ENCYCLOPEDIA OF BIBLE DIFFICULTIES
by Gleason L. And Archer Jr.
Genesis
How can Genesis 1 be reconciled with theistic
evolution?
[THE FIRST VERSE “IN THE BEGINNING GOD CREATED THE HEAVENS AND THE EARTH” FENTON IN HIS TRANSLATION SAYS “BEGINNING” IS IN THE PLURAL “BEGINNINGS” OR AS HE TRANSLATED IT “BY PERIODS” GOD…..
THIS MEANS GOD DID NOT MAKE THE HEAVENS AS WE NOW SEE IT THROUGH THINGS LIKE THE HUBBLE SPACE TELESCOPE. THE HEAVENS GREW AND CHANGED, AS IT DOES TODAY WITH THE FORMING OF STARTS AND THE DEATH OF STARS ETC. MAYBE GOD CREATED DIFFERENT PARTS OF THE HEAVENS AT DIFFERENT TIMES. THEM MAYBE HE SET THE HEAVENS TO MOVE OUT AND EXPAND, AS THEY ARE EXPANDING TODAY, WITH EVER INCREASING SPEED. IT IS QUITE POSSIBLE THE UNIVERSE DID NOT BEGIN FROM A TINY SPECK OF WHATEVER AND THEN A “BIG BAND” TOOK PLACE. SCIENCE SEEING THE EVERY EXPANDING UNIVERSE AS NOW IS, TAKES IT ALL BACK-LOOKING AND THINKS IT GOES BACK TO A PARTICULAR SPECK OF SOMETHING HARDLY VISIBLE, AND IT EXPLODED INTO WHAT THERE IS TODAY, SPEEDING OUTWARDS AND NOT SLOWING DOWN BUT EVER FASTER. THOUGH THAT COULD BE POSSIBLE, IT MAY NOT BE SO, BUT MAYBE BE AS I’VE GIVEN ABOVE. THE TRUTH IS WE ARE NOT TOLD THE HOW OF IT ALL, ONLY THAT THE UNIVERSE AT ONE TIME DID NOT EXIST; IT CAME INTO BEING. WE ARE TOLD IN THE NEW TESTAMENT THAT THE GOD BEING WHO BECAME JESUS THE CHRIST, WAS THE ONE WHO SPOKE AND IT WAS DONE, UNDER THE AUTHORITY OF THE GOD BEING WE TODAY CALL “THE FATHER.” OTHER STUDIES I GIVE TO PROVE ALL THIS, ON THIS WEBSITE - Keith Hunt]
[“THE EARTH WAS WITHOUT FORM AND VOID.” I PROVE IN OTHER STUDIES THAT THIS EARTH WAS CREATED NOT IN CHOAS, BUT IN BEAUTY. OTHER STUDIES SHOW THE BRILLIANT IN COLOR AND POWER—— THE COVERING CHERUB AT GOD’S THRONE, WAS GIVEN AUTHORITY OVER THIS BEAUTIFUL CREATED EARTH. BUT HE REBELLED AND WANTED THE THRONE OF HEAVEN. THERE WAS WAR IN THE HEAVENS; THE COVERING CHERUB BECAME SATAN THE DEVIL; HE MANAGED TO GET 1/3 OF THE ANGELS TO SIDE-UP WITH HIM; THEY BECAME DEMONS. THIS WAR RESULTED IN THE SURFACE OF THIS EARTH BEING DESTROYED, AND COVERED WITH WATER. THE WORLD OF THE DINOSAURS CAME TO AN END VIOLENTLY. WE ARE NOT TOLD HOW LONG THE WATERS COVERED THIS EARTH; COULD HAVE BEEN YEARS, COULD HAVE BEEN CENTURIES, COULD HAVE BEEN THOUSANDS OF YEARS. THEN AT A CERTAIN TIME THE SPIRIT OF GOD MOVED OVER THE FACE OF THE WATERS AND SO WE HAVE GENESIS ONE VERSE 2 - Keith Hunt]
In dealing with this question, we must carefully define our terms, for "evolution" is used in various senses by various people. We must distinguish between evolution as a philosophy and evolution as a descriptive mechanism for the development of species from the more primitive to the "higher" or more complex stages in the course of geological history. Furthermore, we must establish what is meant by theistic evolution. Then we will be in a better position to deal with its relationship to the creationism of Genesis 1.
Evolution as a Philosophy
Evolution as a philosophy seeks to explain the physical—and especially the biological—universe as a self-directed development from primeval matter, the origin of which is unknown but which may be regarded as eternally existing without ever having had a beginning. Philosophical evolution rules out any direction or intervention by a personal God and casts doubt on the existence of even an impersonal Higher Power. All reality is governed by unchangeable physical laws, and ultimately it is the product of mere chance. There is no reason for existence nor a real purpose for life. Man has to operate as an end in himself. He is his own ultimate lawgiver and has no moral accountability except to human society. The basis of law and ethics is basically utilitarian—that which produces the greatest good for the greatest number.
Not all these positions were advanced by Charles Darwin himself in his 1859 classic The Origin of Species. And yet the consistent atheism of philosophic evolution was a position he would not espouse, for he believed that a creating God was logically necessary to explain the prior existence of the original primordial ooze out of which the earliest forms of life emerged. It would be more accurate to call him a deist rather than an atheist, even though his system was taken over by those who denied the existence of God.
