Question for old earth creationists

[kiwiekat]

Hi, I am new in learning about creationism so I hope my question does not sound ridiculous. I read two articles about how Genesis 1 & 2 should be interpreted according to Old Earth Creationism, but the two differ a bit.

The problem is related to the fact that Genesis 1 says that creatures are created before Adam, while Genesis 2 says creatures are created after Adam.

According to site A, Genesis 1 refers to the creation of the whole earth and Genesis 2 refers to the creation of Eden, so there should be no contradiction.
In Genesis 1, God created the creatures and brought them to Eden as it says in Genesis 2.

According to site B, God created creatures before and after Adam. He supported it with evidence from the fossil record. On day 5, sea creatures and birds were created, and then on day 6, mammals were created so there's a big difference between the date of bird fossils and mammal fossils. However, the fossil record shows that birds and mammals came together at the same time, so he is correct in saying that birds and mammals were created again after Adam was created. Also, without that theory, the sea mammals are out of place too (I don't really know what he means).

So my question is, does the fossil record show that birds and mammals came together at the same time? And what does he mean by sea mammals being out of place? Is site A or site B correct?

 

[gluadys]

So my question is, does the fossil record show that birds and mammals came together at the same time? And what does he mean by sea mammals being out of place? Is site A or site B correct?

Since your question was directed to OECs, I will let them explain how they understand the scripture.

But as to the fossil record:

Mammals appear in the fossil record long before birds. (i.e. 100 million years or so)

Sea mammals appear in the fossil record long after birds. (about 50 million years or so.)

In both cases the sequence is out of synch with Gen. 1

 

[kiwiekat]

Why does Genesis 1 say that birds are created before mammals if the fossils show that mammals existed before birds? Also, how many million years is a day supposed to be?

 

[Vance]

Read here:

http://www.ualberta.ca/~dlamoure/3EvoCr.htm

and/or here:

http://www.christianforums.com/t1133651-what-is-theistic-evolution-an-explanation.html

 

[gluadys]

Why does Genesis 1 say that birds are created before mammals if the fossils show that mammals existed before birds? Also, how many million years is a day supposed to be?

Because the author of Genesis 1 did not organize the material chronologically.

The days are a literary device for his writing plan. They are set out in a parallel as described in the framework hypothesis. See the chart about half way down this page

Someone has said it is like a person who has been on a trip organizing their pictures by subject instead of by date.

Some people try to equate the days of Genesis with long periods of time, but I don't think that works well. I prefer to consider that the biblical author just used the concept of a week (already familiar to his readers) as a way of framing a liturgy about creation to be used in worship.

The purpose is to praise God not teach science.

 

[kiwiekat]

Thank you for the links...I'll try to look at them later (the articles are too long ), or do you know of some simpler, shorter articles? I wanted to learn about old earth creationism first, but I don't have any replies yet...am I on the wrong section?

 

[gluadys]

Thank you for the links...I'll try to look at them later (the articles are too long ), or do you know of some simpler, shorter articles? I wanted to learn about old earth creationism first, but I don't have any replies yet...am I on the wrong section?

No,this isn't the wrong section, as creationists of all sorts do post here. However you might get a quicker response if you post in the Creationist sub-forum.

 

[Calminian]

The problem is related to the fact that Genesis 1 says that creatures are created before Adam, while Genesis 2 says creatures are created after Adam.

I'm a YEC but I know that several OECs will agree with me on this. It's really not a YEC verses OEC issue, but rather a historical vs. figurative issue.

In the original Hebrew it actually doesn't say creatures are created after Adam. In the Hebrew language the verb formed is actually undefined and therefore the tense must be determined by the context. This kind of thing is a problem for word for word translations, but when you consult more thought for thought translations like the NIV, you'll find they translate the verb had formed. This is how the hebrew reader would have understood the passge. Compare these two texts:

Gen. 2:19 And out of the ground the LORD God formed every beast of the field and every bird of the sky, and brought them to the man to see what he would call them; and whatever the man called a living creature, that was its name. (NASB)

Gen. 2:19 Now the LORD God had formed out of the ground all the beasts of the field and all the birds of the air. He brought them to the man to see what he would name them; and whatever the man called each living creature, that was its name. (NIV)

An AiG article puts it like this:

...Because in Hebrew the precise tense of a verb is determined by the context. It is clear from chapter 1 that the beasts and birds were created before Adam, so Jewish scholars would have understood the verb ‘formed’ in Genesis 2:19 to mean ‘had formed’ or ‘having formed’. If we translate verse 19 as follows (as one widely used translation does), ‘Now the LORD God had formed out of the ground all the beasts of the field …’, the apparent disagreement with Genesis 1 disappears completely.

