Spirituality
05 Aug 13
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05 Aug 13
Originally posted by RJHindsIs there a Bible verse telling us how old the earth is ?
Age of the earth
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9j_lA9eWlFQ
The Instructor
Where is it ?
This seems not logical because time moves on and on. And the number would have to be updated. So why insist that we know from the bible the age of the earth ?
Maybe you have an approximation by figuring along the lines of genealogies. Don't we see sometimes skipping in bible genealogies ? Can we guarantee that gaps in lists of someone's ancestors in the Bible never occur ?
I don't think you can assure that no skips of people are ever made. The links are according to God's priorities. The Holy Spirit, for example, did skip some people for His own purposes in the geneology of Christ in the book of Matthew. You get a scheme of 14 generations in three periods. But actually David was counted twice and some others were dropped for reasons of God's own desire.
So early genealogies may contain gaps too in which our figuration of years from Adam may be off.
Aside from this you know that some of us see a interval of unspecified time between Genesis 1:1 and 1:2. This would make the overall age of the universe impossible for us to know for sure from the Bible.
What we have in the Bible is this statement -
"By faith we understand that the universe has been framed by the word of God, so that what is seen has not come into being out of things which appear." (Hebrews 11:3)
What I do not see is a passage saying something like this - "By faith we understand that the universe is so many years old."
Are you fighting hard for something that we really are not specifically told in the divine revelation ?
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05 Aug 13
Originally posted by sonshipWHat do you think of this?
Is there a Bible verse telling us how old the earth is ?
Where is it ?
This seems not logical because time moves on and on. And the number would have to be updated. So why insist that we know from the bible the age of the earth ?
Maybe you have an approximation by figuring along the lines of genealogies. Don't we see sometimes skipping in bi ...[text shortened]... or something that we really are not specifically [b]told in the divine revelation ?[/b]
2 Peter 3:8
King James Version (KJV)
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.
Or this:
Psalm 90:4
New International Version
A thousand years in your sight are like a day that has just gone by, or like a watch in the night.
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05 Aug 13
1 edit
Originally posted by JS357Well, before I read many other's opinions on the passage, I understood it to mean that to God a long time to us might be not that long from His perspective.
WHat do you think of this?
2 Peter 3:8
King James Version (KJV)
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.
Or this:
Psalm 90:4
New International Version
A thousand years in your sight are like a day that has just gone by, or like a watch in the night.
In other words, not being mathematically exact, a long period to us, ie. a thousand years, to God seems like one day.
Conversly, (and most people I don't hear mention this) - one day can be like a thousand years. In other words what seems like a very short time to us could be elongated to God's sense to not miss a detail.
A second to God could be given so much divine attention that it seems like a year. In the space of time in which we may think and do something that only takes a minute could be under God's examination like a whole week. He saw all the processes and causes which brought about an action.
That is how I take the passage for the most part. Consider- God has designed the forces that not only take millions of years but also take a trillionth of a second. It is child's play for the Almighty God to know how long a subatomic particle exists that has been spun out from the Hadron Collider. Something lasting only a millionth of a second to humans God knows the workings of as if it took a thousand years.
So I take that passage as essentially saying that to God TIME is not viewed as humans view TIME. He inhabits eternity. He transcends time. A thousand years can be like one day. One day can be like a thousand years.
It may be a thousand years by the time you finish reading this post.
05 Aug 13
Originally posted by sonshipI'd been planning to start a thread about this and how the bible stories relate to the list of pharaohs. For example the Ancient Egyptians had a myth about a famine that lasted 7 years, but it happened in the Old Kingdom and if it has any basis in reality refers to the 4.2 Kyear event.
Is there a Bible verse telling us how old the earth is ?
Where is it ?
This seems not logical because time moves on and on. And the number would have to be updated. So why insist that we know from the bible the age of the earth ?
Maybe you have an approximation by figuring along the lines of genealogies. Don't we see sometimes skipping in bi ...[text shortened]... or something that we really are not specifically [b]told in the divine revelation ?[/b]
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biblical_chronology
There isn't really a gap in Genesis at the start, God creates light, separates it from the dark and calls light day and dark night. The days can't have been 500 million years long as we have circadian rhythms which would be absent had we evolved under those circumstances. There are gaps but if you take a literal reading then you can date most of it fairly precisely. They specify Adam being born on day six, and there is an unbroken line of X lived T years when his son Y was born, X lived a total of U years, Y lived N years etc., all the way from Adam to Issac, after which some ambiguity comes in. There's a lot of uncertainty between Genesis and Exodus, it is really unclear how long they have been in Egypt. The Moses story is specified to be 480 years before the founding of Solomon's temple.
The ages all look like they should be divided by 12 to get sane ages at death (although that has them being fathers too young), and later the Patriarchs get sane ages if they are divided by 4.