[WHAT IS NOT OFTEN TOLD IS THAT DARWIN ONCE CONTEMPLATED BEING A CLERGY-MAN. HE WAS A BIBLE READER; AT THE END OF HIS LIFE HIS NURSE TYPE LADY LOOKING AFTER HIM, SAID HE WAS ALWAYS READING THE BIBLE, AND HE SHOOK HIS HEAD IN DISMAY, AS TO HOW MANY WERE RUNNING WITH HIS BOOK THE ORIGIN OF SPECIES, AND SAID HE NEVER INTENDED THAT HIS BOOK BE TAKEN UP BY MANY WHO WERE USING IT TO DO AWAY WITH A GOD BEING - Keith Hunt]
But it should be pointed out that consistent atheism, which represents itself to be the most rational and logical of all approaches to reality, is in actuality completely self-defeating and incapable of logical defense. That is to say, if indeed all matter has combined by mere chance, unguided by any Higher Power or Transcendental Intelligence, then it necessarily follows that the molecules of the human brain are also the product of mere chance. In other words, we think the way we do simply because the atoms and molecules of our brain tissue happen to have combined in the way they have, totally without transcendental guidance or control. So then even the philosophies of men, their systems of logic, and all their approaches to reality are the resuit of mere fortuity. There is no absolute validity to any argument advanced by the atheist against the position of theism.
On the basis of his own presuppositions, the atheist completely cancels himself out, for on his own premises his arguments are without any absolute validity. By his own confession he thinks the way he does simply because the atoms in his brain happen to combine the way they do. If this is so, he cannot honestly say that his view is any more valid than the contrary view of his opponent. His basic postulates are self-contradictory and self-defeating; for when he asserts that there are no absolutes, he thereby is asserting a very dogmatic absolute. Nor can he logically disprove the existence of God without resorting to a logic that depends on the existence of God for its validity. Apart from such a transcendent guarantor of the validity of logic, any attempts at logic or argumentation are simply manifestations of the behavior of the collocation of molecules that make up the thinker's brain.
Evolution as a Descriptive Mechanism
Evolution as a descriptive mechanism refers to that process by which less-advanced forms of life develop into higher forms of greater complexity. This is thought to be brought about by some sort of inner dynamic that, without any outside control or interference, operates according to its own pattern. In Darwin's day it was believed that this development resulted from the accumulation of chance characteristics and the retention of slight variations that arose during the earlier stages of the species' career and were genetically handed down to succeeding generations.
Since Darwin's time, however, this formulation of evolution as a mechanistic process, governed by the principle of the "survival of the fittest," has, for a variety of reasons, lost support in the twentieth century. G.J. Mendel's experiments in plant genetics demonstrated quite conclusively that the range of variation possible within a species was strictly limited and offered no possibility of development into a new and different species. After a large number of experiments as to the inheritability of acquired characteristics, it was finally determined by geneticists at the close of the century that there was absolutely no transmission of acquired traits because there was no way of coding them into the genes of the parent who developed those traits (cf. Robert E.D. Clark, Darwin, Before and After [Chicago: Moody, 1967]).
As for the continual series of transitional species that the Darwinian theory posited to mark the ascent from "lower" to "higher" orders on the ladder of biological development, the most extensive research possible has finally led scientists to the conclusion that there never were such "missing links." Thus Austin H. Clark (The New Evolution [New Haven: Yale, 1930], p. 189) confessed: "If we are willing to accept the facts, we must believe that there never were such intermediates, or in other words, that these major groups have from the very first borne the same relationship to each other that they bear today." Similarly, G.G. Simpson concluded that each of the thirty-two known orders of mammals appeared quite suddenly in the paleontological record. "The earliest and most primitive known members of every order already have the basic ordinal characters, and in no case is an approximately continuous sequence from one order to another known" (Tempo and Mode in Evolution [New York: Columbia, 1944], p. 106).
Therefore, it was necessary for Clark and Simpson to propose a completely non-Darwinian type of "evolution," which they called the "quantum theory" or "emergent evolution." It declares that dramatically new forms arise by mere chance, or else by some sort of creative response to new environmental factors. No suggestion was offered as to the origin for this capacity for "creative response." From the perspective of Darwinianism, this could hardly be considered evolution at all. As Carl F.H. Henry observed: "Supposition of abrupt emergence falls outside the field of scientific analysis just as fully as the appeal to supernatural creative forces" (R. Mixter, ed., Evolution and Christian Thought Today [Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1959], p. 211).
As for the developmental series customarily exhibited in textbooks and museums to show how evolution worked with horses and men from the earliest stages of Cenozoic until modern times, it should be understood that they prove absolutely nothing about the mechanism that engineered this development. A continuity of basic design furnishes no evidence whatever that any "lower" species phased into the next "higher" species by any sort of internal dynamic, as evolution demands. For if the museum visitor were to go to another part of that museum of science and industry, he would find a completely analogous series of automobiles, commencing with 1900 and extending up until the present decade. Stage by stage, phase by phase, he could trace the development of the Ford from its earliest Model T prototype to the large and luxurious LTD of the 1970s. Everyone knows that there was a continuity of basic design that altered in definite stages, sometimes with dramatically new features. But he would also be aware that it was the engineers at the Ford Motor Company plants who designed these changes and implemented them through craftsmen who followed their blueprints. The ascent from the eohippus to the modern racing horse can be accounted for in exactly the same way—except that in this case the architect and engineer was the Creator Himself.
Theistic Evolution
Theistic evolution posits the existence of God as Creator of all the material substance of the universe and Designer of all the processes to be followed by the various botanical and zoological orders in the development of His master plan. Unlike the philosophical evolutionist, the theistic evolutionist insists that matter was not eternal but was created by God out of nothing and was controlled in its development by the plan He had devised. In other words, the whole mechanism of the evolutionary process was and is devised and controlled by God rather than by some mysterious and unaccountable force for which there is no explanation.
