Evidence for God from Science

RickD wrote:

Starhunter wrote:

RickD wrote:It's a template for 6 work periods followed by 1 rest period. It's not a literal 168 hour week. If it was meant to be specifically and only seven 24 hour days, there wouldn't have been Sabbath years.

...field.[/i]

Sabbath in most instances simply means rest, as you know, six years of working the land, the 7th for fallowing. This does not do away with the weekly cycle, just as a day does not do away with hours.

Are you saying that there is no such thing as the 7th day Sabbath, because there are yearly Sabbaths?
Any Bible student knows that there are many activities in the Jewish calendar all tied in.

Anyway, back to the thread.

Starhunter,

I'm simply saying that your argument doesn't hold water. You claimed the creation week must've been a literal 168 hour week because the Jewish week consisted of six days of work, followed by one day of rest. I'm simply saying that the creation "week" was a template of six work periods followed by one rest period. Just like sabbath years.

I have not found such a template in the Bible, so I accept your view, until I find out. Thanks.

Mazzy wrote:

Starhunter wrote:Matthew 9: 1-7.
Jesus asked the local churchmen, ... gradual acceptance with God.

The paralytic represents the helpless condition of the sinner, like the void before creation. At the instant that the believer, accepts the word of salvation, they are given the power to walk in newness of life.

The age of the earth is fairly easily worked out by genealogies to be around 6000 years old.

Is it necessary to believe in a YEC to be saved? How could you properly appreciate what salvation is if you are relying on the opinions of unbelievers, and not the word of God?

Starhunter said "Re to saying ... can't be saved unless a YEC. I never said that, it has been conveniently pinned on me. I said, the power of creation is the same in salvation, and if God is somehow indebted to pre-existing righteousness or material, you better have something to offer God otherwise you will perish. And they say that I'm legalistic!"

From the above post...

"The age of the earth is fairly easily worked out by genealogies to be around 6000 years old.

Is it necessary to believe in a YEC to be saved? How could you properly appreciate what salvation is if you are relying on the opinions of unbelievers, and not the word of God?"

Note it is a question, open to your interpretation or thought. A question is not the same as a statement. But admittedly this question in the light of other things mentioned, does lean in favor of YEC. Question is, which model best fits the spiritual truth of salvation?

Spiritual truth unlocks natural mysteries, like the creation of earth. And it works the other way round too. Use both.

In regards to God having no voice, can you prove from scripture that He does not use it to create, and direct all His will in the universe? Like the calming of storm on the lake?

Jac3510 wrote:

neo-x wrote:A good point to note is that st. Augustine didn't think of Genesis being 6 day creation. He thought creation had been instant.

He also thought that allegorical interpretation was permissible. On that view, it doesn't matter what Scripture says. The only reason I give ANY credence to OEC is because it claims to be a literal interpretation of Genesis 1. It's a waste of time, then, to appeal to Augustine's (or any other allegorists) opinion in trying to establish a precedent for a non-24 hour literalist view. And if you don't care about having a literalist interpretation, then you don't need Augustine. You don't need ANY precedent, for that matter. If the text can be allegorized or taken as a myth, then it doesn't matter what it says at all. *shrug*

I know and agree. I only mentioned it to show that the debate is quite old. Because I also reject what augustine believed. You are familiar with my position on this, I agree creation day account can't be taken as allegory. It must be literal.

Starhunter wrote:

Danieltwotwenty wrote:

Stu wrote:

Starhunter wrote:No need to, it is easy to scroll back, I like your point about shrinking, and have an answer found in the ten commandments, re the fourth on the seventh day, this implies that the weekly cycle of literal days is a memorial of creation.

This is a good point.

No it's not, it could just be a representation of the 6 ages, Starhunter even admitted that.

What I said is not an admission. I said that to show where people go off in their reasoning without reading the context, and I followed it with a question for thought. I don't like what you have done, it is a sign of weakness.

While Genesis is read best in the yec model, it is precisely for that matter i also reject it. Evidence is to the contrary, i think truth is more important than written words, and I don't think God gives a damn about the whole thing. Yec, oec, te, pc, flat earthers, even conspiracy theorists, are all saved. Thank heavens.

Starhunter wrote:Daniel,
The power of God is through His word which is instant, whatever it states it accomplishes.
If it states for stars to exist in an instant it does, if it states to create the Sun, moon, planets, and all of our creation in six days then that is what it will do, in exactly that time span.
If the word declares the remission of sins in an instant, it is instant. If a person continues to trust in this instant help in God they will be saved.

