missions experts affirm that to impact a culture, the church must address the top elements of society, lest it be permanently marginalized (p. 191).

Snoke, in essence, is contending that if we write off a majority of the “evidences” for an old Earth as faulty, then the bulk of the scientific community is not going to listen to what we say. In order to gain an audience with the “top elements of society” we must work within the “rules” of the “secular scientific world.” It is unfortunate that in his attempt to keep Christianity from being “marginalized” he has failed to correctly identify the “unproven assumptions” that the evolutionary-based scientific community is foisting on the public.

Snoke’s “Biblical” Case

Snoke contends that his understanding of the Bible is not driven by his scientific observations, but is somewhat based upon them. He admits that his “experience in science has affected” his interpretation of the Bible, and he says, “To put it another way, it is very improbable that I ever would have come up with the view that the earth is millions of years old if I had never studied science” (p. 11, emp. added). Even though Snoke contends that his mode of operation in this instance is justified, it seems evident that Snoke allowed his (faulty) understanding of modern science to dictate his interpretation of the Bible.

He further suggests that while all scientific observation is apt to change or be adjusted by new observations, “theological systems are provisional works of human beings, too…. While we must not take lightly the Bible interpretation of faithful scholars of the past, we can also hope that new generations have something to add as well” (pp. 22-23). What Snoke, as a representative of the “new generation” adds, unfortunately, is a biblical interpretation that forfeits much of its truth because it is driven by modern evolutionary science.

The Day-Age Theory advocated by Snoke and a host of others suggests that the days of Creation in Genesis one were not 24-hour periods, but were long, extended periods that would have taken millions or billions of years to complete. Much of the “biblical” case for this theory stems from the idea that the Hebrew word yom, which is translated as “day” in Genesis one and two, can have various meanings. One of those meanings is “an unidentified period of time,” as in the phrase “the day of the Lord.” In this phrase, “day” does not connote an exact 24-hour timeframe. Those who advocate the Day-Age Theory maintain that such a usage could also extend to the days of Creation in Genesis one. After Weston Fields cited a quote from Wilbur Smith, who advocated the Day-Age Theory, Fields said about Smith’s statement: “Most importantly, the primary argument for the Day-Age Theory is shown to be based merely on the fact that the word ‘day’ can (not must!) be used either literally or figuratively in the Bible, the argument most commonly used by those defending this position” (1976, p. 169, italics in orig.).

The problem with attempting to force the days of Creation in Genesis one to mean anything other than literal, 24-hour days is that the context simply does not allow for it. First, the word yom, when used with numeric adjectives such as one, two, three, etc. always means a literal 24-hour day in non-prophetic biblical literature. Arthur Custance, though an old-Earth proponent of the Gap Theory, in critiquing the Day-Age Theory, alluded to the fact that the Hebrew word yom, translated “day” in Genesis one, always refers to a literal 24-hour period when coupled with numeric adjectives such as those that are used in Genesis 1:5,8,13, etc. (1977, p. 100). Snoke actually conceded: “It is true that we can find no other passage in Scripture in which days are numbered and have a generic sense” (2006, p. 145, emp. added). But he then attempts to show why Genesis one might be the only instance in all of Scripture in which this is the case. Needless to say, when a novel rendering of a recognized literary construction is appealed to in order to justify a belief that stems, not from the text, but from a view of modern “scientific” observation, the special pleading required is immediately suspect.

In addition to the fact that the word yom is coupled with numeric adjectives, other contextual factors verify that the word means a literal, 24-hour day. Thompson provides an excellent list of at least nine reasons why the days of Genesis one must logically be viewed as literal, 24-hour periods (2000, pp. 181-211). Custance emphatically argued that the context demands a literal reading for the word “day.” He stated: “The fact is that the Hebrew language just does not have any other way of expressing the exact idea of a true day!” (1977, p. 100). Fields emphatically states: “It is our conclusion, therefore, that the Day-Age Theory is impossible. It is grammatically and exegetically preposterous. Its only reason for existence is its allowance for the time needed by evolutionary geology and biology” (1976, p. 178, italics in orig.). Chaffey and Lisle correctly conclude: “In other words, according to old-earthers, it seems that the general rules of interpretation just do not apply to Genesis. Instead, it should be treated differently than any other book” (2008, p. 31).

Irrelevant Issues

Snoke’s biblical case for an old Earth hinges on novel interpretations and reading into the text concepts that are not there, rather than inferring ideas from the biblical text that the author intended. For instance, one of his contentions is that a major obstacle to believing in an old Earth is the concept of animal death before the fall. He believes that if he can show that animals died before Adam and Eve sinned, then that will help convince many young Earth creationists that he is right about an old Earth. He argues that concepts such as darkness and the sea indicate danger, and their presence in the creation account insinuate that animals could die outside of the Garden of Eden. He writes: “For the ancient Hebrew, however, the sea was a place of danger. Just as in the darkness, where dangerous animals lurk out of sight, ready to jump out, in the sea dangerous monsters lurk out of sight below the surface ready to jump up” (p. 59). He builds on this theme by connecting God’s power with God’s wrath, and stating that it is difficult in Scripture to “make a distinction between the demonstration of God’s power and the demonstration of his wrath” (p. 93).

His analysis is faulty for a number of reasons. He spends over 50 pages and two major chapters dealing with animal death before the Fall, because, in his opinion, “this is the issue that leads to objections to an old Earth” (p. 99, italics in orig.). In reality, however, the issue of Earth’s age has nothing to do with the concept of animal death before the Fall. It is just as easy to believe in a young Earth and maintain that animals died before the Fall as it is to believe in a young Earth while believing that there was no animal death before the Fall. The issue of whether or not there was animal death before the Fall is outside the purview of this article (see Thompson, 2001), and it is irrelevant to the age of the Earth and to the definition of the word “day” in Genesis one.

Furthermore, not only is his connection of animal death to the age of the Earth exaggerated, his strained exegesis of elements—such as the sea and darkness indicating danger, and God’s power being virtually equivalent to His wrath—is equally exaggerated and shows evident signs of special pleading. The reason the days in Genesis one are viewed as literal, 24-hour days is based on a proper understanding of the Hebrew word for yom in Genesis one; and the unity of the rest of the Scriptures flesh out a literal meaning of the word (such as Exodus 20:11). The belief in a young Earth may be connected in some literature with the concept of animal death, but nothing in Scripture mandates this connection, and one does not stand or fall with the other.

