Creation and Controversy

Creation and Controversy

Today with the advances made by modern science, early earth creationists are challenged by many, as to the validity of a six literal 24 hour day creation.

This sparks controversy amongst unbelievers and believers.

 I believe that we need to keep an open mind about this subject. Because if we don’t we may be ridiculed like those who at one time believed in a flat earth. The pictures we get today from satellites in orbit around the planet absolutely proves that the earth is not flat.

 So then when discussing the creation account, we must avoid the pitfalls of some of our predecessor’s obstinacy to accept a different view. Yet we must hold to the absolute fact that God created everything we see in the universe. Truth is relative to our understanding of it, so what seems true to one may be fiction to another.

 As the scripture as I understand it is figuratively much like a jigsaw puzzle, in that a composite picture emerges as our knowledge of it grows. Some things are hidden others emerge over time.

 Genesis 1: 14/19 ¶  And God said, Let there be lights in the firmament of the heaven to divide the day from the night; and let them be for signs, and for seasons, and for days, and years: {the day…: Heb. between the day and between the night}   And let them be for lights in the firmament of the heaven to give light upon the earth: and it was so.   And 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. {to rule the day…: Heb. for the rule of the day, etc.}   And God set them in the firmament of the heaven to give light upon 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.   And the evening and the morning were the fourth day

 The measurement of time frames is contained in the verse above. When we read this verse in account of the creation, we discover that the universe itself is the key that will help us understand the timeframes of the creation account. It is notable that this only occurs on the fourth day, which means that before this there was no visible measurement of day and night. Which are stated as the evening and the morning that delineated the days in the previous verses? The use of the words evening and morning denote periods of invisibility and visibility to us who use our human senses when seeing things. The day here comprises of these two components of invisibility and visibility.  Without the Sun and the moon to give light in the previous verses, we cannot measure them according to the periods of sun setting and sunrise

 Of course these are determined by who is observing the events; it is certainly not humanity for it is the trinity in action.  So we have to place ourselves in the throne room and see these things through the eyes of the creator, who has neither beginning of days nor end of days.

 The other factor is where one would place the throne room; it could be placed outside creation beyond the boundaries of the visible creation, the universe and every thing within it or at the invisible, the very center of the creation.

 The scripture supports the latter in many instances. Salvation itself is an inward change, in that it does not change our outward appearance, it changes the very heart of the man. The Earthly Jerusalem was in the center of Israel, and also in the heart of the tabernacle God dwelt, while the Israelites were arranged in their tribal divisions around the the tabernacle with the three divisions of Levites in the center. Metaphorically they were as the stars of heaven around the throne of the Lord of Hosts.

 Even our modern understanding of nuclear weapons reveals that the greatest natural power lies within the microcosm of an atom.

 Eze 1:4/5 ¶  And I looked, and, behold, a whirlwind came out of the north, a great cloud, and a fire infolding itself, and a brightness was about it, and out of the midst thereof as the colour of amber, out of the midst of the fire.  Also out of the midst thereof came the likeness of four living creatures. And this was their appearance; they had the likeness of a man.

 Ezekiel’s vision of the throne reveals wheels within wheels in motion at the center of a whirlwind.

Gen 1:9/13 ¶  And God said, Let the waters under the heaven be gathered together unto one place, and let the dry land appear: and it was so.  And God called the dry land Earth; and the gathering together of the waters called he Seas: and God saw that it was good.  And God said, Let the earth bring forth grass, the herb yielding seed, and the fruit tree yielding fruit after his kind, whose seed is in itself, upon the earth: and it was so. {grass: Heb. tender grass}   And the earth brought forth grass, and herb yielding seed after his kind, and the tree yielding fruit, whose seed was in itself, after his kind: and God saw that it was good.  And the evening and the morning were the third day.

It should be noted that a divine command is given by this petition of the Son to the Father.

John 1:1/5 ¶  In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.   The same was in the beginning with God.  All things were made by him; and without him was not any thing made that was made.  In him was life; and the life was the light of men.¶  And the light shineth in darkness; and the darkness comprehended it not.

 2Pe 3: 5/7  For this they willingly are ignorant of, that by the word of God the heavens were of old, and the earth standing out of the water and in the water:   Whereby the world that then was, being overflowed with water, perished:  But the heavens and the earth, which are now, by the same word are kept in store, reserved unto fire against the day of judgment and perdition of ungodly men.8  But, beloved, be not ignorant of this one thing, that one day is with the Lord as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day.

 The link between the Apostles comment appears to relate to when God separated the dry land from the Sea.  It also points to the time frames leading up to the deluge in Noah’s lifespan. The thousand years are gleaned from the lifespan of  the  patriarchs who all died just short of a thousand years. 

