Age of the earth, why is it relevant?!

Tetra said:

Yeah, I get you. But to some degree that may be a bit TOO high of a benchmark. Surely not every teacher can have an answer to everything.

I would say for myself though, I find a beauty in not always arriving at a solid answer for everything. When something seems mysterious, it doesn't cause me anxiety, rather joy or excitement.

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Perhaps it is. That's how it is in our denomination, though.

There can be some very significant issues caught up in this discussion. For example, even though our denomination allows for a diversity of views on Genesis 1, our denomination requires (for teachers) belief in a literal Adam and Eve.

If you reject an original Adam and Eve - original first parents - who are the fountain of all humanity and who sinned against God and became corrupt then it's not clear how you can maintain the doctrine of original sin. When original sin is threatened, the whole gospel begins to unravel.

A lot of evangelicals just want to make sure that even if you reject the literal 6 day, that you still believe in Adam, Eve, and original sin.

Tetra said:

Okay, so I'm going to start off by stating my position just so we're clear. I believe the "new earth" theory is nonsense.

However, the purpose of this post isn't to debate the age of the earth, but rather, I'm trying to sort out why it matters how old the earth is?? It seems in my experience, new earthers tend to be obsessively dogmatic in holding this position. It's not sufficient that simply they hold this worldview, it's necessary everyone else does as well. Is there an underlying philosophical position I'm missing here?

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The earth could be as old as it appears, or the Lord could have recently created an earth that appears, geologically, to be very old. I agree with you: What does it matter?

Tree of Life said:

It's a hermeneutical issue. The Scriptures seem to very clearly and straightforwardly teach a literal 6-day creation. If one rejects this teaching or takes a non-literal approach it creates hermeneutical problems.

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In this regard the hermeneutics of many don't seem to take into account translation issues, relating to both language and culture, much of the time.
When a 10th century Jewish teacher (Who takes the idea that every letter of the Torah was dictated by YHWH, very seriously) can arrive at an age of the universe that corresponds to modern cosmology, using the first verses of Genesis, then it should tell us that our understanding of the text is flawed.
http://www.aish.com/ci/sam/48951136.html?mobile=yes

As previously stated by @Tree of Life the narrative of the Garden of Eden is critical to the entirety of Christian doctrine. One could stretch the imagination to think that millions of years of random mutations and culling led up through ape-like things to two distinct humans in a special place made by God, with a forbidden tree...no, the two stories don't really play well together if we're honest with ourselves.

I, personally, cannot be and Old-Earther, because I see the way genetic mutations are arising, and at what rate, compared to the number of obvious genetic deletions in the human population today. It all points back to a young Earth. The fact that mutations range from deadly to negligibly bad, and the fact that natural selection is very effective at preventing evolution, together with chromosomal issues that make jumping the species barrier a nearly herculean task, make me regard Old-Earth faith, at least in terms of biology (my subject) just a really crazy myth that people only find reasonable because it's the myth of our own time, not one from a thousand years ago. I think that if life on Earth had begun five hundred million years ago there would be nothing left of it by now. I regard secular evolutionism to be a betrayal and corruption of science, and I regard religious evolutionism as a corruption and betrayal of both religion and science for no better reason than to escape being mocked by the followers of our modern mythology. I find such people hard to respect, but easy to sympathize with.

yeshuaslavejeff said:

It seems obvious that those who don't believe God's Word is true are like the Germans who likewise taught that God's Word is not truth, and who wanted the children to grow up thinking so also. They figured it would take 3 generations to fully have everyone's soul to their liking, dis-believing God's Word and instead trusting that the government wanted them to think.

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Consider the large group also though, those who totally believe God created, but read some details in the scripture differently than you or me. We'd do harm to suggest they are saying God's word isn't true of course then because they believe in His Word, so our assertion would be false then. For instance, if someone thinks like I do that the 6 days are real but also representative -- thinking the 6 days are actual days (as if recorded on video, though we can't know if they may have been shown in idealized or stylized way possibly in the vision), and further to guess that the chosen days to be shown were likely separated in time from each other -- this guessing about some small details is not itself Truth any more than some other person guessing it was all precisely 156 hours and precisely zero time passed during verse 1 (unlike my expectation), etc.