As we weigh the question of whether theistic evolution can be reconciled with Genesis 1, we have to analyze very carefully whether we are dealing with a deistic or semi-deistic concept of a God who simply sets up the entire system, programming it in advance like some master computer, and then retires to the sidelines to watch the cosmic mechanism work itself out. Such a God is beyond the reach of prayer and takes no active, continuing interest in the needs of His creatures. There is no communication with Him and no salvation from Him; all is locked up in the framework of a rigid determinism.
Or else we may be dealing with a theistic evolution that allows for prayer and personal relationships between man and God, but which conceives of Him as bringing about the ascending biological orders by some kind of evolutionary mechanism that finds its dynamism and direction within itself. In view of the flimsy basis in scientific data for evolution as propounded by Darwin and its virtual rejection by “emergent” evolutionists (for these two bear as close a resemblance to each other as American democracy and the "democracy" of Iron Curtain nations today), there seems to be very little ground for even a scientifically minded theist to hang on to evolutionism at all. But if he accepts the implications of the integrity of species according to Mendelian limits, it could perhaps be argued that he keeps faith with the successive stages of creation of plant and animal orders and genera and species "after its kind," as emphasized in Genesis 1:11-12, 21. If he understands the six creative days as intended by the Author to teach a succession of definite stages in the orderly development of the biological world up until the creation of man, then we should concede that this is reconcilable with the basic intent of that chapter.
[YES IT’S THE IDEA THAT THE DAYS OF GENESIS ONE ARE “AGES” NOT LITERAL DAYS - Keith Hunt]
All this, of course, depends on whether the theistic evolutionist accepts Adam and Eve as literal, historical, created individuals. Many of them do not, but they conceive of Homo sapiens as gradually developing from subhuman hominids and then finally developing a consciousness of God—at which moment, whenever it was, the ape-man became "Adam." Such, for example, was the view of Lecomte de Noiiy in Human Destiny (New York: Longmans, Green & Co., 1947), who suggested that perhaps around 30,000 B.C. the Cro-Magnon became truly man by a sort of spiritual mutation that conferred on him the capacity of responsible moral choice. This type of approach can hardly be reconciled with the presentation of Adam and Eve as historical individuals with personal emotions and responses such as appears in Genesis 2 and 3 (and as certified by 1 Tim. 2:13-14). Any suprahistorical interpretation of Adam, such as is espoused by Neoorthodoxy, is definitely irreconcilable with Holy Scripture and the Evangelical faith.
Helpful Discussions of This General Topic
Anderson, J.K., and Coffin, H.G. Fossils in Focus. Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1977.
Lammerts, W.E., ed. Why Not Creation? Grand Rapids: Baker, 1970. Morris, H.M. The Twilight of Evolution. Grand Rapids: Baker, 1963. Newman, R.C., and Eckelmann, H.J. Genesis One and the Origin of the Earth. Downers Grove, 111.: InterVarsity, 1977.
Young, E.J. Studies in Genesis One. Philadelphia: Presbyterian and Reformed, 1973.
How can Genesis 1 be reconciled with the
immense periods of time indicated by fossil
strata?
One of the most frequently argued objections to the trustworthiness of Scripture is found in the apparent discrepancy between the account of creation given in Genesis 1 and the supposed evidence from the fossils and fissionable minerals in the geological strata that indicate Earth is billions of years old. Yet Genesis 1 allegedly teaches that creation took place in six twenty-four-hour days, at the end of which man was already on the earth. But this conflict between Genesis 1 and the factual data of science (in contradistinction to the theories of some scientists who draw inferences from their data that are capable of quite another interpretation by those equally proficient in geology) is only apparent, not real.
To be sure, if we were to understand Genesis 1 in a completely literal fashion—which some suppose to be the only proper principle of interpretation if the Bible is truly inerrant and completely trustworthy—then there would be no possibility of reconciliation between modern scientific theory and the Genesis account. But a true and proper belief in the inerrancy of Scripture involves neither a literal nor a figurative rule of interpretation. What it does require is a belief in whatever the biblical author (human and divine) actually meant by the words he used.
[SO NOW WE GO INTO “INTERPRETATIONS OF WORDS AND PHRASES.” WE SHALL SEE THE AUTHORS ARE OF THE “AGES” FOR DAYS, AND SO CAN CLAIM GENESIS 1 IS OVER POSSIBLE MILLIONS OF YEARS. THE IMMEDIATE FAULT WITH THEIR REASONING IS THEY DO NOT SEE OR BELIEVE THAT BETWEEN GENESIS 1:1 AND 1:2 THERE COULD BE MILLIONS OF YEARS; BUT LET THEM CONTINUE - Keith Hunt]
An absolute literalism would, for example, commit us to the proposition that in Matthew 19:24 (and parallel passages) Christ actually meant to teach that a camel could go through the eye of a needle. But it is abundantly clear that Christ was simply using the familiar rhetorical figure of hyperbole in order to emphasize how difficult it is spiritually for a rich man (because of his pride in his material wealth) to come to repentance and saving faith in God. To construe that passage literally would amount to blatant heresy, or at least a perversity that has nothing to do with orthodoxy.