For the full article go here:
Genesis contradictions?
by Don Batten

Dr Jonathan Sarfati's book, Refuting Compromise, goes into much greater detail on this issue if you're interested.

But there is absolutely no contradiction between the two chapters.

 

[kiwiekat]

Thank you all for providing me with very important information! I'm just waiting to hear from old earth creationists...

Sorry gluadys, I haven't read the article yet, it's kind of long ...can you tell me what the framework hypothesis is? (Unless it's too long to describe)

 

[Sinai]

how many million years is a day supposed to be?

The Bible refers to the six yoms of creation. Although yom is most commonly translated to mean either a day or a period of time, it can mean daylight hours, an age, an epoch, or an unspecified period of time. There are several Bible passages that indicate that we are still in the seventh yom (the period of God's rest).

In other words, the Bible doesn't specify how long each yom should be. YECs generally prefer to use the most common definition for yom (24-hour day), while OECs generally prefer to use the next most common definition (a period of time, probably of unspecified length)--though some point out that six consecutive 24-hour days (i.e., 144 Earth hours) measured with and at the speed of the outward thrust from the big bang's inflation would yield a time that easily falls within the 11-20 billion year age of the universe (measured looking backward in time against the outward creative flow).

 

[gluadys]

Thank you all for providing me with very important information! I'm just waiting to hear from old earth creationists...

Sorry gluadys, I haven't read the article yet, it's kind of long ...can you tell me what the framework hypothesis is? (Unless it's too long to describe)

Basically it relies on the parallelism of the creative days. As Lamoureux explains it, it begins with the reference to "tohu" (formless) and "bohu" (empty) in v. 2

Then the six days are set in parallel tables so:

Days of formation (end of "tohu")
1. Light/Dark (aka Day/Night) (some would call this the structure of time)
2. Heaven/Earth
3. Sea/Land (with vegetation)

Days of filling/populating (end of "bohu")
4 (corresponding to 1) Day/Night filled with sun, moon and stars
5 (corresponding to 2) Heaven and (water-covered) Earth filled with air and sea creatures
6 (corresponding to 3) Land filled with terrestrial creatures

Finally the account concludes with the seventh day of rest.

The parallelism suggests that the days are not intended to be understood as sequential as on a calendar, but as thematic. It is just a way of grouping things. So neither the length of day nor the order of the days has any bearing on later scientific discoveries about the time period or order in which different species appeared on earth.

 

[kiwiekat]

Oh I see...thanks for telling me about that. Anyway, I was looking at evidence.info (an old earth creationist site), and the author said that birds came 70 x 106 years ago, whales came 50 x 106 years ago, which corresponds to the Cretaceous period/beginning of the Tertiary. Mammals came at around 50 x 106 years ago to 15 x 106 years ago...is that accurate? So if fossils aren't the only factor to date the existence of creatures, then what else is used?

 

[gluadys]

Oh I see...thanks for telling me about that. Anyway, I was looking at evidence.info (an old earth creationist site), and the author said that birds came 70 x 106 years ago, whales came 50 x 106 years ago, which corresponds to the Cretaceous period/beginning of the Tertiary. Mammals came at around 50 x 106 years ago to 15 x 106 years ago...is that accurate? So if fossils aren't the only factor to date the existence of creatures, then what else is used?

No. It may be correct for birds and whales (haven't checked). But mammals appear in the fossil record around the same time as the early dinosaurs (Triassic period 245 - 208 mya). That is a long time before birds. The article may be referring to the appearance of large mammals. For close to 200 million years all mammals were fairly small---mostly small rodents, insectivores and shrew-like animals. Thinks rats, squirrels, gerbils, etc.

But it was not until after the demise of the dinosaurs that large mammals like cattle, horses, big cats, elephants, whales, etc. appeared.

Another way to date the existence of creatures is through their DNA, using their "molecular clock". This gives the rate at which mutations are occurring, and by comparing the difference in homologous genes between species we can calculate roughly when their last common ancestor existed.

The interesting thing is that even though it is not connected to fossils at all, this measurement and the fossil dates are in close agreement.

 

[Vance]

That last sentence is something that YEC's seem to ignore. Very often we will have more than one 'measuring stick' for a given conclusion. Think of the coincidence of multiple lines of measurements agreeing in almost every instance they are used if the conclusion was not correct?

