The Days of Genesis One

The doctrine of creation is not an obscure doctrine in Scripture. Although there are many biblical doctrines that are based upon just a few scriptural references, there are at least 75 references to creation in the Old and New Testaments. The first two chapters of Genesis contain the primary biblical information on creation, so they provide the basis of the biblical doctrine. The meaning of this simple narrative is truly straightforward. This portion of the Bible, however, has been the object of considerable speculation by various writers who have placed interpretations upon the text that have little to do with what the writer originally was trying to convey to his audience. Clearly, the meaning of Scripture as with any writing, has to do with how it would have been perceived and understood by its original audience. What any subsequent generation might force upon it, based upon its unique presuppositions and world-views, is a different matter altogether. Such things will change with the passing of the generations. But the author's original intent ought to determine the meaning.

The Genesis account of creation, and with it the biblical doctrine of creation, has been the subject of such "rethinking" and "reinterpreting" over the years. This has elicited quite a number of approaches to the narration proffered by the author of the document. Consequently, there is much controversy on the interpretation of certain features of the chapters. Still, certain basic truths stand out in such a way as to lie beyond legitimate controversy or quibble, or so it would seem. Let us begin by stating in uncomplicated language one of these points of a general interest, and then address those aspects of the chapters which require further scrutiny.

According to the first two chapters of Genesis, the entire process of animate and inaminate creation appears to have been completed in a very short process of time. There is nothing in these chapters about eons or ages. Not one thing. There is no mention of protracted periods of time. Our author only speaks of evenings and mornings, and of the passage of a few short days which comprise a single creative week. It ends with a single Sabbath, not hundreds or thousands of them. In the present historic moment this may be the most controversial aspect of the chapter, even among professed creationists, for it flies in the face of so much of modern scientific theorizing about the origin of the universe. But the question whether the penman of Genesis wished his readers to believe this, based simply upon what he says about the matter, lies safely beyond dispute. According to this writer, the creation took only six days. When the seventh day came, creation was over.

This point appears to stand on its own merits. The text is so plain that little may be said to object to the conclusion that the writer of Genesis wanted his first readers to believe this basic fact. One may argue either that he does not believe it or that he cannot accept this to be accurate, based upon issues or information extraneous to Genesis, but he may not fairly claim that the early readers would have gotten any impression different from the one stated above in this little synopsis. As a liberal theologian, Dr. Gerhard von Rad, observed in his commentary on Genesis, "What is said here is intended to hold true entirely and exactly as it stands. There is no trace of the hymnic element in the language, nor is anything said that needs to be understood symbolically or whose deeper meaning has to be deciphered" (47, 48). According to Aila Annala, "Anyone who reads the Genesis story in Hebrew will find out quite soon that it is prose -- a historical description of the beginnings. Something very typical for Hebrew prose are the many waw-consecutive forms in the beginning of the sentences (the repeated "ands" in the beginning of the sentences in many English translations). To make the creation story into a hymn is as difficult as trying to sing a couple of pages from a modern history book" (Creation Story: History, Myth, Hymn or Saga?). The writer has written what he has written; one ought to accept it or reject it. But one must not do it the injustice of attempting to bring those words into line with what one would have liked for him to have said based upon a modernistic interpretation of the events which he chronicles.

With the rise of modern scientific opinion, there has been considerable debate among Bible-believing conservatives regarding the length of the days referred to in the creation account. The debate, though, is only among religious conservatives, because modernist biblical scholars tend to take the "days" of Genesis at face value. As the quotation from von Rad shows, they believe that it means precisely what it says, namely, that the world was created in six literal, consecutive twenty-four-hour days. They simply do not believe it. They believe the writer was wrong. Liberal scholars read the account in Genesis 1-2 as outdated cosmology dreamed up by an ancient Hebrew Priestly theologian who was attempting to answer the question, "Where did the world and all that it contains come from?"

Some evangelical scholars on the other hand, have interpreted the days of creation in such a way as to bring them into some semblance of accord with current concepts of historical geology. The temptation to do so is understandable (and thus to avoid a few of the major conflicts and more onerous contradictions between modern scientific theory and the Bible), but such attempts usually involve the imposition of a presupposed structure upon the interpretation of Scripture which the normal rules of biblical interpretation simply will not permit.

Such "interpretation" is not only strained to the breaking point, but also presents itself as rather foolish to the scientific community. They view it as the struggle of religious zealots to retain some meager vestige of what they consider to be their "precious religious mythology." They are not at all impressed with the effort. Those of us who take seriously the words of Genesis are not impressed either, for we view their attempt at striking a bargain with the Zeitgeist or "spirit of the times" as a traitorous sellout to contemporary culture.

Their efforts are neither serious Bible study nor serious science. In the end, they make of themselves "men without a country," so to speak. Evolutionists do not want them. Bible-believing Christians do not want them. But that is the way of the compromiser in every age. History provides us with many examples of this same mentality. The Judaizing teachers of Paul's time were rejected by churches which stood steadfast in the faith, while also being rejected by orthodox Jews who could not accept the notion that Jesus was their Christ. This was the result, in spite of their attempted compromise: "As many as desire to make a good showing in the flesh, these would compel you to be circumcised, only that they may not suffer persecution for the cross of Christ" (Gal. 6:12). Faithful saints rejected them because of their compromise, as we must today reject those who invent compromises with the present culture.

Likewise, the "Christian" gnostics attempted a compromise between the Christian system and the multifaceted Gnosticism, which itself was a commingling of Greek and Oriental mysticism, religion and philosophy. In the end, they too, found themselves unable to please either group. Ultimately, they became what Francis Legge has called one of the "rivals of Christianity" (Forerunners and Rivals of Christianity From 330 BC to 330 AD). The Apostle Paul considered their efforts at defining true wisdom as pure folly: ". . . avoiding the profane and idle babblings and contradictions of what is falsely called knowledge -- by professing it some have strayed concerning the faith" (1 Tim. 5:20, 21).

Our examination of this issue must necessarily begin with a study of the words chosen by the writer of Genesis to describe the temporal aspects of his narrative. Before we take a look at the words involved, though, a simple generalization is necessary. Most words in any language have a somewhat flexible range of meanings, and their meaning is not determined by a lexicon so much as by the context. In Genesis chapters one and two the word "day" (yom), which has the simple lexical meaning of "'day' as division of time" (Brown, Driver, and Briggs, Hebrew and English Lexicon of the O.T. 398) has a similar range of meaning as does our English word. It would be easiest to illustrate this point in the English usage.

One may, for example, speak of "George Washington's day" as an indefinite period of time (the context makes this clear), and this is how the word "day" is used in Genesis 2:4 "in the day that the Lord God made the earth and the heavens." Here the author simply refers to the time when God made the earth and heavens, not a particular day. Many interpreters wish to understand "day" in all its usages in Genesis 1 in this way. There are immense problems with this approach, however, as we will demonstrate below.

If a physician, on the other hand, prescribes medicine that is to be taken at one dosage the first day, at a reduced dosage the second day, and so on, he means something quite different when he uses the word "day." Moreover, it might prove to be a huge mistake to understand his words other than the way they were intended. But the context of the term leaves nothing to the imagination and little room for interpretation. "Day" is clearly used in this latter way in Genesis 1:5, 8, 13, 19, 23, and 31. All the usages in this chapter being of the same type and utilizing the identical descriptive, "there was evening and morning, a first day," and so on, it is natural for the reader to imply that the same thing is meant in each and every instance. And it is very unnatural, if not ridiculous, to infer the existence of millions or billions of years either during the days or between the days of Genesis 1. In Genesis 1-2 we have to understand yom as literal, 24-hour days, for the following reasons:

1. The creation days are delimited by the evening and morning, both of which in the Bible always mean literal evening and morning. Are we to believe that for half the period represented, say on the fourth day, the sun did not shine and that for half the period it did? By saying "evening and morning" the text implies a period of darkness and a period of light. Could plants have survived over such an extensive period of darkness? The same principal applies between the days of chapter one.