[NO JESUS MEANT WHAT HE SAID, IT IS SO IMPOSSIBLE FOR A RICH MAN (WHO HAS HIS GOD AS MONEY), AND IS NOT WILLING IF ASKED BY THE LORD, TO PUT IT ALL TO ONE SIDE AND FOLLOW HIM; WOULD BE LIKE TRYING TO PUT A CAMEL THROUGH THE EYE OF A NEEDLE—— IMPOSSIBLE. NO FANCY INTERPRETATION NEEDED - Keith Hunt]
Or again, when Jesus said to the multitude that challenged Him to work some miracle, "Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up" (John 2:19), they grievously erred when they interpreted His remarks literally. John 2:21 goes on to explain that Jesus did not mean this prediction literally but spiritually: "But He was speaking about the temple of His body. Therefore when He was raised from the dead, His disciples remembered that He said this, and they believed the Scripture." In this case, then, literal interpretation was dead wrong because that was not what Jesus meant by the language He used; He was actually referring to the far greater miracle of His bodily resurrection.
[NO, IT WAS LITERAL, ONLY HE WAS REFEREEING TO HIS BODY NOT THE TEMPLE IN JERUSALEM. IT WAS LITERAL THEN, YOU JUST HAD TO KNOW WHAT LITERAL JESUS WAS TAKING ABOUT - Keith Hunt]
It thus becomes clear in this present case, as we study the text of Genesis 1, that we must not short-circuit our responsibility of careful exegesis in order to ascertain as clearly as possible what the divine author meant by the language His inspired prophet (in this case probably Moses) was guided to employ. Is the true purpose of Genesis 1 to teach that all creation began just six twenty-four-hour days before Adam was "born"?
[REMEMBER NOW THESE AUTHORS HAVE IN MIND THE CREATION OF THE WHOLE UNIVERSE IN 6 DAYS INCLUDING MAN. HENCE THEY JUST CANNOT THINK GENESIS 1 IS LITERAL IN APPLYING IT TO THE WHOLE UNIVERSE, WHEN “SCIENCE” SHOWS THE UNIVERSE IS MILLIONS/BILLIONS OF YEARS OLD - Keith Hunt]
Or is this just a mistaken inference that overlooks other biblical data having a direct bearing on this passage?
[OH THERE IS OTHER BIBLICAL DATA ALRIGHT, THAT SHOWS THE EARTH WAS NOT CREATED IN CHOAS AND WATER COVERING THE WHOLE PLANET; THAT HAPPENING CAME ALONG AFTER A PERIOD OF TIME THAT WE ARE NOT TOLD - Keith Hunt]
To answer this question we must take careful note of what is said in Genesis 1:27 concerning the creation of man as the closing act of the sixth creative day. There it is stated that on that sixth day (apparently toward the end of the day, after all the animals had been fashioned and placed on the earth—therefore not long before sundown at the end of that same day), "God created man in His own image; He created them male and female." This can only mean that Eve was created in the closing hour of Day Six, along with Adam.
[YES INDEED IT DOES MEAN THAT….AND ON THE 6TH LITERAL DAY - Keith Hunt]
As we turn to Genesis 2, however, we find that a considerable interval of time must have intervened between the creation of Adam and the creation of Eve. In 2:15 we are told that Yahweh Elohim (i.e., the Lord God) put Adam in the Garden of Eden as the ideal environment for his development, and there he was to cultivate and keep the enormous park, with all its goodly trees, abundant fruit crop, and four mighty rivers that flowed from Eden to other regions of the Near East. In 2:18 we read, "Then the Lord God said, 'It is not good for the man to be alone; I will make him a helper suitable for him.'" This statement clearly implies that Adam had been diligently occupied in his responsible task of pruning, harvesting fruit, and keeping the ground free of brush and undergrowth for a long enough period to lose his initial excitement and sense of thrill at this wonderful occupation in the beautiful paradise of Eden. He had begun to feel a certain lonesomeness and inward dissatisfaction.
[THIS INDICATES NO SUCH THING! THERE IS NO INDICATION THERE WAS “MUCH TIME” BEFORE EVE WAS CREATED. GOD TOLD HIM WHAT HIS RESPONSIBILITIES IN THE GARDEN WERE; HE WAS TO NAME THE ANIMALS THAT WERE THERE, AS HE LOOKED AT THEM; AND HE SAW NOTHING LIKE HIMSELF, TO PARTNER WITH OR CONVERSE WITH, ANOTHER SOMEBODY LIKE HIMSELF. AS A CHILD OF 7 IN THE CHURCH OF ENGLAND SCHOOL, ON THAT FIRST DAY, WE WERE GIVEN A BIB LE AND TOLD TO OPEN IT TO GENESIS 1. THE TEACHER READ GENESIS 1 AND 2 UP TO THE CREATING OF EVE. WOW IT WAS EASY TO UNDERSTAND. ON THE 6TH DAY AFTER CREATING MAN, AND HE COULD FIND NO ONE ELSE LIKE HIMSELF, AS HE SAW THE ANIMALS, GOD DELIBERATELY DOING THIS THAT WAY, SO HE COULD TELL HIM HE WOULD MAKE SOMEONE TO COMPLETE HIM; GOD THEN TOOK A RIB FROM ADAM [WELL A PART OF HIM] AND FROM IT GOD MADE WOMAN— EVE. IT WAS AS SIMPLE AS THAT TO ME AT AGE 7. NO FANCY THEOLOGY NEEDED, JUST VERY SIMPLE TO UNDERSTAND - Keith Hunt]
In order to compensate for this lonesomeness, God then gave Adam a major assignment in natural history. He was to classify every species of animal and bird found in the preserve. With its five mighty rivers and broad expanse, the garden must have had hundreds of species of mammal, reptile, insect, and bird, to say nothing of the flying insects that also are indicated by the basic Hebrew term ‘op ("bird") (2:19). It took the Swedish scientist Linnaeus several decades to classify all the species known to European scientists in the eighteenth century. Doubtless there were considerably more by that time than in Adam's day; and, of course, the range of fauna in Eden may have been more limited than those available to Linnaeus. But at the same time it must have taken a good deal of study for Adam to examine each specimen and decide on an appropriate name for it, especially in view of the fact that he had absolutely no human tradition behind him, so far as nomenclature was concerned. It must have required some years, or, at the very least, a considerable number of months for him to complete this comprehensive inventory of all the birds, beasts, and insects that populated the Garden of Eden.
