Evidence for God from Science

I recently have been confronted with the fact that the bible says morning and evening in the days of Genesis. What are your thoughts?

My thoughts are that it is from evening to evening.

Neptune Man,

Are you referring to the idea of 24 hour days?

Man from the Neptune wrote:I recently have been confronted with the fact that the bible says moring and evening in the days of Genesis. What are your thoughts?

Actually it oddly says "the evening and the morning".

I am not sure which side of the divide you are on, however I see an important critical question to ask is: How was the first day possible without Earth's prior existence if taken as a solar day? And also prior to the Sun's existence?

The only alternative I see is to understand the days as representing an unspecified interval from God's perspective.

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I read somewhere that the "there was evening and morning" is better translated "order and disorder"...can't remember where I read that...
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No doubt a gap theorist, but I do not see how this is possible unless one entirely divorces such meanings from the original Hebrew.

Found some verses that may explain this. In Leviticus 23:32, Luke 4:40, and Mark 1:32. Leviticus speaks of the Sabbath as being from "even to even", or one day. Mark 1:32 says "in the evening, when the sun had set". And Luke 4:40 says "when the sun was setting". All these mark the end of a day.

jenwat3 wrote:Found some verses that may explain this. In Leviticus 23:32, Luke 4:40, and Mark 1:32. Leviticus speaks of the Sabbath as being from "even to even", or one day. Mark 1:32 says "in the evening, when the sun had set". And Luke 4:40 says "when the sun was setting". All these mark the end of a day.

Jewish culture viewed the start of the day as being at sunset and that is how they practised the sabbath as well.

Man from the Neptune wrote:I recently have been confronted with the fact that the bible says moring and evening in the days of Genesis. What are your thoughts?

Please see this article by Rich...

Quote: "There are 42 verses (not 23) outside Genesis 1 in which yom is used in combination with either "evening" or "morning" (or both).5 The Hebrew words for "evening" and "morning" are juxtaposed only 12 times outside Genesis 1.6 In seven of those verses, the word order is reversed from that found in Genesis 1.6"

http://www.godandscience.org/youngearth/sixdays.html

It all depends on frame of reference. Genesis 1 is God's account of His own creative activity. I don't believe He intended it to be either a scientific treatise, a metaphor, or an allegory. His account reveals His creative power, His method, and His purpose. I believe He wants us to understand first of all that He is the Creator of the Universe, to comprehend the order and method of His Creation, and to understand both His purpose in His Creation and His eternal plan for us. This can only be communicated by relating events to us in our own human frame of reference. I submit that in order to do so, He deliberately chose to actually create according to that frame of reference. Genesis 1 is not metaphorical or allegorical, and it's not science; it is what it is in it's plain and common meaning.

Genesis 1:3-6 recounts the first full day of God's creative activity. On the first day He created light, separated it from the darkness, and delineated day time from night time. Thus it is clear that there was light from the very first day. The source of the first day's light remains debatable. The scripture is unequivocal in that God brought it into existence, designating the period of light "day", the period of darkness "night, and the period between evening and morning as one day. Clearly he was intentional in doing so because He repeated it six times in succeeding verses.

I am aware of various counter arguments. Each has it's own source of inherent error and each breaks down under analysis. Only a reading of the plain and common meaning of the text completely fulfills the goals of God's intended revelation. Assuming a "God's eye view" outside of time erroneosly presumes that we are capable of fully appreciating that perspective. Etymological analysis, even in English, merely creates confusion. Our own language allows several meanings of the same word, day, ranging from a single period of Earth's rotation on it's axis to a specified date, to a particular period or age, or a boundless period of time. Extrapolation of "big bang" calculations assumes that we can fix the initial instant and that the rate of expansion has been constant from our frame of reference since the beginning. Both assumptions remain speculative and the apparent effects can be accounted for by assuming a different frame of reference.

Therefore, in this case as in all others, only the literary context sufficiently defines the intended meaning of the word. The same is true of both Hebrew and Greek. God and His revelation of Himself, our origins, and His plan for Creation is the first order of context here. We have no reason to doubt His account as given. If we concede His omnipotence, then denying Him the ability to accomplish Creation in six, 24 hour long, days would contradict what we know is true of His nature. Since we know Darwinian macroevolution hasn't withstood the test of science, it is of no probative value in our analysis. Thus, there is no "scientific" requirement for "theological evolution" or "day age" concepts. Neither, in fact, has any basis in Scripture and both lead to contradictions of the Gospel.

Whether one adheres to young earth or old earth beliefs, an initial literal six day creation remains the only understanding that is Biblically, scientifically, and intellectually valid and consistent.

RWortman wrote:Therefore, in this case as in all others, only the literary context sufficiently defines the intended meaning of the word. The same is true of both Hebrew and Greek. God and His revelation of Himself, our origins, and His plan for Creation is the first order of context here. We have no reason to doubt His account as given. If we concede His omnipotence, then denying Him the ability to accomplish Creation in six, 24 hour long, days would contradict what we know is true of His nature. Since we know Darwinian macroevolution hasn't withstood the test of science, it is of no probative value in our analysis. Thus, there is no "scientific" requirement for "theological evolution" or "day age" concepts. Neither, in fact, has any basis in Scripture and both lead to contradictions of the Gospel.

Day-Age is better supported in Scripture than YEC which became largely a 20th century popularised position especially via the Scofield Reference Bible.

If we concede His omnipotence, then denying Him the ability to accomplish Creation in six, 24 hour long, days would contradict what we know is true of His nature.

This has nothing to do with His omnipotence. Oec's have no problem establishing God's almighty power and majesty. It has to do with what He choose to do.

Look, with His omnipotence, He could easily have snapped His metaphorical fingers and the universe came to be in an instant. He didn't NNED 24 hour days any more than He NEEDED millions of years.

It is 24 hours. He is talking about our heaven and earth. The evidence is here to stay until God replace it. The time is created for us. He is talking particularly to us and explaining step by step how he created our heaven and earth in the beginning. The day and night, the first day, the second day and so on.......
If God has created our earth and heaven for a thousand years at human time then he should have said so. God created the word day for us and as we know it 24 hours. I came from different country and no matter where I go there is called 24 hours a day.

because wrote:It is 24 hours. He is talking about our heaven and earth. The evidence is here to stay until God replace it. The time is created for us. He is talking particularly to us and explaining step by step how he created our heaven and earth in the beginning. The day and night, the first day, the second day and so on.......
If God has created our earth and heaven for a thousand years at human time then he should have said so. God created the word day for us and as we know it 24 hours. I came from different country and no matter where I go there is called 24 hours a day.

No its not. Of course heaven and earth are being spoken about, this Genesis, about the beginnings. I recommend the following pages if you haven't read them already:
http://www.godandscience.org/youngearth/longdays.html
http://www.godandscience.org/youngearth/genesis.html

If it is not, then you would say that God is a politician. He says one thing but meant another. So, how could we ever understand each other if you read it day and night does not meant what it say. When will we ever have a good communication? When he said let there be light, you gonna say that, that is not what he meant. Is this how we are going to read the Bible?
God is in charge and on this area he meant what he said.