Does The Great Deluge In Genesis Of Necessity Must Be Local?

[gluadys]

Are you saying there was no flood and it is just a made up story?

Not precisely. There may have been an actual, historical flood (necessarily local) which played a role in the inspiration of the flood story of Genesis.

However, the Genesis story is not the account of the historical flood; it is an account of a flood which covered all the earth as a judgment on human wickedness. IOW, it was not the intention of the author to report accurately on the material details of a historical event. His intention was to report accurately both God's judgment on sin and his faithfulness to those who trust in him.

The flood is not written as a mere story, it is written as a historical account.

What is "mere" about an important story? Why do you demean one of the most natural, instinctive and effective teaching tools humans have ever developed? God loves stories; the sacred text is filled with them. God knows our minds and hearts; after all he created them. He made us capable of creating stories, and receiving the stories by which he reveals himself to us.

I agree, what was written is not a "mere" story. It is a God-inspired story with much to teach us about God and about ourselves.

 

[ScottA]

Here an atheist/agnostic/non-believer calculated the math surrounding Noah, his ark, and a global flood, here is his results:

Another thing, how did 8 people manage to feed one million plus or even hundreds of thousands of animals over the course of a year, some animals require hundreds of pounds of nutrition everyday.

How could largest zoo the world has ever seen, set in a giant ship floating on a flooded earth, be maintained by a miniscule staff of eight? Image the work that would be required daily? Would they need to work 16 hour shifts... 20 hour shifts daily? They would be dead on their feet every day.

You know what's really cool? It takes a willing person to believe such a tale.

God, being God...can do anything. So, personally, I believe the story, not because of what is said, but because of who said it. I believed in Santa Claus...and it doesn't even matter if it was true. My parents loved me, and brought joy into my life with a tale that tells me what it is like when a jolly, fatherly character with a bunch of little helpers showers me with gifts...just for being good, and for the asking. Sounds like someOne I have come to know for real...and they (my parents) showed me what it looked like.

But get use to parables and tales. The whole world, everything, was "created"...contrived, out of nothing. Images, out of nothing. Matter is energy, Time is an illusion. History is His story...and He performs miracles, walks through walls, and speaks the truth in parables. We can believe it...because it's Him, the Creator of heaven and earth.

 

[Doveaman]

Thus you are saying these animals migrated to Madagascar and Australia and evolved VERY RAPIDLY in matter of hundreds to a thousand or two years to become unique in all the world, even though there is not a single migratory fossil anywhere in the world to trace that migration into Madagascar and Australia.

That is lame Doveman.

The flood occurred over four thousand years ago, not two. Animals don't always fossilize when they die. The right conditions must be present. Besides, a few could have fossilized and are still waiting to be found.

Keep looking.

The scattering of mankind occurred at the time of Peleg. And Peleg was born just a 111 years after the flood.

Genesis 10:25 And unto Eber were born two sons: the name of one was Peleg; for in his days was the earth divided; - Tower of Babel

Its very simple math, when was Arphaxad born, two years after the flood then you add the years between each birth between Arphaxad to Peleg ... which is 111 years.

It does not tell us exactly when in Peleg's "days" the earth was divided.

Peleg lived for 239 years.

The scattering could have occurred at any time within those 239 years.

Peleg was born 111 years after the flood and he lived for 239 years.

That's a total of 349 years in which the scattering could have occurred.

 

[Doveaman]

Not precisely. There may have been an actual, historical flood (necessarily local) which played a role in the inspiration of the flood story of Genesis. However, the Genesis story is not the account of the historical flood; it is an account of a flood which covered all the earth as a judgment on human wickedness.

If all the land was in one local area (one place) the flood would necessarily be local since there was water everywhere else already:

*And God said, "Let the water under the sky be gathered to one place, and let dry ground appear." And it was so.* -- (Gen 1:9).

If the water was in one place, the dry ground would also be in one place and all life on dry ground would be in that one place, and a flood in that one place would destroy all life on dry ground.

IOW, it was not the intention of the author to report accurately on the material details of a historical event. His intention was to report accurately both God's judgment on sin and his faithfulness to those who trust in him.

You act as if you know the author's intent when you actually don't.

The accuracy of both God's judgment on sin and his faithfulness to those who trust in him is reported accurately in the material details of a historical event and a future even:

*As it was in the days of Noah, so it will be at the coming of the Son of Man. For in the days before the flood, people were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, up to the day Noah entered the ark; and they knew nothing about what would happen until the flood came and took them all away. That is how it will be at the coming of the Son of Man.* -- (Matt 24:37-39).

What is "mere" about an important story? Why do you demean one of the most natural, instinctive and effective teaching tools humans have ever developed? God loves stories; the sacred text is filled with them. God knows our minds and hearts; after all he created them. He made us capable of creating stories, and receiving the stories by which he reveals himself to us.

I agree, what was written is not a "mere" story. It is a God-inspired story with much to teach us about God and about ourselves.

When Jesus teaches a parable He tells us plainly that it's a parable. The flood is not taught as a parable. The most simple reading of the Genesis account is literal and historical. No mental gymnastics required.

 

[random person]

The flood occurred over four thousand years ago, not two. Animals don't always fossilize when they die. The right conditions must be present. Besides, a few could have fossilized and are still waiting to be found.

Keep looking.

No. Not a single fossil has been found to trace Australia's and Madagascar flora and fauna to the Middle East. And the fact, both fossils and nonextinct living species are unique to Madagascar and Australia, to say these creatures migrated from Middle East just 4,000 years ago, how did they become so unique and diverse from the rest of the world? Evolution? Several hundreds of years to a couple of thousands years worth of evolution?