2. The first day, yom ehad, is, in fact, not called the first day in the Hebrew text, but "day one" or "one day." In this particular instance we could speak of a "proto-day," a day that was to be the measure of all coming days. It was not possible to use the order "first" yet, since there had not been any day before. It was not until after this "proto-day" that one could start talking about the second day, third day, and so on. But "day one" set the standard for all successive days, both of the creation itself, and of subsequent earth time.

5. The word yom in the Bible, and its plural form yamim, in approximately 95% of its occurrences has the ordinary literal meaning. Despite the efforts of some writers to force such a reading upon them, passages such as Psalm 90:4 and 2 Peter 3:8 are not meant to interpret the events of Genesis chapters one and two. Their purpose and the occasion of their usage are to show God's eternity, that one day is comparable to a thousand years and a thousand years like one day to One who dwells beyond the realm of time. They do not propose to offer a new way of viewing the creation week. In fact, they have no connection at all with the creation story.

6. With the word yom, always the context and the clues provided in the textual surroundings determine its meaning. And if the contextual evidence in Genesis 1 and 2 is not sufficient to convince the skeptical, Moses proceeded to tell us what he meant in other places in the Pentateuch. In his discussion of the Sabbath command he said, "For in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that is in them . . . " (Exod. 20:11). He also wrote, "For in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, and on the seventh day he rested, and was refreshed" (31:17). These supplementary statements from the hand of the prophet clearly imply that the days of creation were ordinary days and that God rested on the seventh day rather than during the seventh era, for the Jews were required to rest for a day and not for an era. This is an excellent example of Scripture interpreting Scripture, which is Bible interpretation at its best.

7. Psalm 33:6-9 says, "By the word of the Lord were the heavens made, and all the host of them by the breath of His mouth . . . For He spake, and it was done; He commanded, and it stood fast." According to the inspired writer of this psalm, when God spoke, the work of creating was done, and after that it merely stood fast. How is it possible to harmonize this bold declarative statement with an interpretation of the creation account which holds that God spoke merely to begin a process that took millions or billions of years to assume the form which it ultimately attained?

8. Jesus declared the creation of man and woman to have been at the beginning of the creation, not toward the end. The Lord said, "He which made them at the beginning made them male and female" (Matt. 19:4). The parallel account in Mark 10:6 further clarifies: "But from the beginning of the creation God made them male and female." If the progressive creationists are correct, man and woman were brought on the scene much closer to the end of earth history than the beginning. But Jesus said, " . . . from the beginning of the creation God made them . . . " It was not at the end, it was at the beginning. It is easy to understand how the events of the sixth day of a 144-hour week might be viewed as "the beginning"; but it is difficult indeed to see how man's creation 15-20 billion years after the "big bang" or original creation, and roughly 4.5 billion years after the creation of the earth, might in any sense be called "the beginning."

In summary, it is plain from a simple reading of the chapter that these long periods of time are being read into the text and not out of it! One could never find these extensive periods in Genesis the first chapter without first believing this notion that the universe is billions of years old and then inserting them between the verses -- not because they may be found in the word yom or somewhere else, but because they must be placed there in order to fit one's preconceptions. The assumption that modern historical geology has proven beyond all doubt that the earth is billions of years old, and the biblical account must be at the heart of this approach -- not anything that Genesis says.

The modern theory of evolution is not taught in the Scriptures. Whether scriptural language is taken literally or figuratively, it does not leave room for evolutionary development of either the material universe or the biological diversity of earth. Its assumptions are not the agendas which are put forward in the Word of God, nor do they at all motivate the writers of Holy Scripture. This is why evolutionary postulates seem so utterly alien to what we discover when we read Genesis 1-2 on its own terms. Although long "days" may appear more congenial to evolutionary concepts than 24 hour days, in fact they really only substitute new problems for old ones, this time imminently biblical rather than scientific. The "Bible believing scientist" who wishes to strike a compromise with the theories of modern science, merely trades scientific problems for biblical problems, as the following paragraphs show:

Given these facts, the clearest and simplest approach to Genesis 1 is to render the days of the chapter as comparable to our own days, to allow that those days reflect the temporal order of creation events, and to appreciate the internal harmony among the various biblical passages dealing with creation. There is no reason to suggest that the events of Genesis 2 contradict those of chapter 1. Genesis 1 deals with creation in general, showing man's place in the larger pattern of God's genesis of the cosmos. Genesis 2 treats the creation of the human family in more detail; it represents an enlarging of what was summarily discussed in chapter 1.

It is also entirely possible and reasonable to translate certain verbs in Genesis 2 in the pluperfect tense, as does the New International Version: "Now the Lord had formed out of the ground all the beasts of the field and all the birds of the air" (Gen. 2:19). This is in complete harmony with the normal usage of the Hebrew perfect, as Gesenius says, "The perfect serves to express actions, events, or states, which the speaker wishes to represent from the point of view of completion, whether they belong to a determinate past time, or extend into the present, or while still future, are pictured as in their completed state" (Gesenius' Hebrew Grammar 309). All apparent contradictions disappear when this is done. Chapter one thus represents a summary of all six days of God's creating, whereas chapter two focuses in upon day six, and in particular the beginning of the human race.

Several views have been put forward in an effort to escape the obvious assertion made in the early chapters of Genesis that the world is of recent origin. Given the fact that this position is completely out of favor in the scientific community because evolution is currently the most popular of the theories of origins, several alternative views have been set before the reading public with the hope that both contemporary religion and contemporary science may happily coexist. None of these views has gained much currency among Christians or scientists. But for those who seem set upon the notion of "having it both ways," so to speak, these are options which have become quite popular. The following are the main alternatives to the traditional way of viewing the Genesis account of creation:

According to this view, there is a gap in time between the inaugural event reported in Genesis 1:1 and the creative forming of those elements which were fashioned in 1:2, which may consist of millions or even billions of years. During this period the original creation stood in total chaos. This hypothesis is sometimes described as the "Gap Theory." Those who entertain this position say that the evidence of great age which is apparent from their reading of the geological record comes from this chaotic period. C.I. Schofield popularized this notion in his 1909 reference Bible. He also cited Isaiah 45:18 as proof that such a time existed in the history of the earth. In fact, there is nothing either in Genesis 1:1-2 or Isaiah 45:18 which remotely suggests such an extended period of chaos.

Is there support for this idea in the distinction between the words for "create" (bara) and "make" (asah) which some writers say marks a very important difference in the writer's revelation of the events of creation? One promoter of this theory has written, "The passage of Exodus (20:11) is a reference to the subjects of the creation week of Genesis -- that which God made (asah), not that which God created (bara -- Gen. 1:1)" ("Flat Earth Bible Study Techniques," by John N. Clayton in Does God Exist?, Vol. 3, No. 10 [Oct. 1976] 5-6). According to this idea "create" is used to describe only the calling of things out of nothingness (creatio ex nihilo), which only happened once at the origin of the universe, whereas the term "made" is used of the shaping and forming process relative to things which already exist.