From Abraham on it is impossible to work ot which pharaoh a given biblical story refers to, none of them make sense. Most of the action seems to take place towards the end of The Middle Kingdom and during the Second Intermediate Period (at least if we use the dates from the chronology above), when Upper Egypt was ruled from Thebes, and Lower Egypt was ruled from Hyksos - interestingly they worshipped Set, god of foreigners among other things, and forbade worship of other Gods. It is not clear from the bible whether they mean the Hebrews are interacting with the Hyksos kingdom of the north, or the Egyptian Monarchy in the south. Ahmose 1 (mose = moses = born of) finally defeated the Hyksos, and pushed on into Canaan - only here it's not the Israelites taking the promised land but the Egyptians restoring their Suzerainty over it. Nothing that survives from Egyptian history fits well with the bible stories.
Originally posted by sonshipThere is no bible verse that says how old the earth is. However, there have been attempts to calculate based on adding the genealogies given down to Joseph, I believe. Then there is a statement about the children of Israel (Jacob) being slaves in Egypt for 430 years, I believe it is. Then they pick up with the length of the reigns of the Kings of Israel that gets them to times that can be associated with other histories like that of the Babylonians. So there could be some gaps but they are generally considered of minor importance in getting a good approximation of the age of the Earth that is 6,000+ years old instead of billions. Some scholars give a generous amount of time to stretch the age to maybe 10,000 years old. However, that is nowhere near the 4.5 billion years needed by evilutionists.
Is there a Bible verse telling us how old the earth is ?
Where is it ?
This seems not logical because time moves on and on. And the number would have to be updated. So why insist that we know from the bible the age of the earth ?
Maybe you have an approximation by figuring along the lines of genealogies. Don't we see sometimes skipping in bi or something that we really are not specifically [b]told in the divine revelation ?[/b]
There is another video titled "Thousands Not Billions" that covers a report of experiments and investigations of dating rocks that also provides serious challenges to the accuracy of the RadioIsotope dating methods. If you are interested in watching it just go to youtube and type that Title.
If it is true, as the video reports, that the measure of dust found on the moon calculates the moon to about 6,000 years old, then according to the Genesis account the Earth should be about 6,000 years old too.
There are other videoes concerning the Mount Saint Helens volcano eruptions that suggest that larger catastophic events like the worldwide flood could easily account for what we see in the Grand Canyon. There are also videoes on a couple new theories on the light-time travel calculation that also gives thousands of years for the age of the earth when counted by Earth time. It is like a theory of relativity for light-time travel calculations.
The Instructor
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06 Aug 13
2 edits
DeepThought,
There isn't really a gap in Genesis at the start, God creates light, separates it from the dark and calls light day and dark night.
You are of course assuming that God saying "Let there be light" is God CREATING light.
However, what it says is "LET ... there be light". You cannot really insist that nowhere LIGHT did not exist hampered from shining in the universe.
The days can't have been 500 million years long as we have circadian rhythms which would be absent had we evolved under those
The days being 500 millions years long each is not the ONLY alternative to YEC understanding of Genesis.
Seven typical days could be the case. But there could still be the creation "in the beginning" and a seven typical day period at some undefined interval length after "the beginning".
There are gaps but if you take a literal reading then you can date most of it fairly precisely. They specify Adam being born on day six, and there is an unbroken line of X lived T years when his son Y was born, X lived a total of U years, Y lived N years etc.,
An additional factor to consider is that there is, I believe, an unspecified interval of time between the beginning and the dark time in which the seer observed that the earth was waste and void. There is some unelaborated history of the universe in that interval of unspecified time.
Just from reading Genesis we might not notice this. Other portions of the Bible indicate this as a valid understanding of the beginnings of creation.
all the way from Adam to Issac, after which some ambiguity comes in. There's a lot of uncertainty between Genesis and Exodus, it is really unclear how long they have been in Egypt. The Moses story is specified to be 480 years before the founding of Solomon's temple.
I do not say no specific time lengths are provided anywhere in the Old Testament. I say that the time between "in the beginning" and the shinning of light over a wasted and voided earth commencing day # 1 is unspecified.
The pre-history of Satan and the world dominion which was under his authority probably fits into that unspecified interval. But the pieces to this puzzle appear elsewhere in the revelation of the Bible.
The ages all look like they should be divided by 12 to get sane ages at death (although that has them being fathers too young), and later the Patriarchs get sane ages if they are divided by 4.