It does not tell us exactly when in Peleg's "days" the earth was divided.

Peleg lived for 239 years.

The scattering could have occurred at any time within those 239 years.

Peleg was born 111 years after the flood and he lived for 239 years.

That's a total of 349 years in which the scattering could have occurred.

That only makes it worse for the literalist if they believe the Garden of Eden is 6,000 years old, because now the date of the tower changes from 2233 BCE to 1994 BCE approaching the birth of Abraham and Abraham was born around 300 years after the Flood. But the text suggests that Peleg was named for the division of the Earth.

Remember the Flood occurred 1,656 years after the earth was created according to YEC that believe the Earth was created around 4000 BCE.

 

[random person]

Timeline of Noah's Flood:

Event/Person ___________________ Passage ___Total Time from Creation (years)

God created everything. Genesis 1–2 0
Adam became the father of Seth at 130. Genesis 5:3 0 + 130 = 130
Seth became the father of Enosh at 105. Genesis 5:6 130 + 105 = 235
Enosh became the father of Kenan at 90. Genesis 5:9 235 + 90 = 325
Cainan became the father of Mahalalel at 70. Genesis 5:12 325 + 70 = 395
Mahalalel became the father of Jared at 65. Genesis 5:15 395 + 65 = 460
Jared became the father of Enoch at 162. Genesis 5:18 460 + 162 = 622
Enoch became the father of Methuselah at 65. Genesis 5:21 622 + 65 = 687
Methuselah became the father of Lamech at 187. Genesis 5:25 687 + 187 = 874
Lamech became the father of Noah at 182. Genesis 5:28 874 + 182 = 1056
The Flood started when Noah was 600. Genesis 7:6 1056 + 600 = 1656

 

[classicalhero]

No. Not a single fossil has been found to trace Australia's and Madagascar flora and fauna to the Middle East. And the fact, both fossils and nonextinct living species are unique to Madagascar and Australia, to say these creatures migrated from Middle East just 4,000 years ago, how did they become so unique and diverse from the rest of the world? Evolution? Several hundreds of years to a couple of thousands years worth of evolution?

The fossil record is rather incomplete. In fact there are fossils of such creature that currently live, in fact marsupial fossils have been found in Suoth America and Africa, where they haven't been known to live. http://newsroom.unsw.edu.au/news/science/marsupial-links-south-america-and-africa

The two fragments are set to overturn the conventional theory about the evolution of marsupials, which holds that there was a single migration from the part of the Gondwana 'supercontinent' that became South America to the part that became Australia.

"The origins of Australian marsupials suddenly got a lot more complicated," says UNSW palaeontologist Dr Robin Beck, an ARC DECRA postdoctoral fellow.

"All the species of modern day marsupials here are quite closely related. The species represented by the ankle-bone belongs to an entirely different group - a group that we know lived in South America but, up until now, we thought never made it to Australia.

"The tooth is more of a mystery: are its origins in South America, Africa or somewhere else

 

[gluadys]

If all the land was in one local area (one place) the flood would necessarily be local since there was water everywhere else already:

*And God said, "Let the water under the sky be gathered to one place, and let dry ground appear." And it was so.* -- (Gen 1:9).

But it wasn't. Pangaea was formed about 300 million years ago, but began breaking up about 175 million years ago. By 90 million years ago much of the Atlantic Ocean had formed and the American continents were well separated from Africa/Europe/Asia. And Antarctica was separated from South America and southern Africa. All of this is before the extinction of the dinosaurs and much, much, much before the appearance of humans.

So there is no time within human existence (much less within recorded human history) when all land was in one local area.

If the water was in one place, the dry ground would also be in one place and all life on dry ground would be in that one place, and a flood in that one place would destroy all life on dry ground.

You do realize that the total land area of Pangaea was close to the total land area of all the continents added together, do you not? Hong Kong would be no more "local" to a person in Mesopotamia than it is today.

You act as if you know the author's intent when you actually don't.

Nor do you. What we do know is the limited extent of his knowledge. He knew nothing of the existence of sub-Saharan Africa, of any part of Europe more than a 100 miles north of the Mediterranean Sea or anything of Asia east of the Indus, if he even knew that much. He knew nothing of the American continents, of Japan, Australia, of either the north or south pole, of the Pacific Ocean and its islands. So, from his perspective, the lands he was aware of could seem to be all in one place; but from our perspective, he would be in error.

If you want to insist that all land was gathered together in one place as late as the days of Noah, then, just as you have to propose super-fast evolution to explain biodiversity, you need to propose super-fast tectonic movement to get the continents to their current positions. But there are serious problems with that; problems that would wipe out the life that had just been saved in the ark.

The accuracy of both God's judgment on sin and his faithfulness to those who trust in him is reported accurately in the material details of a historical event and a future even:

The only material details of any historical flood in the area are of a flood confined to some part of the ANE geography, which was certainly not the only habitation of life (not even just human life) at the time. And the story understood literally, disagrees that the flood was local and that terrestrial life anywhere was not affected. So the historical details and the story details cannot be reconciled. At least not with the proviso that the literal meaning of the story is an accurate representation of a possible historical event.

When Jesus teaches a parable He tells us plainly that it's a parable. The flood is not taught as a parable. The most simple reading of the Genesis account is literal and historical. No mental gymnastics required.

No he doesn't. The gospel writer sometimes (but not always) tells us it is a parable. Jesus just tells the story. He doesn't tell his listeners that it is a parable.

Sure the most simple reading of any narrative is the literal reading with the assumption that it is history. That doesn't make it the only possible reading, the intended reading, the most sensible reading or a correct reading. We have plenty of reasons to hold that the story as we have received it is not accurate history, so re-evaluating what it actually is becomes a worthwhile endeavour.