In fact, in a sense the two words are used interchangeably in the Old Testament, and are so used throughout the creation narrative in the first two chapters of Genesis. Nowhere is this more striking than in 1:26, 27. "And God said, Let us make man in our image . . . So God created man in his own image . . . " In Psalm 148:1-5, the writer spoke of the creation of the angels. Yet when Nehemiah spoke of the creation of the angels, he employed the word asah to describe it. The word is thus employed because the basic definition of bara is to "shape, create" (BDB 135); the root from which it derives (br') means "to build" or "to bring forth, give birth to" (TDOT, Vol. II, 245). In the Bible this word is always used of God's work of creating and shaping of things. It does not, however, necessitate "creation out of nothing," even though it is used so in Genesis 1:1 (compare Heb. 11:3). In Exodus 20:11, Moses uses "made" to describe the entirety of the creative activity during the creation week, even the original creation ex nihilo. It is clear from this that asah may at times mean "create" as well as "make" (cf. also Pss. 33:6; 96:5; 100:3; Isa. 66:22; Jer. 32:17; etc.). In Psalm 104:30 the word "create" is used to describe the regular and continual bringing of new life into the world (creatio continua), while in Ezekiel 28:13, 15 "the day that you were created" seems to mean the day of the birth of the prince of Tyre, so it appears to take on the same meaning as "make" in some instances. This leads us to believe gap theorists are making much more of the verbs of "creating" and "making" than is actually found there!

Further, there is no evidence whatever for the gap theory in Genesis' words for "was" (hayetah) or "without form and void" (tohu wabohu) in 1:2a. The verb hayah is commonly used to describe states of being ("to be, to exist"). Many gap theorists take it to mean "became" in this passage, i.e., "the earth became formless and void." Now, hayah may have the connotation "to become" at times, but it is the context which determines this, and nothing in this particular context points the reader toward that meaning. That is the reason translators do not render it so. They would be inclined to translate it that way if there were some indication in the biblical text that there was an original creation which somehow became disordered and chaotic. As Bernard Ramm has written, "The effort to make was mean became is just as abortive. The Hebrews did not have a word for became but the word to be did service for to be and become. The form of the verb was in Genesis 1:2 is the Qal, perfect, third person singular, feminine. A Hebrew concordance will give all the occurrences of that form of the verb. A check in the concordance with reference to the usage of this form of the verb in Genesis reveals that in almost every case the meaning of the verb is simply was. Granted in a case or two was means became, but if in the preponderance of instances the word is translated was, any effort to make one instance mean became, especially if that instance is highly debatable, is very insecure exegesis" (The Christian View of Science and Scripture 139).

The words which describe the chaos before God brought order to the material universe (tohu wabohu), under certain circumstances could be taken to mean something that is brought to ruin, but once again, the context dictates that it rather describes something which is empty and unshapen because it had not yet been configured for use. Jeremiah uses the phrase metaphorically to describe Judah after a devastating invasion from her northern enemy: "I looked on the earth, and lo, it was waste and void; and to the heavens, and they had no light" (Jer. 4:23). In Jeremiah, however, the context clearly shows that the land of Judah was to become "waste and void" because of the impending disaster. But Genesis 1:2 does not suggest any such circumstance. It does not say that the world was disorganized, but that it was unorganized. Keil and Delitzsch explain that although the etymology of the two words has been lost, the meaning here is "waste and empty" or "barren." They do not imply a "laying waste" or a "desolating" (Biblical Commentary on the O.T., Vol. 1, 48). They rather describe the coming earth and tell us it was at first a desolate, formless, lifeless mass. Surely if the author had intended us to believe there was a world which came to nought before the one which he describes as coming into being during his creative week, he would have given us more than words which may so easily be taken to mean something else entirely! If such a world existed, why did he not just come out and say it? Why did its discovery await the era when evolutionary science caused the biblical account to fall into disrepute in the minds of so many?

The truth is, this "gap" must be read between the lines of Scripture, for it is most assuredly missing from Scripture itself. Good biblical scholarship has always been against this speculative theory, as the following words written by Oswald T. Allis show: "The first objection to this gap theory is that it throws the account of Creation almost completely out of balance. To regard the words of Genesis 1:1 as a brief statement (or heading) which is amplified in the rest of the chapter, makes the entire chapter deal with the original creation. But when verse one is regarded as stating or announcing -- it does not describe in any way -- an original creation which was reduced to desolation (v. 2) and restored in six days (vv. 3-31), the character of the chapter is radically changed. It becomes almost wholly an account not of the creation, but of the re-creating or repairing of that original creation. This is the most obvious objection to this interpretation. It seems highly improbable that an original creation, which according to this theory brought into existence a world of wondrous beauty, would be dismissed with a single sentence and so many verses be devoted to what would be in a sense merely a restoration of it" (God Spake by Moses 153).

According to one popular form of this view, it is the creation of the world intended for the angels that is reported in Genesis 1:1. Some time after this angelic world had been created, the evil angels, led by Satan himself, fell into sin. As a punishment for this sin the world was destroyed and the evil angels cast into hell. It is this condition of the earth which is reported in Genesis 1:2: "and the earth was without form and void." Proponents of this theory believe it would account for the passage of considerable time and explain many of the fossils found in the geologic column. These, they believe, are evidence of animals annihilated when the angelic world was destroyed.

Another rather formidable problem exists as well. First, no passage of Scripture clearly teaches the idea, and the Bible is definitely against it, especially the Genesis account. A simple and straightforward examination of the early verses of Genesis chapter one shows that verses 1-5, which are said to contain the period of chaos and ruination, are inextricably connected with their context and offer no mention of either. Furthermore, there is no pause or other indicator of this supposed additional era of earth history; instead, the words which connect the sentences indicate a progression which is continuous, excluding any break in thought for a gap of millions or billions of years. Second, the theory contradicts Exodus 20:11, which says, "in six days the Lord made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them, and rested the seventh day . . . " and connects the creative week with the ordinary work week of the Hebrew people. Moses summarizes the creation within a single calendar week and leaves no room at all for a long period of chaos or recreation. The remainder of the Bible is also completely silent about it. So, Holy Scripture is in general also against the view.

3. The Day-Age Theory. This is one of the more popular of the "alternative theories" for understanding the Genesis account. According to this theory, each creation day is supposedly answerable to a Geologic Age represented in the various layers of the crust of the earth. A major obstacle to the acceptance of this position is the fact that the modern scientific theorist's reconstruction of the development of life upon the earth cannot be made to correspond with Genesis 1 and its picture of the creation of living organisms. This view also is tormented by the problems associated with all "long day" systems (cf. the section above titled, "Problems With Long Days"). The writer's use of the terms "evening" and "morning" in Genesis also contradicts any approach which does not take seriously this rather obvious and simple terminology, which in all other cases would be taken at face value and not subjected to further interpretation. As Dr. Davis Young, a committed Day-Age theorist has acknowledged, the literal-day interpretation of Genesis is not only a "legitimate" approach to the text but is "the obvious view" (Creation and the Flood 44, 48). It is certainly fitting to challenge the promoters of the Day-Age theory to produce even a single instance as a parallel in Scripture where the word "day" (yom) means an age comprised of millions or billions of years. This is what they avow the word means in Genesis one, so it is appropriate to ask for proof.