From Abraham on it is impossible to work ot which pharaoh a given biblical story refers to, none of them make sense. Most of the action seems to take place towards the end of The Middle Kingdom and during the Second Intermediate Period (at least if we use the dates from the chronology above), when Upper Egypt was ruled from Thebes, and Lower Egypt was ruled from Hyksos - interestingly they worshipped Set, god of foreigners among other things, and forbade worship of other Gods. It is not clear from the bible whether they mean the Hebrews are interacting with the Hyksos kingdom of the north, or the Egyptian Monarchy in the south. Ahmose 1 (mose = moses = born of) finally defeated the Hyksos, and pushed on into Canaan - only here it's not the Israelites taking the promised land but the Egyptians restoring their Suzerainty over it. Nothing that survives from Egyptian history fits well with the bible stories.
That is not what I read in the volume (non-religious) on Egyptian history. But the details were dense and I cannot recall without re-study.
It is observed that the Egyptians disdained to record on the tombs of Pharoahs things which were an embarrassment to them. Even military defeats they would spin to appear as military victories. Things which latter became an embarrassment they would eventually scratch off of their walls or alter them to spin more positively.
This I learned from lectures on ancient Egypt which were secular in nature. We should not expect Egypt would record on the royal tombs anything that would diminish their dignity. That may explain why no story of the Exodus of Hebrew slaves would be truthfully told though they did tell us many things.
I will go over your comments a second time latter.
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Originally posted by RJHindsyou do understand that the science in the second video is all wrong dont you? the makers are just praying on peoples ignorance. they state scientists presume that the lead has always been in the rock, which is complete nonsense. if you genuinely had an interest in the truth you would know that by now and not be one of the simpletons that these videos are praying on.
Rock dating methods wrong:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7fgYSXe_7I0
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dAxaxjeyLZQ
The Instructor
oh, id love to see any evidence backing up the first video. do they provide the source of their information? ive googled it and came up with zilch.
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07 Aug 13
Originally posted by RJHindsDo you ever consider the issue from a purely biblical perspective ?
Rock dating methods wrong:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7fgYSXe_7I0
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dAxaxjeyLZQ
The Instructor
Do you think when Adam ate vegetation that the vegetation died in that process ?
If so how does that square with YEC insistence that no death was in the world before the fall of Adam ?
07 Aug 13
Originally posted by sonshipI was assuming a literal interpretation of the first chapter of Genesis - verse 3 is:
DeepThought,
There isn't really a gap in Genesis at the start, God creates light, separates it from the dark and calls light day and dark night.
You are of course assuming that God saying [b]"Let there be light" is God CREATING light.
However, what it says is "LET ... there be light". You cannot really insist that nowh ...[text shortened]... id tell us many things.
I will go over your comments a second time latter.[/b]
And God said, "Let there be light," and there was light.The narrative ends each day with "And there was evening and there was morning - the nth day." I don't think there's any reason to interpret the narrative as indicating anything other than the usual day night cycle. Whether Genesis should be interpreted literally is another thing. Especially since the sun, the moon and the stars aren't created until the fourth day so it's not clear where the light is meant to be coming from.
I was recalling "Inherit the Wind" where the attorney for the guy who was being prosecuted for teaching Darwinism asked how they knew how long the days were since the sun and moon haven't been created yet. The problem with capitulating to the literalness of the story is that a day/night cycle where the days and the nights are long enough to get seven days won't work with evolution.
The Egyptian stuff isn't really connected with your earlier post, I've been doing some reading on the internet. They did record deaths and there isn't a pharaoh at the right time who died just after his oldest son for the Moses story - even if they are do avoid telling the whole story.
With the Hyksos, the Upper Nile rulers destroyed most of their records, so there isn't anything there to mention them. There is a reference to 240,000 "Shepherd Kings" in the now lost Aegyptiaca Manetho, according to "Against Apion" by Josephus (second half of section 14), which Josephus identifies with the fleeing Israelites. This is the text:
And these six were the first rulers among them, who were all along making war with the Egyptians, and were very desirous gradually to destroy them to the very roots. This whole nation was styled Hycsos, that is, Shepherd-kings: for the first syllable Hyc, according to the sacred dialect, denotes a king, as is Sos a shepherd; but this according to the ordinary dialect; and of these is compounded Hycsos: but some say that these people were Arabians." Now in another copy it is said that this word does not denote Kings, but, on the contrary, denotes Captive Shepherds, and this on account of the particle Hyc; for that Hyc, with the aspiration, in the Egyptian tongue again denotes Shepherds, and that expressly also; and this to me seems the more probable opinion, and more agreeable to ancient history. [But Manetho goes on]: "These people, whom we have before named kings, and called shepherds also, and their descendants," as he says, "kept possession of Egypt five hundred and eleven years." After these, he says, "That the kings of Thebais and the other parts of Egypt made an insurrection against the shepherds, and that there a terrible and long war was made between them." He says further, "That under a king, whose name was Alisphragmuthosis, the shepherds were subdued by him, and were indeed driven out of other parts of Egypt, but were shut up in a place that contained ten thousand acres; this place was named Avaris." Manetho says, "That the shepherds built a wall round all this place, which was a large and a strong wall, and this in order to keep all their possessions and their prey within a place of strength, but that Thummosis the son of Alisphragmuthosis made an attempt to take them by force and by siege, with four hundred and eighty thousand men to lie rotund about them, but that, upon his despair of taking the place by that siege, they came to a composition with them, that they should leave Egypt, and go, without any harm to be done to them, whithersoever they would; and that, after this composition was made, they went away with their whole families and effects, not fewer in number than two hundred and forty thousand, and took their journey from Egypt, through the wilderness, for Syria; but that as they were in fear of the Assyrians, who had then the dominion over Asia, they built a city in that country which is now called Judea, and that large enough to contain this great number of men, and called it Jerusalem." Now Manetho, in another book of his, says, "That this nation, thus called Shepherds, were also called Captives, in their sacred books." And this account of his is the truth; for feeding of sheep was the employment of our forefathers in the most ancient ages and as they led such a wandering life in feeding sheep, they were called Shepherds. Nor was it without reason that they were called Captives by the Egyptians, since one of our ancestors, Joseph, told the king of Egypt that he was a captive, and afterward sent for his brethren into Egypt by the king's permission. But as for these matters, I shall make a more exact inquiry about them elsewhere.
