Carnivorous animals before the fall...

[dayage]

Yes, the whole passage.

[Jac3510]

You'd expect them to be in the same (or at least overlapping) strata as their supposed contemporaries, though.

"their" is ambiguous. Could you restate?

In other words you'd expect to find human remains in at least some corresponding strata with those that dinosaurs are found in, wouldn't you? (Pardon the question, but you're "pure" YEC aren't you, not progressive or anything, just a single act of creation?)

As I said, there were a relatively small number of humans living in a small area. I would not expect to find them buried together, especially not over the entire world. Further, humans are a bit smarter than animals, so they could have survived the flood longer, meaning any human remains that would have been fossilized during the flood--and there wouldn't have been many--would have been more likely to be found in higher strata.

And I'm not sure what you mean by "a single act of creation." I think creation took place progressively over six days.

If animals do not sin, then this death cannot effect them (Romans 5:12). This is the only reason the text says it effects all men.

Even Kem Ham in a debate with Hugh Ross and Walt Kaiser, on the John Ankerberg Show, admitted that Romans 5:12 only refers to humans.

In context I see no way to make it refer to animals. The whole text is about our relationship (pre and post salvation) with God. Animals cannot be dragged in.

Lots and lots I can disagree with here. If you want to have a debate on Rom 5:12,then open another thread on it. My argument is that the YEC interpretation is lexically and grammatically VALID. As such, contrary to what both you and Bart have asserted, there ARE verses that singularly teach--or can be construed to teach--no death before the Fall. You are factually wrong in your claim.

AGAIN, the bottom line, then, is not that the Bible does not attribute animal death to Adam's sin. That is either an argument from silence or a case of circular reasoning, take your pick. The bottom line is how verses such as Gen 1:30 and Rom 5:12, along with others, are to be interpreted.

[touchingcloth]

As I said, there were a relatively small number of humans living in a small area. I would not expect to find them buried together, especially not over the entire world. Further, humans are a bit smarter than animals, so they could have survived the flood longer, meaning any human remains that would have been fossilized during the flood--and there wouldn't have been many--would have been more likely to be found in higher strata.

But it is plausible that there will be some human remains in strata in the middle east that are deeper than corresponding strata in, say, Australia that contain dinosaur remains, right? Or in other words, finding human remains below the Kt boundary is entirely plausible?

[Jac3510]

But it is plausible that there will be some human remains in strata in the middle east that are deeper than corresponding strata in, say, Australia that contain dinosaur remains, right? Or in other words, finding human remains below the Kt boundary is entirely plausible?

To directly answer your question: possible? Yes. Plausible? That may be a stretch. Bear in mind that the YEC view has the flood happening very early in human history--maybe only a couple thousand years.

More generally, the KT boundary is problematic enough in itself for a lot of reasons I won't go into here. Further, you are still assuming uniformitarian geology. Who says that much of the pre-flood strata were not rearranged by the Flood?

Put the question this way: suppose there was a global flood during the very early portion of human history. What would you expect to find in the rock strata and fossil layers? You would expect a fossil record composed primary of marine and plant life, and then to a much lesser extent of animal life, and to a far, far lesser extent some human life. That human life would not be uniformly distributed throughout the strata but would be concentrated in the upper. You would also expect evidence of very quickly formed rock layers, of marine animals at the tops of mountains, of trees and even animal fossils protruding through various strata, and evidence of animals dying and being fossilized in an instant, and this, all over the globe, etc.

Guess what? We find exactly all these things. Now, at this point, we are turning the conversation more in the direction of a discussion about the Flood, which is not what this thread is about, so if you want to continue this line, I'd suggest opening a thread on it. My only point, though, in bringing this to your attention is that the fossil record is perfectly consistent with what we would expect in a YEC model, which, I believe, was the essence of your question.

Now, I'm not a geologist, and I don't spend a ton of time focusing on the geological defenses of YEC. Most of what I know are things I've picked up from here or there. My primary area of study is in biblical studies, philosophy, and Hebrew. I may have to do some digging to get the answers to some of your questions. But I think the general framework I've provided is sufficient to provide at least a broadly conceptual answer.

[zoegirl]

I would only quibble about the point about animals being dumber than humans with regard to the flood.

Do you really think that animals wil just sit there are drown? Animals don't need high-level intellect to know it's time to escape and move. animals flee from fire, floods as much as they can. We would certainly see some evidence of humans and dinosaurs together in the fossil record in some respect.

[touchingcloth]

Put the question this way: suppose there was a global flood during the very early portion of human history. What would you expect to find in the rock strata and fossil layers? You would expect a fossil record composed primary of marine and plant life, and then to a much lesser extent of animal life, and to a far, far lesser extent some human life. That human life would not be uniformly distributed throughout the strata but would be concentrated in the upper. You would also expect evidence of very quickly formed rock layers, of marine animals at the tops of mountains, of trees and even animal fossils protruding through various strata, and evidence of animals dying and being fossilized in an instant, and this, all over the globe, etc.