The important thing is that whatever our conclusion about the nature of the story, we still take it seriously as a communication from an author chosen by God to provide an important message from God to us. Why is this story here in sacred scripture? Even in the case of actual history, we need to ask why it is important to keep a memory of this event rather than thousands of others whose memory is not preserved.

 

[Doveaman]

No. Not a single fossil has been found to trace Australia's and Madagascar flora and fauna to the Middle East. And the fact, both fossils and nonextinct living species are unique to Madagascar and Australia

So what? Animals don't always fossilize when they die. And just as God brought them to the Ark and preserved them on the Ark without any of them dying, He could also have preserved them and brought them to Australia and Madagascar without any of them dying.

to say these creatures migrated from Middle East just 4,000 years ago, how did they become so unique and diverse from the rest of the world? Evolution? Several hundreds of years to a couple of thousands years worth of evolution?

Yes, 4400 years of divinely inspired evolution. Not Darwinian inspired evolution.

That only makes it worse for the literalist if they believe the Garden of Eden is 6,000 years old, because now the date of the tower changes from 2233 BCE to 1994 BCE approaching the birth of Abraham and Abraham was born around 300 years after the Flood.

I never said the scattering was 300 years after the flood. I said it could have occurred anytime between Peleg's birth and Peleg's death, so it could have been 120 to 220 years after the flood for all we know.

But the text suggests that Peleg was named for the division of the Earth.

Sometimes names are given to signify a future event:

"You are to give him the name Jesus, because he will save his people from their sins." -- (Matt 1:21).

 

[Doveaman]

But it wasn't. Pangaea was formed about 300 million years ago, but began breaking up about 175 million years ago.

I am not talking about Pangaea. I am talking about a few thousand years ago.

Genesis 1 begins with the earth covered in water. This means that any preexisting continents would have been buried under that water. Genesis is describing a time when those continents were buried under water and were now beginning to reemerge from the water. The only existing continent that had emerged up to that point was located in one place. It was on this one continent in this one place that life was created, and it was on this one continent in this one place that the flood occurred destroying all life on that continent.

So there is no time within human existence (much less within recorded human history) when all land was in one local area.

Except in Genesis.

Just because you don’t see it as recorded history doesn’t mean it isn’t so. A historical reading of Genesis makes the most sense. This is why Jesus and his apostles referred to it when teaching historical lessons.

What we do know is the limited extent of his knowledge.

No we don’t. You are just saying that because it makes you feel like you actually know, when you actually don't.

He knew nothing of the existence of sub-Saharan Africa, of any part of Europe more than a 100 miles north of the Mediterranean Sea or anything of Asia east of the Indus, if he even knew that much. He knew nothing of the American continents, of Japan, Australia, of either the north or south pole, of the Pacific Ocean and its islands.

God knew, and it was God who inspired what the author wrote. You act as if God had nothing to do with what was written.

So, from his perspective, the lands he was aware of could seem to be all in one place; but from our perspective, he would be in error.

Those continents you described would still have been buried under the water described in Genesis 1. The only continent that had emerged by the time of the flood was in one place. So no error.

If you want to insist that all land was gathered together in one place as late as the days of Noah, then, just as you have to propose super-fast evolution to explain biodiversity, you need to propose super-fast tectonic movement to get the continents to their current positions. But there are serious problems with that; problems that would wipe out the life that had just been saved in the ark.

The only thing I need to propose is that all the continents were still buried under the water described in Genesis 1 and only a single continent had emerged in one place by the time of the flood.

The only material details of any historical flood in the area are of a flood confined to some part of the ANE geography, which was certainly not the only habitation of life (not even just human life) at the time. And the story understood literally, disagrees that the flood was local and that terrestrial life anywhere was not affected. So the historical details and the story details cannot be reconciled. At least not with the proviso that the literal meaning of the story is an accurate representation of a possible historical event.

If all life on dry land existed on a single continent in one place, the flooding of that continent would be a global flood since everywhere else was already covered in water. It was only after Noah's flood that all the continents we see today began to reemerge.

No he doesn't.

Yes he does.

The gospel writer sometimes (but not always) tells us it is a parable. Jesus just tells the story. He doesn't tell his listeners that it is a parable.

Yes he does.

You are again demonstration why your interpretation of Scripture is flawed.

Quotes from Jesus:

Matt 13:18
Therefore hear the parable

Matt 21:33
Hear another parable

Matt 24:32
Now learn this parable

Mark 4:13
Do you not understand this parable

Luke 8:11
Now the parable is this

Sure the most simple reading of any narrative is the literal reading with the assumption that it is history. That doesn't make it the only possible reading, the intended reading, the most sensible reading or a correct reading. We have plenty of reasons to hold that the story as we have received it is not accurate history, so re-evaluating what it actually is becomes a worthwhile endeavor.

No it isn’t.

What you have is a fabricated theory on animal and human evolution and a whole lot of mental gymnastics to try to fit Genesis into that theory. It is the theory that needs re-evaluating, not the Genesis account.

The important thing is that whatever our conclusion about the nature of the story, we still take it seriously as a communication from an author chosen by God to provide an important message from God to us. Why is this story here in sacred scripture? Even in the case of actual history, we need to ask why it is important to keep a memory of this event rather than thousands of others whose memory is not preserved.

It is the historical details that adds to its importance. To take away from the historical details is to take away from its importance. The whole point of the historical account is so we can learn from the past. We learn who God is, we learn what he did and how he did it, and we learn how we are to relate to him based on the examples of those who lived in the past. An allegorical interpretation takes away from that message because an allegory is a fictional story that teaches us nothing about the things God actually did in the past.

