Old Earth or Young Earth

[Guest]

The Young Earth theory was first started by an Irish archbishop and St. Bede in the 1600's+/- a few years. The early Hebrew and Christians never believed the earth was young. This was the product of very bad math done on the Bible. I believe the God created the universe and science tells us how it happened. The early Hebrews and Christians also believed the 7 day creation was an allegory as the word for yom has multiple meanings not just a 24 hour period, but an unknown space of time. The only problem I have with the evolution theory is that God isn't included and some of the testing instruments can yield questionable data.

[SavedOnebyGrace]

Source: Old Earth vs New Earth

 

Quote

 

What is the primary difference between “young-earth” and “old-earth” creationists?

The primary difference between young- and old-earth creationists is the speculated amount of time between God’s creative acts. Young-earthers insist that it was all accomplished in 144 hours—six successive 24-hour days—while old-earth (progressive) creationists allow for millions (or even billions) of years. This is usually done by:

1. placing long periods of time before Genesis 1:1 (making it a recent and local Creation);
2. placing the long periods of time between Genesis 1:1 and 1:2 (called “gap” views);
3. making the “days” of Genesis 1 long periods of time;
4. allowing long periods of time between literal 24-hour days in Genesis 1 (called “alternate day-age views); or
5. making the days of Genesis to be days of revelation of God to the writer, not days of Creation (called “revelatory day” views).

There are several variations within these perspectives, making a total of more than a dozen different views held by evangelical theologians on the matter.

 

I am a proponent of the Gap Theory.

[dprprb]

I was under the impression that the math used was founded in Peter saying a day with the Lord is a thousand years and a thousand years a day. I see that according to the Word OT Adam, Eve, Noah, Lamech, Methuselah etc all died the day they were born- in that NT measure....then God changes the rate to 120yrs. Did anyone anticipate what the change in rate caused to the way we measure it? Oh so He just knocks off a few years and off we go? Let's rephrase: God changes how He sees things to the new rate. That ought to be something major ..IMO.  My interpretation is strange and hinged on recving the OT and NT simultaneously and them having an interconnected nature  but I think a major change to nature should occur. I cant imagine an inconsequential act of God..

[Guest shiloh357]

The Gap Theory is simply a non-starter because the Hebrew of Gen. 1:2 doesn't allow for it.   Gen. 1:1 and 1:2 have what we refer to as a "vav disjunctive."  That means that Gen. 1:1 is a complete thought.   Gen. 1:1 isn't a continuation of the truth statement of v. 1.

Gen. 1:2 starts off with the  word "and."   In Hebrew, "and" is one letter:  "vav,"  the 6th letter of the Hebrew alphabet.  When it occurs at the beginning of a verse, and is followed by a noun (in this case, "haeretz or "the earth")  it is a disjunctive, meaning it is not connected to the previous.  It is the beginning of a new thought. 

The Gap Theory depends on the word "ha-yah" (was)  to be translated as "became."  And it can be translated that way, depending on the context.   In this case, it cannot be translated that way.    If the "vav" at the beginning of v. 2 were followed by a verb, then ha-yah could and should be translated "became."  If that were the case, then Gen. 1:1 and 1:2 would form a "vav connective" or "vav conjunction" and verse 2 would flow from verse 1.  But that is not the case in this passage.

The "vav" disjunctive of 1:1 and 1:2 means that 1:1 is merely a synopsis and is no way connected to the new line of the thought of verse 2.   That means that the earth was not one thing in v. 1 but became something else in v. 2.  It completely torpedoes the Gap Theory from a biblical stand point.

[enoob57]

It amazes me of the scholars that have entered into this obvious error... for if it were true then

Genesis 2:1 (KJV)

[2:1] Thus the heavens and the earth were finished, and all the host of them.

[2] And on the seventh day God ended his work which he had made; and he rested on the seventh day from all his work which he had made.

[3] And God blessed the seventh day, and sanctified it: because that in it he had rested from all his work which God created and made.