[AGAIN READING INTO THINGS NOT THERE. DID ALL THE BIRDS WE HAVE TODAY, AT FIRST LIVED IN EDEN? DID ALL THE SEA CREATURES FIRST LIVE IN EDEN AND ADAM HAD TO NAME THEM? DID ALL THE INSECTS IN THE WORLD TODAY AT FIRST LIVE IN EDEN? DID ALL THE ANIMALS OF THE WORLD TODAY FIRST LIVE IN EDEN FOR ADAM TO NAME? DID THE AUSTRALIAN KANGAROO AND PLATYPUS FIRST LIVE IN EDEN? DID THE KOALA BEAR FIRST LIVE IN EDEN? DID THE PANDA BEAR FIRST LIVE IN EDEN? GOD HAS NEVER SAID ANYWHERE IN HIS WORD THAT ALL CREATURES OF THE SKY, SEA AND LAND, FIRST LIVED IN EDEN SO ADAM COULD NAME THEM—— ANYONE THINKING IT WAS SO, NEEDS TO GET REAL OR SEE A PSYCHIATRIST. ADAM NAMED THE CREATURES GOD PUT IN EDEN, IT DOES NOT SAY GOD PUT ALL AIR, SEA, AND LAND CREATURES WE HAVE TODAY ALL OVER THE WORLD, FIRST IN THE GADEN OF EDEN FOR ADAM TO NAME - Keith Hunt]
Finally, after this assignment with all its absorbing interest had been completed, Adam felt a renewed sense of emptiness. Genesis 2:20 ends with the words "but for Adam no suitable helper was found." After this long and unsatisfying experience as a lonely bachelor, God saw that Adam was emotionally prepared for a wife—a "suitable helper." God, therefore, subjected him to a deep sleep, removed from his body the bone that was closest to his heart, and from that physical core of man fashioned the first woman. Finally God presented woman to Adam in all her fresh, unspoiled beauty, and Adam was ecstatic with joy.
As we have compared Scripture with Scripture (Gen. 1:27 with 2:15-22), it has become very apparent that Genesis 1 was never intended to teach that the sixth creative day, when Adam and Eve were both created, lasted a mere twenty-four hours. In view of the long interval of time between these two, it would seem to border on sheer irrationality to insist that all of Adam's experiences in Genesis 2:15-22 could have been crowded into the last hour or two of a literal twenty-four-hour day.
[OH YES IT DOES TEACH VERY CLEARLY THAT THERE WAS 6 LITERAL DAYS OF GOD WORKING HIS WORK ON THIS EARTH; THAT ADAM WAS CREATED SOMEWHAT ON THE 6TH DAY, TOLD TO MAINTAIN EDEN, NAME THE CREATURES CREATED THERE AND IN THAT GARDEN, AND THEN SEE NOT ONE OF THEM WAS FITTING FOR HIM TO SADDLE UP WITH. HENCE THE CREATION OF EVE. NOTHING TO IT, JUST THAT SIMPLE AND ONLY NEEDED THE LATTER HOURS OF THE DAY TO DO IT, BUT THEN WE ARE NOT TOLD WHAT HOUR OF THE 6TH DAY ADAM WAS CREATED, IT IS ONLY GUESSING TO SAY LATE IN THE DAY, IT COULD HAVE BEEN 11 AM OR 1 PM…..WE ARE NOT TOLD - Keith Hunt]
The only reasonable conclusion to draw is that the purpose of Genesis 1 is not to tell how fast God performed His work of creation (though, of course, some of His acts, such as the creation of light on the first day, must have been instantaneous). Rather, its true purpose was to reveal that the Lord God who had revealed Himself to the Hebrew race and entered into personal covenant relationship with them was indeed the only true God, the Creator of all things that are. This stood in direct opposition to the religious notions of the heathen around them, who assumed the emergence of a pantheon of gods in successive stages out of preexistent matter of unknown origin, actuated by forces for which there was no accounting.
[NO GENESIS 1 IS EXACTLY TELLING US IT WAS 6 LITERAL DAYS THAT GOD WORKED ON AN EARTH COVERED WITH WATER; IT IS NOT TELLING US ABOUT THE CREATING OF THE UNIVERSE OR OF THE EARTH ITSELF, IN ANY DETAIL AT ALL, WHICH BOTH COULD BE MILLIONS OF YEARS OLD - Keith Hunt]
Genesis 1 is a sublime manifesto, totally rejecting all the cosmogonies of the pagan cultures of the ancient world as nothing but baseless superstition. The Lord God Almighty existed before all matter, and by His own word of command He brought the entire physical universe into existence, governing all the great forces of wind, rain, sun, and sea according to His sovereign will. This stood in stark contrast to the clashing, quarreling, capricious little deities and godlets spawned by the corrupt imagination of the heathen. The message and purpose of Genesis 1 is the revelation of the one true God who created all things out of nothing and ever keeps the universe under His sovereign control.