 

[random person]

So what? Animals don't always fossilize when they die. And just as God brought them to the Ark and preserved them on the Ark without any of them dying, He could also have preserved them and brought them to Australia and Madagascar without any of them dying.
Yes, 4400 years of divinely inspired evolution. Not Darwinian inspired evolution.
I never said the scattering was 300 years after the flood. I said it could have occurred anytime between Peleg's birth and Peleg's death, so it could have been 120 to 220 years after the flood for all we know.
Sometimes names are given to signify a future event:

"You are to give him the name Jesus, because he will save his people from their sins." -- (Matt 1:21).

Here is a great compilation of information of the myriad of difficulties an ark and a global flood present to the world's flora and fauna:

Gathering the Animals

Bringing all kinds of animals together in the vicinity of the ark presents significant problems.

Could animals have traveled from elsewhere? If the animals traveled from other parts of the world, many of them would have faced extreme difficulties.

• Some, like sloths and penguins, can't travel overland very well at all.
• Some, like koalas and many insects, require a special diet. How did they bring it along?
• Some cave-dwelling arthropods can't survive in less than 100% relative humidity.
• Some, like dodos, must have lived on islands. If they didn't, they would have been easy prey for other animals. When mainland species like rats or pigs are introduced to islands, they drive many indigenous species to extinction. Those species would not have been able to survive such competition if they lived where mainland species could get at them before the Flood.

Could animals have all lived near Noah? Some creationists suggest that the animals need not have traveled far to reach the Ark; a moderate climate could have made it possible for all of them to live nearby all along. However, this proposal makes matters even worse. The last point above would have applied not only to island species, but to almost all species. Competition between species would have driven most of them to extinction.

There is a reason why Gila monsters, yaks, and quetzals don't all live together in a temperate climate. They can't survive there, at least not for long without special care. Organisms have preferred environments outside of which they are at a deadly disadvantage. Most extinctions are caused by destroying the organisms' preferred environments. The creationists who propose all the species living together in a uniform climate are effectively proposing the destruction of all environments but one. Not many species could have survived that.

How was the Ark loaded? Getting all the animals aboard the Ark presents logistical problems which, while not impossible, are highly impractical. Noah had only seven days to load the Ark ( Gen. 7:4-10). If only 15764 animals were aboard the Ark (see section 3), one animal must have been loaded every 38 seconds, without letup. Since there were likely more animals to load, the time pressures would have been even worse.

Caring for the Animals

Special diets. Many animals, especially insects, require special diets. Koalas, for example, require eucalyptus leaves, and silkworms eat nothing but mulberry leaves. For thousands of plant species (perhaps even most plants), there is at least one animal that eats only that one kind of plant. How did Noah gather all those plants aboard, and where did he put them?

Other animals are strict carnivores, and some of those specialize on certain kinds of foods, such as small mammals, insects, fish, or aquatic invertebrates. How did Noah determine and provide for all those special diets?

Fresh foods. Many animals require their food to be fresh. Many snakes, for example, will eat only live foods (or at least warm and moving). Parasitoid wasps only attack living prey. Most spiders locate their prey by the vibrations it produces. [Foelix, 1996] Most herbivorous insects require fresh food. Aphids, in fact, are physically incapable of sucking from wilted leaves. How did Noah keep all these food supplies fresh?

Food preservation/Pest control. Food spoilage is a major concern on long voyages; it was especially thus before the inventions of canning and refrigeration. The large quantities of food aboard would have invited infestations of any of hundreds of stored product pests (especially since all of those pests would have been aboard), and the humidity one would expect aboard the Ark would have provided an ideal environment for molds. How did Noah keep pests from consuming most of the food?

Ventilation. The ark would need to be well ventilated to disperse the heat, humidity, and waste products (including methane, carbon dioxide, and ammonia) from the many thousands of animals which were crowded aboard. Woodmorappe (pp. 37-42) interprets Genesis 6:16 to mean there was an 18-inch opening all around the top, and says that this, with slight breezes, would have been enough to provide adequate ventilation. However, the ark was divided into separate rooms and decks (Gen. 6:14,16). How was fresh air circulated throughout the structure?

Sanitation. The ungulates alone would have produced tons of manure a day. The waste on the lowest deck at least (and possibly the middle deck) could not simply be pushed overboard, since the deck was below the water line; the waste would have to be carried up a deck or two. Vermicomposting could reduce the rate of waste accumulation, but it requires maintenance of its own. How did such a small crew dispose of so much waste?

Exercise/Animal handling. The animals aboard the ark would have been in very poor shape unless they got regular exercise. (Imagine if you had to stay in an area the size of a closet for a year.) How were several thousand diverse kinds of animals exercised regularly?

Manpower for feeding, watering, etc. How did a crew of eight manage a menagerie larger and more diverse than that found in zoos requiring many times that many employees? Woodmorappe claims that eight people could care for 16000 animals, but he makes many unrealistic and invalid assumptions. Here are a few things he didn't take into account:

• Feeding the animals would take much longer if the food was in containers to protect it from pests.
• Many animals would have to be hand-fed.
• Watering several animals at once via troughs would not work aboard a ship. The water would be sloshed out by the ship's roll.
• Many animals, in such an artificial environment, would have required additional special care. For example, all of the hoofed animals would need to have their hooves trimmed several times during the year. [Batten, 1976, pp. 39-42]
• Not all manure could be simply pushed overboard; a third of it at least would have to be carried up at least one deck.
• Corpses of the dead animals would have to be removed regularly.
• Animals can't be expected to run laps and return to their cages without a lot of human supervision.