The Word is replete with the fact of God's teaching on sin / rebellion -yet- gap states God builds upon it and sanctifies it.
A definite error of grandiose proportions I'd say!  Life cannot be built upon death 'ye must be born again'... 
Love, Steven

[SavedOnebyGrace]

11 hours ago, dprprb said:

I was under the impression that the math used was founded in Peter saying a day with the Lord is a thousand years and a thousand years a day. I see that according to the Word OT Adam, Eve, Noah, Lamech, Methuselah etc all died the day they were born- in that NT measure....then God changes the rate to 120yrs. Did anyone anticipate what the change in rate caused to the way we measure it? Oh so He just knocks off a few years and off we go? Let's rephrase: God changes how He sees things to the new rate. That ought to be something major ..IMO.  My interpretation is strange and hinged on recving the OT and NT simultaneously and them having an interconnected nature  but I think a major change to nature should occur. I cant imagine an inconsequential act of God..

120 years is the time Noah has to build the ark, not man's lifetime.  Man had long lifetimes before and after the flood.  Peter's words about 1 of God's days equal to 1000 of ours is nothing more than a figure of speech.  God is the ancient of days, or in simpler terms, He is eternal.

[Guest shiloh357]

17 minutes ago, enoob57 said:

It amazes me of the scholars that have entered into this obvious error... for if it were true then

Genesis 2:1 (KJV)

[2:1] Thus the heavens and the earth were finished, and all the host of them.

[2] And on the seventh day God ended his work which he had made; and he rested on the seventh day from all his work which he had made.

[3] And God blessed the seventh day, and sanctified it: because that in it he had rested from all his work which God created and made.

The Word is replete with the fact of God's teaching on sin / rebellion -yet- gap states God builds upon it and sanctifies it.
A definite error of grandiose proportions I'd say!  Life cannot be built upon death 'ye must be born again'... 
Love, Steven

The Bible interprets itself and any place where the days of creation are mentioned elsewhere, outside of Genesis 1, they are spoken of as ordinary, 24 hour days, not longs epochs of time, as old earth proponents contend about Genesis 1. 

The Gap Theory ran into a theological quagmire, though and has been revised to evade the problem.   Originally, the Gap Theory stated that there was a pre-adamite human population.   This was a convenient way of accounting for cave men, Neanderthal, etc.  and the billions of years needed to account for alleged evolutionary changes in the  animal kingdom and in humanity.   Back in the day, many saw it as the bridge between the Bible and Evolution.

But the fact that God had to destroy that race of humanity raised a lot of concerns about the nature and character of God, namely why was that race of humans not eligible for redemption?   God's redemptive nature is immutable, but yet, God did not act redemptively toward these human beings.   Secondly, if God had to destroy a race of humans, then sin didn't originate with Adam as Paul stated.

So the Gap theory was revised to say that the earth was inhabited by an angelic kingdom led by Lucifer.  It wasn't revised because there was any biblical evidence to support the revision, but to avoid the obvious theological errors that the theory could not account for.    So it was really was no different than how the book of Mormon has had to edited and changed in order to avoid the obvious theological errors it contains.  

The Gap theory is a mess.

[enoob57]

20 minutes ago, Saved.One.by.Grace said:

120 years is the time Noah has to build the ark, not man's lifetime.  Man had long lifetimes before and after the flood.  Peter's words about 1 of God's days equal to 1000 of ours is nothing more than a figure of speech.  God is the ancient of days, or in simpler terms, He is eternal.

'120 years is the time Noah has to build the ark' not according to Scripture but is commonly taught as truth but denies the Biblical timeline God set forth:

Genesis 5:32 (KJV)

[32] And Noah was five hundred years old: and Noah begat Shem, Ham, and Japheth.

 

Genesis 6:9 (KJV)

[9] These are the generations of Noah: Noah was a just man and perfect in his generations, and Noah walked with God.

[10] And Noah begat three sons, Shem, Ham, and Japheth.