I'll put aside the various problems I have with this, and agree with you that given certain conditions a global flood could result in animals being fossilized in that order.

However, that doesn't account for older rocks being found in deeper strata; a 2 week old igneous rock is much the same as a thousand year old one, or a million year old one. As I've agreed that there are elements of plausibility to your flood hypothesis as an interpretation of the evidence, I'd hope you would agree that gauging the age of when a strata was laid down by the age of the rocks it contains is also a reasonable use of the evidence?

[dayage]

Jac3510,

My argument is that the YEC interpretation is lexically and grammatically VALID.

Lexically- based on the definitions of the words, OK.

Grammatically

- Do you mean the way the words are arranged in a sentence? If this is your meaning then, NO. Context- within the given context, which I have already shown, No Way.

Show me in context how to find animals. Context determines the lexical meaning that is correct.

[dayage]

I was speaking of Romans 5:12.

[Jac3510]

TC - open a thread on the flood. We'll continue our discussion there.

DA

You have confused grammar with syntax. Try again. Grammatically, yes. You can argue syntactically, no. But grammatically, yes. I've already told you, if you want to have a discussion on the exegesis of Rom 5:12, then open a thread on it. My point, which you are not answering, is that Both Rom 5:12 and Gen 1:30 directly and independently teach no death before the fall in a YEC worldview. Thus, your "bottom line" is only a bottom line if OEC is assumed, which makes it circular. The point of debate, then, is on the interpretation of those verses--which is what I have been saying this entire thread.

[DannyM]

My point, which you are not answering, is that Both Rom 5:12 and Gen 1:30 directly and independently teach no death before the fall in a YEC worldview.

Jac, this is only according to your own interpretation of these passages. Could you show me how Romans 5:12 independently teaches no death before the fall?

[Canuckster1127]

My point, which you are not answering, is that Both Rom 5:12 and Gen 1:30 directly and independently teach no death before the fall in a YEC worldview.

Jac, this is only according to your own interpretation of these passages. Could you show me how Romans 5:12 independently teaches no death before the fall?

I've still never heard to my satisfaction an explanation either as to why Romans 5:12 is usually invoked in combination with passages from Genesis to form a type of syllogism in which each premise comes independently from each passage to form a conclusion and further why the majority of YEC references to this doctrine that I've seen tie these two passages together, if the same conclusion could be reached independently from either one. If it's so strong based on independent passages, it begs the question as to why this syllogistic contrivance is utilized as the

I echo your question especially with regard to Romans 5:12. The context of the passage has no reference to physical life. It's clearly referring to spiritual quickening and further it is speaking of a human spiritual condition and not in the context of animal life outside that.

It appears to me to be a YEC hermeneutic elevated to the equivilence of scripture itself that circles back upon itself every bit as much as what Jac has claimed above is the case of OEC. OEC however isn't making a claim from this passage with regard to the fall and physical death except to counter the faulty, in my opinion, exegesis of this passage.

When I was being trained in a YEC position in Christian Schools, these passages were repeated and combined in this manner very regularly, often to the point where the concept that was drawn from this combinative form of exegesis was simply given as a given and reinforced in this manner.

I agree that it is possible for OEC to do things in this manner as well. My, probably biased, view is that YEC tends to do this more because they are proactively making the case for the texts applying in a more literal or specific manner. OEC often is taking the position, such as in this case in Romans 5:12 that the passages are not addressing the age of the earth and therefore what is not addressed within Scripture is not in conflict with scripture.

There's no passage or passages in YEC for example that by themselves establish an age for the earth. Usually it's an inference based upon calculations made from genealogies (eg Bishop Usher's) or it's a general assessment based upon on overall view of the passages. Usually YEC varies from about 6,000 to as much as 100,000 years depending upon the source.

OEC in a strict sense doesn't propose an exact or even an approximate age from the earth. Most OECers I think are generally in agreement with the science derived proposition that the earth is about 4.6 billion years old. That's independent of anything textually derived however. If science were (as it has in the past) to change that number it wouldn't cause a problem for most OECers as all we're stating is pretty much that the days in Genesis are not literal 24 hour days and can be seen as periods of time representative of the progressive work of creation done by God. Many progressive OEC creationists in fact, agree that man was created about 10,000 years ago and in that regard wouldn't necessarily be far off the conclusion that YEC proponents make in the context of mankinds presence.

All this to say, again in my opinion, while it's true that an OEC hermeneutic or viewpoint may be imposed back onto a text, I think it's fair to say that the onus is more upon the YEC position that seeks to come to the conclusions they do from a text to demonstrate it, where they are proactively arguing that the age of the earth must be seen in the context of that scripture, because in many (not all) cases the OEC position is that the application or the context falls outside of that claim and simply isn't there. The onus in such cases is upon those making the more specific claim to demonstrate it first textually and then also to a lesser degree, in my opinion, from creation itself to show the consistency between the two.

[Jac3510]

Jac, this is only according to your own interpretation of these passages. Could you show me how Romans 5:12 independently teaches no death before the fall?

