Young earth vs. ancient earth- where do you stand?

[Guest]

I would really prefer actual dialogue to just copy/pasting huge amounts of information that I won't possibly be able to respond to (and have a life at the same time). But thanks for the info.

I definitely appreciate that -- I intend to go back and address your specific bits when I get the time (yes, challenges of life and that), but I do think this bit of info is useful to the discussion rather than simply addressing one-off bits one at a time -- ticking off specific issues isn't always the best approach -- there is a lot of background to these issues, and there really are a few folks who have dedicated a lot of time to addressing them, so I thought sharing some of their analysis and critiques could be of some usefulness to anyone really wanting to know what the other "camp" believes and why.

[Guest]

I take Genesis to refer to the beginning of the time God has given us a written acount of. Not the beginning of the time of the earth. I believe this earth may have gone through many ages prior to man.

Ah yes. The Gap Theory. A gap of millions or billions of years between the first two verses of the Bible. A popular theory among fundamentalists in the early 20th century to try to harmonize Genesis with the evolutionary "science" of the day.

I didn't realize before that the Gap Theory is still believed.

[Guest]

The Gap Theory
I do not know precisely what all the trappings of the Gap Theory are. What I do believe is not the result of what some fundamentalist believers put together to harmonize Genesis with evolutionary science. I don't buy into evolutionary science. I believe the earth has been reconstructed at least once. I did not always believe this. I believed it was all done in seven 24 hr shifts. I put it in a class with some other things I used to believe.
1-That Christmas (or Christ mass) was the actual literal birthday of Y'shua and not some borrowed and refurbished pagan celebration originally designed to placate the pagan "converts"
2-That the Sabbath was Sunday ( and not a thing changed by the monstrous Constantine) mainly because nearly everyone had an interesting although nonscriptural theory how it was changed from what God gave.
3-That God creates people knowing ahead of time which ones will reject Him and knowing He will torment them for eternity. Though He loves everyone.
4-a pretribulational airlift where God comes back not once but twice and takes all the believers up before the bad things happen. This would be comfortable to think but I cannot find adequate footing.
5-The most sobering and eye-opening of all had to do with what happens when you translate a thing from one language to another. Or from one language to another and then another....
and suddenly not everything I had come to believe was so certain. Over the centuries people have had agendas when translating or having things translated and there seem to be questions about that translating even today.

-------I cannot pretend to be certain that the earth is not only six thousand years old. I can only state that it does not necessarily violate scripture or history for me to think it is older. And for me, given what I have read, studied and pondered-it is where I have landed for now.

[Guest]

OK, so to save you all from another copy and paste -- here's a link to Hugh Ross' discussion on Gap Theory.

http://www.reasons.org/resources/fff/20 ... ng_the_gap

[Guest]

I haven't been following this thread but...really liked darin-houston's Dec 05, 2006 11:31 pm post (from Gerald Schroeder). Thanx Darin...I used to live in Pasadena...well, anyway....

Off Topic Edit:

About a month ago I had a serious disagreement with another Christian over "Young Earth V. Old Earth." At the time I simply stated that I'm not a "YEC." I had no idea this would cause any problems. This person became so angry that I was, essentially, disfellowshipped. But through efforts on my part we are now on speaking terms again. However, this issue continues to divide us to the point that it possibly just can't be talked about...I haven't brought it up yet. Should I start a new thread about this? Thanx.
Rick

[Guest]

About a month ago I had a serious disagreement with another Christian over "Young Earth V. Old Earth." At the time I simply stated that I'm not a "YEC." I had no idea this would cause any problems. This person became so angry that I was, essentially, disfellowshipped. But through efforts on my part we are now on speaking terms again. However, this issue continues to divide us to the point that it possibly just can't be talked about...I haven't brought it up yet. Should I start a new thread about this? Thanx.

Personally, I think this kind of thing is silly. Among brothers/sisters, this should not be that big of a deal. In fact, if someone believes Jesus is Lord, and follows Him as such, I can't think of much worth dividing, (or even getting upset), over.

God bless,

[Guest]

amen to that derek! (you dirty young-earther you!)

TK

[Guest]

I haven't been following this thread but...really liked darin-houston's Dec 05, 2006 11:31 pm post (from Gerald Schroeder). Thanx Darin...I used to live in Pasadena...well, anyway....

I liked it too. I have some questions/comments on it though (go figure).

The idea of having to dig deeper is not a rationalization. The Talmud (Chagiga, ch. 2) tells us that from the opening sentence of the Bible, through the beginning of Chapter Two, the entire text is given in parable form, a poem with a text and a subtext.

How is this substantiated from scripture? It certainly isn't like any other biblical poetry. Nor like poetry from the same author, (Ps. 90), which fits right in with other biblical Hebrew poetry.

So when the Sages excluded these six days from the calendar, and said that the entire text is parable, it wasn't because they were trying to apologize away what they'd seen in the local museum. There was no local museum. No one was out there digging up ancient fossils. The fact is that a close reading of the text makes it clear that there's information hidden and folded into layers below the surface.

First, there's the question of the justification for calling it poetry/parable (see above). As to the rest of the statement, I agree fully that there is a deeper meaning in the text than the creation narrative. It is a type of salvation. God saving Israel out of Egypt and bringing them into the promised land is another instance of historical narrative/typology. This is common to the bible. It doesn't have to be either/or.