Species Survival and Post-Flood Ecology

"He blotted out every living thing that was upon the face of the ground," the Bible says (Gen 7:23). If the Flood was as described, that must have been an understatement.

How did all the modern plant species survive?

• Many plants (seeds and all) would be killed by being submerged for a few months. This is especially true if they were soaked in salt water. Some mangroves, coconuts, and other coastal species have seed which could be expected to survive the Flood itself, but what of the rest?
• Most seeds would have been buried under many feet (even miles) of sediment. This is deep enough to prevent spouting.
• Most plants require established soils to grow--soils which would have been stripped by the Flood.
• Some plants germinate only after being exposed to fire or after being ingested by animals; these conditions would be rare (to put it mildly) after the Flood.
• Noah could not have gathered seeds for all plants because not all plants produce seeds, and a variety of plant seeds can't survive a year before germinating. [Garwood, 1989; Benzing, 1990; Densmore & Zasada, 1983] Also, how did he distribute them all over the world?

How did all the fish survive? Some require cool clear water, some need brackish water, some need ocean water, some need water even saltier. A flood would have destroyed at least some of these habitats.

How did sensitive marine life such as coral survive? Since most coral are found in shallow water, the turbidity created by the runoff from the land would effectively cut them off from the sun. The silt covering the reef after the rains were over would kill all the coral. By the way, the rates at which coral deposits calcium are well known, and some highly mature reefs (such a the great barrier) have been around for millions of years to be deposited to their observed thickness.

How did diseases survive? Many diseases can't survive in hosts other than humans. Many others can only survive in humans and in short-lived arthropod vectors. The list includes typhus, measles, smallpox, polio, gonorrhea, syphilis. For these diseases to have survived the Flood, they must all have infected one or more of the eight people aboard the Ark.

Other animals aboard the ark must have suffered from multiple diseases, too, since there are other diseases specific to other animals, and the nonspecific diseases must have been somewhere.

Host-specific diseases which don't kill their host generally can't survive long, since the host's immune system eliminates them. (This doesn't apply to diseases such as HIV and malaria which can hide from the immune system.) For example, measles can't last for more than a few weeks in a community of less than 250,000 [Keeling & Grenfell, 1997] because it needs nonresistant hosts to infect. Since the human population aboard the ark was somewhat less than 250,000, measles and many other infectious diseases would have gone extinct during the Flood.

Some diseases that can affect a wide range of species would have found conditions on the Ark ideal for a plague. Avian viruses, for example, would have spread through the many birds on the ark. Other plagues would have affected the mammals and reptiles. Even these plague pathogens, though, would have died out after all their prospective hosts were either dead or resistant.

How did short-lived species survive? Adult mayflies on the ark would have died in a few days, and the larvae of many mayflies require shallow fresh running water. Many other insects would face similar problems.

How could more than a handful of species survive in a devastated habitat? The Flood would have destroyed the food and shelter which most species need to survive.

How did predators survive? How could more than a handful of the predator species on the ark have survived, with only two individuals of their prey to eat? All of the predators at the top of the food pyramid require larger numbers of food animals beneath them on the pyramid, which in turn require large numbers of the animals they prey on, and so on, down to the primary producers (plants etc.) at the bottom. And if the predators survived, how did the other animals survive being preyed on?

How could more than a handful of species survive random influences that affect populations? Isolated populations with fewer than 20 members are usually doomed even when extraordinary measures are taken to protect them. [Simberloff, 1988]

Species Distribution and Diversity

How did animals get to their present ranges? How did koalas get from Ararat to Australia, polar bears to the Arctic, etc., when the kinds of environment they require to live doesn't exist between the two points. How did so many unique species get to remote islands?

How were ecological interdependencies preserved as animals migrated from Ararat? Did the yucca an the yucca moth migrate together across the Atlantic? Were there, a few thousand years ago, unbroken giant sequoia forests between Ararat and California to allow indigenous bark and cone beetles to migrate?

Why are so many animals found only in limited ranges? Why are so many marsupials limited to Australia; why are there no wallabies in western Indonesia? Why are lemurs limited to Madagascar? The same argument applies to any number of groups of plants and animals.

Why is inbreeding depression not a problem in most species? Harmful recessive alleles occur in significant numbers in most species. (Humans have, on average, 3 to 4 lethal recessive alleles each.) When close relatives breed, the offspring are more likely to be homozygous for these harmful alleles, to the detriment of the offspring. Such inbreeding depression still shows up in cheetahs; they have about 1/6th the number of motile spermatozoa as domestic cats, and of those, almost 80% show morphological abnormalities. [O'Brien et al, 1987] How could more than a handful of species survive the inbreeding depression that comes with establishing a population from a single mating pair?

http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/faq-noahs-ark.html#flood

 

[gluadys]

I am not talking about Pangaea. I am talking about a few thousand years ago.

A few thousand years ago, the land was not all in one place. It was arranged around the world pretty much as it is today. Any difference would be in terms of inches, not the width of the Atlantic or Indian Oceans.

Genesis 1 begins with the earth covered in water. This means that any preexisting continents would have been buried under that water. Genesis is describing a time when those continents were buried under water and were now beginning to reemerge from the water. The only existing continent that had emerged up to that point was located in one place. It was on this one continent in this one place that life was created, and it was on this one continent in this one place that the flood occurred destroying all life on that continent.
Except in Genesis.

Then the Genesis event did not occur in the history of this world. None of this happened to this world only a few thousand years ago.

Are you saying then, that God did not create this world?

Just because you don’t see it as recorded history doesn’t mean it isn’t so.

That depends. People have only been recording history for about 6,000 years. But you place the flood well within that time. So in that case both the flood itself, and its aftermath should be part of recorded human history.