[11] The earth also was corrupt before God, and the earth was filled with violence.

[12] And God looked upon the earth, and, behold, it was corrupt; for all flesh had corrupted his way upon the earth.

[13] And God said unto Noah, The end of all flesh is come before me; for the earth is filled with violence through them; and, behold, I will destroy them with the earth.

[14] Make thee an ark of gopher wood; rooms shalt thou make in the ark, and shalt pitch it within and without with pitch.

Genesis 7:6 (KJV)

[6] And Noah was six hundred years old when the flood of waters was upon the earth.

The very most Scripture allowes is 100 years.... whatever the 120 it cannot be Ark build time!
   Love, Steven

 

[enoob57]

17 minutes ago, shiloh357 said:

The Bible interprets itself and any place where the days of creation are mentioned elsewhere, outside of Genesis 1, they are spoken of as ordinary, 24 hour days, not longs epochs of time, as old earth proponents contend about Genesis 1. 

The Gap Theory ran into a theological quagmire, though and has been revised to evade the problem.   Originally, the Gap Theory stated that there was a pre-adamite human population.   This was a convenient way of accounting for cave men, Neanderthal, etc.  and the billions of years needed to account for alleged evolutionary changes in the  animal kingdom and in humanity.   Back in the day, many saw it as the bridge between the Bible and Evolution.

But the fact that God had to destroy that race of humanity raised a lot of concerns about the nature and character of God, namely why was that race of humans not eligible for redemption?   God's redemptive nature is immutable, but yet, God did not act redemptively toward these human beings.   Secondly, if God had to destroy a race of humans, then sin didn't originate with Adam as Paul stated.

So the Gap theory was revised to say that the earth was inhabited by an angelic kingdom led by Lucifer.  It wasn't revised because there was any biblical evidence to support the revision, but to avoid the obvious theological errors that the theory could not account for.    So it was really was no different than how the book of Mormon has had to edited and changed in order to avoid the obvious theological errors it contains.  

The Gap theory is a mess.

I like to establish a good hermeneutic of thought solely from the Scripture and stand there... I am ready at all times to give a good account of my place by Scripture alone. I labor daily to this end and establish avtivities in my life that support that stand -however there's this other guy...  

[SavedOnebyGrace]

1 hour ago, enoob57 said:

'120 years is the time Noah has to build the ark' not according to Scripture but is commonly taught as truth but denies the Biblical timeline God set forth:

Genesis 5:32 (KJV)

[32] And Noah was five hundred years old: and Noah begat Shem, Ham, and Japheth.

Genesis 6:9 (KJV)

[9] These are the generations of Noah: Noah was a just man and perfect in his generations, and Noah walked with God.

[10] And Noah begat three sons, Shem, Ham, and Japheth.

[11] The earth also was corrupt before God, and the earth was filled with violence.

[12] And God looked upon the earth, and, behold, it was corrupt; for all flesh had corrupted his way upon the earth.

[13] And God said unto Noah, The end of all flesh is come before me; for the earth is filled with violence through them; and, behold, I will destroy them with the earth.

[14] Make thee an ark of gopher wood; rooms shalt thou make in the ark, and shalt pitch it within and without with pitch.

Genesis 7:6 (KJV)

[6] And Noah was six hundred years old when the flood of waters was upon the earth.

The very most Scripture allowes is 100 years.... whatever the 120 it cannot be Ark build time!
   Love, Steven

So, according to you, Shem, Ham, and Japheth were triplets.

Source: Apologetics Press

Noah, 120 Years, and the Flood

Quote

 

by	Eric Lyons, M.Min.

