how can the universe be 6000 years old.....

[Epiphoskei]

It is physically impossible. The universe is roughly 13.7 billion years. (+- 200 million years)

If it were only 6 000 years old... Well, let's ignore that we wouldn't have complex matter for one thing... But let's assume God created everything - as it is now - 6000 years ago. We would not be able to see halfway through our own galaxy.
It would be so unbelievably dull.

You're operating from a philosophy restricted to christians who want to be modernist thinkers.

There is revealed truth and discovered truth. Modernism says discovered truth is the only truth. The christian modernist argument is that if we have discovered truth contradicting revealed truth, the revealed truth is misunderstood or just wrong.

However, in the issue of creation and origins, man's thinking must take second place. The argument is only this: what does the bible mean to say. Whatever it meant to say happened. If it meant to say God created the world ex nihilo in a period of 144 hours, then that happened, and though we know not how, the scientists got it wrong. Revealed truth always trumps discovered truth.

If we have revealed truth and we have the understanding correct, then all contradictory statements are wrong by default. Our only concerns are what is revealed and what that actually means- everything else is irrelevant. Worthwhile discussions, perhaps; but in the grand scheme of things, only what the bible says and what this means as determined through internal evidence, irregardless of external evidence, ultimately matters.

I am not necesarraly anti-science, which I know is the typical protest to what I wrote, but I am totally opposed to the sufficiency of science to determine truth. If two statements called truth contradict, one of them is not true. In a fight between what the creator says and what the created says, God knows how he created the universe better than man did. If he says 144 hours ex nihilo a few thousand years ago, that is what happened. The only discussion now is, "did God say that?" and such a discussion must happen without appeals to science.

 

[USincognito]

But what if the revealed truth in Genesis 1-11 is not about how the Earth came to be but a message from YHWH to the Hebrews that he was in charge of the Earth, not the various Babylonian gods and group of stories meant to teach mans relationship with God, not astronomy, geology and biology?

 

[TheReasoner]

You're operating from a philosophy restricted to christians who want to be modernist thinkers.

There is revealed truth and discovered truth. Modernism says discovered truth is the only truth. The christian modernist argument is that if we have discovered truth contradicting revealed truth, the revealed truth is misunderstood or just wrong.

However, in the issue of creation and origins, man's thinking must take second place. The argument is only this: what does the bible mean to say. Whatever it meant to say happened. If it meant to say God created the world ex nihilo in a period of 144 hours, then that happened, and though we know not how, the scientists got it wrong. Revealed truth always trumps discovered truth.

If we have revealed truth and we have the understanding correct, then all contradictory statements are wrong by default. Our only concerns are what is revealed and what that actually means- everything else is irrelevant. Worthwhile discussions, perhaps; but in the grand scheme of things, only what the bible says and what this means as determined through internal evidence, irregardless of external evidence, ultimately matters.

I am not necesarraly anti-science, which I know is the typical protest to what I wrote, but I am totally opposed to the sufficiency of science to determine truth. If two statements called truth contradict, one of them is not true. In a fight between what the creator says and what the created says, God knows how he created the universe better than man did. If he says 144 hours ex nihilo a few thousand years ago, that is what happened. The only discussion now is, "did God say that?" and such a discussion must happen without appeals to science.

I think you are mistaken
(and I edited my post to contain more by the way)

If God did A, then the evidence we will fnd trhough study will indicate A was done. Not Z.
In this case - if we are to believe that God created the world, universe and everything in 6 days I strongly believe God would have left indications of this.
Instead we see the opposite.
Then again, the bible is also clear that God is beside time. Outside it. A thousand years is as one day to Him, and a day is like a thousand years it says.
Why should we believe that Genesis was made in a 144 hour period and not longer, when the evidence we find is that it is MUCH longer.

 

[Epiphoskei]

But what if the revealed truth in Genesis 1-11 is not about how the Earth came to be but a message from YHWH to the Hebrews that he was in charge of the Earth, not the various Babylonian gods and group of stories meant to teach mans relationship with God, not astronomy, geology and biology?

That's the age old allagory/narrative dispute. Did God make it up to teach somthing, or did he make it happen to teach somthing? Or perhaps teaching is not always the point.