An interesting footnote to this view is set forward in Dr. Young's book Creation and the Flood. Young's main biblical basis for viewing the creation days as ages is his contention that the seventh day is still going on, since according to his view God is still resting from his work of creation. Shane Scott uses this same argument, "To prove that the days are ages, consider the seventh day. All the other days of creation ended with, 'and there was evening and there was morning, the ___ day.' I understand that phrase to mean that each of those days had a distinct conclusion. However, there is no such statement for the seventh day, which must mean that it has not ended. In other words, on the seventh day God ceased creating new life forms, and that day has continued until now because He still 'rests' from creating new life" (Sentry Magazine, Vol. 21, No. 1 [March 31, 1995]. Shane Scott, Young, and others who hold to this view ignore the tense of the verb "rested" in the phrase "and He rested on the seventh day . . . " (Gen. 2:2, 3). The writer does not tell us that God "is resting" as they assert, but that "He rested." Moreover, in Exodus 31:17 the Bible goes on to explain that God "rested, and was refreshed." And, even though God's rest from the original creation may be said to be continuing, that would not prove that the seventh day of Genesis 2:2, 3 was continuing, much less that it continues to the present. After all, Jesus said, "My father has been working until now, and I have been working" (John 5:17). And that was on a Sabbath! The Lord viewed the Sabbath of the creation week as over. God only rested from his original creation, for the Bible gives ample evidence of his continued work of creating (cf. Pss. 51:10; 104:2; Isa. 43:15; 65:17, 18). In addition, Hebrews 4:9 does not provide any consolation for this mistaken view, since verse 11 makes it evident that the author has in mind in this context the heavenly rest, i.e., heaven itself, and not the original Sabbath or any subsequent one. The author is not really discussing Sabbath days at all, but the ultimate Sabbath rest in heaven.

The best-known advocate of this view is Dr. Bernard Ramm. He makes his case for it in his influential book The Christian View of Science and Scripture (1954); it is also advanced by the several writers of Evolution and Christian Thought Today (1959). The idea in the progressive creation approach is to suppose that, while life was developing over the vast span of geologic time the way evolutionists have imagined it, God intervened at various occasions to create something new, which the evolutionary process could not have accomplished unaided. "Saltatory evolution," "macro evolution," "quantum evolution," and "punctuated equilibrium" are all terms and ideas used by Drs. Richard B. Goldschmidt and Stephen J. Gould to describe their own particular brand of evolutionary theory. Their writings have given impetus to religious evolutionists (or should I say rather, "progressive creationists") among the so-called evangelicals; the theories seem to give support to their claims. The following is a characterization of these writers and their position, given in the words of Dr. Henry M. Morris in his excellent book Scientific Creationism (220-221): "Details vary considerably in the exposition of the progressive creation concept by various writers, with greater or lesser numbers of creative acts interspersed in the evolutionary process according to the taste of the writer. All, however, accept the basic framework of the evolutionary geologic ages and visualize progressive creation as taking place more than five billion years instead of six days. It is difficult to see any Biblical or theological advantage which the progressive creation idea has over a straightforward system of theistic evolution." Bert Thompson is just as emphatic on this point, "Is progressive creationism theistic evolution? Both call in God to start creation. Both accept evolution (in varying amounts). Both accept the validity of the geologic age system. Both postulate an old Earth. Where is the difference, except that progressive creationism allows God 'a little more to do in the system'? Both systems put God (theos) and evolution together. By any other standard that's theistic evolution" (Creation Compromises 193).

According to the form of this view to which we recently have been introduced in the churches of Christ, each of the days of creation were 24-hour periods, but they were separated by millions or billions of years between them. What this view attempts to do is to avoid one of the very obvious and troublesome problems of the Day-Age theory, namely the fact that it places the interpreter into the unenviable position of forcing the word "day" (yom) into a strait-jacket which it never wore when it was used in classical biblical Hebrew. The word never described long eons of time in any instance in the Old Testament, and the cases where it is claimed to have meant this (in Genesis 1) are bounded by very conspicuous contextual limitations ("evening and morning," "day one," "day two," etc.).

So some promoters of the view think they avoid this difficulty by saying that the days of Genesis 1 are literal 24-hour periods which are separated by long ages of time. It is clear that they make the identical assumption that all Day-Age theorists do, however, namely, that the creation week must somehow be expanded to incorporate all of earth's history from its primeval beginning up to and including man's arrival. Hence, the "days" of Genesis 1 must correspond more or less to the geological "ages" as set forth in modern science text books. This theory ignores the evidence offered by scientists for a relatively young earth, some of which is provided later in this presentation, and the difficulties created by the assumption that the creative week was more than six 24-hour periods immediately following one another. See the section titled, "The Trouble With Long Days" above. Each of these difficulties is precisely the same, whether the days are longer than the 24 hour periods they claim to be, or the week is longer than the 144 hours it claims to be. And make no mistake about it, the creative week is just as critical to the biblical chronology as are the days (cf. Exod. 20:11; 31:17). One does not avoid the difficulties intrinsic to stretching the "days" into billions of years by, in its stead, extending the creative week into billions of years. Both approaches collapse because of the same fatal flaw

5. The Pictorial Day Theory. The thrust of this approach to the first two chapters of Genesis is that the "six days" are merely devices to picture what went on at the beginning. It is not at all literal, nor was it ever meant to be. The writer's presentation is topical and logical, but not chronological in any fashion. Here the "days" are merely taken as literary devices and not serious descriptions of what happened or in what time-frame they occurred. All it seems to say according to its proponents, is, "God did it."

A view such as this cannot be taken seriously by those who say they "believe" what the Bible says about other things. If this straightforward narrative which is given at the beginning of Scripture may be turned into mere symbolism, purely on the ground that it is considered "pre-scientific," or even on the ground that it is considered to be inaccurate because it does not correlate with contemporary scientific theory, then any other narrative found anywhere else in the Bible may be considered symbolic and treated in the same fashion on this or some other pretext. Moreover, if narratives are subject to such prejudging on these kinds of a priori considerations, then ipso facto, any and every other type of literature in Scripture will fall under a similar spell. Before you know it, no part of the Bible will be taken literally. Such a situation would lead to interpretive chaos. In fact, all who approach the Bible without preconceived opinions about such matters will have to admit the proposition that "every passage is to be taken literally except those which cannot by virtue of the context." Put another way, "The literal or most usual meaning of a word; if consistent, should be preferred to a figurative or less usual signification" (Clinton Lockhart, Principles of Interpretation 160). In this instance there is nothing in the context which suggests that the days should be looked upon as long ages or as pictorial representations of anything else besides ordinary days of the week.

6. Theistic Evolution. Theistic evolution is a form of reaction against mechanistic or atheistic evolution. This view suggests that God's methods of "creation" might really have been what modern scientists designate "evolution." As John Clayton has written, " . . . we can find that evolution and the Bible show amazing agreement on almost all issues and that one is not mutually exclusive of the other" (The Source 130). Religious evolution makes an earnest effort to get God involved in the process of the evolution of the cosmos and of the living world. There are two types of such evolutionists. First, there are those who consider it a continuous process with God always present and working out the program constructively through natural laws. Then there are those who believe in what has been called "God at the beginning only." In this approach the processes are left to themselves after an original creation. This view in all of its manifestations, of course, assumes from the outset that evolution actually did happen, and that scientists have proven it so conclusively that some vestige of the biblical tradition must be salvaged from the catastrophic effects of this torrent of new and damaging information.