Either you have an implicit trust in the Bible or not. Of course its not fashionable, and if you are reading a quack version, of course you'll be battling with contrary theories.

I have implicit trust in my reason as well. Its sad that I find the creation account to be wrong in the Bible. But it is what it is. I can do nothing about it. I believe god knows best. I am fine if God created everything in 6 seconds. I have evidence that it didn't happen that way.

So I chose not to believe the creation story. You can believe it and we'll still meet in heaven.

neo-x wrote:

Jac3510 wrote:

neo-x wrote:A good point to note is that st. Augustine didn't think of Genesis being 6 day creation. He thought creation had been instant.

He also thought that allegorical interpretation was permissible. On that view, it doesn't matter what Scripture says. The only reason I give ANY credence to OEC is because it claims to be a literal interpretation of Genesis 1. It's a waste of time, then, to appeal to Augustine's (or any other allegorists) opinion in trying to establish a precedent for a non-24 hour literalist view. And if you don't care about having a literalist interpretation, then you don't need Augustine. You don't need ANY precedent, for that matter. If the text can be allegorized or taken as a myth, then it doesn't matter what it says at all. *shrug*

I know and agree. I only mentioned it to show that the debate is quite old. Because I also reject what augustine believed. You are familiar with my position on this, I agree creation day account can't be taken as allegory. It must be literal.

I know you know.

I was just raising the point because it is so often improperly applied. The debate is old, but it has nothing to do with how old the earth is. It has everything to do with how Scripture out to be read. Those who have thought that it ought to be taken literally have always taken the view that the earth was created in six twenty four hour days. Those who denied that it must be taken literally have held a range of other opinions. What we cannot say is that Augustine provides a precedent for OEC. No matter how much Ross and others say that, it just is not true. The FACT is that there is absolutely NO version of OEC prior to the findings of modern science. NONE. OEC is just eisogesis. Yom cannot and does not mean "long undefined period of time." OEC's are on the right track in claiming that they are taking a literal view of Scripture. But the fact is that their view falls apart because a literal reading can't justify their claims. It's all just standard eisogesis.

The fact is incredibly simple: if the eath is billions of years old, then Genesis 1-11 is literally wrong. We would then have to sit back and work out the hermeneutical and theological implications. What we don't get to do is pretend like there have been literalists before the 19th century who held that the eart was older than a few thousand years (Augustine included). They just don't exist.

No one ever really put a time frame on the creation of the Earth, much less the universe, until AFTER the death of Christ.

It was Jose Ben Halafta that started it in the late 2nd century (IIRC).

WHY? I have no idea to be honest and since most of that dating ASSUMED that the creation of the world was based on the chronologies that are, well, debatable at best.

Here I found this:
Jewish and Christian dates for creation[edit]
Biblical scholars today report evidence that the first major comprehensive draft of Genesis was composed by the Yahwist in the late 7th or the 6th century BC, during the Babylonian captivity, or at the court of Solomon, c. 950 BC, with later additions made by the priestly source.[14]

The earliest post-exilic Jewish chronicle preserved in the Hebrew language, the Seder Olam Rabbah compiled by Jose ben Halafta in 160 AD, dates the creation of the world to 3751 BC, while the later Seder Olam Zutta (804 AD) dates it to 4339 BC.[15] The Hebrew Calendar ascribed to Hillel II has traditionally since the 4th century AD dated creation to 3761 BC.[16][17][18][19][20]

Young Earth Creationists have claimed that their view has its earliest roots in ancient Judaism, citing, for example, the commentary on Genesis by Ibn Ezra (c. 1089–1164).[4] Shai Cherry of Vanderbilt University notes that modern Jewish theologians have generally rejected such literal interpretations of the written text, and that even Jewish commentators who oppose some aspects of Darwinian thought generally accept scientific evidence that the Earth is much older.[21]

Calculations based on the Septuagint have traditionally dated creation to around 5500 BC, while the Samaritan Torah produces a date around 4300 BC, and the Masoretic a date around 4000 BC.[22] Many of the earliest Christians who followed the Septuagint calculated creation around 5500 BC, and Christians up to the Middle Ages continued to use this rough estimate: Clement of Alexandria (5592 BC), Julius Africanus (5501 BC), Eusebius (5228 BC), Jerome (5199 BC) Hippolytus of Rome (5500 BC), Theophilus of Antioch (5529 BC), Sulpicius Severus (5469 BC), Isidore of Seville (5336 BC), Panodorus of Alexandria (5493 BC), Maximus the Confessor (5493 BC), George Syncellus (5492 BC) and Gregory of Tours (5500 BC).[23][24][25] The Byzantine calendar has traditionally dated the creation of the world to 1 September, 5509 BC, María de Ágreda and her followers to 5199 BC, while the early Ethiopian Church (as revealed in the Book of Aksum) to 5493 BC.[26][27] Bede was one of the first to break away from the standard Septuagint date for the creation and in his work De Temporibus ("On Time") (completed in 703 AD) dated the creation to 18 March 3952 BC but was accused of heresy at the table of Bishop Wilfrid, because his chronology was contrary to accepted calculations of around 5500 BC.[28]