For what occurred prior to recorded human history, we still have the testimony of archeological artifacts and geology--neither of which are confined to a single place. 6,000 years ago there were many people living across the Atlantic in the Americas. So how could there be just one continent? There were people living in Australia after it had become a continent to itself. So how could there be just one continent?

A historical reading of Genesis makes the most sense.

Not if it requires that we rewrite the known facts of history.

This is why Jesus and his apostles referred to it when teaching historical lessons.

They were not teaching history. The lesson, in each case, theological. It was often about a point of law. For example: whether divorce is permissible (Jesus said "no".)

No we don’t. You are just saying that because it makes you feel like you actually know, when you actually don't.

Yes,we do. We may not know everything they knew about, but we do know that they did not know of the existence of continents and civilizations far from them, about the plants and animals of those places, and that their knowledge of the heavens was limited to what they could observe without telescopes--so they knew nothing of galaxies, the nature of what we call planets, the real distance of stars or what they actually are.

God knew, and it was God who inspired what the author wrote. You act as if God had nothing to do with what was written.

So God knew the science we know. No doubt God knows science we don't know yet, and knows what scientific mistakes we are making. Is there any evidence whatsoever that, as part of the process of inspiration, God told Hebrew prophets that many people lived far off in America across the great sea? Or that the stars visible in the sky are only a fraction of all the stars in our local galaxy?

These are not things people had to know to be inspired authors. The actual history of the universe: the big bang, the formation of stars and galaxies, the formation of our solar system, the 4 billion year history of the earth, the two million year history of our genus and two hundred thousand year history of our species are also things no one at the time needed to know to be an inspired author.

Those continents you described would still have been buried under the water described in Genesis 1.

But they weren't. Not at any time while humans have walked the earth. People were living on those continents a few thousand years ago. People who would have been drowned if the flood were a global event.

The only thing I need to propose is that all the continents were still buried under the water described in Genesis 1 and only a single continent had emerged in one place by the time of the flood.

And that proposal is at complete odds with the evidence of the historical and social realities of the time. Your proposal cannot refer to this planet.

Quotes from Jesus:

Matt 13:18
Therefore hear the parable

Matt 21:33
Hear another parable

Matt 24:32
Now learn this parable

Mark 4:13
Do you not understand this parable

Luke 8:11
Now the parable is this


Three of these are three accounts of the Parable of the Sower. All three are not about telling the parable, but about interpreting it privately to the disciples. To find how Jesus told it, you have to go to an earlier paragraph.

What do we find there?

"Listen! A sower went out to sow." Matt. 13:3b

"Listen! A sower went out to sow." Mark 4:3

"A sower went out to sow his seed" Luke 8:5

IOW, most of the people who heard the story were not told it was a parable. But, of course, Jesus called it a parable when speaking about the story later on when interpreting it in private to the disciples.

I give you the other two. Note that in Matthew 24 he is again speaking privately to the disciples.
And in Matthew 21 he is responding to the temple authorities. He has just told them one parable (which he did not personally identify as a parable Matt. 21:28) and now he tells them to listen to another.

So, contrary to what is often claimed (that Jesus clearly identified parables) we actually have a typical pattern of simply launching into a story. Identifying a story as a parable is primarily the work of the author/editor.

What you have is a fabricated theory on animal and human evolution and a whole lot of mental gymnastics to try to fit Genesis into that theory.

Why on earth would I try to fit Genesis into the theory of evolution?!? That is as ridiculous as trying to fit the theory of evolution into Genesis. They don't fit together, and that is that.

You have no call to refer to the theory of evolution as "fabricated". That is a serious accusation and slander against thousands of scientists and can in no way be substantiated. You only need it to be "fabricated" because you try to make Genesis something it is not: a scientific, objective account of the early history of our species.

Stop trying to make Genesis a science account and you no longer have to go evade actual history of the times.

It is the historical details that adds to its importance. To take away from the historical details is to take away from its importance. The whole point of the historical account is so we can learn from the past. We learn who God is, we learn what he did and how he did it, and we learn how we are to relate to him based on the examples of those who lived in the past. An allegorical interpretation takes away from that message because an allegory is a fictional story that teaches us nothing about the things God actually did in the past.

Yet we see Jesus and the apostles, not to mention earlier prophets, using allegory as an important teaching tool. His parables of the Prodigal Son and the Good Samaritan lose no force because these people are fictional characters. And we sometimes see actual people used as allegories, as when Paul sets up Hagar and Sarah as allegories of law and grace; old covenant and new. Allegory helps us retain the truth of a story which we now know cannot be actual history. If we have to believe in a false history to value the story, we lose everything: we lose our whole commitment to truth and to Him who is the Truth, and especially to the truth that God really created this world.

 

[Doveaman]

A few thousand years ago, the land was not all in one place. It was arranged around the world pretty much as it is today. Any difference would be in terms of inches, not the width of the Atlantic or Indian Oceans.

You don’t know that. You are assuming the past based on what you observe in the present. An assumption is not history.

Then the Genesis event did not occur in the history of this world. None of this happened to this world only a few thousand years ago.

Are you saying then, that God did not create this world?

I’m saying your knowledge of history is flawed. Those who lived in the past have better knowledge of the past than those who merely speculate on it

That depends. People have only been recording history for about 6,000 years. But you place the flood well within that time. So in that case both the flood itself, and its aftermath should be part of recorded human history.

It is. It’s called Genesis.

For what occurred prior to recorded human history, we still have the testimony of archeological artifacts and geology--neither of which are confined to a single place. 6,000 years ago there were many people living across the Atlantic in the Americas. So how could there be just one continent? There were people living in Australia after it had become a continent to itself. So how could there be just one continent?