In reality, neither of these assumptions is correct. Evolutionary theory is flawed at every turn, but is relentlessly held to in spite of the fact that it cannot be observed or proven in the laboratory. It contradicts the second law of thermodynamics, a physical principle which states that there is a continual tendency toward greater randomness, positing that in the biological sphere there is a tendency toward a higher degree of organization. The mathematical improbability of the thousands of "miracles" the theory demands is an inexplicable mystery for evolutionists. Evolution can give no answer to the question of how matter came to exist in the first place. It cannot account for the gap between inorganic matter and living organisms. It cannot explain the Cambrian explosion of life in the fossil record. It cannot explain the mysterious appearance of single cells, invertebrates, fishes, amphibians, reptiles, mammals, rodents, sea mammals, insects, flight in winged creatures, primates, or plants. The typical absence of transitional or intermediate forms in the fossil record is a constant source of frustration to evolutionary scientists. Theistic evolutionists see themselves as filling the "gaps" of the theory of evolution by putting God into the gaps. At the same time they see themselves as saving religion from the attacks of atheistic evolutionists by attempting to make religion conform to evolutionary theory. In reality, religion does not need saving from this fragile hypothesis.

The idea of an extremely ancient earth is deemed essential to evolutionary science. Given sufficient time, it is surmised, virtually anything might happen. A primordial pool might give rise to life. An amoeba might evolve into man. Time is the key. According to Dr. George Wald of Harvard, "However improbable we regard this event, or any of the steps which it involves, given enough time it will almost certainly happen at least once. . . . Time is in fact the hero of the plot. . . . Given so much time, the 'impossible' becomes possible, the possible probable, and the probable virtually certain. One has only to wait: time itself performs the miracles" (The Physics and Chemistry of Life 12).

So the contention for a very old earth is the one absolutely necessary ingredient to evolutionary science. Interestingly, it is the one factor which theistic evolutionists are most eager to grant. At the same time, the evidence which is proposed for a recent creation is usually ignored, and sometimes assailed. The evidence is much more favorable toward the idea of a young earth and a recent creation than most modern scientists will allow and even than some theistic evolutionists will admit. Theistic evolution is, in point of fact, in all of its various manifestations, a compromise with and surrender to that part of the scientific community which arrogantly proclaims that "evolution is a fact and modern science has proven it."

The word translated "kind" (min) in Genesis 1:11-12, 21, and 24-25 apparently refers to the general reproducing groups of organisms. The term probably does not refer to the technical word species in most cases, but it may refer to what we today call genera, families, orders, or other taxonomic categories. The word may in fact have no exact twentieth-century equivalent. And, while there may be some uncertainty as to what is precisely meant by "kind," it is plain that the word does have a definite and fixed meaning. (It may be helpful to note that the word "species" is similarly difficult to define by scientists today.) One thing is certain about the use of min in Genesis. One "kind" could not transform itself into another "kind." We may therefore infer that all the changes which take place (and

The Genesis account does not have a clear reference to creatio ex nihilo, a creation out of nothing. It is assumed rather than explicitly taught, and it is the context which distinguishes these particular instances as such. Moreover, that this creation was not from pre-existing matter is made quite clear by the New Testament. In Romans 4:17, Paul speaks of God who "calls into existence the things that do not exist." As well, the author of the Epistle to the Hebrews has this to say, "By faith we understand that the world was created by the Word of God, so that what is seen was made out of things which do not appear" (11:3).

In the other instances in Genesis, other than 1:1, 21, and 27, God's work was to "make" ('asah) or to "form" (yatsar), i.e., out of pre-existing matter the final product, as a potter would shape his vessel on the wheel out of clay. In terms of the material universe, according to the text itself, the only creatio ex nihilo is in Genesis 1:1. There God is said to have created the matter and energy out of which the universe was fashioned, and then took six days to organize it. So, the six days were dedicated to organizing the matter and energy he had called into being at the beginning. One thing is very clear about the process as described in the Genesis account, and wherein these three verbs are employed, it was never left to its own devices, i.e., to form and shape itself. God was the Former and the Fashioner. He did not leave the elements of his creation to fashion themselves over vast stretches of time. One looks in vain in Genesis 1 for these vast eons of time and the Ages which they represent in the geological time table as described in modern science text books. But one also looks in vain to find the physical processes acting on their own to produce the world we now see. This latter concept is as foreign to the biblical cosmology as are the long ages of historical geology.

One particular writer's remarks about the word "make" are indicative of one who believes the physical elements were left to themselves over these vast expanses of time. According to his view they formed themselves into what became planet earth as we know it today: "Now once again God lets this environment he's created do what he created it to do: make (Assam') [sic] the surface of the Earth. The earth is going through a process of cooling as it stabilizes . . . How long was this? How long did it take God to pronounce his will? Not long. A day is surely sufficient. How long did it take the Earth to comply with his decree? However long it takes . . . " (Hill Roberts, A Harmonization of God's Genesis Revelation and His Natural Revelation). In this writer's humble opinion it is very difficult to avoid the term "evolutionist" to describe such people and their views, since it is apparent that they believe in a process of "evolution" (whether or not they would agree to the use of this word) of the inanimate world through natural processes and subject to natural law. If God used such processes over vast ages to bring the inanimate world to an advanced state, why would it be unthinkable for him to have used the same or similar processes to bring the animate world to an advanced state of development? Whether you have one or the other, or both together, it would seem to this writer that the result ought to be called "theistic evolution," simply because that is what it is -- all objections to the contrary notwithstanding.

1. Purposeful progress. Each stage of the creative process in the Genesis account was an appropriate preparation for the succeeding phase and all of them for the ultimate purpose of providing a suitable home for man. But on the whole the stages in Genesis cannot be made to fit the sequences of evolutionary theorists and their way of reading the geologic column. This fact has been a constant source of frustration for theistic evolutionists. They could wish that Moses had been more aware of these later hypothetical reconstructions of the development of life on earth, so that he could have configured his creation narrative more in line with them!

2. Appearance of Age. The creation was mature from its inception. It did not have to grow or develop from simple beginnings. Adam and Eve are presented as fully formed adults; stars and sun gave light immediately, though the spaces between the stars were many light years and would normally require eons to cross that space, etc. The earth and the elements that composed it (along with the rest of the universe for that matter) may have possessed some of the appearances of age as well. It was so because God willed it to be so and spoke it into existence. The fact that under "ordinary circumstances" it would not be so has absolutely nothing to do with the creation as it is described in Genesis. Even though some operate on the assumption that such a miraculous intervention would be an aberration in a "uniformitarian" world, the Bible says it was so: "And God said, Let there be . . . and there was . . . " God's creation was instantaneous, not gradual: "By the word of the Lord were the heavens made, and all the host of them by the breath of his mouth . . . For he spake, and it was done; he commanded, and it stood fast" (Ps. 33:6, 9).

4. A Worldwide Flood Made a Significant Impression Upon Earth Geology. This is one factor which is generally ignored or even denied by many from among the ranks of theistic evolutionists. Of course, most from the contemporary scientific community give it no credence whatsoever. But those who take seriously the biblical account of creation and the flood (Gen. 6-9) also wish to come to terms with the geologic facts provided by the earth's crust. All of the geologic strata and formations, the great coal and oil deposits, the volcanic and glacial beds, the mountain ranges and geosynclines, and all the multitudinous phenomena of historical geology require some adequate explanation for their very existence. As Dr. Henry Morris has said, "The only possible explanation for the geologic column and fossil record, consistent with Scripture, must therefore be sought in terms of the Noachian Deluge. This tremendous worldwide cataclysm does provide a satisfactory framework within which to reinterpret these data. If the Flood was really of the magnitude and intensity the Bible indicates, then the entire case for evolution collapses. Evolution depends entirely on the fossil record interpreted in terms of vast geologic ages. If these did not take place, evolution is impossible" (Scientific Creationism 251).