After the Masoretic text was published, dating creation around 4000 BC became common, and was received with wide support.[29] Proposed calculations of the date of creation, using the Masoretic from the 10th century – 18th century include: Marianus Scotus (4192 BC), Maimonides (4058 BC), Henri Spondanus (4051 BC), Benedict Pereira (4021 BC), Louis Cappel (4005 BC), James Ussher (4004 BC), Augustin Calmet (4002 BC), Isaac Newton (4000 BC), Johannes Kepler (27 April, 3977 BC) [based on his book Mysterium], Petavius (3984 BC), Theodore Bibliander (3980 BC), Christen Sørensen Longomontanus (3966 BC), Melanchthon (3964 BC), Martin Luther (3961 BC), John Lightfoot (3960 BC), Cornelius Cornelii a Lapide (3951 BC) Joseph Justus Scaliger (3949 BC), Christoph Helvig (3947 BC), Gerardus Mercator (3928 BC), Matthieu Brouard (3927 BC), Benito Arias Montano (3849 BC), Andreas Helwig (3836 BC), David Gans (3761 BC) and Gershom ben Judah (3754 BC).[22][25][30][31][31][32]

Among the Masoretic creation estimates or calculations for the date of creation Ussher's specific chronology dating the creation to 4004 BC became the most accepted and popular, mainly because this specific date was attached to the King James Bible.[33] The youngest ever recorded date of creation within the historic Jewish or Christian traditions is 3616 BC, by Yom-Tov Lipmann Heller in the 17th century[34] while the oldest proposed date was 6984 BC by Alfonso X of Castile.[15] However some contemporary or more recent proponents of Young Earth Creationism have taken this figure back further by several thousands of years by proposing significant gaps in the genealogies in chapters 5 and 11 of the Book of Genesis. Harold Camping for example dated the creation to 11,013 BC, while Christian Charles Josias Bunsen in the 19th century dated the creation to 20,000 BC.[35]

Despite a long history of Christianity and Judaism, a number of prominent early Church Fathers and Christian writers, including Origen and Augustine, did not believe that the creation myth in Genesis depicted ordinary solar days and read creation history as an allegory as well as being theologically true.[24] Several early Jews also followed an allegorical interpretation of Genesis, including most notably Philo (On the Creation, III.13).[36]

The Protestant reformation hermeneutic inclined some of the Reformers, including John Calvin[37][38] and Martin Luther,[39] and later Protestants toward a literal reading of the Bible as translated, believing in an ordinary day, and maintaining this younger-Earth view.[40]

An Earth that was thousands of years old remained the dominant view during the Early Modern Period (1500–1800) and is found typically referenced in the works of famous poets and playwrights of the era, including Shakespeare:

...The poor world is almost 6,000 years old.[41]

Jac wrote:The fact is incredibly simple: if the eath is billions of years old, then Genesis 1-11 is literally wrong. We would then have to sit back and work out the hermeneutical and theological implications.

That would be?

Jac I agree with you to some degree being that if OECs assert Genesis is not a 24 hour day then we are not taking the days of Genesis as 24 hours days as we know them here on earth at this time. However, before the earth was set in orbit and the physics of the universe put in full motion a day was not 24 hours. In fact scientists believe, the earth was much closer to the sun and had even shorter days. We are now slowly moving away fromthe sun and our days are getting longer.

In the early Carboniferous period some 350 million years ago an Earth year was around 385 days, ancient corals indicate, meaning not that it took longer for the planet to revolve around the sun, but that a day–night cycle was less than 23 hours long. Sedimentary rocks such as sandstone also testify to the quicker days of yore. As moon-spawned tides wash over rocks they deposit mineral specks, layer upon layer. In southern Australia, for example, these vertically accumulating tidal "rhythmites" have pegged an Earth day at 21.9 hours some 620 million years ago. This equates to a 400-day year, although other estimates suggest even brisker daily rotations then. In billions of years a single day could be 500 hours.

On other planets a day can be years, the bible says in 2 Peter and Psalms that a day can be as a thousand years, and we are told to not uphold myths and geneologies in the New Testament.