This assumes that your dating methods are accurate. They are not. Your dating methods must first assume past conditions and then work forward from those assumptions. An assumption is not evidence.

Not if it requires that we rewrite the known facts of history.

What you claim to be history is not known facts. It is all assumed. Science does not know history. That’s why everything in science is held tentatively. In science there are no known facts of history.

So God knew the science we know.

He knew the history you don’t know.

These are not things people had to know to be inspired authors.

They had to know history.

Three of these are three accounts of the Parable of the Sower. All three are not about telling the parable, but about interpreting it privately to the disciples.

So you are in denial now? You are the one who said that Jesus doesn't tell his listeners that it is a parable. His disciples were among the listeners. It doesn’t matter if he told them before or after. He still told them.

Stop trying to make Genesis a science account and you no longer have to go evade actual history of the times.

Genesis is not a science account. It is a historical account. Science maybe used to try to explain the details of the history, but it is still history even without those details.

Yet we see Jesus and the apostles, not to mention earlier prophets, using allegory as an important teaching tool. His parables of the Prodigal Son and the Good Samaritan lose no force because these people are fictional characters. And we sometimes see actual people used as allegories, as when Paul sets up Hagar and Sarah as allegories of law and grace; old covenant and new.

That's correct. We also see real people being used to signify sin and redemption:

*For since death came through a man, the resurrection of the dead comes also through a man. For as in Adam all die, so in Christ all will be made alive.* -- (1 Cor 15:21a-22)

To deny Adam as real man is to deny Christ as real man.

Allegory helps us retain the truth of a story which we now know cannot be actual history.

And when that story is not actual history we can easily tell it is not. And when it is actual history we can also tell it is.

Luke 3:23-38:
*Now Jesus himself was about thirty years old when he began his ministry. He was the son, so it was thought, of Joseph...the son of David...the son of Judah, the son of Jacob, the son of Isaac, the son of Abraham...the son of Noah…the son of Seth, the son of Adam, the son of God.*

It takes some real mental gymnastics to deny that Noah and Adam were real, historical figures.

If we have to believe in a false history to value the story, we lose everything: we lose our whole commitment to truth and to Him who is the Truth, and especially to the truth that God really created this world.

I think you have it backwards. It is the history that tells us that God created everything, not an allegory. An allegorical interpretation denies the history, and when the history is denied we lose our whole commitment to truth and to Him who is the Truth, and especially to the truth that God really created this world.

 

[Doveaman]

Here is a great compilation of information of the myriad of difficulties an ark and a global flood present to the world's flora and fauna:

Your mistake is relying on observed natural processes to try to determine whether or not a super-natural event did occur.

The virgin birth and the resurrection of Jesus is inconsistent with observed natural processes, but they did occur.

 

[random person]

Your mistake is relying on observed natural processes to try to determine whether or not a super-natural event did occur.

The virgin birth and the resurrection of Jesus is inconsistent with observed natural processes, but they did occur.

Okay, it was supernatural act that all of the world's species of animals were loaded up on the ark in a SINGLE DAY.

Okay, it was supernatural act that every specific diet foods were successfully collected and gathered was provided for all animals on the ark.

Okay, it was supernatural act that ark had its very own climate controls for all animals, that they all received their own specific temperature, humidity, and substrate/bedding needs. Semi-aquatics received their own temperature controlled pools. Cold climates, desert climates, tropical climates, etc.

Okay, Noah afterwards toured the world and replanted all its trees and flora. Did he raise up every jungle and forest? Or was that a supernatural act too. Though the earth should still be underwater today. And if not all plantlife should be buried under the sediment and dead.

 

[Doveaman]

Okay, it was supernatural act that all of the world's species of animals were loaded up on the ark in a SINGLE DAY.

No. Only their ancestors were loaded. New species emerged after the flood.

Okay, it was supernatural act that every specific diet foods were successfully collected and gathered was provided for all animals on the ark.

Some of the animals were in hibernation. The rest ate vegetables.

*And to all the beasts of the earth and all the birds of the air and all the creatures that move on the ground — everything that has the breath of life in it — I give every green plant for food.* -- (Gen 1:30).

Okay, it was supernatural act that ark had its very own climate controls for all animals, that they all received their own specific temperature, humidity, and substrate/bedding needs. Semi-aquatics received their own temperature controlled pools. Cold climates, desert climates, tropical climates, etc.

All the animals lived on one continent in one place, so the climates and temperatures would not have varied that much.

*And God said, "Let the water under the sky be gathered to one place, and let dry ground appear." And it was so.* -- (Gen 1:9).

Okay, Noah afterwards toured the world and replanted all its trees and flora.

No. Some plants did survive the flood. The rest grew naturally after the flood.

Did he raise up every jungle and forest? Or was that a supernatural act too.

Under good growing conditions you can have a naturally grown jungle or forest in less than fifty years.

God did it in one day.

*The land produced vegetation, plants bearing seed according to their kinds and trees bearing fruit...And the evening and the morning were the third day.* -- (Gen 1:12-13).

Though the earth should still be underwater today.

Why should it? After the flood, much of the water receded deep underground to where it came from.

*On that day all the fountains of the great deep burst open, and the floodgates of the sky were opened.* -- (Gen 7:11).

And if not all plant life should be buried under the sediment and dead.

Jesus should be buried under the sediment and dead too, but he isn't.

 

[random person]

No. Only their ancestors were loaded. New species emerged after the flood.

So you believe in evolution, only it occurred at a hyper rate, huh?

Some of the animals were in hibernation. The rest ate vegetables.

Where does the Bible say anything about hibernation, don't forget they were all loaded upon the ark within a single day while the flood rains began that very same day.