The position held by theistic evolutionists which states that the biblical flood was merely a local phenomenon and the geologic column and fossil record are to be explained by vast eons of prehistoric time instead, holds the Bible in contempt, for it reduces the statements made in Scripture about the height and duration of the Flood to fiction (cf. Gen. 7:19, 20; 8:5). Mount Ararat, where the Ark came to rest is 17,000 feet high. The Bible says the waters covered these peaks for more than nine months. Such a "local flood" is impossible on many different grounds. Again, in their search for compliance with the theory of evolution, these "Bible students" are willing to surrender the literal and obvious meaning of certain passages from the Word of God. Their greatest loyalty is to current scientific theory, not the Holy Scriptures.

5. The Genealogies of Genesis Provide No Benefit to Theistic Evolutionists. It is often argued that because the Hebrew expression "to beget" (yalad) does not necessitate a direct father/son relationship but often only means "to be a descendant," there is plenty of room in the genealogies of Genesis for considerable additional time than the traditional way of viewing them would permit. It is also noted that there is ample evidence of the fact that genealogies in general are not to be viewed as chronologies would be, that is, as straight-line and all-inclusive generational depictions. Rather, they are often punctuated by abbreviations which may skip several generations. This much is not a matter of controversy. And this clearly renders the 4004 B.C. date of Archbishop Ussher for the creation obsolete. His dates may prove to be hundreds or even thousands of years off. Most careful Bible students today do not attempt to offer a precise date for the creation because of this. However, the question whether this fact provides any serious encouragement to the notion that millions or even billions of years may have intervened is utterly preposterous. The age of Abraham has been dated at approximately 2000 B.C. on a solid historical basis, so it is only the 2000 years from Adam to Abraham recorded in the genealogies of Genesis 10-11 which provide any room at all for flexibility in reckoning the duration of Old Testament history. Even the most generous approach to generation-skipping finds it hard to make this 2000 years correlate with evolution's 100,000 to 250,000 years of human evolution. Moreover, this does not even consider the other 4.5 billion years of earth history proposed by historical geology which must be made to fit into the six days of creation! The genealogies of Genesis cannot be made to provide the theistic evolutionist what he is looking for, i.e., vast eons of time. If those expansive periods of time actually transpired, then the Bible is wrong. It is that simple. But if they did not, then evolution is wrong. It is that simple.

Godless evolution requires an old earth and an old solar system. Theistic evolution argues that the assumptions of old earth scientists have merit. Those who believe that the days of Genesis one are actually ages of time, or are punctuated by ages of time, make the identical assumptions. Without billions of years, virtually all informed evolutionists will admit that their theory is dead. As R.L. Wysong has commented, "Both evolutionists and creationists believe evolution is an impossibility if the universe is only a few thousand years old. There is probably no statement that could be made on the topic of origins which would meet with so much agreement from both sides. Setting aside the question of whether vast time is competent to propel evolution, we must query if vast time is indeed available" (The Creation-Evolution Controversy 144). Dr. Bert Thompson has further remarked, "This matter is of importance not only to evolutionists, but to theistic evolutionists, progressive creationists, and other 'old-Earth creationists.' While a young earth presents no problem whatsoever for a creationist, it is the death knell to each and every variety of the evolutionary scenario" ("Popular Compromises of Creation --The Gap Theory," Reason & Revelation, Vol. 14, No. 7 [1994], 49).

By hiding the "origins question" behind the veil of vast periods of time, the unsolvable problems of the theory of evolution become difficult for scientists to appreciate and laymen even to imagine. Our media and text books have implied for over a century that this almost unimaginable age is correct, but practically never do they or the professors who thoughtlessly repeat the mantra, examine the shaky assumptions and growing body of contrary evidence. Some even imply that there is no evidence whatever that the earth is younger than billions of years.

Therefore, most people instinctively believe that things are old, and it is disturbing (at least initially) to hear evidence that our origins might be relatively recent. Walter T. Brown, Jr., Ph.D. authored an article on the "Evidence That Implies a Young Earth and Solar System" published by the Institute for Creation Research in March of 1981. Brown wrote: "Actually most dating techniques show that the earth and solar system are young -- usually less than 10,000 years old." Listed below are just a few of these evidences as they are provided in Brown's insightful essay (his citations are also provided) along with several others which we have culled from other sources. Our belief in creation as described in the Genesis account is not dependent upon any one of these proofs, nor upon the sum of them. It is wholly dependent upon what the Word of God has revealed in the Bible.

1. Atomic clocks, which have measured the earth's spin rate to the nearest billionth of a second, have consistently found that the earth is slowing down at the rate of almost one second a year (cf. Arthur Fisher, "The Riddle of the Leap Second," Popular Science, Vol. 202, March 1973, 110-113, 164-166; Air Force Cambridge Research Laboratory, Earth Motions and Their Effect on Air Force Systems, November 1975, 6; Jack Fincher, "And Now, Atomic Clocks," Readers' Digest, Vol. III, November 1977, 34). If the earth were billions of years old, its initial spin rate would have been fantastically rapid -- so rapid that major distortions in the shape of the earth would have occurred.

2. Direct measurements of the earth's magnetic field or dipole, since Karl Gauss first evaluated it in 1835, show a steady and rapid decline in its strength. This decay pattern is consistent with the theoretical view that there is an electrical current inside the earth which produces the magnetic field. Physicists like Sir Horace Lamb and Dr. Thomas Barnes have examined the depletion of the earth's magnetic field and shown that, given its rate of depletion, the earth cannot be older than about 10,000 years. If this view is correct, then 25,000 years ago the electrical current would have been so vast that the earth's structure could not have survived the heat produced. This would imply that the earth could not be older than 10,000 years (Thomas G. Barnes, Origin and Destiny of the Earth's Magnetic Field [San Diego: Institute for Creation Research, 1973]).

3. More than twenty-seven billion tons of sediments, primarily from our rivers, are entering the oceans each year. Obviously, this rate of sediment transport has not been constant and has probably been decreasing as the looser top soil has been removed. But assuming that the rate of sedimentation has been constant, the sediments which are now on the ocean floor would have accumulated in only about 30 million years. The Geological Society of America Bulletin (Jan. 73), estimates the average sediment thickness over the entire ocean at approximately 2,950 feet. When that is multiplied by the area of the world's oceans and the density of the sediment, we are told that the mass of ocean sediments is about 820 million billion tons. How long would it take to deposit that much sediment on the ocean floor if there was none to begin with? What limit does the ocean put on its own age? Robert Garrels and Fred Mackenzie wrote Evolution of Sedimentary Rocks in which they listed and quantified sources and rates at which sediment is added to the ocean each year. The total addition of sediment to the world's oceans was found to be 27.5 billion tons per year. Most geologists accepting the general theory of evolution will admit that this total is approximately correct and is to be taken as a constant rate throughout that supposed evolution. However, when we divide the total mass of ocean sediment by that rate, we find the outer limit of the age of the earth's oceans to be 30 million years! (Stuart E. Nevins, "Evolution; The Ocean Says No!," ICR Impact Series, No. 8 [San Diego: Institute for Creation Research]).