 

[gluadys]

That last sentence is something that YEC's seem to ignore. Very often we will have more than one 'measuring stick' for a given conclusion. Think of the coincidence of multiple lines of measurements agreeing in almost every instance they are used if the conclusion was not correct?

Exactly. There are multiple ways of being wrong, but only one way of being right.

Examiners and lawyers use this fact to detect cheating and plagiarism. People who make errors independently tend to make different errors. So when one finds two or more people consistently making the same infrequent error, chances are they are copying it from a common source.

The one way you can escape detection for cheating on an exam is by copying from someone who makes no errors at all. If the three errors on your test are precisely the same as the three errors on their test, you are in trouble. If you are making mistakes independently, you will make your own errors, not theirs.

The obverse of this is that if several people (or measurements) independently come to the same conclusion, the conclusion is probably correct.

 

[kiwiekat]

No. It may be correct for birds and whales (haven't checked). But mammals appear in the fossil record around the same time as the early dinosaurs (Triassic period 245 - 208 mya). That is a long time before birds. The article may be referring to the appearance of large mammals. For close to 200 million years all mammals were fairly small---mostly small rodents, insectivores and shrew-like animals...

I checked the article again...oh and it's called "Day-Age Genesis One Interpretation". He was referring to all animals appearing on Day 6. Anyway, since I'm not getting any response from OECs, do you know how they defend that birds came before mammals?

 

[gluadys]

I checked the article again...oh and it's called "Day-Age Genesis One Interpretation". He was referring to all animals appearing on Day 6. Anyway, since I'm not getting any response from OECs, do you know how they defend that birds came before mammals?

As far as I know the only way to defend it is to say that the text of scripture, literally interpreted, is more reliable than the evidence in nature, scientifically interpreted. If an OEC has a different reason, they will have to say what it is.

Since both scripture and nature are said to come from God and both are interpreted by fallible human minds, I do not understand why this should be so. I.e. why is a literal interpretation of scripture more accurate than a scientific interpretation of nature? Both interpretations are based on human reasoning, not on the divine revelation which they interpret.

 

[kiwiekat]

Oh okay, thanks for your help. I guess I'll have to find other OECs (other than on this board) to find out how they defend it.

So the way theistic evolutionists view Genesis is that it is based on theme and not actually days (whether 24 hours or millions of hours), correct? I find it kind of difficult to understand because of the part in the passage where it says "and there was morning and night, the sixth day" (or something like that).

 

[Vance]

So the way theistic evolutionists view Genesis is that it is based on theme and not actually days (whether 24 hours or millions of hours), correct? I find it kind of difficult to understand because of the part in the passage where it says "and there was morning and night, the sixth day" (or something like that).

A poetic refrain. We see this a lot in Ancient Near East literature.

If God is going to inspire a story to be written using a figurative framework, such a poetic refrain makes perfect sense. Remember that the two creation accounts almost assuredly passed down orally for many, many generations before being written down. Such poetic formulations make this much easier.

Also keep in mind that ANE cultures would still have considered their stories about the creation process as very REAL and TRUE, even if they understood the story was not strict literal history.

One example that helps us moderns (with our empirical minds) get our "heads around" this idea of things being "true" while not being literal history is the idea of "God breathed". Now, I would guess that most of us, even literalists, do not think that God took on human form so as to have actual lungs from which to have actual, literal "breath" to pass into Man (or Mankind). But, even so, we can accept that this means God did SOMETHING that He is describing as "breathing", something which it might be difficult for us to grasp, or for which "breathing" is simply a very useful and powerfully evocative description.

THus, we don't see the text as merely a "fable" or a false account, just a figurative rendition, using symbology, typology, poetry and powerful imagery to describe very real and true events. Thus, it IS literal in that it tells about literal events: God created it all, He did so with a purpose and plan, God created Mankind in His image, put Mankind in dominion (responsibility) over the earth, etc. God is just using one of many, many literary styles that were available.

The Bible is full of a wide variety of literary styles, and literal/historical is only one of them. I don't know why people insist that Genesis 1 and 2 must have been written, and intended to be read in that one, particular style.

 

[rmwilliamsll]

Oh okay, thanks for your help. I guess I'll have to find other OECs (other than on this board) to find out how they defend it.

So the way theistic evolutionists view Genesis is that it is based on theme and not actually days (whether 24 hours or millions of hours), correct? I find it kind of difficult to understand because of the part in the passage where it says "and there was morning and night, the sixth day" (or something like that).

not necessarily. framework interpretation sees the creation week as 7 24 hr days, just not historical or scientifically described days but rather literary.