However, I am not aware that (non-Christian) Jewish people see such typology in the historical narrative portions of the Old Testament, seeing as it's all pointing to Jesus and His church. So it doesn't surprise me that Dr. Schroeder would perceive it as an either/or scenario.

There are early Jewish sources that tell us that the calendar is in two-parts (even predating Leviticus Rabba which goes back almost 1500 years and says it explicitly). In the closing speech that Moses makes to the people, he says if you want to see the fingerprint of G-d in the universe, "consider the days of old, the years of the many generations" (Deut. 32:7) Nachmanides, in the name of Kabbalah, says, "Why does Moses break the calendar into two parts - 'The days of old, and the years of the many generations?' Because, 'Consider the days of old' is the Six Days of Genesis. 'The years of the many generations' is all the time from Adam forward."

How does Nachmanides exegete this information? Where does the bible make such a distinction between the "days of old", and the "years of many generations"?

Would it not be more reasonable to interpret this as parallelism? Just read the context. This is a portion of the "Song of Moses" in Deuteronomy that is written in poetry. Hence the parallelism that is the most common characteristic of biblical poetry. If we interpret this passage like any other passage of Hebrew poetry we will see that the "days of old" and "the years of many generations" are just two ways of saying the same thing, and not at all, some division in time between the creation of the universe and Adam.

Let's jump back to the Six Days of Genesis. First of all, we now know that when the Biblical calendar says 5758 years, we must add to that "plus six days." A few years ago, I acquired a dinosaur fossil that was dated (by two radioactive decay chains) as 150 million years old. (If you visit me in Jerusalem, I'll be happy to show you the dinosaur fossil - the vertebra of a plesiosaurus.) So my 7-year-old daughter says, "Abba! Dinosaurs? How can there be dinosaurs 150 million years ago, when my Bible teacher says the world isn't even 6000 years old?" So I told her to look in Psalms 90:4. There, you'll find something quite amazing. King David says, "1000 years in Your (G-d's) sight are like a day that passes, a watch in the night." Perhaps time is different from the perspective of King David, than it is from the perspective of the Creator. Perhaps time is different.

There it is, the everpresent Psalm 90 quote. Why doesn't anyone ever consider the fact that the same author wrote this that wrote Genesis 1? Why can't they see the distinction between what is written there, and poetry? By the same author no less.

I think I should note, here, regarding the 6000 yr. Figure. I haven’t studied the idea of whether or not there are gaps in the genealogies. There very well may be, (as far as I know) gaps. I am not, as of now, strictly thinking of 6000 yrs. Although, I don’t think it could be terribly longer than that (definitely not 5 billion years worth).

But Nachmanides points out a problem with that. The text says "there was evening and morning Day One... evening and morning a second day... evening and morning a third day." Then on the fourth day, the sun is mentioned. Nachmanides says that any intelligent reader can see an obvious problem. How do we have a concept of evening and morning for the first three days if the sun is only mentioned on Day Four?

There was however "light'. However you want to explain it is fine. Perhaps the glory of the Lord. Exegesis of the text of scripture almost always (and I say "almost" because of a verse or two in exception) shows that “day”, with a number, and the words morning and evening are regular days.

I've gotta say, I realize that this is ancient commentary and all, but this guy Nachmanides' interpretations are rather esoteric. (as were many early extra biblical Christian interpretations by the church fathers-I would reject any unbiblical statements they say as well).

As for the rest of his (Dr. Schroeder's) statements, although they are really interesting, and will require further study for me to really understand, they offer nothing in the way of biblical exegesis.

Many of his points are very interesting and thought provoking, without a doubt. But they really don't prove anything biblically.

I did enjoy reading it though, and look forward to reading the rest of your posts. I am, as of now, convinced of what I think the bible says on this subject, but I don't mean to sound close minded or anything. I guess it's hard to avoid sounding that way when you think you're right!



Thanks and God bless!

[Guest]

TK & Derek,

Apparently you guys know one another well enough to joke around a bit (I sure hope so)....

In one of Steve Gregg's lectures, "Strategies for Unity" I think it was; Steve says something like, "As long as people believe in the 'real' Jesus...we can have other doctrinal differences." That's not an exact quote but the point being: We can -- and do -- have secondary, non-essential, doctrinal differences and are true followers of Jesus, regardless. Yet Steve went on to say that we should dialogue about these differences of opinion or of understanding.

TK, Mort, and myself probably have about the same view on this thread's topic while Derek and Steve (Gregg) seem to share very similar views.

The thing is, we are talking about it! And one theme seems to underscore the views being presented: No one is claiming to know-it-all.

Maybe I need to start a new thread about "Tolerance of Doctrinal Differences" or something along those lines?
gtg for now tho, thanx,
Rick

P.S. And now, back to your regularly scheduled thread....

[Guest]

yeah-- i'm sure derek knows i'm just kidding around.

this topic is very interesting to me, although i am not a super-expert in either view. i have waffled back and forth for years.

for some reason i like topics such as this- probably because of the science aspects.

they just found (or think they found) evidence of liquid water on Mars.

what if they find algae or bacteria as well?

TK