4. It has been estimated that seventy volcanoes the size of Mexico's Paricutin producing 0.001 cubic miles of water per year for 4.5 billion years of earth's history could account for the 315 cubic miles of water in the oceans today. There are now approximately 600 active volcanoes and about 10,000 dormant ones. Six hundred volcanoes comparable to Paricutin could account for the present oceans in approximately 0.5 billion years. However, the evidence shows that volcanic activity was much greater in the past than at present, so if that rate could be determined this number would decline substantially (William D. Stansfield, Science of Evolution 80-84).

5. It has been estimated that four volcanoes spewing lava at the rate observed for Paricutin and continuing for five billion years could almost account for the volume of the continental crusts. The Colombian plateau of northwestern United States (covering 200,000 square miles) was produced by a gigantic lava flow several thousands of feet deep. The Canadian shield and other extensive lava flows indicate that volcanic activity has indeed followed an accelerated tempo in the past. Since there are at present about 600 active volcanoes and probably were substantially more in the past, the time involved would be considerably less (Ibid. 80-84).

6. The atmosphere has less than 40,000 years worth of helium, based on the production of helium -- (the most abundant isotope of helium) from the decay of uranium and thorium. There is no known means by which large amounts of helium can escape from the atmosphere. If the present rate of accumulation had been constant throughout four billion years of the earth's history, there should be thirty times as much helium in our present atmosphere as is presently there. The atmosphere therefore appears to be young (Melvin A. Cook, Prehistory and Earth Models [London: Max Parrish, 1966], 10-14).

7. The rate at which elements such as copper, gold, tin, lead, silicon, mercury, uranium, and nickel are entering the oceans is very rapid when compared with the small quantities of these elements already in the oceans. Uranium salts, for example, presently appear to be accumulating in the oceans at about 100 times the rate of their loss. It is estimated that sixty billion grams of uranium are added to the oceans annually. Under uniformitarian rules, the total concentration of uranium salts of the oceans (estimated at less than 1E+17 grams) could be accumulated in less than one million years. Therefore, the oceans must be younger than a million years.

8. There are several factors which add salt to the oceans on an on-going basis. Rivers pick up salt from surrounding mineral deposits as they flow into the sea, thereby carrying salt into the sea. Hot springs on the floor of the ocean are another source of salt, as is dust from volcanoes. Also, ground water seeps into the sea, and this often has a very high mineral content -- including salts. Of course, there are other factors that cause the ocean to lose some of its salt. However, it has been shown that the salt is added much faster than it is taken out. In fact, it is possible to calculate the rate at which the level of salt is increasing. By using the standard assumptions used by evolutionists, geologist Steve Austin and physicist Russell Humphreys calculated that the oceans must be less than 62 million years old. Keep in mind that this figure represents the maximum age, and that any age less than 62 million years is consistent with the evidence. Moreover, if the assumptions are changed, the maximum age decreases. For example, the evolutionists assume that the ocean had no salt whatsoever when it was first formed. However, if we allow for some level of salt at the time of creation, then factor in the rate at which the salt level increases, the maximum age of the sea declines sharply. In addition, since Austin and Humphreys did their work, a newer study has shown that the rate at which salt is being added to the ocean is actually faster than previously thought. It has been shown that much more salt enters the ocean through the ground water each year than expected. Thus the maximum possible age of the ocean is significantly less than Austin and Humphreys' figure.

11. There have been no authenticated reports of the discovery of meteorites in sedimentary material (Peter A. Steveson, "Meteoritic Evidence or a Young Earth," Creation Research Quarterly, Vol. 12, June 1975, 23-25). If the sediments, which have an average depth of one and one-half miles, were laid down over hundreds of millions of years, many of these steadily falling meteorites should have been discovered. Therefore, the sediments appear to have been deposited rapidly; furthermore, since there have been no reports of meteorites beneath the sediments, they appear to have been deposited recently. This provides evidence for both recent creation and flood geology.

12. The rate at which meteoritic dust is accumulating on the earth is such that after five billion years, the equivalent of 182 feet of this dust should have accumulated. Because this dust is high in nickel, there should be an exceedingly large amount of nickel in the crustal rocks of the earth. No such concentration has been found -- on land or in the oceans. Consequently, the earth appears to be young (Henry M. Morris, Scientific Creationism [San Diego: Creation-Life Publishers, 1974], 151-153; Steveson, 23-25; Hans Peterson, "Cosmic Spherules and Meteoritic Dust," Scientific American, Vol. 202, February 1960, 132).

14. The sun acts as a giant vacuum cleaner which sweeps up about 100,000 tons of micrometeorites per day. If the solar system were significantly older than 10,000 years, no micrometeorites should remain since there is no significant source of replenishment. A large disk shaped cloud of these particles is orbiting the sun. Conclusion: the solar system is less than 10,000 years old (Paul M. Steidi, The Earth, the Stars, and the Bible [Grand Rapids: Baker Book House, 1979], 60-61).

15. Since 1836, more than one hundred different observers at the Royal Greenwich Observatory and the U.S. Naval Observatory have made direct visual measurements which show that the diameter of the sun is shrinking at a rate of about .1 % each century or about five feet per hour! Furthermore, records of solar eclipses infer that this rapid shrinkage has been going on for at least the past 400 years ("Analyses of Historical Data Suggest Sun Is Shrinking," Physics Today, September 1979, 17-19). Several indirect techniques also confirm this gravitational collapse, although these inferred collapse rates are only about 1/7th as much ( David W. Dunham, et. al., "Observations of a Probable Change in the Solar Radius Between 1715 and 1979," Science, Vol. 210, December 12,1980, 1243-1245; and Irwin 1. Shapiro, "Is the Sun Shrinking?", Science, Vol. 208, April 4,1980, 51-53). Using the most conservative data, one must conclude that had the sun existed a million years ago, it would have been so large that it would have heated the earth so much that life could not have survived. Yet, evolutionists say that a million years ago all the present forms of life were essentially as they are now, having completed their evolution that began a thousand million years ago.

16. Short period comets "boil off" some of their mass each time they pass the sun. Nothing should remain of these comets after about 10,000 years. There are no known sources for replenishing comets. If comets came into existence at the same time as the solar system, the solar system must be less than 10,000 years old (see Thomas D. Nicholson, "Comets, Studied for Many Years, Remain an Enigma to Scientists," Natural History, March 1966, 44-47; Harold Armstrong, "Comets and a Young Solar System," Speak to the Earth, ed. George F. Howe [New Jersey: Presbyterian and Reformed Publishing Co., 1975], 327-330; and Steidi, 58-59).

17. Jupiter and Saturn are each radiating more than twice the energy they receive from the sun (H.H. Aumann and C.M. Gillespie, Jr., "The Internal Powers and Effective Temperature of Jupiter and Saturn," The Astrophysical Journal, Vol. 157, July 1969, 169-172; "Close Encounter with Saturn," Time, November 10, 1980, 78). Calculations show that it is very unlikely that this energy comes from radioactive decay or gravitational contraction. The only other conceivable explanation is that these planets have not existed long enough to cool off (cf. Steldi, 51-52, 55).

18. Radiometric dating methods for rocks are said to be the most dependable of all methods in use today. Yet they are acknowledged to be completely inadequate: "If we assume that (1) a rock contained no Pb206 when it was formed, (2) all Pb206 now in the rock was produced by radioactive decay of U238, (3) the rate of decay has been constant, (4) there has been no differential leaching by water of either element, and (5) no U238 has been transported into the rock from another source, then we might expect our estimate of age to be fairly accurate. Each assumption is a potential variable, the magnitude of which can seldom be ascertained. In cases where the daughter product is a gas, as in the decay of potassium (K40) to the gas argon (Ar 40) it is essential that none of the gas escapes from the rock over long periods of time. It is obvious that radiometric techniques may not be the absolute dating methods that they are claimed to be. Age estimates on a given geological stratum by different radiometric methods are often quite different (sometimes by hundreds of millions of years). There is no absolutely reliable long-term radiological 'clock'" (Stansfield, 80-84).