First, it doesn't matter if it's not there to teach how eden came to be, fact is it does say how eden came to be. "God planted a garden in the east." Is this statement, not the point it teaches, but is this statement itself a truth or a lie? Did God plant a garden in the east? Literal language surrounding a real event is acceptable. Figurative language surrounding a real event is acceptable. False event is "using a lie to tell the truth," which may be appropriate for middle east war correspondants, but not for scripture.

But second, if we don't believe God actually did it the way he said he did it, how do we know when it comes to Jesus that he did it the way he said he did it? If Jesus's death and resurrection did not happen the way the Bible says it happened, we are damned. The point is not always merely the truth of the teaching, it can be the literal truth of the event. And if the first part of the truth of the actual redemption- i.e., creation and fall, wasn't an actual event, it's no more a scandal to our faith than if the atonement was a fairy story.

 

[Epiphoskei]

If God did A, then the evidence we will fnd trhough study will indicate A was done. Not Z.

If God truely says he did A, A happened. Z doesn't matter. Period. If we found written in astronomical sized letters on the back side of the moon, "You stupid twits, I created you by evolution," unless Genesis and genesis alone permits evolution, it did not happen, end of story.

Now, I understand there is a debate on what Genesis actually does say, and I'm not trying to get into that so much as to say it is a bad hermeneutic to consider science when it comes to determining what the Bible does or does not say. Scientists are not infallable, and every letter of Genesis is. End of discussion.

 

[TheReasoner]

But what if the revealed truth in Genesis 1-11 is not about how the Earth came to be but a message from YHWH to the Hebrews that he was in charge of the Earth, not the various Babylonian gods and group of stories meant to teach mans relationship with God, not astronomy, geology and biology?

Or even just an explanation which would fit their level of understanding.

I'll go with what evidence is presented, thank you. I don't believe the earth is flat. For this reason alone I would be killed by certain people in the dark ages. I don't believe we are the center of the universe, nor do I believe the sun orbits the earth. All of which were seen as absolute truths. Biblically proven.
Why should Archie and co be correct in their interpretation when the evidence just as clearly indicate they are wrong as it shows the world is round, orbiting the sun, in a little corner of the universe?!

 

[Epiphoskei]

I'm not saying we necesarraly have the absolute interpretation, I'm just saying that using science to determine what the interpretation acutally is is enslaving the purest truth to our crude discovered truth.

But as to this "level of understanding" stuff, I have to point out it's modernist, progressive nonsense. Our amount of knowledge may have increased, but we have always had the same capacity to understand. We are not intellectually any stronger than the ancient Romans, Greeks, Babylonians, Egyptians, Chineese, etc. Mark my words carfully, as I said we now know more, but stupidity isn't lack knowledge, it's inability to grasp. The theory of evolution, if true, could have been taught to any ancient without trouble. They could have understood it just fine. It isn't beyond them.

 

[USincognito]

It's kinda funny how you keep referring to modernist thought when YECism engages in a post-modernism that almost borders on madness, suggesting that we all "interpret" reality itself.

The theory of evolution, if true, could have been taught to any ancient without trouble. They could have understood it just fine. It isn't beyond them.

Given the number of people I encounter who ostensibly have heard of fossils, DNA, and biology - something the ancients lacked any knowledge up - but have little or no understanding of evolution, I'm not sure how the ancients would have fared.

 

[theQuestionist]

I'm not saying we necesarraly have the absolute interpretation, I'm just saying that using science to determine what the interpretation acutally is is enslaving the purest truth to our crude discovered truth.

What evidence do you have to show that Genesis is indeed factual? You seem to be basing your arguments entirely on the idea that the Bible is infallible.

You even stated that if there was an inscription on the moon (presumably left by God) that said evolution was true, you wouldn't believe it simply because it would contradict the writings of an ancient man.

Don't you think that's an entirely foolish thing to believe?

After all, the events described in Genesis were written several thousand years after their alleged occurance, based on teachings handed down from generation to generation. There's no reason to believe they're anything more than allegorical....and even if they were based on some truths, chances are many of those "truths" would have been lost through the passage of time before they were transcribed.

Why do you trust science in every other area of your life, but as soon as an ancient book says something that contradicts science...you believe the ancient book?

The Bible mentions that the earth has 4 corners, and that it stands on "pillars"....so are you a flat-earther?

 

[KerrMetric]

Scientists are not infallable,

True.

and every letter of Genesis is.

Even more untrue.

 

[artybloke]

Did God make it up to teach somthing, or did he make it happen to teach somthing?