[GENESIS 1 IS TELLING US GOD DID CREATING; HE IS SUPREME IN THE UNIVERSE, HE WORKED ON THIS EARTH COVERED WITH WATER FOR 6 LITERAL DAYS AND DID WHAT IS WRITTEN THERE—— JUST THAT SIMPLE, SO SIMPLE A CHILD CAN UNDERSTAND. I DID WHEN I FIRST READ IT (OR HAD IT READ TO US BY THE CHURCH OF ENGLAND TEACHER), WHEN I WAS 7 YEARS OLD - Keith Hunt]
The second major aspect of Genesis 1 is the revelation that God brought forth His creation in an orderly and systematic manner. There were six major stages in this work of formation, and these stages are represented by successive days of a week. In this connection it is important to observe that none of the six creative days bears a definite article in the Hebrew text; the translations "the first day," "the second day," etc., are in error. The Hebrew says, "And the evening took place, and the morning took place, day one" (1:5). Hebrew expresses "the first day" by hayyom hari'son, but this text says simply yom 'ehad ("day one"). Again, in v.8 we read not hayyom hasseni ("the second day") but yom seni ("a second day"). In Hebrew prose of this genre, the definite article was generally used where the noun was intended to be definite; only in poetic style could it be omitted. The same is true with the rest of the six days; they all lack the definite article. Thus they are well adapted to a sequential pattern, rather than to strictly delimited units of time.
[NOTICE THE AUTHORS SAYS “WAS GENERALLY USED”—— IF THERE IS ONE THING IN STUDYING THE BIBLE, YOU NEED TO GET MARKED INTO YOUR BRAIN IT IS, THER E ARE ALWAYS EXCEPTIONS TO A GENERAL RULE; SAME IN ENGLISH, THERE ARE ALWAYS IN ALL AREAS OF LIFE EXCEPTIONS TO THE RULE. SO IF THE KJV TRANSLATORS HAD WRITTEN, “EVENING AND MORNING, FIRST DAY” OR “DARK AND LIGHT, FIRST DAY.” IF THEY HAD TRANSLATED THE HEBREW AS “EVENING AND MORNING, SECOND DAY” OR “DARK AND LIGHT, SECOND DAY” I AS A KID OF 7 WOULD STILL HAVE TAKING IT TO BE 6 AND 7 LITERAL DAYS. IT WOULD HAVE BEEN EASY FOR MOSES (THE WRITER) TO HAVE SAID “AGES” OR “OVER A LONG PERIOD OF TIME GOD MADE….”
THE COMPLETE JEWISH BIBLE BY DAVID H. STERN TRANSLATES THE HEBREW…. “SO THERE WAS EVENING, AND THERE WAS MORNING, ONE DAY…… SO THERE WAS EVENING, AND THERE WAS MORNING, A SECOND DAY….ETC.” IF I HAD READ THIS AT AGE 7 IT STILL WOULD HAVE BEEN 7 LITERAL DAYS TO ME. JESUS SAID, “I THANK YOU FATHER THAT YOU HAVE HID THESE THINGS FROM THE WISE AND PRUDENT, AND HAVE REVEALED THEM UNTO BABES” “IF YOU DO NOT BECOME AS A LITTLE CHILD YOU SHALL NOT ENTER THE KINGDOM OF HEAVEN.” PRETTY PLAIN TO ME - Keith Hunt]
Genesis 1:2-5 thus sets forth the first stage of creation: the formation of light. This must have meant primarily the light of the sun and the other heavenly bodies. Sunlight is a necessary precondition to the development of plant life and animal life, generally speaking (though there are some subterranean forms of life that manage to do without it).
Genesis 1:6-8 presents the second stage: the formation of an "expanse" (raqia') that separated between moisture in suspension in the sky and moisture condensed enough to remain on the earth's surface. The term raqia' does not mean a beaten-out metal canopy, as some writers have alleged—no ancient culture ever taught such a notion in its concept of the sky—but simply means "a stretched-out expanse." This is quite evident from Isaiah 42:5, where the cognate verb raqa' is used: "Thus says the God Yahweh, the Creator of the heavens, and the one who stretched them out [from the verb natah, 'to extend' curtains or tent cords], the one who extended [roqa'] the earth and that which it produces [the noun sesa'im refers always to plants and animals]." Obviously raqa' could not here mean "beat out," "stamp out" (though it is often used that way in connection with metal working); the parallelism with natah (noted above) proves that here it has the force of extend or expand. Therefore, the noun raqia' can mean only "expanse," without any connotation of a hard metal plate.
Genesis 1:9-13 relates the third stage in God's creative work, the receding of the waters of the oceans, seas, and lakes to a lower altitude than the masses of land that emerged above them and thus were allowed to become dry. Doubtless the gradual cooling of the planet Earth led to the condensation of water necessary to bring about this result; seismic pressures producing mountains and hills doubtless contributed further to this separation between land and sea. Once this dry land (hayyabbasah) appeared, it became possible for plant life and trees to spring up on the earth's surface, aided by photosynthesis from the still beclouded sky.
[NOTICE THE AUTHORS GIVE AGES OF TIME FOR ALL THIS TO HAPPEN; ONLY WAY THEY CAN FIGURE IT MUST BE TO FIT WITH GEOLOGY OF MILLIONS OR BILLIONS OF YEARS TO FORM THE EARTH SLOWLY OVER MUCH TIME. THEY CANNOT SEE THE EARTH ALREADY EXISTED FOR WHO KNOWS HOW LONG AND THEN A CATASTROPHE HAPPENING TO COVER THE EARTH WITH WATER, THEN GOD DOING WHAT HE DID IN 6 LITERAL DASYS, WHEN HE DECIDED TO DO IT - Keith Hunt]
Genesis 1:14-19 reveals that in the fourth creative stage God parted the cloud cover enough for direct sunlight to fall on the earth and for accurate observation of the movements of the sun, moon, and stars to take place. Verse 16 should not be understood as indicating the creation of the heavenly bodies for the first time on the fourth creative day; rather it informs us that the sun, moon, and stars created on Day One as the source of light had been placed in their appointed places by God with a view to their eventually functioning as indicators of time ("signs, seasons, days, years") to terrestrial observers. The Hebrew verb wayya'as in v. 16 should better be rendered "Now [God] had made the two great luminaries, etc.," rather than as simple past tense, "[God] made." (Hebrew has no special form for the pluperfect tense but uses the perfect tense, or the conversive imperfect as here, to express either the English past or the English pluperfect, depending on the context.)