Snoke further weakens his case when he attempts to tie the days of Creation with the events that were seen by John in the book of Revelation. He wrote: “The seven seals, one may argue, themselves come as the sevenfold completion of the Sabbath day of creation. Thus the events of the seven seals represent the ‘beginning of the birth pangs’ mentioned by Jesus in Matthew 24:4-8” (p. 110). He then concluded: “If we take seriously the sequences of Revelation as representing a real chronology of events over a long period of time, then it is natural to see a parallel with the sequence of Genesis one representing a real chronology over a long period of time” (p. 110). Notice how he stretches to try to connect Genesis one to the entire book of Revelation. This stretch is impossible to prove and is dubious due to the fact that Genesis and Revelation are not even the same genre of literature. While Genesis is historic narrative, Revelation is apocalyptic literature.

It is often the case that those who are attempting to force outside information into the biblical text resort to the book of Revelation and contend that difficult-to-understand passages in that book lend credence to their novel interpretation. We must always remember, however, that the basic rule of good Bible interpretation is to assess the less difficult passages first and not to allow more difficult passages to obscure the clear meaning of the less difficult ones. In an attempt to make Genesis one and two look like difficult passages, Snoke connects them to Revelation and tries to let passages of Revelation that are more difficult to understand reinterpret the clear historic narrative of Genesis. Such is not the way to engage in proper Bible interpretation.

An Additional Problem

It is often the case that those who compromise the truth of the creation account are forced to compromise other aspects of the biblical text as well. One of the primary biblical events where such compromises are seen is the biblical Flood of Noah. Due to their adherence to such evolutionarily based concepts as uniformitarianism, many old-Earth advocates feel that a global flood would have been “scientifically” impossible, and they feel that adequate physical evidence is not available to justify a world-wide flood. As Snoke stated: “One thing I could not do, without being utterly dishonest in regard to my scientific experience, would be to adopt the view of Henry Morris and some other flood geologists, that science tells us that the earth appears to have had a global, six-mile-deep flood. It does not” (p. 175, italics in orig.). [NOTE: Snoke inserts a strawman argument into the above quote, suggesting that flood geologists must advocate a “six-mile deep” flood. That is based on his uniformitarian assumption that the topography of the Earth must have been the same during the Flood as it is now. Such an assumption should not be granted. In fact, there seems to be a biblical indication that the height of mountains and the depth of oceanic trenches was drastically altered during or following the Flood (Psalm 104:8).] Because of these, and other reasons, old Earth advocates often reinterpret the Genesis account in a way that allows for a local flood instead of one that covered the entire globe.

Snoke laid out his approach clearly when he declared: “The scientific data cause us to take a second look at the traditional interpretation, because things appear inconsistent with flood geology” (p. 174). This statement is another indication of why he has syncretized many aspects of the Bible. He consistently gives precedence to the “scientific” evidence, and uses it to “reinterpret” the biblical text. His teachings (and all other old Earth ideas) are based primarily, not on what the Bible says, but on what modern “science” says, and how modern scientific discoveries can be squeezed into the biblical text. This approach is flawed, not only because it gives the biblical text a secondary status compared to modern evolutionary science, but also because it selectively chooses those “scientific” evidences that purportedly prove an old Earth. The approach discounts the legitimate scientific evidences that point to a young Earth and the global Flood (see Morris and Austin, 2003; Whitcomb and Morris, 1961). Furthermore, modern “scientific” ideas change rapidly, and many of the ideas that are used today to “reinterpret” the biblical text will be defunct tomorrow.

Relying, then, not on a proper understanding of the biblical text, but on an adherence to modern “science,” Snoke and others insist that the Flood of Noah was a local event that did not cover the entire globe. Arthur Custance, the old-Earth advocate of the Gap Theory, gives a hint as to his mode of biblical interpretation, when he wrote: “Actually, I would say personally that anyone who takes the text wholly seriously will be forced to conclude that the event had a quite limited magnitude in terms of depth of water, simply because the run-off was slow. This run-off can be shown from the figures in the text to have been only a few inches per day!” (1979, p. 25, italics in orig.).

Notice the built-in assumptions that undergird Custance’s conclusion. He is assuming that the processes we see today are the same ones that were at work during the Flood. And he is assuming that we can understand Earth’s topography during the Flood based on our current knowledge of its topography. In essence, Custance is using a uniformitarian assumption that things are continuing now as they did in the past. While he insists in other places that he is not discounting all miraculous events during the Flood, he (like Snoke and others) relies quite heavily on an application of uniformitarian processes to events surrounding the Flood. Notice, also, that he believes the text of Genesis should be understood in light of what he thinks he knows scientifically about water run-off rates. Could it be, however, that there are certain aspects of water run-off that he does not fully understand and that would not call for the Flood to be “quite limited” in magnitude? Could it be that the topography of the Earth was vastly different from what we see today? Or is it possible that the complete saturation of the entire Earth slowed the run-off process? Any number of possibilities could be supplied as to why run-off was slow that would not require us to conclude that the Flood was a local event. Yet Custance appeals to his knowledge of water run-off rates, and believes that anyone who wants to take the text of Genesis seriously must factor them into his understanding of the text.

By minimalizing the Flood to that of a local catastrophe and not a global phenomenon, many old-Earth advocates have put their “scientific” knowledge of evolutionary-based geology and uniformitarianism in front of an accurate understanding and interpretation of the text of Genesis. The method of interpretation that allows them to discount the week of Creation as being composed of literal, 24-hour days that occurred a few thousand years ago, is the same mode of interpretation that they use to discount the global Flood. That is, they have relied on current assumptions by modern evolutionary and uniformitarian science to lead their biblical interpretation around by the nose.

Snoke understands that many will see his reinterpretation of the days of Genesis one and of the global Flood as a sell out. In an effort to soften the blow of this accusation, Snoke stated: “I can already hear people saying, ‘Here we go down the slippery slope. First he wants to “explain away” the creation week, now he wants to “explain away” the flood, then what?’” (p. 158). He knows that many conservative scholars, who see such tactics as Snoke uses, often conclude that those interpretative devices allow for faulty biblical interpretations in other places.

While Snoke insists that he is not trying to negate all the miracles in the Bible, he fails to realize that his interpretative method has already compromised two of the most important and most physically impacting miracles in the Universe’s history: Creation and the Flood. With these two miracles “out of the way,” the door is opened for all types of reinterpretations, and many of the New Testament warnings and teachings are rendered meaningless. For instance, in 2 Peter 3:5-6, we read: “For this they willfully forget: that by the word of God the heavens were of old, and the earth standing out of water and in the water, by which the world that then existed perished, being flooded with water.” About this verse, Snoke wrote: “The New Testament references to this passage also do not specify the size of the flood. Peter says that the kosmos was destroyed (2 Peter 3:6), a word that typically refers to political order (hence, ‘cosmopolitan’)” (p. 169).