Yes, it is only according to my interpretation of the passage, which I myself said. Note:

"My point, which you are not answering, is that Both Rom 5:12 and Gen 1:30 directly and independently teach no death before the fall in a YEC worldview. "

Now, I could be a bit more technical and point out that, more precisely, it isn't the YEC view that reads the passage this way; it is reading the passage this way that results in the YEC view.

As far as the actual verse goes, I'll provide my own exegesis of it later. I had asked to open another thread for that, but I realize that such a discussion is perfectly appropriate for the existing thread topic.

-------------------------------

Canuckster,

I'd be very interesting in seeing this syllogism you are referring to. I don't think it exists, much less that it exists in some widely referred to form.

As far as why Gen 1:30 and Rom 5:12 are often found together, it is because they both teach the same truth independantly of one another. For example, when you argue that salvation is by faith and not works, you may well cite John 3:16 and Gen 15:6 together. Does that mean the two have to be linked to establish the doctrine? No. It just means that both verses provide the same truth. The reason we provide TWO verses is to avoid the silly charge of building a theology on only one verse.

For my own part, Rom 5:12 was never what kept me from fully embracing OEC, nor what maintained by leaning toward the no-death-before-the-fall view. Gen 1:30 has always been my basis for that. Rom 5:12 was always secondary support, though I have always seen it as independent. As Danny said, it is certainly the weaker of the two verses in terms of evidence. I've given my defense of Gen 1:30 on these boards before. As I said to Danny, I'll provide a discussion on Rom 5:12 later.

Second, you said:

There's no passage or passages in YEC for example that by themselves establish an age for the earth. Usually it's an inference based upon calculations made from genealogies (eg Bishop Usher's) or it's a general assessment based upon on overall view of the passages. Usually YEC varies from about 6,000 to as much as 100,000 years depending upon the source

1. I don't hold to a 6000 year old earth. I don't make any claims about how old the earth is because the Bible doesn't say. I will say I don't expect it to be older than 100,000 years. Usher assumed there were no gaps in the geneologies, which I think is completely wrong.

2. I don't see how the universe could be older than 100,000 years due to the fact that I think the Bible teaches that there was no death before the Fall. So unless I can somehow make a case for millions of years of no animal death, I have to conclude the earth was created relatively recently.

I also think the word yom in Gen 1 refers to a literal 24 hour day. I am in the middle of a sematic analysis of the word, which should be completed later next month. I'll provide the results of my research then and you can decide for yourself what you think of it. Suffice it to say, for now, that in analyzing the syntactical flags related to its sematic range, I see absolutely no way in which yom can refer to an unspecified period of time in Gen 1.

Anyway, I don't want to get off-topic too far. Just addressing this point about the Bible not telling us how old the earth is . . .

[DannyM]

Jac, this is only according to your own interpretation of these passages. Could you show me how Romans 5:12 independently teaches no death before the fall?

Yes, it is only according to my interpretation of the passage, which I myself said. Note:

"My point, which you are not answering, is that Both Rom 5:12 and Gen 1:30 directly and independently teach no death before the fall in a YEC worldview. "

Now, I could be a bit more technical and point out that, more precisely, it isn't the YEC view that reads the passage this way; it is reading the passage this way that results in the YEC view.

As far as the actual verse goes, I'll provide my own exegesis of it later. I had asked to open another thread for that, but I realize that such a discussion is perfectly appropriate for the existing thread topic.

Sure Jac and I respect that deeply. I was referring to your own exegesis and I see that is coming so look forward to it brother.

[DannyM]

My point, which you are not answering, is that Both Rom 5:12 and Gen 1:30 directly and independently teach no death before the fall in a YEC worldview.

Jac, this is only according to your own interpretation of these passages. Could you show me how Romans 5:12 independently teaches no death before the fall?

I've still never heard to my satisfaction an explanation either as to why Romans 5:12 is usually invoked in combination with passages from Genesis to form a type of syllogism in which each premise comes independently from each passage to form a conclusion and further why the majority of YEC references to this doctrine that I've seen tie these two passages together, if the same conclusion could be reached independently from either one. If it's so strong based on independent passages, it begs the question as to why this syllogistic contrivance is utilized as the

I echo your question especially with regard to Romans 5:12. The context of the passage has no reference to physical life. It's clearly referring to spiritual quickening and further it is speaking of a human spiritual condition and not in the context of animal life outside that.

Whether the passage is referring to the spiritual death or physical death of human beings it IS clearly dealing with human beings and their justification through Christ. The text is very clear.

[dayage]

I did not confuse grammar and syntax. Syntax is one of about four parts of grammar. I wanted to know which aspect you were refering to.

My point, which you are not answering, is that Both Rom 5:12 and Gen 1:30 directly and independently teach no death before the fall in a YEC worldview.

The worldview is not what is important if the context does not allow an interpretation. Besides, I showed above it deals with spiritual death so cannot apply to animals.

I left our discussion about Genesis 1:30 because it grew too long and encompassed too many topics. Keep checking back, because I started a response way back then and I just need to get around to finishing it.