Gen 3:16/17  ¶  And the LORD God commanded the man, saying, Of every tree of the garden thou mayest freely eat: {thou…: Heb. eating thou shalt eat} But of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it: for in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die. {thou shalt surely…: Heb. dying thou shalt die}

 Gen 5:5  And all the days that Adam lived were nine hundred and thirty years: and he died.

 This gives a yard stick to measure the timeframes of the creation account of the periods comprising of   invisibility and visibility, The Evenings and the Mornings of the events preceding the fourth day.  When we understand that God intervenes within human time spans on this planet whose day length differs from other planets due to there rotation periods , we begin to grasp the fact that God lives in the eternal present, and he is not limited to the constraints of time  that  we measure our lives by. 

One day is with the Lord as a thousand years  That is: All time is as nothing before him, because in the presence as in the nature of God all is eternity; therefore nothing is long, nothing short, before him; no lapse of ages impairs his purposes, nor need he wait to find convenience to execute those purposes.  And when the longest period of time has passed by, it is but as a moment or indivisible point in comparison of eternity.  This thought is well expressed by PLUTARCH, Consol. ad Apoll.:

“If we compare the time of life with eternity, we shall find no difference between long and short.  (ta gar cilia, kai ta muria eth, stigmh tiv estin aoristov, mallon de morion ti bracutaton stigmhv) for a thousand or ten thousand years are but a certain indefinite point, or rather the smallest part of a point.”  The words of the apostle seem to be a quotation from #Ps 90:4. (Adam Clarkes Commentary)

 Ps 90:4  For a thousand years in thy sight are but as yesterday when it is past, and as a watch in the night.

 Of course we could in spite of this declare that all are 24 hour periods. Alternatively we could use the gap theory between the first verse and the second verse of the account as very long period of time.

Genesis 1:1/2 ¶  In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth.   And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters.

 So these are things we should ponder over and discuss without resorting to incrimination of one another.

 Moses dictated this account to his scribes the Levites during their time in wilderness after the Exodus from Egypt. Recently we have discovered that the pyramids themselves were aligned by the Pharaohs’ to what they saw in the heavens.  The classic one is Orion which the three pyramids on the Giza plateau are aligned too. We know today that the Egyptians had great knowledge of the stars and there movements, as what they saw in heavens they emulated on the ground. In the Genesis account we discover that the patriarchs spent time in Egypt during the famines. 

Ge 12:10 And there was a famine in the land: and Abram went down into Egypt to sojourn there; for the famine was grievous in the land.

Ac 7:22  And Moses was learned in all the wisdom of the Egyptians, and was mighty in words and in deeds.

 There is a time marker to the Egyptian beginning of time on the Giza plateau, it is the sphinx and recently we discovered that it looked at itself approximately 12500 years ago. This was calculated by using the precession of the stars.  When the sphinx looked at the constellation of Leo (the image it represents) in 10500 BC.( Source  Keeper of Genesis by  Robert Bauval  and Graham Hancock). 

 This has bothered me for a long time now because of  this time marker and my attempts to construct a chronology of the scriptures , I have discovered that the Masoretic text (Hebrew) used in our KJV bibles for the new testament differs from the Septuagint  (the Greek  translation) which  has a longer period between  Adam and the flood. (See post on Hales Chronology)

 Recently I looked at Orion in the evening sky and noticed that it resembles the Throne Room in the book of Revelation. The Four Beasts and the Father Son and Holy Ghost, the seven major points in the constellation of Orion. Here in the Sothern Hemisphere you can see Exodus through to Calvary (the Southern Cross) written in the night sky. 

Where is this leading you may be asking? 

2Pe 3: 5/7  For this they willingly are ignorant of, that by the word of God the heavens were of old, and the earth standing out of the water and in the water:   Whereby the world that then was, being overflowed with water, perished:  But the heavens and the earth, which are now, by the same word are kept in store, reserved unto fire against the day of judgment and perdition of ungodly men.8  But, beloved, be not ignorant of this one thing, that one day is with the Lord as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day.

 A long Chronology of approx 6000bc plus the six days of creation according to Peter’s definition gives us approx 12000 odd years. A lot longer than the early earth creationists propose. 

Giving us time for the vegetation and the marine and the animal and the insect kingdoms to fill the earth, this appears very improbable in three limited 24 hour periods.   Seasonality affects the reproduction of these which is needed for the producing of seeds and fruit, which use insects and animals and the wind to disperse the fruit and seeds.  The Planet itself has many symbiotic relationships where the various forms of life interact with one another. Like the old saying “No man is an Island”. Moses would have been aware of these relationships in nature, which can be seen in the life of bees that produce honey and wax from plants and in turn pollinate plants and trees. 

I have found flaws in Ushers Chronology as even some may find in mine. 

Then we also do not know how long Adam was in the Garden of Eden before his expulsion, so dating the creation event as occurring in 4004 BC becomes very shortsighted to me. 

So let us debate this point and perhaps we may come to some kind of agreement.

Tags: Chronology, Creation