His conclusion concerning the word kosmos is incorrect. The word kosmos does not “typically” refer to political order. In fact, that use of the word is less than typical when compared with the typical uses of it. In one of the most respected Greek lexicons available, the authors give for the meanings of the word: “the orderly Universe…the world as the earth, the planet upon which we live…the world as the habitation of mankind…earth, world in contrast to heaven” (Bauer, et al., 1979, pp. 445-447). Each of these meanings comes before the meaning of kosmos referring to mankind or the political order. In addition, the inspired writer linked the world with the concepts of “the heavens and the Earth;” clearly referring to the physical realms of the terrestrial globe and what surrounds it.

CONCLUSION

The age of the Earth is not a peripheral issue that is irrelevant to one’s understanding of the Bible. As has rightly been concluded, even by those who adopt an old-Earth approach: “The debate over the age of the earth is not just an academic exercise in dating but a very lively debate over the very core themes of the Bible, which relate to our view of all life” (Snoke, p. 194). The age of the Earth, then, often becomes a test as to how a person will approach the entirety of the biblical text. Those who choose to look to culture and modern “science” for the answers find themselves reinterpreting the biblical text to fit the modern notions of the evolutionary, uniformitarian scientific community. Once they veer from an accurate understanding of Genesis one and two, they are forced to do the same with the global Flood, and numerous other ideas found in the Bible.

A proper understanding of modern science, however, shows that there is no conflict with what we know to be fact and a straightforward reading of Genesis one and two as a historical narrative that describes the Creation of the entire Universe in six literal, 24-hour days only a few thousand years ago. In fact, a host of credentialed scientists have shown that the actual facts we possess about the physical Universe point to a young Earth and militate against an old-Earth interpretation. There is no conflict between fact-based science and the concept of a young Earth. Those who have chosen to adopt old-Earth views have done so in a spirit of syncretism, and have diluted the truth and power of the biblical text. It is our hope that they will see the error into which they have been led and into which they have led others, and turn from such compromising practices.

REFERENCES

Ashton, John, ed. (2000), In Six Days: Why Fifty Scientists Choose to Believe in Creation (Green Forest, AR: Master Books).

Bauer, W., W.F. Arndt, F. W. Gingrich, and F.W. Danker (1979), Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament and Other Early Christian Literature (Chicago: University of Chicago Press), second edition.

Butt, Kyle (2008), “The Catch-22 of Peer-Reviewed Journals,” Apologetics Press, /apcontent.aspx?category=9&article=2508.

Chaffey, Tim and Jason Lisle (2008), Old-Earth Creationism on Trial: The Verdict Is In (Grand Rapids, MI: Master Books).

Crick, Frances (1988), What a Mad Pursuit: A Personal View of Scientific Discovery (New York: Basicbooks).

Custance, Arthur (1977), Time and Eternity (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan).

Custance, Arthur (1979), The Flood: Local or Global? (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan).

DeYoung, Don (2winxp005), Thousands not Billions (Green Forest, AR: Master Books).

Fields, Weston (1976), Unformed and Unfilled: A Critique of the Gap Theory (Phillipsburg, NJ: P&R).

Hesselgrave, David J. and Edward Rommen (2000), Contextualization: Meanings, Methods, and Models (Pasadena, CA: William Carey).

Mills, David (2006), Atheist Universe: The Thinking Person’s Answer to Christian Fundamentalism (Berkeley, CA: Ulysses Press).

Morris, John D (1994), The Young Earth (Green Forest, AR: Master Books).

Morris, John and Steven Austin (2003), Footprints in the Ash (Grand Rapids: Master Books).

Snoke, David (2006), A Biblical Case for an Old Earth (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker).

Thompson, Bert (2000), Creation Compromises (Montgomery, AL: Apologetics Press).

Thompson, Bert (2001), “Did Death Occur on Earth Prior to Man’s Sin?” Apologetics Press, http://www.apologeticspress.org/apcontent.aspx?category=11&article=677.

Whitcomb, John and Henry Morris (1961), The Genesis Flood: The Biblical Record and Its Scientific Implications (Phillipsburg, NJ: P&R).

Wise, Kurt P. (2002), Faith, Form, and Time (Nashville, TN: Broadman and Holman).

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Some have come to believe that the questions Job asked in verse five somehow support the view that the days of Creation were not literal days, but long periods of geologic time. In fact, a friend recently relayed to me how someone objected to her literal interpretation of Genesis chapter one partly based upon this verse. Does Job 10:5 really support the Day-Age Theory of Creation?

First, it is disappointing that anyone who claims to care about “rightly dividing the word of truth” (2 Timothy 2:15) would appeal to this section of Scripture to prove any doctrine. Although Job is a great example of perseverance (James 5:10-11), there is no indication that his speeches were inspired. Neither he nor anyone else in the book ever claimed Job’s statements were “given by inspiration of God.” Job is an inspired book, but a very unique book in that it is full of speeches by uninspired men (e.g., Eliphaz, Bildad, Zophar). In fact, when God finally answered Job out of the whirlwind, He asked the patriarch: “Who is this who darkens counsel by words without knowledge?” (38:2, emp. added). Obviously, God never would have asked such a rhetorical question had Job been inspired. Prior to the Lord’s speeches, Elihu twice accused Job of the very same thing (34:35; 35:16). Later, Job even said himself: “I have uttered what I did not understand, things too wonderful for me, which I did not know” (42:3, emp.added; cf. 30:16-23). Ironically, in the very passage that some would claim supports the Day-Age Theory, Job was guilty of uttering things he “did not know” (see 10:3).

But doesn’t Job, through his rhetorical questions, simply acknowledge a well-known truth—that God’s days and years are not like those of man (10:5)? Certainly, this fact is known from other scriptures. Just as God does not see as a finite man (Job 10:4) but as an infinite, omniscient Creator (Psalm 139:1-12), God’s days and years are not numbered like those of a man (Job 10:5). God is eternal (Deuteronomy 33:27). He is “from everlasting to everlasting” (Psalm 90:2). In Job 10:4-6, the patriarch acknowledged that God did not need to investigate his life (as a man would) to know that he was not wicked. He is the infinite, eternal, omniscient Creator Who already knew that Job was innocent. Notice, however, that this truth says nothing about how long the days of Creation were.