*And to all the beasts of the earth and all the birds of the air and all the creatures that move on the ground — everything that has the breath of life in it — I give every green plant for food.*

-- (Gen 1:30).
All the animals lived on one continent in one place, so the climates and temperatures would not have varied that much.

*And God said, "Let the water under the sky be gathered to one place, and let dry ground appear." And it was so.* -- (Gen 1:9).
No. Some plants did survive the flood. The rest grew naturally after the flood.
Under good growing conditions you can have a naturally grown jungle or forest in less than fifty years.

God did it in one day.

*The land produced vegetation, plants bearing seed according to their kinds and trees bearing fruit...And the evening and the morning were the third day.* -- (Gen 1:12-13).
Why should it? After the flood, much of the water receded deep underground to where it came from.

*On that day all the fountains of the great deep burst open, and the floodgates of the sky were opened.* -- (Gen 7:11).
Jesus should be buried under the sediment and dead too, but he isn't.

But the animals didn't live on one continent and they didn't live in one climate and didn't live in one ecosystem.

This is really stretching every thing, if God was going to raise all plant life in a single day, why didn't he just raise all the animals again. Deus ex machina. That is not the way to approach the scriptures.

 

[gluadys]

You don’t know that. You are assuming the past based on what you observe in the present. An assumption is not history.

Conclusions from evidence are not assumptions.

I’m saying your knowledge of history is flawed. Those who lived in the past have better knowledge of the past than those who merely speculate on it

Obviously, those who lived through an event know it best; but most written records were not made on the spot. Often generations passed before a history was recorded in a permanent fashion, and by then the history had been storified and most of the people who told and retold the story knew no more about the actual history than you or I. We have only those written records, not the immediate knowledge of people who lived the history.

It is. It’s called Genesis.

That is your assumption. You can't use it to bolster your argument that the author of Genesis is recording history objectively or accurately. Indeed, he had no more real knowledge of the history than I do. What he had were the stories his people had shared around campfires for many generations, and perhaps some copies of written collections of those stories. If he believed they were history, he was making the same assumption as you are.

This assumes that your dating methods are accurate. They are not.

You have no basis for that negative evaluation. You want the methods to be inaccurate because of what must be concluded from them. But that is no solid ground for saying they are inaccurate. In fact, they have been carefully tested and checked many times over. After all, unreliable dating methods are of no use whatsoever to investigators of history or science. The methods they use are the best available, and until you study them well enough to use them yourself, you have no basis for dismissing them.

Science does not know history.

Actually, science is one of our best tools for discovering history. That is why forensic scientists are an important part of any police department. We would have virtually no evidence that any of the bible is history without the important work of archeologists. And science is our only way of discovering natural history.

That’s why everything in science is held tentatively.

True, but there are degrees of tentativeness. With some things, it's 50-50. With some it's more like 90-10 certain. And when the tentativeness gets down to less than 1% (meaning it is more than 99% certain) even scientist tend to call it a fact until proved otherwise. Indeed, Stephen Gould defined a "fact" in science as whatever is

'confirmed to such a degree that it would be perverse to withhold provisional assent.' I suppose that apples might start to rise tomorrow, but the possibility does not merit equal time in physics classrooms.​

Read more at http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/quotes/s/stephenjay107540.html#c8lzfS9gfVHZsurx.99

Dating is often among those kinds of tentative facts.

[God] knew the history you don’t know.

Yes, and the history I know too.

[The biblical authors] had to know history.

Apparently they didn't. They seem to have got on fine without an accurate knowledge of history.

So you are in denial now? You are the one who said that Jesus doesn't tell his listeners that it is a parable. His disciples were among the listeners. It doesn’t matter if he told them before or after. He still told them.

The interesting thing is the disciples clearly understood the story was a parable before Jesus called it one. He didn't have to announce it was a parable for them to understand that it was. The same is true of the temple authorities in regard to the first parable he told them. Jesus didn't say it was a parable; he just told the story and asked them a question about it. But they clearly understood it was a parable anyway, and then Jesus says "Now listen to another parable".

Take home message. Parables don't need to be announced as parables by the storyteller beforehand. There is certainly no general rule in scripture (as you asserted) that parables are always clearly indicated as such.

And when that story is not actual history we can easily tell it is not. And when it is actual history we can also tell it is.

If that were true, there would be no controversy about what is and is not history in the bible. Clearly there is a controversy, so clearly it is not as cut and dried as you propose.

I think you have it backwards. It is the history that tells us that God created everything, not an allegory. An allegorical interpretation denies the history, and when the history is denied we lose our whole commitment to truth and to Him who is the Truth, and especially to the truth that God really created this world.

It is neither history nor allegory that tells us God created everything. It is faith. It is something God revealed to us, which we could not discover on our own--certainly not through science. A major reason for scripture is to present the message of faith. That is its most important task.

 

[classicalhero]

But it wasn't. Pangaea was formed about 300 million years ago, but began breaking up about 175 million years ago.

The irony of this position is the fact that it was creationist who first proposed a single continent that broke up catastrophically.

 

[gluadys]

The irony of this position is the fact that it was creationist who first proposed a single continent that broke up catastrophically.

History has many ironies. Many creationists opposed the concept of the big bang, yet that mocking term came from an atheist who felt that the idea was too close to affirming creation. And, in fact, it was a Christian who first proposed it.

Some creationists mock the idea that with just a bone or two palaeontologists reconstruct a whole organism. They think this is evolutionary overkill. Yet the father of comparative anatomy, the person who first claimed such reconstruction was possible, was a creationist who rejected evolution out-of-hand.

It was also a creationist who provided the final evidence that there was no geological evidence of a global deluge.