[YES AS FENTON TRANSLATES THE HEBREW “HAD MADE” - FENTON STUDIED HEBREW AND GREEK FOR 50 YEARS BEFORE GIVING HIS TRANSLATION OF THE BIBLE. THE SUN AND MOON WERE ALREADY THERE, COULD HAVE BEEN FOR THOUSANDS, MILLIONS, OR BILLIONS OF YEARS; THEN GOD MOVED THINGS AWAY SO THEY COULD BE SEEN AND USED FOR MONTHS, YEARS, SEASONS, AS MANY PEOPLE HAVE USED THEM FOR IN HUMAN HISTORY - Keith Hunt]
Genesis 1:20-23 relates that on the fifth creative day God fully developed marine life, freshwater life, and introduced flying creatures (whether insects, lizards, or winged birds). It is interesting to observe that the fossil-bearing strata of the Paleozoic era contain the first evidence of invertebrate animal life with startling suddenness in the Cambrian period. There is no indication in the pre-Cambrian strata of how the five thousand species of marine and terrestrial animal life of the Paleozoic era may have developed, for there is no record of them whatever prior to the Cambrian levels (cf. D. Dewar, "The Earliest Known Animals," Journal of the Transactions of the Victoria Institute 80 [1948]: 22-29).
[THERE WAS BEFORE GENESIS 1:2 A WORLD OR AGE (LENGTH NOT TOLD - MAYBE MILLIONS OF YEARS) OF THE DINOSAUR WORLD, THEN IN HUGE VIOLENCE IT CAME TO A CRASHING STOP AND BURIAL, SOME VERY LOW DOWN, SOME NEAR THE TOP OF THE WORLD CREATED BY GOD IN GENESIS 1; THE FAMOUS DRUMHELLER, ALBERTA, CANADA, BEING NEAR THE TOP FOR DINOSAUR REMAINS - Keith Hunt]
Genesis 1:24-26 records that in the sixth and final stage of the creative process, God brought forth all the land animals after their various species (leminah in v.24 and leminehu in v.25 mean "according to its kind," whether the antecedent was male or female in grammatical gender), culminating finally in the creation of man, as discussed more extensively above.
[YES LAND ANIMALS ON THE 6TH LITERAL DAY; AND WHY SHOULD THAT SEEM KINDA STRANGE TO SOME PEOPLE. GOD CAN BRING WHATEVER HE LIKES INTO BEING IN THE BLINK OF AN EYE. WE ONLY HAVE TO LOOK AT THIS UNIVERSE, AS WE ARE DOING NOW WITH TELESCOPES IN OUTER SPACE, AND WE SEE THE MIGHTY POWER OF THE GODHEAD—— THE HUMAN MIND CANNOT GRASPE IT ALL…. The Milky Way is a barred spiral galaxy with a diameter between 100,000 and 180,000 light-years. The Milky Way is estimated to contain 100–400 billion stars. There are probably at least 100 billion planets in the Milky Way.
THAT IS JUST FOR STARTERS - Keith Hunt]
In this connection, a comment is in order concerning the recurring formula at the end of each creative day: "And it was/became evening, and it became/was morning, a second day" (or whatever ordinal it might be). The reason for this closing statement seems to have been twofold. First, it was necessary to make clear whether the symbolic unit involved was a mere sunrise-to-sundown day, or whether it was a twenty-four-hour day. The term yom ("day") could mean either. In fact, the first time yom occurs is in v.5: "And He called the light day, and the darkness He called night." Therefore, it was necessary to show that each of the creative days was symbolized by a complete twenty-four-hour cycle, beginning at sunset of the previous day (according to our reckoning) and ending with the daylight portion, down to the setting of the sun, on the following day (as we would reckon it).
[SO WHAT IS ALL THAT SUPPOSED TO PROVE? - Keith Hunt]
Second, the twenty-four-hour day serves as a better symbol than a mere daylight day in regard to the commencement and completion of one stage of creation before the next stage began. There were definite and distinct stages in God's creational procedure. If this be the true intention of the formula, then it serves as no real evidence for a literal twenty-four-hour-day concept on the part of the biblical author.
[BUT IT WAS NOT THE TRUE INTENTION OF MOSES TO TRY AND TELL US IT WAS “AGES” HERE AND NOT A SINGLE LITERAL DAY. MOSES COULD HAVE EASILY USED HEBREW AND GIVEN US “AGES” OR “LONG PERIOD OF TIME” OR “MUCH TIME GOING BY” - THERE ARE HEBREW WORDS FOR ALL THOSE ENGLISH WORDS - Keith Hunt]
Some have argued that the reference in the Decalogue (commandment four) to God's resting on the seventh day as a basis for honoring the seventh day of each week strongly suggests the literal nature of "day" in Genesis 1. This is not at all compelling, however, in view of the fact that if there was to be any day of the week especially set aside from labor to center on the worship and service of the Lord, then it would have to be a twenty-four-hour day (Saturday) in any event.