Still, some would argue, “Regardless of the context of Job 10:5, thefact remains that God is not bound by time and the days of Genesis just as easily could have been thousands or millions of years.” There is no question that God is not bound by time. The point, however, is not whether God is outside of time, but what God has revealed to us—both in Genesis 1 and in the rest of Scripture. God could have created the Universe in any way He desired, in whatever order He wanted, and in whatever time frame He chose. He could have created the world and everything in it in six hours, six minutes, six seconds, or in one millisecond—He is, after all, God Almighty (Genesis 17:1). But the question is not what God couldhave done; it is what He said He did. And He said that He created everything in six days (Genesis 1). When God gave theIsraelites the Ten Commandments, He stated:

Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. Six days you shall labor and do all your work, but the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord your God. In it you shall do no work: you, nor your son, nor your daughter, nor your male servant, nor your female servant, nor your cattle, nor your stranger who is within your gates. For in six days the Lord made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them, and rested the seventh day. Therefore the Lord blessedthe Sabbath day and hallowed it (Exodus 20:8-11, emp. added).

This Sabbath command can be understood properly only when the days of the week are considered regular 24-hour days.

Based upon God’s use of words throughout Scripture which represent time periods that are much longer than a regular day (cf. Genesis 1:14; 2 Peter 3:8; Lyons, 2007), we can rightly conclude that God could have revealed to man that this world was created over a vast period of time. [For example, He could have used the Hebrew word dôr, which means long periods of time.] The fact is, however, God said He created this world and everything in it in six days (Genesis 1; Exodus 20:11; 31:17; cf. Psalm 33:9; 148:5; Mark 10:6). What’s wrong with just believing what God said He did?

REFERENCE

Lyons, Eric (2007), “With God One Day is a Thousand Years,” /articles/3414.

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How do you know the “Days” of Genesis 1 were literal?

A.

There are several linguistic reasons that demonstrate that “day” in Genesis 1 refers to an ordinary day (Lyons, 2001). There are also scientific reasons to draw the same conclusion. One indication is the presence of symbiosis in the created order. Symbiosis is defined as “the relation between two different species of organisms that are interdependent; each gains benefits from the other” (“Symbiosis,” n.d.). Mutualism is a form of symbiosis in which both species benefit. Many mutualistic relationships are obligative, that is, neither species can live without the other. For example, the Yucca plant and Yucca moth are completely dependent on each other for survival. The Yucca plant is unable to pollinate itself to grow more seeds and reproduce. It depends specifically on the Yucca moth for pollination. The moth depends specifically on the Yucca plant to provide the means to hatch new moths. The two were clearly designed to function together. But according to the Genesis account, plants were made on Day 3 while insects were created on Days 5-6. So the moth and the plant had to come into existence in close temporal proximity. They could not have been separated by millions of years. Nor could they have “co-evolved”—a meaningless, nonsensical notion that fails to account for the inherent and irreducible necessity of mutualism from the beginning of each organism’s existence.

REFERENCES

Lyons, Eric (2001), “Were the Days Really Days?” http://apologeticspress.org/articles/1624.

“Symbiosis” (no date), Word Net, http://wordnetweb.princeton.edu/perl/webwn? s=sym biosis.

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There is no question that God is not bound by time. He is the infinite, eternal, all-powerful, all-knowing Creator. The point, however, is not whether God is outside of time (cf. Psalm 90:2), but what God has revealed to us—both in Genesis 1 and in the rest of the Bible. God could have created the Universe in any way He so desired; in whatever order He wanted, and in whatever time frame He so chose. He could have created the world and everything in it in six hours, six minutes, six seconds, or in one millisecond—He is, after all, God Almighty (Genesis 17:1). But the question is not what God could have done; it is what He said He did. And He said that He created everything in six literal days. When God gave the Israelites the Ten Commandments, He stated:

Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. Six days you shall labor and do all your work, but the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord your God. In it you shall do no work: you, nor your son, nor your daughter, nor your male servant, nor your female servant, nor your cattle, nor your stranger who is within your gates. For in six days the Lord made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them, and rested the seventh day. Therefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and hallowed it (Exodus 20:8-11, emp. added).

This Sabbath command can be understood properly only when the days of the week are considered regular 24-hour days.

Based upon God’s use of words throughout Scripture which represent time periods that are much longer than a regular day (cf. Genesis 1:14; 2 Peter 3:8), we can rightly conclude that God could have revealed to man that this world was created over a vast period of time. [He could have used the Hebrew word dôr, which means long periods of time.] The fact is, however, God said He created this world and everything in it in six days (Genesis 1; Exodus 20:11; 31:17; cf. Psalm 33:9; 148:5; Mark 10:6).

Question: What’s wrong with the way God said He did it?

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Consider another frequently disregarded discrepancy between evolutionary theory and the Bible. According to a recent New Scientist article titled “A Forest is Born,” “[p]lants first colonised land in the Ordovician period, around 465 million years ago” (O’Donoghue, 2007, 196[2631]:38). Allegedly, “it wasn’t until the evolution of trees 80 million years later that vegetation could spread around the globe” (p. 40, emp. added). What’s more, trees with roots, seeds, and leaves supposedly evolved nearly 100 million years after the first land plants (p. 40). There were fish in the seas (see Evolution, 1994, p. 30) and “tiny creatures such as insects” on land (O’Donoghue, p. 38), but according to evolution, seed-producing, fruit-bearing trees bloomed millions of years later.

What does the Bible teach about the origin of vegetation? On day three of Creation, the omnipotent God Who created everything with “the breath of His mouth” (Psalm 33:6), said: “Let the earth bring forth grass, the herb that yields seed, and the fruit tree that yields fruit according to its kind, whose seed is in itself, on the earth” (Genesis 1:11). The Bible then reveals, “and it was so. And the earth brought forth grass, the herb that yields seed according to its kind, and the tree that yields fruit, whose seed is in itself according to its kind. And God saw that it was good. So the evening and the morning were the third day” (Genesis 1:11-13).

It is really very simple. God made grass, herb, and tree, seed, spore, and fruit on the same day of Creation. There were no epoch-long, time-laden processes that turned plants into shrubs and shrubs into trees over many millions of years. God said He did it in one day, “and it was so.” Furthermore, He did it prior to His creation of any animal life. Although evolution says that fish and insects were around before fruit bearing trees, the Bible teaches otherwise (Genesis 1:20-25).