19. According to the standard geological time scale, the Jurassic, Triassic, and Eocene epochs represent hundreds of millions of years of evolution. Fossils in Colorado, however, indicate that they are actually not so far apart. This has been determined by examining radiohalos, which are rings of color that form around microscopic traces of radioactive minerals. The Polonium-210 radiohalos in the Colorado fossils indicate that the Jurassic, Triassic, and Eocene formations were deposited within months of each other! Thus, rather than representing hundreds of millions of years of evolution, the deposits in Colorado are suggestive of a single cataclysmic event (i.e. the Genesis Flood).

20. The term "polystrate" was coined to describe a fossil which is encased within more than one (poly) layer of rock (strata) thus "polystrate" or "many layers." Fossil-bearing sedimentary rock consists (with few exceptions) of sediments which accumulated in a watery environment and are now hardened into sedimentary rock. Rock units are separated by obvious bedding planes, but frequently even small-scale banding is visible, interpreted as yearly indicators, much like tree rings in a tree. Counting these yearly bands of dividing rock thickness by today's meager accumulation rates, is said to give support to the millions-of-years concept of geological ages. The question is, were past sedimentation rates equivalent to today's rates (or perhaps higher to account for minor catastrophes), or were they accomplished by processes whose rates, scales, and intensities are not occurring, or perhaps not even possible today? Polystrate fossils may help to address this question. Polystrate fossils are the exception to the rule, but are known to all geologists. Frequently trees are found protruding out of coal seams into the strata above, and perhaps extending into a second coal seam, several feet above the first. Reed-like stems are also found, sometimes transgressing numerous layers. Occasionally hundreds of individual fossils appear whose body width exceeds the width of the banded layers in which they are encased. Obviously the layers cannot be the result of slow accumulations, for a dead fish, for example, will not remain in an articulated condition for several years while sediment accumulates around it. It must be quickly buried in order to be preserved at all. Some of the big polystrate trees transgress multiple strata otherwise thought to have required tens of thousands of years. Apparently, the entire section required less time than it takes a tree to rot and fall over, else these trees would have done just that.

Evolutionists answer this enigma by arguing that it has now been demonstrated that rapidly-moving, sediment-laden fluids can result in an abundance of laminations and/or layers. They have been formed in lab experiments, by hurricanes, and were even formed by catastrophic mud flows associated with the eruption of Mount St. Helens. This may explain some of these phenomena (John D. Morris, "What Are Polystrate Fossils?" Vital Articles on Science/Creation [September 1995] ICR). However, their profusion may more easily be explained by a world-wide catastrophe, such as a universal flood like the one described in Genesis 6-9. The great abundance of such fossils throughout the world is not easily rationalized otherwise.

The great beds of dinosaur bones and other creatures are likewise inexplicable under the uniformitarian assumptions. Enormous heaps of dinosaur bones cover massive areas in many parts of the world, fully fossilized, and piled in heaps upon one another like logs in a jam. In Belgium, for example, the fossil boneyard is of gigantic proportions, i.e., a verticle extention through more than one hundred feet of rock. Similar graveyards are found on every continent, all over the world (elephant beds of Siberia, hippopotamus beds of Sicily, Permian beds of Texas, plant fossils in coal mines, etc.). These fossils give every indication of rapid deposition and burial, and therefore support the notion that some catastropic event created them. No uniformitarin theory can adequately explain them.

21. Evolutionists say humans have inhabited this planet hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of years. Creationists, on the other hand, point to the Bible's record of a few thousand years since the creation. Which of these ages is more realistic, according to known records of population and its rate of growth? Population statistics during recorded history all fall into the fairly consistent range of about 1/4 to 3 percent per year. One growing population is specifically mentioned in the Bible. When Jacob's family moved to Egypt it had 70 members; when the Israelites left Egypt 430 years later (in about 1450 B.C.) they had grown to between one and two million people, which greatly concerned their Egyptian slave masters. If we calculate their growth rate, we find it to have been between 2.25 % and 2.41% per year. This is within the range of modern population studies, and is thus completely reasonable. On the other hand, if we consider any sort of evolutionary growth over a period of a few million years, we arrive at ridiculously low growth rates. For example, if an original pair of "pre-humans" had begun a million years ago, and increased to five billion humans today, the growth rate would have been an average of only 0.00217% per year. At that rate, the time required for the group to double its size would be 32,000 years! At such low growth rates, these "people" would quickly have become extinct, considering that a life span was probably less than a hundred years or so. In the early millennia, an accidental death of a single adult of child-bearing age would have been devastating. As Dr. W.D. Stansfield has admitted, "If humanity is really about 2.5 million years old (as claimed by Dr. Louis Leakey), creationists calculate from conservative population estimates (2.4 children per family, average generation and life span of forty-three years) that the world population would have grown from a single family to 10 to the 2700th power of people over one million years. The present world population is about 2x10 to the 9th power, an infinitesimal part of the 10 to the 2700th power" (Science of Evolution 80-84).

Population factors, therefore, seem to make the evolutionist's position almost impossible, whereas growth rates according to the creationist's time scale are well within the limits of actual numbers observable throughout recorded history. This same problem troubles those religious evolutionists and "old earth creationists" who believe Adam may have been created hundreds of thousands or even millions of years ago. Population growth studies are against them.

All dating techniques, to include the few that imply an old earth and an old universe, lean heavily on the assumption that a process observed today has always proceeded at a known rate. In many cases this assumption may be grossly inaccurate. But in the case of the many dating "clocks" that offer evidence for a young earth, a much better understanding usually exists for the mechanism that drives the clock. Furthermore, the extrapolation process is over a much shorter time and is therefore more likely to be correct. It is also important to observe that when the various methods are all brought into consideration, those methods which seem to attest a young earth ought to take precedence. How are they to be explained, unless the earth actually is relatively young?

Taken as a whole, the force of these various scientific facts is very powerful to the objective mind. It is difficult to imagine the reason why some advocates of the various brands of theistic evolution are so eager to ignore or even dismiss these compelling evidences for a recent creation. Their commitment to the evolutionary development of the inanimate world, or the animate world, or both, appears to be unequivocal. They are willing to surrender the obvious sense of the words of the Genesis narrative. They discover gaps and ruinations where there are none. They read billions of years between the lines of simple texts. They redefine words and events in the light of their pet theory. In reality, not a single passage of Scripture can be marshaled to their defense. What the Bible says about the creation is very obviously against their view. They show themselves uncompromising on the issue no matter what Genesis 1-2, Exodus 20:11 and 31:17, Psalm 33:6-9, Matthew 19:4, Mark 10:4, or any other passage of Scripture may say. Yet these Scriptures and others like them contain the biblical doctrine of creation. They, on the other hand, take their doctrine of creation from another source. Affirming that God has manifested his revelation in two ways, in Nature and in Scripture, they subordinate the teaching of Scripture to a contemporary scientific theory, believing it to be the voice of God in Nature speaking. In reality it is neither Nature nor God who is speaking. They are merely repeating the mantras of their godless evolutionist gurus.