God didn't make up anything because God didn't write the Bible. A bunch of people a long time ago did. Inspired by God they may have been; automaton secretarial machines they were not.

 

[archaeologist]

Why do you trust science in every other area of your life, but as soon as an ancient book says something that contradicts science...you believe the ancient book?

The Bible mentions that the earth has 4 corners, and that it stands on "pillars"....so are you a flat-earther?

these are such ridiculous arguments and aren't worth the time to go through again.

 

[theQuestionist]

these are such ridiculous arguments and aren't worth the time to go through again.

Nice answer there. Or should I say, nice dodge.

Clearly you're a literalist when it comes to genesis....but you cherry-pick the rest of scriptures, no?

Isaiah 11:12
12 And he shall set up an ensign for the nations, and shall assemble the outcasts of Israel, and gather together the dispersed of Judah from the FOUR CORNERS OF THE EARTH. (KJV)

Revelation 7:1
1 And after these things I saw four angels standing on FOUR CORNERS OF THE EARTH, holding the four winds of the earth, that the wind should not blow on the earth, nor on the sea, nor on any tree. (KJV)

Job 38:13
13 That it might take hold of the ENDS OF THE EARTH, that the wicked might be shaken out of it? (KJV)

Jeremiah 16:19
19 O LORD, my strength, and my fortress, and my refuge in the day of affliction, the Gentiles shall come unto thee from the ENDS OF THE EARTH, and shall say, Surely our fathers have inherited lies, vanity, and things wherein there is no profit. (KJV)

Daniel 4:11
11 The tree grew, and was strong, and the height thereof reached unto heaven, and the sight thereof to the ENDS OF ALL THE EARTH: (KJV)

Matthew 4:8
8 Again, the devil taketh him up into an exceeding high mountain, and sheweth him all the kingdoms of the world, and the glory of them; (KJV)

"He set the earth on its foundations; it can never be moved. (From the NIV Bible, Psalm 104:5)"

Etc etc, I need not go on....

Obviously you must be a flat-earther, because the secular scientists who contradict the Bible and state that the earth is round are just trying to feed the uneducated public a pack of lies. Thankfully we have God's word to set us straight!

 

[archaeologist]

no--just been there, done that

 

[theQuestionist]

no--just been there, done that

Another pointless post from archaeologist....

 

[birdan]

I'm not saying we necesarraly have the absolute interpretation, I'm just saying that using science to determine what the interpretation acutally is is enslaving the purest truth to our crude discovered truth.

And yet you and most other young earthers have indeed used science to inform your 'literal' interpretation, unless you are a geo-centrist. Nowhere in the bible is a helio-centric solar system stated or implied. Not one religious figure up to the time of Copernicus mentions a helio-centric solar system; in fact, there are long discourses about geo-centrism. For the few hundreds years from Copernicus to post-Galileo, there are heated defenses of geo-centrism, including Luther and Calvin. After a few hundred years, when helio-centrism (science) has been fully incorporated into mainstream thought, the apologetics do a complete 180 degree turn to "explain" those geo-centric biblical references as compatible with helio-centrism, when for the the first 1,600 years of Christianity they were simply read literally.

So unless you're a geo-centrist, you've already done what you admonish others not to do.

 

[Yekcidmij]

You don't have to believe in six consecutive 24 hour periods to believe the genesis account.

 

[crawfish]

these are such ridiculous arguments and aren't worth the time to go through again.

It's not our fault that you don't believe what the bible PLAINLY says. Rest assured God will judge you for doubting His word.

 

[Yekcidmij]

these are such ridiculous arguments and aren't worth the time to go through again.

I'm not familiar with your replies to these arguments. So to me this translates to one of the following:
1. I have no replies
2. I have replies, but someone has already shown them to be false.
3. I have replies, but I'm afraid of posting them for whatever reason.
4. I have replies, but am not to make a little bit of time to show them again even considering there may be someone who hasn't seen them before.
5. I have no idea what's going on.

 

[theQuestionist]

I'm not familiar with your replies to these arguments. So to me this translates to one of the following:
1. I have no replies
2. I have replies, but someone has already shown them to be false.
3. I have replies, but I'm afraid of posting them for whatever reason.
4. I have replies, but am not to make a little bit of time to show them again even considering there may be someone who hasn't seen them before.
5. I have no idea what's going on.

Or maybe all of the above?