In truth, the chronology of Creation as revealed in Genesis 1 contradicts evolution theory. One cannot reasonably hold to a theory that claims fruit-bearing trees evolved millions of years after the “first plants,” or that certain animals were around millions of years before trees. The sooner that Christians who are sympathetic to the evolutionary timetable acknowledge the differences between evolution and God’s Creation account, the better. If evolution theory is true, the Bible is wrong. If the Bible is true, the evolutionary theory is a lie. “How long will you falter between two opinions?” (1 Kings 18:21).

Evolution: Change Over Time (1994), (Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall).

O’Donoghue, James (2007), “A Forest is Born,” New Scientist, 196[2631]:38-41, November.

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Generally, the Day-Age Theory is not defended by an appeal to the biblical text. Rather, its advocates usually claim, more often than not, that there is “scientific evidence” for a much older Earth than a literal reading of the Scriptures would indicate. Therefore, the assumption is made that the “days” of Genesis 1 cannot be interpreted literally. Recently, however, attempts have been made to argue for the Day-Age concept by an appeal to the Genesis narrative itself. The argument runs as follows: (1) There is textual evidence in Genesis 2 that the sixth day of the creation week could not have been a literal day; (2) But obviously it was the same type of “day” as the previous five; (3) Thus, none of the “days” of the creation week is to be seen as literal.

What, though, is the “evidence” that would indicate the sixth day of creation was not a literal day? The reply is two-fold: (1) First, it is said that after God created Adam on the sixth day, He commissioned him to name all of the animals before Eve was fashioned later on the same “day,” and this would have involved a much longer period than a mere twenty-four hour day. (2) Second, it is alleged that when Adam first saw Eve, he said, “This is now bone of my bones…,” and his statement reflects that he had been some time without a mate—certainly longer than a few hours. Let us give due consideration to each of these matters.

The foregoing compromise of the clear biblical record is presented in Gleason L. Archer’s book, Encyclopedia of Bible Difficulties (1982, pp. 58-65). Significantly, professor Archer revealed that he has been influenced by the assertions of evolutionary geochronology. His discussion of this matter is in response to the question: “How can Genesis 1 be reconciled with the immense periods of time indicated by fossil strata?” He claimed that there is a conflict between Genesis and the beliefs of evolutionary geologists only if one understands “Genesis 1 in a completely literal fashion,” which, he asserted, is unnecessary. Archer has suggested that God then “…gave Adam a major assignment in natural history. He was to classify every species of animal and bird found in the preserve” (1982, p. 59). Dr. Archer said that it

…must have taken a good deal of study for Adam to examine each specimen and decide on an appropriate name for it, especially in view of the fact that he had absolutely no human tradition behind him, so far as nomenclature was concerned. It must have required some years, or, at the very least, a considerable number of months for him to complete this comprehensive inventory of all the birds, beasts, and insects that populated the Garden of Eden (1982, p. 60).

One would be hard pressed to find a better example of “the theory becoming father to the exegesis” than this. Archer simply has “read into” the divine narrative the assumptions of his erroneous view. Let us take a careful look at the Bible facts.

First, apparently only those animals that God “brought” unto Adam were involved, and this seems to be limited, as even Archer has conceded, to Eden. Second, certain creatures were excluded. There is, for example, no mention of fish or creeping things. Third, the text does not suggest how broad the categories were that Adam was to name. It is sheer assertion to claim that he was to name all “species.” God created living organisms according to “kinds” which, in the Bible, appears to be a rather elastic term. It translates the Hebrew word, min, which sometimes seems to indicate species, sometimes genus, and sometimes family or order. [But, as Walter C. Kaiser, Chairman of the Department of Old Testament and Semitic Languages, Trinity Divinity School, has observed: “This gives no support to the classical evolutionist view which requires developments across kingdom, phyla, and classes” (as quoted in Harris et al., 1980, 1:504).] Fourth, why should it be assumed that Adam had to “give a good deal of study” to this situation? He never had to “study” walking or talking; clearly Adam had been miraculously endowed with a mature knowledge that enabled him to make his way in that antique environment. He needed no “human tradition” behind him; he was “of God” (Luke 3:38).

Keil and Delitzsch, in their commentary on Genesis, observed that Adam and Eve were created on the same day, “…and there is no difficulty in this, since it would not have required much time to bring the animals to Adam to see what he would call them, as the animals of paradise are all we have to think of ” (1978, 1:87). H.C. Leupold remarked:

That there is a limitation of the number of creatures brought before man is made apparent by two things. In the first place, the beasts are described as beasts of the field (hassadheh), not beasts of the earth, as in 1:24. Though there is difficulty in determining the exact limits of the term “field” in this instance, there is great likelihood (Cf.: also v. 5) that it may refer to the garden only. In the second place, the fish of the sea are left out, also in v. 20, as being less near to man. To this we are inclined to add a third consideration, the fact, namely, that the garden could hardly have been a garden at all if all creatures could have overrun it unimpeded. Since then, very likely, only a limited number of creatures are named, the other difficulty falls away, namely, that man could hardly have named all creatures in the course of a day (1975, pp. 130-131).

Henry Morris has commented:

We have no way of knowing exactly how many “kinds” of animals appeared before Adam, but it was clearly not such a large number as to be incapable of examination within a few hours at most. It is not unreasonable to suggest that Adam could note and name about ten kinds each minute, so that in, say five hours, about three thousand kinds could be identified. Clearly, this number seems more than adequate to meet the needs of the case (1976, p. 97).

Archer’s argument about the animals is, therefore, much ado about nothing. Further, Archer has suggested that the naming the animals left Adam with a “long and unsatisfying experience as a lonely bachelor” and so he was “emotionally prepared” when Eve was formed (1982, p. 60). Another writer declared: “It seems that he [Adam—WJ] had been searching diligently for a long time for a suitable mate, and when he found her, he burst out, This at last [literally, ‘this time’] is bone of my bones, etc.” (Willis, 1979, p. 113.).

Again, one can only express amazement at how some scholars so adroitly “read between the lines.” There is nothing in the statement, “This is now bone of my bones…” that demands a long, lonely, searching bachelorhood for Adam. The Hebrew word translated “now” is pa’am. The term does not require a protracted span of time, as asserted by Willis. It can denote simply a contrast with that which is previously recorded, as it obviously does in this context. Professor M.W. Jacobus observed that the term denotes “this time—in this instance, referring to the other pairs,” and so it simply expressed Adam’s satisfaction with his mate in contrast to the animals he had been naming (1864, p. 110). Or, as Jamieson commented:

…this time, is emphatic (Cf.: 30:30; 46:30). It signifies “now indeed,” “now at last,” as if his memory had been rapidly recalling the successive disappointments he had met with in not finding, admidst all the living creatures presented to him, any one capable of being a suitable companion to him (1945, 1:46).