[YEP YOU GOT IT—— SATURDAY - Keith Hunt]
As a matter of fact, Scripture does not at all teach that Yahweh rested only one twenty-four-hour day at the conclusion of His creative work. No closing formula occurs at the close of the seventh day, referred to in Genesis 2:2-3.
[SO WHAT HAS A CLOSING “FORMULA” GOT TO DO WITH ANYTHING GOD WANTS TO SANCTIFY? THE HEBREW AND ENGLISH IS VERY CLEAR; GOD IS NOT BOUND BY YOUR SO-CALLED “FORMULAR”—— HE’S NOT RESTRICTED BY HOW YOU SAY HE SHOULD HAVE WRITTEN IT; GOD IS GOD NOT YOU; HE CAN INSPIRE WHOEVER TO WRITE IT AS HOW GOD WANTS IT WRITTEN. AS A CHILD OF 7 IT WAS PRETTY SIMPLE TO ME, AND TIED IN EXACTLY WITH THE 4TH COMMANDMENT AS GIVEN IN EXODUS 20 - Keith Hunt]
And, in fact, the New Testament teaches (in Heb. 4:1-11) that that seventh day, that "Sabbath rest," in a very definite sense has continued on right into the church age. If so, it would be quite impossible to line up the seventh-day Sabbath with the Seventh Day that concluded God's original work of creation!
[NOT AT ALL IMPOSSIBLE, VERY SIMPLE TO READ THE 4TH COMMANDMENT IN EXODUS 20 AND SEE HOW IT TIES IN WITH GENESIS 2. MY OH MY, HOW YOU “PRUDENT” AND “WISE” GUYS GET SO FAR OUT WITH YOUR PhD MINDS…. IT’S LAUGHABLE IF NOT SO SERIOUS A MATTER. AND IF YOU WANT TO SEE THE TRUTH OF HEBREWS 4 GO AND READ DR. SAMUELE BACCHIOCCHI’S STUDY “FROM SABBATH TO SUNDAY” UNDER “SABBATH AND FEASTS OF GOD” ON THIS WEB SITE - Keith Hunt]
One last observation concerning the word yom as used in Genesis 2:4. Unlike some of the modern versions, KJV correctly renders this verse "These are the generations of the heavens and of the earth when they were created, in the day that the Lord God made the earth and the heavens." Since the previous chapter has indicated that there were at least six days involved in creating the heavens and the earth, it is abundantly evident that yom in Genesis 2:4 cannot possibly be meant as a twenty-four-hour day—unless perchance the Scripture contradicts itself! (For a good discussion of this topic by a Christian professor of geology, see Davis A. Young, Creation and the Flood and Theistic Evolution [Grand Rapids: Baker, 1977]. Some details of his treatment are open to question, and he is not always precise in his terminology; but in the main his work furnishes a solid contribution to this area of debate.)
[NOTHING STRANGE HERE. AS I READ GENESIS 2: 4 AS A 7 YEAR OLD, IT WAS CLEAR TO ME THAT THIS WAS A WAY OF SAYING WHAT HAD ALREADY TAKEN PLACE IN GENESIS 1 FROM THE VERY START OF THE GENERATIONS OF GOD CREATING THE UNIVERSE TO HIS CREATING WHAT HE DID ON 7 LITERAL DAYS. I NEVER IN ALL MY FOLLOWING YEARS EVER THOUGHT THIS GENESIS 2: 4 WAS TEACHING “AGES” FOR THE 6 DAYS; IT NEVER CROSSED MY MIND TO THINK OF AGES OR MASSIVE LONG PERIODS OF TIME FOR EACH “DAY”—— HOW WOULD MANY FLOWERS AND THE LIKE GET POLLINATED WITH NO CREATURES AROUND FOR HUNDREDS OR THOUSANDS OR TENS OF THOUSANDS (LET ALONE MILLIONS) OF YEARS?
DAVIS A. YOUNG’S WRITINGS HAVE BEEN ANSWERED BY OTHER PhD FELLOWS THAT UNDERSTAND THE DAYS OF GENESIS 1 AND 2 AS LITERAL 24 HOUR DAYS.
YOUR IDEAS OF COURSE MAKE IT EASY FOR YOU TO THROW OUT THE OBSERVANCE OF THE 7TH DAY SABBATH, AND MANGLE THE TEN COMMANDMENTS, IN SOME BIZZAR THEOLOGY. THEN IT MAKES IT EASIER FOR YOU TO UPHOLD AND TEACH THE OBSERVANCE OF WHAT YOU SAY IS THE NEW TESTAMENT HOLY SABBATH DAY— THE FIRST DAY OF THE WEEK— SUNDAY OBSERVANCE. WHAT PEOPLE LIKE YOU WILL DO TO MAKE THE COMMANDMENTS OF GOD OF NONE AFFECT (SEE MARK 7).
JESUS SAID THE SABBATH WAS MADE FOR MAN; YES IT WAS MADE ON THE 7TH LITERAL DAY OF GENESIS 2. JESUS IT IS WRITTEN OBSERVED THE WEEKLY SABBATH AS HIS CUSTOM WAS, YES WITH THE JEWS OF HIS TIME— THE 7TH DAY SABBATH, WHICH HAS NEVER BEEN LOST, THE JEWS HAVE KEPT IT IN TACT SINCE MOSES’ TIME. MAKES ME SO RIGHTEOUSLY ANGRY AT PEOPLE LIKE YOURSELVES. ONE DAY YOU WILL KNOW IN NO UNCERTAIN WAY, THE ERRORS OF YOUR APOSTASY - Keith Hunt]
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