Neither supposing about small details is the point, the Truth, but both are about some guessing, however much or little supported by whatever.

The real point of chapter 1 is to know God created all that is, and by His design, and made it "good" and "very good", and the awe of that, and if you get those you actually are getting the real message.

But if someone thinks He created regarding such small details in a different way than I do or you do, details that are not clear in scripture, we should take great care to avoid suggesting they are saying God's Word isn't true, because in that light of their real faith, it would be a slander, of course. Obviously if they truly believe God created all that is, they already have the Truth here, regardless of trivial errors about relatively beside the point things like the time duration of verse 1 and such. Similarly for various guessing about other possible details and such so long as the person doesn't claim their own suppositions are the Truth (which claiming one's theories/ideas are themselves Truth is another kind of wrong).

There is no guessing and no theories involved. All the guessing and all the theories are or seem to be all opposed to trusting Yahweh's Word and believing Him.

Thankfully, scholarship which is opposed to Yahweh is dealt with by Yahweh so we don't have to trust in man at all.
To know what is Truth, simply believe Yahweh, seek Yahweh trusting Him and relying on Him.
As Jesus says: PRAISE YAHWEH, for REVEALING SALVATION and everything concerning SALVATION to the infants / little children
AND for HIDING SALVATION/TRUTH from the scholars/ educated ones,
FOR THIS IS WELL-PLEASING to YOU (FATHER YAHWEH) !

Whenever the Father with/and Jesus REVEALS anything, we know it is TRUTH, as HE SAYS. WE don't have to try to figure it out. Just BELIEVE HIM!

Could earth look like old but be young instead ? For example fall caused by sin could make entropy not linear but very fast at first and then slow down over time ?

Tree of Life said:

There's no clear genre distinction between Genesis 1-2 and the rest of Genesis. If Genesis 1 is a poem or Genesis 1-2 is something other than historical narrative, then we have no clear principle to guide us in where we draw the line between poetry and historical narrative. Slippery slope.



I think that an evangelical, Bible believing, orthodox Christian is simply being inconsistent if they're an old earther. It's not the biggest deal. In my denomination, the view is allowed to be held by ordained ministers. So it's not a disqualifying view.

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Regarding how to many ears (though I'm not in that group) the wording in Genesis 1 seems figurative, it's reasonably possibly due to the language, the difference readily visible between sentences like: "The earth was without form and void, and darkness was over the face of the deep." , which could be read as either very concrete though lyrical, or as figurative and representative of something real, written poetically, to allude to a time that was real but in a poetic way that isn't necessarily clear in it's concrete situation at all. But then contrasting to a very different style of language later in chapter 4 such as: "Now Adam knew Eve his wife, and she conceived and bore Cain, saying, “I have gotten a man with the help of the LORD.” ", which really doesn't sound figurative at all, none, nor alluding, but about a specific birth of a specific named person, very concrete. So, the language style of chapter 1 can allow someone to wonder how stylized this vision was, how much a representation, akin to how many visions are at other moments in scripture, about the real but not identical to a camera viewpoint at all. A variety of possibilities fit the verses quite well.
We should want Christians to not think they have to choose some view and argue with others about it at all. Rather, people could/should offer their views as merely another way to see it, ( or better, to entirely refrain from discussion in a forum like this if they are unable to tolerate/admit that other viewpoints are possible with total faith in scripture). Don't you agree? We do not want believers creating antagonistic accusations and even at times slanderous ones against each other, as we too often see.

It doesn't matter. The Bible isn't a science book. So don't look to it for scientific claims. Those that wrote the Bible were scientifically ignorate compared to today's standard. We have learned a lot about our universe that biblical writers couldn't even imagine.

yeshuaslavejeff said:

There is no guessing and no theories involved. All the guessing and all the theories are or seem to be all opposed to trusting Yahweh's Word and believing Him.