There is, therefore, nothing in Genesis 2 that is in conflict with the plain, historical, literal statement of Genesis 1:27ff.: “And God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them…. And there was evening and there was morning, the sixth day.” As we have pointed out repeatedly, the Scriptures indicate that the creation week of six days was composed of the same kind of “days” that the Hebrews employed in the observance of the Sabbath (cf. Exodus 20:8-11). Although this point has been ridiculed, it never has been answered.

There is another point, from the New Testament, that is worthy of consideration. In 1 Timothy 2:13, Paul stated: “For Adam was first formed, then Eve.” Of special interest here is the word “then” (Greek, eita). This term is an adverb of time meaning “then; next; after that” (Thayer, 1958, p. 188). It is found thirteen times in the New Testament in this sense. [Once it is employed in argumentation to add a new reason and so is rendered “furthermore” (Hebrews 12:9).] The word, therefore, generally is used to suggest a logical sequence between two occurrences: there is never an indication that a long lapse of time separates the two. Note the following:

1. Jesus “girded himself. Then (eita) he poureth water into the basin…” (John 13:5).
2. From the cross, to Mary, Jesus said, “Woman, behold thy son! Then (eita) saith he to the disciple…” (John 19:26-27). Compare also John 20:27: “Then (eita) saith he to Thomas….” See also Mark 8:25.
3. In Luke 8:12, some seed fell by the wayside, “then (eita) cometh the devil and taketh away the word from their heart.” Note Mark’s parallel: “Straightway cometh Satan, and taketh away the word…” (4:15). These examples reveal no long lapses of time.
4. James stated a man “is tempted when he is drawn away by his own lust, and enticed. Then (eita) the lust, when it hath conceived, beareth sin…” (1:14-15). How long does that take?
5. Christ appeared to Cephas, “then (eita) to the twelve” (1 Corinthians 15:5), and this was on the same day (Luke 24:34-36). See also 1 Corinthians 15:7.
6. In speaking of Christ’s coming, Paul declared: “Then (eita) cometh the end” (1 Corinthians 15:23-24). Will there be a long span of time between Christ’s coming and the end? Indeed not (see Jackson, n.d.).
7. For the two other uses of eita, see Mark 4:28 and 1 Timothy 3: 10. And so, “Adam was first formed, then (eita) Eve” (1 Timothy 2:13). Paul’s use of this adverb, as compared with similar New Testament usages elsewhere, is perfectly consistent with the affirmation of Moses that Adam and Eve were made on the same literal day of history. The specious arguments that would accommodate Genesis to the unscriptural (and unscientific) views of modern evolutionism are shown to be totally false.

Archer, Gleason L. (1982), Encyclopedia of Bible Difficulties (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan).

Harris, R.L. G.L. Archer, and B.K. Waltke (1980), Theological Wordbook of the Old Testament (Chicago, IL: Moody).

Jackson, Wayne (no date), Premillennialism—A System of Infidelity (Stockton, CA: Courier Publications).

Jacobus, M.W. (1864), Notes on Genesis (Philadelphia, PA: Presbyterian Board of Publication).

Jamieson, Robert (1945), Jamieson, Faucett, Brown Bible Commentary (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans).

Keil, C.F. and F. Delitzsch (1978 reprint), Commentary on the Old Testament (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans).

Leupold, H.C. (1975 reprint), Exposition of Genesis (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker).

Morris, Henry M. (1976), The Genesis Record (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker).

Thayer, J.H. (1958 reprint), Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament (Edinburgh, Scotland: T. & T. Clark).

Willis, John T. (1979), Genesis (Austin, TX: Sweet).

Originally published in Reason & Revelation, October 1982, 2[10]:41-43. Copyright © 1982 Apologetics Press, Inc. All rights reserved.

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Were plants or humans created first?

A.

Most knowledgeable Christians read this question and immediately recall what Genesis 1 teaches: plants were created on day three (vss. 9-11) and humans on day six (vss. 24-31). Skeptics, however, have long criticized Genesis 1 and 2 as being contradictory. According to Bible critic Dennis McKinsey, “God made the fruit trees on the third day and created man three days later” in Genesis 1, but in Genesis 2 “God made man before the fruit trees” (1984, 22:1, emp. added). McKinsey’s criticism centers on Genesis 2:8-9a: “The Lord God planted a garden eastward in Eden, and there He put the man whom He had formed. And out of the ground the Lord God made every tree grow that is pleasant to the sight and good for food.” Allegedly, these verses contradict the chronology of Genesis 1:9-11,24-31.

The main reason that skeptics see disharmony in the events recorded in the first two chapters of the Bible (especially regarding the order of God’s creation of vegetation and man) is because they fail to realize that Genesis 1 and 2 serve different purposes. Chapter one (including 2:1-4) focuses on the order of the creation events; chapter two (2:5-25) simply provides more detailed information about some of the events mentioned in chapter one.

Consider a basketball announcer who, from beginning to end, tells of every point that each player scores in a particular game. After the game, however, the statistics are tallied, and the announcer informs the audience who scored all of the points, from most to fewest. Whereas earlier, the points were all announced in the precise order in which they were scored (and by whom), later, the results are presented non-sequentially.

Similar to a post-game summary that never is intended to be a regurgitation of what previously was announced sequentially, Genesis 2 never was meant to be a chronological accounting of the Creation. Whereas Genesis 1 is arranged chronologically, Genesis 2 is arranged topically.

McKinsey, Dennis (1984), “The Creation Accounts,” Biblical Errancy, 22:1-3, October.

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First, the Bible does not say, “With God one day is a thousand years and a thousand years is one day.” The apostle Peter actually wrote: “[B]eloved, do not forget this one thing, that with the Lord one day is as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day” (2 Peter 3:8). Peter used a figure of speech known as a simile to compare a day to a thousand years. It is not that one day is precisely equivalent to 1,000 years or vice versa. Rather, within the specific context of 2 Peter 3, one could say that they share a likeness.