I suggest that these scriptures and current scientific understanding give OECs leave to still be identified as biblical literalists. It''s just that the world had no idea that a day could be literally any length of time depending on where you are, what period of time one lives in and what view point God was taking in inspiring the composing of Genesis.

Jac wrote:
... Yom cannot and does not mean "long undefined period of time." OEC's are on the right track in claiming that they are taking a literal view of Scripture. But the fact is that their view falls apart because a literal reading can't justify their claims. It's all just standard eisogesis...

What about yom in Isa 30:8?
8 Go now, write it on a tablet for them,
inscribe it on a scroll,
that for the days to come
it may be an everlasting witness.

Isn't yom used there, to mean forever?

http://www.oldearth.org/word_study_yom.htm

Jac wrote:
OEC is just eisogesis.

This article shows the exegetical support for an old earth.
http://godandscience.org/youngearth/six ... ation.html

Starhunter wrote:Daniel,
The power of God is through His word which is instant, whatever it states it accomplishes.

The Bible is not the word of God, Jesus was the word of God, the Bible is a collection of books written by man who were inspired by their interactions with God and we use the Bible as a tool for understanding things about God etc..

If it states for stars to exist in an instant it does, if it states to create the Sun, moon, planets, and all of our creation in six days then that is what it will do, in exactly that time span.
If the word declares the remission of sins in an instant, it is instant. If a person continues to trust in this instant help in God they will be saved.

Maybe instant from God's perspective because he is not effected by time, we on the other hand are effected by time.

Either you have an implicit trust in the Bible or not. Of course its not fashionable, and if you are reading a quack version, of course you'll be battling with contrary theories.

I trust in Jesus and his work on the cross, it seems to me that the Bible has become a bit of an idol for you.

Starhunter wrote:

Danieltwotwenty wrote:

Stu wrote:

Starhunter wrote:No need to, it is easy to scroll back, I like your point about shrinking, and have an answer found in the ten commandments, re the fourth on the seventh day, this implies that the weekly cycle of literal days is a memorial of creation.

This is a good point.

No it's not, it could just be a representation of the 6 ages, Starhunter even admitted that.

What I said is not an admission. I said that to show where people go off in their reasoning without reading the context, and I followed it with a question for thought. I don't like what you have done, it is a sign of weakness.

So it's a sign of weakness to use reason and logic?

I think it is a sign of weakness not to use the gifts God has given us.

I also think you are a hypocrite, you said

"The age of the earth is fairly easily worked out by genealogies to be around 6000 years old.

The Bible never states the age of the Earth yet you have assumed something that is not explicit based on faulty reasoning and a faulty understanding of context. Who has a weakness now huh.

It was a mistake to use what I had said contrary to what I intended. It is not a reflection of you.

Re to earth age/genealogies, I worked that out myself as a teenager. It's just my take on it, and if I'm wrong it does not necessarily make me a hypocrite.

A hypocrite is someone who pretends to be one thing and is really another, or says one thing and denies it.

Even so, the above actions don't prove someone is a hypocrite, they might just be tired or muddled up, which happens more as you get older, so if you called me a muddled up old man that's probably right on!

I don't make a distinction between the works of creation and the works of recreation

I read recreation as leizure enjoyment instead of re-creation, my bad there.

you don't have to quibble or cuddle with every philosophy.

Don't say I quibble, that was unjust and uncalled for. I 'cuddle' with every concept I don't understand that I want to. If you don't want to talk with me about a subject then either say so or stay silent. I'm not interested in subjective opinion.

What is salvation if it is not restoring the image of God in man?

Salvation is acceptance that Jesus is God, the avoidance of death waiting for us.
Restoring humanity to what it was intended to be, through re-creation is the fullfilment of our salvation.
Salvation starts at acceptance and ends on our part there. The rest is done through and by God.

Your concept of salvation is correct, but not how to obtain it. There, Jesus is the way. And to believe in Him is to avoid death; to receive salvation. Salvation then starts for the individual, but is not completed until the restoration of humanity as the correct image of God, as you say.

And it is important to know the distinction. To put any more weight on someone in how to obtain salvation (given to us through Christ, by His Word) is to put up stumbling bocks for our brothers and sisters. And to add to what Christ teaches.

Nor why I am saying all this trivial.

Jesus used to teach, beginning with the writings of Moses. Is the beginning important for salvation, is not all scripture profitable for salvation?

Again, the only thing that grants salvation is by faith Christ is who He says He is. Understanding truth to the depth you suggest is important for refinement.