Thankfully, scholarship which is opposed to Yahweh is dealt with by Yahweh so we don't have to trust in man at all.
To know what is Truth, simply believe Yahweh, seek Yahweh trusting Him and relying on Him.
As Jesus says: PRAISE YAHWEH, for REVEALING SALVATION and everything concerning SALVATION to the infants / little children
AND for HIDING SALVATION/TRUTH from the scholars/ educated ones,
FOR THIS IS WELL-PLEASING to YOU (FATHER YAHWEH) !

Whenever the Father with/and Jesus REVEALS anything, we know it is TRUTH, as HE SAYS. WE don't have to try to figure it out. Just BELIEVE HIM!

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Jesus worked during the seventh day when he healed a paralytic and again when he and his disciples were gleaning grain during the Sabbath. Jesus is greater than Moses. Moses was not around 20,000 years ago when New England was covered with glaciers. There is nothing in the Bible about the Ice Age. It summarizes the history of the earth in a few paragraphs. It can not compare to what geologists have learned. Jesus did stone people as Moses commanded people should be stoned for Sabbath violations. I would not want to praise Moses more than Jesus. Jesus set a good example by healing people instead of stoning them.

Tetra said:

Okay, so I'm going to start off by stating my position just so we're clear. I believe the "new earth" theory is nonsense.

However, the purpose of this post isn't to debate the age of the earth, but rather, I'm trying to sort out why it matters how old the earth is?? It seems in my experience, new earthers tend to be obsessively dogmatic in holding this position. It's not sufficient that simply they hold this worldview, it's necessary everyone else does as well. Is there an underlying philosophical position I'm missing here?

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Well because - if evolution is true, God isn't. Either God created all life in one day, or the bible is lying.

In order to justify an old earth, the geologies in Genesis have to be interpreted in a non-literal manner, or there have to be gaps in them. That's a tenuous argument.

Devin P said:

Well because - if evolution is true, God isn't. Either God created all life in one day, or the bible is lying.

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There is tons of evidence for evolution. Not to mention we can litterally watch microevolution. And according to the Bible God created all life over the span of a few days. Literal or allegorical days are up to interpretation.

Tetra said:

why it matters how old the earth is?? It seems in my experience, new earthers tend to be obsessively dogmatic in holding this position.

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It matters for the same reason everything in God's word matters. If God went to all the trouble to spell it out, it matters.

Tetra said:

I'm trying to sort out why it matters how old the earth is??

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This must matter to God or He would not have given us the evidence that He gives us to examine and to study. Just what we have in fossils is quite a bit and there is a lot more in geology in general.

jesus316 said:

It matters for the same reason everything in God's word matters. If God went to all the trouble to spell it out, it matters.

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"Spell it out" implies that it is easy to comprehend. The fact that this site exists shows evidence that the Bible isn't spelled out. Some take it literally and others do not. Some believe that everything in it is perfect yet others find contradictions. Some claim that a certain version is the true version even though almost every version we have has been translated from other languages and words and phrases have changed.

It's irrelevant to salvation but it's totally relevant to our understanding of the world and the universe in which we live.

Tetra said:

Okay, so I'm going to start off by stating my position just so we're clear. I believe the "new earth" theory is nonsense.

However, the purpose of this post isn't to debate the age of the earth, but rather, I'm trying to sort out why it matters how old the earth is?? It seems in my experience, new earthers tend to be obsessively dogmatic in holding this position. It's not sufficient that simply they hold this worldview, it's necessary everyone else does as well. Is there an underlying philosophical position I'm missing here?

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It isnt.impprtant, those who.hold to.an old earth cosmology are probably putting you on. The core emphasis in Genesis of 1 is the creation of life, those who tell you it's about the sun, moon and stars don't care about the creation account.

MoneyGuy said:

It's irrelevant to salvation but it's totally relevant to our understanding of the world and the universe in which we live.

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So when you look for answers about our physical universe you turn to the Bible? Not the physicist, biologist, chemists and countless other scientific professionals who work on exploring and discoving things about our place in the cosmos?