What is the context of 2 Peter 3? In this passage, Peter reminded Christians that “scoffers” would arise in the last days saying, “Where is the promise of His [Jesus’] coming?” (vss. 3-4). Peter declared: “[T]he heavens and the earth…are reserved for fire until the day of judgment and perdition of ungodly men” (vs. 7). Regardless of what the scoffers alleged about the Second Coming, Peter wanted the church to know that “the Lord is not slack concerning His promise [of a return], as some count slackness, but is longsuffering toward us, not willing that any should perish but that all should come to repentance” (vs. 9). Sandwiched between these thoughts is the fact that the passing of time does not affect God’s promises, specifically the promise of His return. If Jesus promised to return 1,000 or 2,000 years ago, it is as good as if He made the promise yesterday. Indeed, “with the Lord one day is as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day.” With men, the passing of long periods of time generally affects their keeping of promises, but not with God. Time has no bearing on whether He will do what He said He would do: “a thousand years are like a day” (vs. 8, NIV).

Another point to consider is that Peter used the term “day” (Greek hemera) and the phrase “thousand years” (chilia ete). This in itself is proof that God is able to communicate to man the difference between one day and 1,000 years. (For similes to make sense, one first must understand the literal difference between what is being compared. If there were no difference, then it would be meaningless to use such a figure of speech.) What’s more, within Genesis chapter one God used the terms “days” (Hebrew yamim) and “years” (shanim). Many rightly have questioned, “If a day in Genesis is really a thousand years (or some other long period of time), then what are the years mentioned in Genesis chapter one?” Such a definition of “days” makes a reasonable interpretation of Creation impossible. The facts are: (1) God knows the difference between a day and a thousand years; (2) Peter and Moses understood this difference; (3) their original audience comprehended the difference; and (4) any unbiased reader today can do the same.

Finally, even if 2 Peter 3:8 could be tied to the length of the Creation days (logically and biblically it cannot), adding 6,000 years to the age of the Earth would in no way appease evolutionary sympathizers. A person could add 600,000 years or 600 million years and still not come close to the alleged age of the Universe. According to evolutionary calculations, one would still be 13+ billion years away from the Big Bang and four billion years this side of the formation of Earth. Truly, even an abuse of 2 Peter 3:8 will not help Day-Age theorists.

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on the fourth day, God “set” the sun, moon and stars in the heavens to govern the days, months, seasons and years (verse 17). When God “set” the lights in the heavens, it was much like when we “set” a clock. And that really is what God did—He “set” His clock on the 4th day. But these (the sun, moon, stars) were all created “in the beginning” (Gen. 1:1) (Thurman, 2006, p. 3, emp. added).

The problem with this line of argumentation is that it contradicts what the Bible says.

Certainly, “[i]n the beginning God created the heavens and the earth” (Genesis 1:1). But, it was not until later that God created the Sun, Moon, and stars. Genesis 1:14-19 reads:

Then God said, “Let there be lights in the firmament of the heavens to divide the day from the night; and let them be for signs and seasons, and for days and years; and let them be for lights in the firmament of the heavens to give light on the earth”; and it was so. Then God made two great lights: the greater light to rule the day, and the lesser light to rule the night. He made the stars also. God set them in the firmament of the heavens to give light on the earth, and to rule over the day and over the night, and to divide the light from the darkness. And God saw that it was good. So the evening and the morning were the fourth day (Genesis 1:14-19, emp. added).

God not only “set” (Hebrew nathan) the Sun, Moon, and stars in their precise locations in the heavens on the fourth day of Creation, but it was on this day when God literally “made” (Hebrew asah) these heavenly bodies. Similar to how God initially made the land and seas void of animal life (which later was created on days five and six of Creation), the “heavens” were made “in the beginning,” but the hosts of heaven (which now inhabit them) were created “in the firmament of the heavens” on day four (Genesis 1:14).

Consider also how God spoke light into existence on day one of Creation, saying, “Let there be light” (1:3, emp. added). On the fourth day God declared, “Let there be lights in the firmament of the heavens…and it was so” (1:14-15, emp. added). Gary Workman commented on this similarity, saying:

“Let there be lights” (v. 14) is identical in grammatical construction with other statements of “let there be…” in the chapter. Therefore the command can only mean that God spoke the luminaries into existence on the fourth day just as he had created the initial light on day one and the firmament on day two (1989, p. 3).

On day one God made intrinsic light; on day four He made the generators of light. Keep in mind that “the Father of lights” (James 1:17), Who is “light” (1 John 1:5), could create light easily without first having to create the Sun, Moon, and stars. Just as God could produce a fruit-bearing tree on day three without a seed, He could produce light supernaturally on day one without the “usual” light bearers (which subsequently were created on day four). Again, there is no indication in Scripture that the generators of light already were made before day four.

Suppose, however, that the creation of the heavens “in the beginning” had included the creation of the Sun, Moon, and stars (which Genesis 1:14-19 says were made on day four). One still would not be justified in trying to appease the evolutionary timeline by claiming that the “beginning” took place billions of years before the six days of Creation. Why? Because God said, “For in six days the Lord made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them, and rested the seventh day” (Exodus 20:11, emp. added). Both the heavens and all that is in the heavens were created during the six-day creation.

In truth, on day one God created “the heavens,” and on day four He made the Sun, Moon, and stars. And all things were made within the six days of Creation. No “rightly divided” (2 Timothy 2:15) Bible passage will lead a person to any other conclusion.

Thurman, Clem (2006), “How Was Light Before the Sun?” Gospel Minutes, September 8.

Workman, Gary (1989), “Questions from Genesis One,” The Restorer, 9[5/6]:3-5, May/June.

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One prominent manifestation of humanistic influence in the church is the tendency to make concessions to the theory of evolution. Even Christian college science professors have been seduced by pseudo-scientific “proof ” that the Earth is 4.6 billion years old. Evolution’s illusion of scientific credibility depends upon an ancient Earth. This circumstance has created a climate in the scientific community in which those dating methods that support an ancient Earth receive preeminence, while those that support a young Earth are effectively ignored.

Once a Christian accepts the idea of an ancient Earth, he automatically is placed in a position where he must abandon a literal interpretation of the biblical Creation account. He must reject the “days” of Genesis one as literal twenty-four-hour days (or accept some other compromising concept such as the Gap Theory, Modified Gap Theory, etc.). Historically, in their frantic need to maintain their own credibility as a valid academic discipline, liberal theologians reevaluated their views of Genesis 1, and altered their assessments in order to accommodate the evolutionary framework. Consequently, the Creation account was stylized as a “myth” or a “hymn.” It is incredibly naïve to think that Christians can use the term “myth” to refer to Genesis 1, and there be no connection with liberal theology, evolution, and a devaluated view of the inspiration of that sacred chapter.