Question:

“I am confused about some of the numbers found in Genesis 5-7. What exactly does the 120 years refer to in Genesis 6:3? I’ve heard some say that it refers to the limit of one’s lifespan on Earth, but that can’t be true because people lived longer than 120 years after the Flood. I also don’t understand how, as some have concluded, it could refer to there only being 120 years left before God flooded the Earth. That seems impossible since Noah was 500+ years old when he learned about the Flood (Genesis 5:32-6:13), and the Flood occurred when he was 600 (Genesis 7:6). It seems that either the 120 years does not refer to the time just before the Flood or the “120 years” should have been “100 years” (otherwise the Flood would have come in the 620^th year of Noah and not the 600^th year). Can you help explain this conundrum?”

Answer:

 You have correctly concluded that the “120 years” reference in Genesis 6:3 does not allude to the limit of a person’s lifespan on Earth. A number of people have lived longer than 120 since the Flood. Just five chapters after the “120 years” reference, we learn that after Noah’s son Shem begot Arphaxad, “Shem lived five hundreds years” (11:11). Then, each patriarch listed after Arphaxad (for about the next 500 years) lived to be over 120 years old (and in most cases well over 120—Genesis 6:12-25). Abraham, Ishmael, Isaac, and Jacob all lived to be older than 120 (Genesis 25:7; 25:17; 35:28; 47:28). Even Aaron, the first high priest of Israel, who lived approximately 1,000 years after the Flood, lived to be 123 (Numbers 33:39). What’s more, according to the Encyclopedia of Genetics, Jeanne Calment of France “died in 1998 at the age of 122.”¹

Furthermore, immediate and remote Bible verses suggest the 120 years is a reference to something very different than the limit of a person’s lifespan. The people on Earth during Noah’s pre-Flood life were extremely wicked. In fact, “the wickedness of man” was so “great,” that “every intent of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually” (Genesis 6:5). The Earth had become so depraved and filled with so much violence by the time Noah was 500 that God decided to bring destruction upon the Earth, the likes of which the world had never seen (6:13; 7:6). However, since God is perfect in His patience and desires to see sinners repent rather than perish (whether in the Flood or in eternal hell—2 Peter 3:9; cf. Romans 15:4-5; 1 Timothy 2:4), “the Divine longsuffering waited in the days of Noah” (1 Peter 3:20). Similar to how God patiently waited hundreds of years before bringing judgment upon the increasingly wicked Canaanites (since at the time of Abraham their sin had “not yet reached its full measure”—Genesis 15:16, NIV), God waited year after year, and decade after decade “while the ark was being prepared” (1 Peter 3:20).

During this waiting period, God’s “Spirit” contended with a works-of-the-flesh-loving mankind for 120 years (Genesis 6:3; cf. Galatians 5:19-21). Notice that when Peter wrote about Noah, his disobedient contemporaries, and the patience of God (1 Peter 3:20), he remarked that “the Spirit” of Christ “went and preached to the spirits in prison” (3:18-19, emp. added).

• When exactly did the Spirit of Christ do this? When “the Divine longsuffering waited in the days of Noah” (3:20, emp. added).
• How did God’s Spirit go about His work? We are not informed in all the ways He worked during the years leading up to the Flood, but we do know that Noah was “a preacher of righteousness” (2 Peter 2:5). It may be that Lamech and Methuselah (Noah’s father and grandfather) were also godly preachers through whom God’s Holy Spirit spoke.
• To whom did the Spirit speak? Peter says, “To the spirits in prison, who formerly were disobedient” (3:19-20). How did the Spirit speak to spirits in prison? Dave Miller explained: “[A]t the time Peter was writing the words, that is where those people were situated. Those who were drowned in the Flood of Noah’s day descended into the hadean realm, where they continued to reside in Peter’s day. This realm is the same location where the rich man was placed (Luke 16:23), as were the sinning angels (“Tartarus”—2 Peter 2:4).”² 

Indeed, in the days of Noah the Spirit of Christ spoke to disobedient souls (before they departed from their bodies in death for the hadean realm, i.e., “spirit prison”). Since God is longsuffering with mankind, He “waited patiently” (1 Peter 3:20, NIV). He did not bring judgment upon the world hastily. Our gracious God did not fail to give mankind ample time to repent. However, the Lord’s longsuffering is not eternal suffering. He did not wait forever. Rather, as the Lord said in Genesis, “My Spirit shall not strive with man forever, for he is indeed flesh; yet his days shall be one hundred and twenty years” (6:3). It seems biblically consistent and perfectly logical to conclude that this period of 120 years was the amount of time that the human race as a whole had to repent before the Flood waters destroyed the Earth.