Full document here:
http://onlinebooks.library.upenn.edu/webbin/gutbook/lookup?num=2849
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The narrative ends each day with "And there was evening and there was morning - the nth day." I don't think there's any reason to interpret the narrative as indicating anything other than the usual day night cycle. Whether Genesis should be interpreted literally is another thing. Especially since the sun, the moon and the stars aren't created until the fourth day so it's not clear where the light is meant to be coming from.
It has been pointed out to me that what happens on the fourth day are the appointing (not creating) of the light holders. The word is not bara but asah, not created but made. And the entities "made" or possibly "appointed" are the light bearers or light holders. The RcV brings this out in translation -
"And God said, Let there be light-bearers in the expanse of heaven to separate the day from the night, ... (v.14)
And let them be light-bearers in the expanse of heaven to give light on the earth; and it was so. (v.15)
And God made the two great light-bearers, the greater light-bearer to rule the day and the lesser light-bearer to rule the night, and the stars." (vs. 16)
I was recalling "Inherit the Wind" where the attorney for the guy who was being prosecuted for teaching Darwinism asked how they knew how long the days were since the sun and moon haven't been created yet. The problem with capitulating to the literalness of the story is that a day/night cycle where the days and the nights are long enough to get seven days won't work with evolution.
It has been unfortunate that most people refer to the play or the movie Inherit the Wind rather than the actual court proceedings.
In the actual court proceedings, I think, W.J. Bryant does not nearly come out as bad looking as he is made out to be in the movie Inherit the Wind..
In fairness, I think William Jennings Bryant volunteered himself for the task, maybe presumptously. Had I had anything to say about it I would have suggested that the Bible scholar G.H. Pember should have been on the witness stand.
Anyway, I don't think God had in mind an exhaustive explanation of how He created everything. And it could be that the seer or prophet had the vision unfolded to him in seven successive visions which appeared to him as Day 1, Day 2, ....etc. But I do agree that typical days seem to be communicated.
Day Age interpreters do have various arguable reasons for seeing otherwise.
I have pointed out to others this: Exodus says - "For in six days Jehovah made heaven and earth, the sea and all that is in them, and rested on the seventh day ..." (Exodus 20:11)
Strictly speaking, this would STILL be a true statement if prior to these six days in which God MADE the heavens and earth there had been a previous heaven and earth which He had overturned, damaged in divine judgment, overthrew and caused to become waste and void and darkened and under the deep.
Had God judged a previous world and then reformed and recovered it in the time relating to Genesis chapter one, this would still be a true statement -
"For in six days Jehovah made heaven and earth, the sea and all that is in them ..."
And this would not be hard to understand in conjunction with this -
"In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. And [or But] the earth was [or became] waste and emptiness, and darkness was on the surface of the deep."
The Egyptian stuff isn't really connected with your earlier post, I've been doing some reading on the internet. They did record deaths and there isn't a pharaoh at the right time who died just after his oldest son for the Moses story - even if they are do avoid telling the whole story.
Do you think that proves the account to be fictional ?
With the Hyksos, the Upper Nile rulers destroyed most of their records, so there isn't anything there to mention them. There is a reference to 240,000 "Shepherd Kings" in the now lost Aegyptiaca Manetho, according to "Against Apion" by Josephus (second half of section 14), which Josephus identifies with the fleeing Israelites. This is the text:
I have yet to read the pasted text. Thanks for it anyway, as I check it out. I have no comment on it.