What are the practical effects of retreating to such a view? Many older Christians (i.e., World War II generation and before) were faced with the growing threat of an evolution-based view of science at a time when their own convictions about the reliability and inspiration of the Bible already had been crystallized. Consequently, many simply have not understood what all the fuss is about. They have been convinced that one can believe in evolution and an ancient Earth, and yet still hold to firm convictions about the reliability of the biblical account of Creation. What they fail to realize is that they already had come to accept the Bible viewpoint, and so learned to live with the logical incompatibility of the two divergent viewpoints. Their determination to maintain a belief in the inerrancy of Scripture was formed at a time when bold comparisons with the evolutionary framework were not forced upon them in the classroom.

But times are different. Babyboomers, whose adolescent years transpired after World War II, were forced to bring into bold relief and stark contrast two clearly clashing world views: creation and evolution. Irreligious science teachers caused us to face the fact that there is no common ground between the two views. Ultimately, the main reason for accepting the idea of an ancient Earth is to accommodate an evolutionary position of one sort or another.

Generation X arrived, and has been genuine and honest enough to see and embrace the logical implications of the ancient Earth viewpoint. Consequently, they have adjusted their perceptions of the integrity of the biblical text. They recognize that since Genesis 1 may be interpreted rather loosely, so may the rest of the Bible and, for that matter, the whole of their parents’ religion. Generated by a secular, humanistic society, and perpetuated by careless parents, the children have come to adopt a relativistic view of Christianity (if they have not abandoned it altogether). Alarmed, even panic-stricken, parents look on with wonderment at how their children can so easily throw overboard such ironclad certainties as God’s laws governing marriage, New Testament worship, and the plan of salvation. They apparently are blind to the fact that they, themselves, in league with humanistic philosophy, have sown the wind that yielded the whirlwind!

The solution? It may be too late to save many of the post-World War II population, in whom a modern mindset has been deeply embedded. However, the only road to recovery, and the only hope for future generations, is a return to complete trust in the written documents of the Bible. Tampering with the text in order to accommodate every fast-talking scientific or theological “authority” that comes along must stop. God must be taken at His word. Everything must be measured by the standard of the plain teaching of the Bible. The god of secular education, which has become the measuring stick and the absolute authority, must be dethroned. The God of heaven must be re-enthroned in one’s life. His ability to communicate His view of reality to humans in simple, straightforward, easy-to-understand language must be taken seriously.

Once the biblical text is compromised, once the obvious meaning of Scripture is whitewashed in order to make its teaching more palatable and in step with secular culture, once Scripture is adjusted to fit human ideas rather than human ideas being adjusted to fit Scripture—the battle has been lost and Satan has won. No one should be surprised if our children have enough sense to see it, and to live accordingly.

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Did God “create” or “make” the world?

A.

Oftentimes, those who advocate the view that the Earth is billions of years old suggest that God initially “created” the Earth (Genesis 1:1) and then later “made” (i.e., re-created) it in six days. As awkward as this sounds to those who take a more straightforward (and accurate) approach to reading Scripture, these old-Earth advocates make a distinction between the Hebrew words bara (to create) and asah (to make or fashion). They claim that bara and asah always must mean two different things in relation to God’s creative acts. Not long ago, I heard a gentleman on the radio teaching that Exodus 20:11 does not mean that God created the Universe and everything in it in six days, but instead means that He “re-created” or “fashioned” the Universe in six days after originally creating it billions of years earlier. This man based his whole argument on the “fact” that “to make” does not mean “to create.”

What is the truth of the matter? After surveying the creation account, one finds that no distinction is made between God’s creating (bara) and His making (asah). These words are used fifteen times in the first two chapters of Genesis in reference to God’s work. Genesis 1:21 states that God “created” (bara) the sea creatures and birds. Then in 1:25 we read where God “made” the animals of the Earth. Are we to believe that God created the birds and fish from nothing and then “refashioned” the land animals from materials he had made billions of years earlier? Preposterous! In Genesis 1:26-27 we read that God made (asah) man in His image. Yet, the very next verse says that He created (bara) him in His image. How can one assert (logically) that in these two verses “make” and “create” refer to completely different creations?

Furthermore, the “explanatory notes” God has given us throughout the Old Testament concerning the events recorded in Genesis 1 reveal that the words “create” (bara) and “make/made” (asah) are used interchangeably in reference to the creation of the Universe and everything in it. When we read Exodus 20:11, Psalm 148:1-5, Nehemiah 9:6, and Genesis 1-2, the only logical conclusion we can draw is that “to create” and “to make” refer to the same event.

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The available evidence reveals several reasons why we can know that the days mentioned in Genesis 1 are the same kind of days we experience in the present age, and were not eons of time. First, whenever the Hebrew word for day (yom) is preceded by a numeral (in non-prophetic passages like Genesis 1), it always carries the meaning of a 24-hour day. The same occurs in the plural (cf. Exodus 20:11 and 31:17).

Second, yom is both used and defined in Genesis 1:5. Whenever the words “evening” or “morning” are used in the Old Testament (in non-prophetic passages) they always refer to regular, 24-hour days. Furthermore, if the “days” of Genesis 1:14, were “eons of time,” then what were the years? And, if a “day” is an “age,” then what is a “night”?

Third, if the “days” of Genesis were not days at all, but long geological periods, then a problem of no little consequence arises in the field of botany. Plants came into existence on the third day (Genesis 1:9-13). If the days of Genesis 1 were long geological ages, and each day had one long period of darkness and one long period of daylight (“evening and morning,” Genesis 1:5), how did plant life survive millions of years (one-half of a “day”) of total darkness? Furthermore, how would the plants that depend on insects for pollination have survived the supposed millions or billions of years between “day” three and “day” five (when insects were created).

Fourth, while Jesus was on the Earth He taught that men and woman had been here from “the beginning of creation” (Mark 10:6; cf. Matthew 19:4). Paul affirmed this same sentiment in Romans 1:20-21, where he stated that man and women have been here “from the beginning of the creation” when they were “perceiving the things that were made.” The Day-Age Theory, on the other hand, places man at the end of billions of years of geologic time. Both cannot be true.

Finally, one must ask, if God wanted us to know that He created the world in six literal days, what words would He have used? Or if a person wanted to explain to someone else that God created all things in a literal six days, what words would he use? The answer?—the exact words used in Genesis 1.

You can trust your Bible when it says, “For in six days [not six billion years—EL] the Lord made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them, and rested the seventh day” (Exodus 20:11).

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