To some, however, this conclusion seems impossible. After all, if, before we ever learn about the coming Flood, Genesis 5:32 indicates that Noah was 500 years old when he “begot Shem, Ham, and Japheth,” and Genesis 7:6 specifies that the Flood occurred when Noah was 600, then only 100 years of time is possible, not 120, right?

As with all perceived problems with the inspired Word of God, the difficulty is not with the inspired penmen, but with uninspired interpreters. There actually is no difficulty whatsoever if we take into account the fact that neither the book of Genesis nor the Bible as a whole was written in a strict chronological fashion.³ For example, Genesis 2:5-25 does not pick up where Genesis 1 left off. What’s more, Genesis 11 speaks of an event that actually occurred when some of the people mentioned in the previous chapter (Genesis 10) actually lived.⁴ Similarly, the 120 years of Genesis 6:3 could reasonably extend back to when Noah was 480 years old, not 500. Simply because the Bible reader learns that Noah was 500 when he began having sons (Genesis 5:32),⁵ does not mean that God could not have begun communicating at an earlier time about His impending judgment upon the world.

Finally, notice that Genesis 5:32 serves as the conclusion to the Adam-to-Noah genealogy. As with other Bible passages where one or more genealogies precede the mention of certain events that actually occurred during or before the lifetimes of some of those previously mentioned in the genealogies,⁶ some of the events in Genesis 6:1-9 (including God’s expressed warning in 6:3) took place before Noah actually began siring sons at age 500.

Endnotes

¹ “Genetics of Ageing” (2001), Encyclopedia of Genetics, ed. Eric C.R. Reeve (New York: Routledge), p. 582, emp. added.

² Dave Miller (2002), “Did Jesus Go to Hell? Did He Preach to Spirits in Prison?” Apologetics Press, http://apologeticspress.org/APContent.aspx?category=10&article=851&topic=71.

³ See Eric Lyons (2005), “Alleged Chronological Contradictions,” Reason & Revelation, 25[10]:73-79, October, http://apologeticspress.org/APContent.aspx?category=6&article=1582.

⁴ Ibid.

⁵ Genesis 11:10, 7:6, and 8:13 seem to indicate that Shem was not the firstborn of Noah, but was born two years later. If so, the number 500 represents the year in which Noah began having sons. A comparison of Genesis 11:26, Acts 7:4, Genesis 11:32, and 12:4 suggests that Abraham was not the firstborn son in his family either. Likely, Shem, Abraham, Arphaxad (Genesis 11:10; 10:22) and others are all mentioned first for the same reason—because they are Messianic ancestors, not because they were necessarily the firstborn sons of their fathers.

Interestingly, numerous other Messianic ancestors, such as Seth, Isaac, Jacob, Judah, and Perez, were not firstborn sons. Lest someone accuse Moses of dishonesty when recording these genealogies, we must remember that “the year of begetting a first son, known in the Old Testament as ‘the beginning of strength,’ was an important year in the life of the Israelite (Gen. 49:3; Deut. 21:17; Psa. 78:51; and Psa. 105:36). It is this year…and not the year of the birth of the Messianic link, that is given in each case in Genesis 11” [John C. Whitcomb and Henry M. Morris (1961), The Genesis Flood (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker), p. 480.]

⁶ See 1 Chronicles 1-11 where people are listed (e.g., the children and grandchildren of Zerubbabel—3:19ff.) who would likely not even be born until sometime after the close of the events recorded in 2 Chronicles; cf. Ezra 1-5. See also Genesis 10-11.